Random Thread ~Usagi-Chan ☮ Tūsurī~

[TotallyUncool]

There are a lot more places to get shots locally than there were a few weeks ago, and I think that most of the people who are highly motivated to get them have probably done it already. So that leaves people who were waiting until the crowds cleared up - and the ones who are reluctant, or refuse altogether. I don't know what kind of coverage that's going to result in overall, but I'm glad to have whatever level of protection I can get!

[erilaz]

I got my 2nd Moderna shot today. It was interesting to see the place half staffed compared to my first shot. I’m not sure if that’s because more options are open or people just aren’t getting their shots.

The situation is similar here. When I got my second Pfizer shot last week, there were far fewer people at the mass vax site than when I got my first, maybe 20% as many. Time of day may have been partially responsible for the difference, since I got my first shot at 9:30 am but the second at 3:30 pm.

[esm]

The rate of people getting vaccinated has been going down since mid-April. Most people that want the vaccine have gotten their first dose at this point.

[TotallyUncool]

That's the way it seems around here - the big rush (with long lines and a long wait) was early on. From this point on, I can imagine a more-or-less steady trickle of people who think, OK, it's about time that I got my vaccination, but maybe not much more than that.

[Amped]

I'm in Israel now. As I have vaccine and am a citizen, when I arrived I was quarantined, got a blood test, and then was released from quarantine as soon as it was shown I have antibodies to COVID. Israel is down to less than 100 cases per day, barely, if any deaths... and the mask mandate has been lifted for outdoors. Looking forward to a great month!

Let us know if you are okay. I hope you are someplace safe.

[boinsie]

^ He has posted some soccer stories on IG today, so he's at least ok... but yeah, what a time for a visit.

[esm]

Was exploring a vintage furniture store close by and they have thousands of vintage postcards, so I thought of erilaz. I didn’t browse for too long this evening because I was on my way elsewhere.

[erilaz]

^ Yep, that's definitely one of my addictions. I'm looking forward to rummaging through boxes and boxes of old postcards at Westpex at the end of July and at the Vintage Paper Fair whenever that starts up again.

I'm presently awaiting the delivery of a postcard from 1916 that I bought on Delcampe, featuring a bird's-eye view of the U.C. Berkeley campus and a message written in Esperanto.

[TotallyUncool]

I just did a Google image search for "cuneiform postcards" - all I found were a few contemporary postcards with cuneiform designs. I was hoping to find at least one with a message written in cuneiform (Sumerian, Akkadian, Hittite, even Ugaritic - anything would have been good), but no such luck!

[erilaz]

I wonder how much cuneiform correspondence might have been in a sort of "postcard" format. Many cuneiform letters survive, but it seems that they were often (usually? always?) enclosed in clay "envelopes".

Postcards in the modern sense are a relatively recent invention. Some of the earliest German ones (circa 1870) include detailed instructions on how to use this newfangled technology: