Coronavirus: General discussion (see opening post for rules)

[chris11256]

Might not make much difference but as I've now got a few physical servers not doing very much, I've set them going with Folding@Home working on Coronavirus related work.

 

Very cool that Folding@Home is now technically the worlds most powerful supercomputer reaching 2.4 exaflops.

[witch]

Coronavirus: Insurer Admiral to give £25 refunds as cars and vans sit idle

 

Yes, we got our notification of this yesterday! Very welcome, particularly as I had been listening to an article on Radio 4 about car and van insurance being put UP during this coronavirus emergency

 

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

[chris11256]

Yes, we got our notification of this yesterday! Very welcome, particularly as I had been listening to an article on Radio 4 about car and van insurance being put UP during this coronavirus emergency

 

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

 

 

I've noticed that here in South Essex, have been a more people & cars out generally this week. Am also starting to wonder whether we're seeing lockdown fatigue.

[stevejp]

Yes, we got our notification of this yesterday! Very welcome, particularly as I had been listening to an article on Radio 4 about car and van insurance being put UP during this coronavirus emergency

 

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

 

Definitely more cars on the roads around Dudley this week.

[southhamster]

Definitely more cars on the roads around Dudley this week.

I've forgotten what colour my car is! Haven't seen it for four weeks. I hope it's not lonely out there. I've noticed loads more cyclists from high speed Billy Whizz to Dad and wobbly child in tow.

[LeMarchand]

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

 

We get regular photo sets from a family member who is driving miles to various localish beauty spots for their "exercise". In theory they may be there for longer than the driving (I have my doubts) but as they have a toddler, they're not actually getting a lot of exercise done. Yet they are now wiping down any food they buy before putting it away, so do have concerns about the spread of the virus.

[hardtailstar]

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

 

I've forgotten what colour my car is! Haven't seen it for four weeks. I hope it's not lonely out there. I've noticed loads more cyclists from high speed Billy Whizz to Dad and wobbly child in tow.

 

I have noticed more cars and bikes this week on my runs.

 

Also a lot more people out again.

 

I haven't driven my car for well over a month now but its safely in front of my house covered in dust/dirt and what ever else!

[elsiegee40]

Yes, we got our notification of this yesterday! Very welcome, particularly as I had been listening to an article on Radio 4 about car and van insurance being put UP during this coronavirus emergency

 

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

 

My car hasn’t been off the drive for most of the last month. We were quarantined for a fortnight and then I could get what I needed by walking to the local little coop. I had to give in and drive to the supermarket yesterday. I wonder if others are finding the same.

[Norphy]

The most my car had done was a two mile trip to the big Sainsburys in Sydenham, at least until I noticed the battery had died. I managed to get it jump started and took it on a 30 mile drive on Saturday, hopefully that'll keep it going for a while.

 

Go to say, it was nice just getting out even if it was just a quick jaunt on the motorway.

[AJWhite1970]

I filled my car up on the day before lockdown, it’s still showing full....

[Andycat]

A lot more companies are getting people back to work after implementing new procedures. A neighbour is back in this week at BAe after a few weeks off, they're all back to work unless office based, doing their normal (in his case, building planes) jobs. I think many other companies are doing the same.

[LeMarchand]

Cat has arthritis and struggles to get in her litter tray, so decided to check DIY stores for low-sided trays. Screwfix, Homebase and Wickes fine. B&Q 48 minute queue to get on the site!!!

 

Edited April 22, 2020 by LeMarchand

[StevieM]

I took my mum to the hospital, yesterday, for her routine blood tests. She was so happy just to get out of the house and see the blue sky. On the way home, I decided to take her for a short (20-minute) drive down a few country lanes and along the coast overlooking the Mersey estuary, the Wirral peninsula and the Clwydian hills. You'd think I'd taken her on a world cruise, bless her.

 

On a related note, while I was waiting in the hospital car park for her, a car pulled up and a couple of excited nurses ran over. The driver opened the boot to reveal a few boxes of, what I can only assume to have been, PPE.

 

"I'll go and get a wheelchair," said one of the nurses, with a huge smile on her face.

"We should get a photograph of this," said the other.

 

I hope that, once these troubling times are over, we will all remember the joy that we can all take from the little things that make such a big difference and continue to be grateful for them.

[Arthur]

Coronavirus: Insurer Admiral to give £25 refunds as cars and vans sit idle

Has anyone else noticed that there are many more cars on the road this week? It is a lot busier here. I am wondering if people are beginning to have had enough

I bet Admiral will increase next year's insurance premiums by £50!

 

I have noticed there are more cars too.

[Davit2005]

I filled my car up on the day before lockdown, it’s still showing full....

 

I'd normally be filling my car up every 6-7 days. I put in half a tank on Thursday last week, that was first fuel stop since before lockdown and not used car since.

[Arthur]

B&Q 48 minute queue to get on the site!!!

Did your cat manage to log in to the B&Q website and buy what she needed in the end?

 

I see they have removed the number of people in the queue now. It must put people off?

 

 

Boots and Ocado had similar queuing systems on their websites.

Edited April 22, 2020 by Arthur
Not fully awake! ;)

[LeMarchand]

Did your cat manage to log in to the B&Q website and buy what she needed in the end?

 

Didn't bother. Found some on Amazon that may be low enough.

[Davit2005]

Coronavirus: Insurer Admiral to give £25 refunds as cars and vans sit idle

 

And I'd just changed from Admiral this year fed up with their continued increases year on year for 4 years, :-( . Hopefully other big insurers will follow suit.

[mikeprice]

Missouri sues Chinese government over virus handling

 

Yup - a US state is suing the Chinese government in a federal court over lying about the virus

 

 

That'll learn 'em

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52364797?intlink_from_url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/us_and_canada&link_location=live-reporting-story

[Norphy]

Working from home is really starting to do my nut in. I can’t wait to get back to the office so I can get some rest!

[3s-gtech]

“We need to poll the students and parents to see who doesn’t have internet connectivity for devices at home.”

 

Guess how they chose to do this. Go on, have a wild stab at it. If you said “an online form” you can use the facepalm emoji (or Picard doing it).

 

Sometimes the logic just baffles me. Yes, it will still reach some parents, as they may have a smartphone but nothing else, but how on Earth can you call it a comprehensive survey if you’re excluding the targeted recipients of that survey by its nature?

[CHiLL]

“We need to poll the students and parents to see who doesn’t have internet connectivity for devices at home.”

 

Guess how they chose to do this. Go on, have a wild stab at it. If you said “an online form” you can use the facepalm emoji (or Picard doing it).

 

Sometimes the logic just baffles me. Yes, it will still reach some parents, as they may have a smartphone but nothing else, but how on Earth can you call it a comprehensive survey if you’re excluding the targeted recipients of that survey by its nature?

I'm not surprised. I still remember back in dial-up and when broadband was introduced, BT's support was along the lines of 'if you have internet connection issues, go to .

 

Unless they think parents will have an internet connected phone, but would that rule them out of this survey? Or would it not class as 'connectivity for devices at home', given hotspot and data limits?

[paulkerton]

Sometimes the logic just baffles me. Yes, it will still reach some parents, as they may have a smartphone but nothing else, but how on Earth can you call it a comprehensive survey if you’re excluding the targeted recipients of that survey by its nature?

 

If they're sending it to smartphones, they should at least be able to respond. You'll just need to make sure the question is accurate in regards to what kind of connection you're asking them about.

The problem you'll really have is engagement. You'll need to work out exactly how many responses you've got, how many are repeats, how many are straight up just BSing... Then working out how to extrapolate that data to understand who has and hasn't got connections. Do you decide that anyone that couldn't respond should be included in not having a connection? Do you work out a percentage and try and work out the margin of error? It's not easy unless you get a response from every single person, which you won't.

 

We had one child when we did a survey of the pupils in our school (in February before the lockdown began, as we attmpted move early on this) who said "I havent' got the internet at home" and then proceeded to inform us about the tablet, chromebook and windows pc he also had at home.

We had a 14% reponse rate, which is enough to extrapolate information regarding the student body as a whole, but we still had lots of parents claiming a lack of devices and internet, when their students claimed to have both.

[3s-gtech]

If the parent and child don’t have any access, how can they respond or even know the survey exists? Extrapolating is no good in this instance, as they want details on who needs what rather than stats.

[paulkerton]

If the parent and child don’t have any access, how can they respond or even know the survey exists? Extrapolating is no good in this instance, as they want details on who needs what rather than stats.

Like I said, do you assume all that don't reply have no access? Do you ring up those that don't reply and ask them on the phone? It clearly hasn't been well thought through.