Strange days

Hello from Madrid, Spain,

Weird days, certainly.
Luckily, all my relatives are safe and sound, with no symptoms by now.
We are confined at home with only free to go out to buy basic supplies.
Shops, shopping malls, sport centers, parks, thaters, etc, are to be kempt closed. Only food and basic supplies shops are alowed to be open.
Crazyness in shops only was first days of confinement. Most people bought a lot of food (an other items) like there was no tomorrow. They bought a lot of toilet paper. Most shops got out of stock !
Hopefully, the situation at shops
Police and army are working to keep people at home, only alowing to get out for basic supplies, walk the dogs, go to work (if you cannot tele-work) or go help elder people.
Strong penalties can be applied if the rule is not respected.

My situation is special: I work as a communications field engineer. I am alowed to work from home and only attend emergency interventions but, I am in hollidays actually, so I am having the weirdest hollidays ever.

As I am having quite some spare time, I am giving a bump an old project for MSX.

Take care and stay at home !

Hello from Norway

Indeed its strange days. Here everything except shops are closed. Most people work from home, and most people stay indoors.
Me and my dog is doing just fine, I have alot of food & beer stored, and Im working on a few projects, not MSX related however. Im trying to get a pinball machine up and running again. There will be time for MSX'ing later on, I have a huge "todo list" in that regard.

Last week I went on a ski trip to the French Alps, just in time before it closed . Now working from home as well, a bit of getting used to again but settling in. A benefit is that I don’t have the two hours commute every day. Things are much quieter outside and most public activities have stopped, but luckily we’re not under a complete lock-down.

Thank you, Hamlet, for opening up this very important thread!

Hello everyone. I live in the USA, in Michigan. In my day job I am the CTO of the only organization in the country that manages a network of medications exchange between independent pharmacies. This crisis overnight elevated us from a simple company to a very important player in the attempt of maintaining the supply of medication across the country afloat. It put me to work very closely with the FDA, the CDC, and other Governmental agencies because we have experience with the required networks and systems that support the distribution of medication operations. I am saying all that because this proximity with the global taskforce gives me access to a few somewhat privileged information beyond what the news is bringing up to us, and believe me when I say we do not have easy times ahead of us. This may be just the beginning!

I am truly concerned about my family and friends around the world, which is the reason why I am writing in this thread. I urge everyone to take all possible measures to stay isolated, safe and protected. The real concern for the following months is that the virus may be only the first wave of problems. If we don't manage to control it, the possibility of social collapse is very real. It can make life much harder than it is now. It all starts with the economy failing, then the supply-chain in general, which, ultimately, affects everyone like a tsunami. If it comes to happen, that will be when this situation will truly hit us hard!

I know no one wants to hear that, and I do not want to say all that, but it is time for a reality check and if any of you are not believing in the seriousness of this situation you are simply amplifying your own risks. Please, call me crazy and hate me but take precautions and measures to stay safe and healthy. That is the most important thing we all can do at this point. And, just in case, prepare yourself for the worse. If nothing happens, we can laugh later and build the most amazing MSX game that will beat SD Snatcher by the mile. On the other hand, if we have to stand strong for a while and hard times come upon us, we will be prepared and have better chance to prevail so we can reconvene in a near future and exchange our stories of superation, and then we can build multiple MSX games about our own adventures.

But, until we have moved beyond this crisis, take this situation with the seriousness it deserves. And, if MSX helps, let's make usage of it to its limits!

I love you all because we all love MSX!

Somehow luckily for me nothing much changes. The wife and I were already sick at home for several years due to massive burnouts, so we're used to be around each other 24/7. But the whole global "weird" affects me quite a lot. I do hope to reverse that weird energy into something creative. For the last several months I'm working on just one track which needs to be finished.
Meanwhile we just moved to a new house on our old address so there's a lot to be done there. Keeps me distracted from all the crazy.
Hopefully it'll be over asap and very much hopefully without too many losses. On top of that do I hope that the possible suffering of each and everybody will be bearable in the sense of health and economics.

I can understand that very well. My mother came to visit us briefly today and it was very difficult to give up the usual hugs and keep the distance. What a strange feeling. I work with over 140 people at risk, so it is not easy for me to draw boundaries here. But it is absolutely necessary.

I am already working from home so nothing new in that department. I can't really say my life has changed really a lot since the corona virus but because we (people living in the Netherlands) are somewhat urged to stay at home I have lots of time to work on our upcoming game. So only happy faces here for now

Also quite a strange situation here. We're at home with the 4 of us 24/7: My wife is working at home now as they are not allowed to come to the office, my 15 year old daughter is now following here highschool lessons online and bingewatching on Netflix & Disney+. And our cat is quite happy that everyone is at home 24/7... more attention for him
And as for me? Well... Last month we got a nice message at our office: All office staff will be fired 01/05 and all activities will be transfered to our head office in Mechelen, leaving us without a job by 01/05. So I am looking for another job now, but most companies where they invited me for an interview have put everything on hold due to the corona crises. One of the companies is making arrangement to do a job interview by video conference, but... this is not the right period to be without job ;-)

So if anyone is aware of a company in the south of the Netherlands (near Breda) looking for an internal sales, preferably in the Industrial PC's/Industrial Electronics market

Wife and I working from home since friday. spending a lot of time with children without leaving home and playing with them: msx and lego included. Guess we're lucky in this sense. Attached today's contruction. You'll love it, hamlet. Thanks!

Here in France the containment started two days ago. It seems that many people remain desperately closed to the situation, and do not seem to understand what the government is asking to stop the epidemic.

I work on the maintenance of computers in high schools, but since these are closed, I stay at home, with remote access to deal with small problems on the servers.
I work for the public service, so I am fortunate to be able to continue to receive my salary, whatever happens.

Every shops are closed, only the food stores are open. Most services, post offices, banks, town halls are closed to the public, but have remote or telephone access.

I must admit that I am very afraid of catching this virus. I received a transplant three years ago, I have a defective immune system. Getting to know the Covid 19 is not an option for me !

I am very shocked, and very sad to see the situation in Italy and spain so degraded in hospitals, and to see that there are so many deaths.
I am really sad.

To try not to think about all this too much, I'm working on the next version of FUSION-C and other MSX projects.
I hope everything will not collapse before I finish !!

Be careful, and stay healthy. I need each of you, we all need each others.

My prayers are with you, Wolverine_nl, and with all front line workers and first responders that are relentlessly facing this crisis without hesitation. I am working from home since yesterday noon, but supporting the supply-chain of medication exchange across the country by managing some of the infrastructures, with disaster recovery plans, and by engaging in many discussions over video-conference with FEMA, CDC, and other State and Government Agencies. I consider myself a lucky one for being able to do what I do behind the Internet with a little bit more safety than others, the reason why I am so proud of the hard work and dedication I can see everyone putting on the containment of this situation.

I don't recall the last time so many opposite groups joined forces and work together towards the same goal as I see today. Sometimes it feels like this virus is bringing everyone closer by keeping us apart.

Hello from Japan. I have spent ordinary days as usual. Here we can hear several announce warning COVID-19 but nothing is forced to the citizens, only public school are closed.

A good period to develop something comes! Watch this video and let you get high.
https://youtu.be/LL4tlFGxxAk

Hi from Milan,
Lombardy is the center of the epidemic: there are more cases here than in all of Spain or Germany.
I'm working in home-office since a month ago, being an IT professional I am used to long periods of isolation but the fact of not going out starts to weigh.
All commercial activities are closed except food stores and pharmacies.
The tension starts to increase, sometimes I hear people shouting in the street, but I think it's normal.
My relatives live in Southern Italy, for their safety I preferred not to move and stay here.

Turmoil all around every continent. Also from Brazil, I'm at Brasília, our country's capital city. Things here look really scary since it seems to be ahead of the curve in terms of infections, compared to other cities. I'm very worried because the Federal Government doesn't really believe in the seriousness, calling it "hysteria" and "overblown". The Minister of Health is the only authority taking it seriously, but he's being undermined by the other authorities, particularly the President, who even berates State Governors for taking matters on their own hands, and the Minister of Economy, who thinks the working population, already sacrificed in the name of economic growth (which didn't happen), should be sacrificed even more. Less favoured communities will be hit extremely hard, since our public health system is underfunded and overcrowded and not everyone can afford private health insurance.

Really, things here are very complicated. The Federal District, where Brasília is located, has its own government and the local government has been issuing decrees closing down most places where too many people gather since last week. The IT company I work on, on the other side, has been mostly ignoring workers' pleas and explicitly said they would only send people to work from home by force of law, despite the infrastructure being mostly in place. I personally rebelled against this and I've been working from home since Wednesday. Today they backpedaled and said they will try to send everyone home, beginning from Monday. Too late, in my humble opinion.

I live alone, but I'm very anxious with all this since I have many relatives in the risk groups, particularly my mother who has emphysema and my granny who is 88 years old. I'm not too worried for myself, though, since I'm only 45 and my health is fine. I also find it weird being physically disconnected from people, despite being an introvert and not really meeting a lot of people. Looking at the silver lining, though: no one minds if I'm working in my underpants, I'm really saving on fuel, and I can manage my own time with a bit more freedom.

I simply don't have enough words to describe how I feel about our Federal Government, though; they are being completely irresponsible and if you don't already know, I'm sorry but I won't bore you with the details. It's too uncannily unbelievable, anyway. And despite being a disaster since day one, it still has a lot of followers and they aren't really taking the situation seriously, calling it some kind of Chinese communist conspiracy to destroy Western countries' economies. This despite rushing to the pharmacies and virtually ending alcohol gel and hydroxychloroquine (!!) everywhere. Irrationality reigns.

Greetings from Southern California. We were the first State to implement a "Shelter in State" order in the US. Basically means to stay in your home, unless you have good reason to go out, like getting groceries or medicine. I work from home, as many of us here, I'm in an IT job, so that makes it easier to work from home.
We can still go for a walk, but have to keep social distance from everyone. I have family in the Netherlands and here in California, and thank goodness everyone is fine.
Stay safe everyone, be careful if you have to go out, wash your hands well, keep your distance, even if your country does not have a policy yet, use common sense.

Prophecy https://youtu.be/fvLTEzBIGGM :o

Hi hamlet and MSX fans!

Hello from Barcelona. I work at the University and these days I am working from home doing online meetings and writing emails ;-)

I am spending time with my wife and our cat at home and taking care of the other members of my family.

There always is a bit of time for our beloved MSX. I am a macOS user I play Nemesis II with CocoaMSX and I also had and OpenMSX TurboR emulatex MSX to follow the MSX C Couse writed by Javi Lavandeira and also the Fusion C library on my Macbook.

But the day do not have enought hours and for all my hobbies Lego, Nintendo Switch, Raspberry Pi, etc.

Take care of your relatives and stay at home!

Best wishes!

Hi all,
Great initiative, Hamlet!

I've been away from the MRC since long, because with this crisis my free time has almost vanished :S
But I'm well. I'm spending almost all my time in my research projects and making video-conferences with my students at the university (Paris). Now my browser is crazy, with lots of tabs with different Slack groups, Trellos, Overleafs, Github projects, discussion groups, and things like that. I love some of this tools as much as I hate others.
The good news is that keep playing MSX games I play Arkanoid at least once a day. Quite relaxing!
I guess I'm slowly moving from physical isolation to virtual communication. Just different.

I hope you're all well. Take care!

Hi from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Our MSX meetings which would be in the first semester, were cancelled. MSXRio (Rio de Janeiro) and MSX Curitiba (Curitiba, Paraná) were suspended due to further notice.

As a professor, my work antecipated the mid-year holidays (2 weeks), but today we'll start with "distance education".

I decided to test and check all my MSXs (30), so I found some little problems, like the faulty keyboard of my Turbo-R, my Pioneer PX-V60 which doesn't boot... But almost all of them runs perfectly.

And I'll try to finally spend some time using my MSXs, mainly using network (Obsonet! GR8Net! MSX Hub!) and try to develop software. I hope I can!

Take care and don't forget to wash your hands.
Ricardo.

One year since this post guys... and we're still in the same situation.... although I feel positive because there is hope as we get vaccinated to lead us to the end of this tunnel.

Take care you all, stay safe

Yes, good luck with that. Get your (experimental, long term untested) shots every year again, as the thing will continuously mutate. Or they'll come up with something new next year, something worse. Friend BG predicted (announced?) that already.

Some dude in the MSM here has claimed several times: let's vaccinate overweight 60+ males, will result in ~60% reduction IC load. Enough to open up / live life. No, let's ignore that, let's just continue the lock down, and wait to get everyone vaccinated or something (even children perhaps?) Soon your 'cov1-pass', required to take part in society.

Since we're already living with this thing for a year, shouldn't there be some form of herd and/or individual immunity/resistance? Do you actually need that vac.? I know they're saying you're also doing it for the 'critical whatever percentage', but did you also get shots for the flu these past years? (That kills as well..)

Never questioned the following?: there have been some heavy flu seasons these past years. Also taxing the hospitals, reports in the MSM they could hardly manage. Also (remarkable) young, otherwise healthy people admitted, also long-term after effects (bit like what you're hearing now).

And didn't scientists warn for a new pandemic / outbreak for years? Yet, with all this knowledge / experience our government continued to break down healthcare / lowering IC capacity. Look at us (them) now. Great savings!

Take care, do your research, ask questions, decide wisely / do what you think is right (is what I'd say).

Thanks, I've heard different reports, depending on region etc.
Don't you think high sick leave has part in that? Sick in the sense of: getting tested positive (doesn't mean you're actually sick/infected and/or infectious, or that it is even a real positive), need to stay home?
(And haven't we had the worst already?)

For the Dutch people among us (unfortunately, there are no English subtitles available yet), this video offers some quite big pieces of the puzzle which would explain part of these "Strange Days" (or rather - strange decades; even centuries).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiC34T1H5rM&ab_channel=KafkaNL
This is not about the virus itself; nobody sane would deny the devastating effect it can have. I do not, and neither does this video. But it does tie in with what's happening around us.
This is not about lizard mutants from Mars hiding behind the moon in their spaceships, flat earth or toddler eating devil worshipers, but 100% verifiable facts.
I hope this will help you make a little more sense of it all. ♥

I have high hopes on the vaccination campaign, even if we need yearly shots from now on. I am personally exhausted with this situation where Covid has broken our health and killed our elderly, and its associated restrictions have killed economies, family ties, friendships, mental health and future plans. I wish health to you all, and sincerely hope that we don't need to reopen this thread again in 2022, unless if it is to celebrate the return to normality.

Best best wishes.

Hi!
Hasten slowly!!
Stay healthy you all!!