Schif

Just got some information from Villanova. 2 classes in person, one online and one weekend online thing for the fall semester. Orientation will be a zoom call. Interesting Mix.

Thankfully this was a fast moving storm. This could have really been a complete disaster if it was moving slow

I guess this is a bad day to try to run to the post office.

And here I was thinking a softer ski might be the way to go. I want something that will feel solid and fully connected to the ground no matter what kind of chop I end up hitting. That's the wall that I'm currently hitting with my skiing right now. When things get bumpy I don't feel like I have the ability to either react fast enough, or power through it.

That's a wildly good deal. Do you guys think Sick Days would be a good ski for me?

Thanks to watching entirely too many ski movies over the summer I'm really interested in some touring gear for this coming season.

It's only a blip if it's certain years for kids though. Elementary school will probably be fine, but missing high school time could be detrimental.

I would suggest a PASR bubble for the winter but the sheer volume of meat and beer that would be needed to sustain that endeavor would be irresponsible.

The leagues stand to lose a ton of they just throw in the towel, and there are players out there who won't opt out because this is their shot to make that money. For the superstars in any sport it must be a lot easier to decide whether or not to play when they have a tremendous amount of money already in the bank, but the guys farther down on the depth chart have to weigh the paycheck vs the risk.

Controversial plan to get a whole football season in: 100 man rosters If you get Covid you quarantine for 2 weeks completely alone and they cycle in a clean guy from the back of the roster/practice squad. When your 2 weeks is up and you're healthy again you can come back to practice and play. If 30% of your huge roster is healthy at any given time you can soldier on as an organization. Marketing Spin: AB-InBev puts together a "stimulus package" and mails everyone a case of beer.

I can't see schools having ski clubs at all this year. Odds are they won't have sports so that will mean they won't have clubs as well. There won't be any way to socially distance in a lift line. They can say to stay 6 feet apart all they want but the reality is that people will slide forward. Technically they can probably widen the rope lanes after the gate but that's about it. Not to mention if you don't have complete control over your skis you'll likely slide near someone anyway. It'll just come down to how much risk are you willing to take to ski.

That's wild. Thankfully it happened far enough away from anything else or people, though that kind of stuff burning over a river isn't great either

Looks like Allegheny had a few more new cases than Philadelphia.

Some seem to think that this pandemic will cause more housewives to exist rather than fewer. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-the-pandemic-could-force-a-generation-of-mothers-out-of-the-workforce/

Blue is still operating the summer stuff and it seems to be working for them. I would imagine by the time winter rolls around they will have a decent idea on how to run the lodges which are the pinch point in my mind. An emphasis on buying tickets in advance and using the kiosks could go a long way, as would be having some sort of outdoor ticket window. I can see skiing actually getting a bump this winter from the general public. I think we all noticed parks, trails, etc. being more crowded than normal thanks to this pandemic as people went outside in search of some sort of recreation. When it's too cold for outdoor dining people are going to be looking to some sort of outdoor activity in the winter and skiing will likely fit the bill.

I think the biggest change is that everyone will have their own barrel of cheese balls so you don't have to dip your hand into the communal one.

The smart thing to do would be open up for the first hour for pass holders only and give that time to the staff to thoroughly clean/disinfect the lodge which they know we don't really use anyway.

We kind of already do that hahaha

I cannot see my leagues happening this year.

Those old railroad spikes are really cool. Either just the way you found it, or if you clean it and shine it up it makes a cool little decoration.

If I can't go play laser tag what's the point of even carrying on anymore? Laser tag is the only thing that gets me through summer with no skiing.

I think the move here would be to look at each state vs each European country. I mean at the end of the day there are only 2 more nations on earth with more people than us. If we keep looking at the USA as a monolith you're going to have a bad time. We are 50 unique little countries, some are doing well, some are not. We also have more freedom than most places (though as I said before we are shockingly OK with leaders stepping on that right now) so they can't lock us in our houses and spray us with Lysol cannons if we go out (I'm looking at you China) and we aren't going to cover up data (I see you China and Russia). This thing is here. It sucks. It's not going anywhere. I mean if we all go into hiding the numbers will surely go down. Then we come out and they go up. Lather rinse and repeat.

Who is even enforcing this and how? Do they make you submit your transactions at the end of the week to make sure each one has a food item on it? Also what is the long term plan here? Covid is not going away anytime soon (or ever) and not to get all Ned Stark on everyone but Winter is Coming. Outdoor dining will be off the table in 3 months. Maybe not for parking lot meat lovers like us like us, but still. 25% capacity in a restaurant and you can't just pump your highest profit margin product, alcohol, out over the bar to people is just a recipe to close your doors for good.

What do you guys think about the silly hoops that they are making you jump through to go for a drink now? Logically it makes sense, discourage people from gathering in bars to sit and watch the game and drink all night. It also has the side effect of having establishments make an extra few bucks on food that might not have otherwise been bought. Is it really going to do anything at this point though? Probably not. People who don't want to go to bars are going to stay home and those that have decided it's worth the risk will just order some fries. I'm getting concerned that we are oddly OK with the governor of a state having the broad authority to implement such ticky tack regulations. Even if they are in this case for the greater good, this is kind of not cool.

All good news now, but what happens if these vaccines hit a wall in the third phase of testing? Do we think that they will be pushed through the stage gates faster than a typical vaccine trial would go just to get it done? I heard something interesting on the radio a few days ago too. It's happened in the past and is surely going to happen this time where whichever country develops the first vaccine hoards it for their own population before distributing it to the rest of the world. It was a week ago since I heard this so the details were fuzzy but the last time there was a major outbreak Australia had the breakthrough and was holding out on everyone else for a while. I wonder what will happen when someone actually gets a Covid vaccine done this time around? Also, I was listening to SiriusXM on my ride today and flipped to Business Radio and caught some of the Wharton Moneyball show, it's a really awesome show (link below) especially when there are actual sports to talk about, but they were chatting about Coronavirus today for a while. They were talking about the r value of the infection rate, good if below 1 and bad if above. 1 means that every person with the virus infects 1 other person. This is incredibly tricky to accurately track but sounds like it's the value that really has the most impact on things. Also they reiterated something I've been saying for a very long time. ALL THE DATA IS TRASH DATA. https://businessradio.wharton.upenn.edu/wharton-moneyball/ Hope all of you have a magnificent Wednesday!!