I think we'd all love to be completely fluent in any number of languages, but how much of the above is really reasonably achievable in a year by an adult learner? Especially one who has a full plate of adult activities to do in their lives? How much time (both in-class and out-of-class) are these students willing to devote to this task? Would that time be more usefully spent learning a few phrases and number, and the rest studying about culture? While google translate generates phrases that are no where near fluent, it is darned useful, and, I think, changes the calculus about what the bare minimum a traveler might need to learn.

Two friends of mine, whose mothers live in nursing homes, have both told me that their moms have tested positive for covid this weekend. These are supposedly "good" nursing homes, and neither is in a state particularly hard hit, but both states are still "closed". Both facilities banned in-person guest visits weeks ago, and as far as I can tell are doing everything right -- testing everyone daily, and isolating those residents who test positive immediately. Flattening or not, it seems hard to understand how we are going to keep our elderly population safe, if we are still seeing new transmission even in this locked down state.

Totally agree. I think that one reason states are cautious to re-open is they realize there's no way they can close up again.

FYI, the "stay six feet apart" rule that we all know so well now, comes from studies of how SARS was passed between airline passengers -- this wikipedia article discusses how SARS may have been transmitted from an infected passenger to others sitting up to seven rows away: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_China_Flight_112

Surely it must have it's own twitter?

At first I thought you meant the football team, but clearly it represents the Russian Bears.

I think it is hard to decide what to count and what not to count. Presumably, there are fewer deaths due to car crashes with fewer people commuting -- how does that impact "excess deaths". Sadly, there is also presumably more domestic violence. Should that count? China's skies were reported to be noticeably cleaner with the shutdown of so many factories, presumably the better air quality saved lives -- should that count?

Faith. And RAID!

Pork bone chips or human ?

Do you know how to butcher a pig? Safely? I don't.

From what I understand, there are a couple of things going on. At least one of the plants was closed, not by management, but by local authorities. Not getting into states' rights vs federalism, but presumably an executive order could try to override the local order. Now, as you point out, how well the plant would be able to operate if half the employees are out sick is an open question. I guess, in theory, the state or federal government could send in the national guard or other troops to try to help operate the plant, but who knows how long it would take to train new people? The other thing this order did was to try to reduce the legal liability meat cutting plants would face if they were responsible for their workers getting sick. Presumably, this would encourage any companies that voluntarily shut down to stay open. At the end of the day, though, OP is spot on -- without healthy workers, these plants can't operate, even if they are "open" in some sense.

The Stratford Festival in Ontario is also putting up one free show to stream every couple of weeks. The current free stream is a full performance of King Lear, which looks mesmerizing:

I would strongly recommend getting a Roku or fire stick or anything that plugs into the TV rather than buying a smart tv. The apps on a smart TV are unlikely to be updated by the manufacturer for as long as I want to keep my TV, but I'm happy to buy a $100 gizmo to plug into the TV every five years rather than a whole new TV.

Exactly! For example, most hospitals won't offer a lung transplant to a patient who still smokes.

I'm curious how accurate these are. My Samsung has one, and the results can move around several percentage points if I measure two or three times in a row.

Doctors also "fire" patients from their practices all the time, too.

What are the specific restrictions in Michigan which you feel are so different than other states? Are you claiming golf courses and hairdressers should be open in Michigan?

Meanwhile, in Florida... the State of Florida has decreed that professional sports with "national audiences" are an essential service, and as such, are allowed to operate, as long as there are no spectators. The wresting company WWE is set to broadcast live from their Florida studies this week. There will be no audience, but lots of performers, announcers, cameramen, etc. So, I don't think the US is "locked down" in the same way that other parts of the world are.

Or perhaps it means that Texas, like many places, isn't testing people it should be, and the problem is worse than reported. It is naive to think that the virus isn't everywhere in the US by now.

Right -- so people who have been in the Schengen zone are banned, which seems odd. Austria, Italy, Germany: banned. Switzerland, ok.

I think this is just fine. While I didn't really date much as a teen, I distinctly remember wanting to have some quiet, somewhat-private place to hang out with friends to have our "important" conversations. We didn't have money to go out to eat, you can't talk during a movie, maybe the weather isn't suitable for hanging out outside in a park, but we did want to seem more independent than hanging out at home under the noses of our families. What we did have was plenty of time to chat and try to figure out life. Where else are teens supposed to go?

link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iowa_caucuses But the bigger issue is that we teach our kids in citizenship courses that private voting is important to democracy. Private voting helps to ensures that votes can't be sold, and that citizens are free to vote for whom they like, with no direct repercussions. Employers can't fire workers for voting the "wrong" way if they don't know how they voted, etc. Confidentiality is what makes it so very hard to ensure the integrity of voting in this country. It would be so much easier to prove that no election shenanigans happened if we could just publish a big list of every voter in this country and their votes. But I hope that no one wants that. I don't see why things are so different on a local scale.

I've never lived in a caucusing state, but they strike me as bizarre and anti [lower-case] democratic. In all other places where we vote, down to high school class president, secret voting is considered essential to the integrity of the process. But in a caucus, it's all out in public. Also, apparently some caucus locations are at people's houses? That seems like a huge potential source of bias.

I wonder if this is mainly due to economic reasons -- there can't be that many people wanting to fly to China right now. Also, I bet it is hard for airlines to find cabin crews who want to work these flights.

I suspect I might have very different stereotypes (err, observations) of British travelers abroad if I lived in Ibiza vs. say, Kenya.