U.S. futures are up.

@JASFLALMT wrote:

U.S. futures are up.

Something I learned from Jim Cramer (who I rarely trust): in bear markets, people lay traps...futures are up/first half hour of the market trades opposite of what the big/smart money wants to do.....

It's like "pump and dump."

I think it was Liz Ann Sonders (?) or one of these analysts I heard in the past talk about the smart money index and trading times. The most important and most watched trading times are the first half hour and last half hour of trading days. That's when the smart money make their moves.

Will be interesting to see how the day plays out!

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2020 03:31AM by shoptastic.

BFF works at Costco and said it was complete insanity all weekend.

Not correct. Yearly flu has a mortality rate of just 0.1%, which works out to be between 26,000 and 61,000 deaths in the US each year. It varies from year to year depending upon the strain, vaccine effectiveness, etc. In 2019 in the US, there were 35.5 million reported cases of flu and 34,200 deaths.

With COVID-19, the best estimate is that the mortality rate is 2.0%, which is 20 times higher. So, instead of 26,000 to 61,000 expected death the range jumps to 520,000 to 1,220,000 deaths. The upper number is 1.22 MILLION deaths in the US. That is not "just as many" deaths as the flu, it is 20 times higher!

@lbtweety47 wrote:

The different flu viruses kill just as many yearly. I'm not worried about it. Keep hands away from face and use hand sanitizer often. Change clothes when you return home.
Masks do not protect your eyes/ears, which if particles are in the air, can get in and infect you.
Think about it, eye, ears, nose, and mouth are all inter-related. Why cover up half (mouth and nose) and leave 50% unprotected. Masks are a waste of money folks.

@Tarantado wrote:

@shoptastic wrote:

Were YOU the reason stocks recovered slightly the end of Friday? ...and why futures are up?

Plowing your millions in, eh?

Hahaha, millions?! Naw. More like thousands, so I'm just a speck in all this traffic. My brother in law works at Fidelity and basically told me that his team's swamped this past week (and probably this week) with people pulling out of their portfolios from the scare.

It was really my lump sum that did it!

I should have been more specific about my question. How as the Coronavirus effected your Mystery Shopping? Not the stock market.

It hasn't. Yet. As planned, I am shopping at the speed of molasses and completing a few shops per month. For personal reasons, this change is good for me. I planned it last year, and it has nothing to do with the novel Coronavirus (Covi19) situation. Generally, I spent more time at the CDC website than I had in the past. This had no impact on my shops,

@shopper8 wrote:

I should have been more specific about my question. How as the Coronavirus effected your Mystery Shopping? Not the stock market.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2020 08:19PM by Shop-et-al.

Not affecting my MS work at all. Taking CDC-recommended precautions, but those are pretty standard ones for me.

I am somewhat concerned about the housemate who teaches third grade, because of her exposure, 5 days a week, to 32 children with sniffles, coughs, and a head cold that had been making the rounds for about 2 months now at that school.

At the church were the other (long term) housemate often serves as assisting minister, and is on the board, they are already starting cautionary measures for communion and baptisms, for instance. Another meeting this week will tackle plans for possible further precautions. She is a serious germaphobe, so I am sure that she will stay vigilant and push for preparedness there and here at home.

There are now six dead in the county where I live.... There is a suspected case at the middle school that feeds into my high school......

I did three shops this past weekend. Two of them were out of sanitizer, canisters of wipes, and the like, but they did each have pump bottles on the checkout counter for when I used the CC machine and electronic pen. In fact, when I took the receipt from the checker at one of them, after using the hand sanitizer, it discolored the receipt paper. I wrote in my report that this is why some of the info is partially obscured. The last shop was a cell phone visit shop and I made sure to use my hand sanitizer when I got back to the car.

LOL but how I am doing in the stock market affects my need to mystery shop

@shopper8 wrote:

I should have been more specific about my question. How as the Coronavirus effected your Mystery Shopping? Not the stock market.

@prince wrote:

LOL but how I am doing in the stock market affects my need to mystery shop

@shopper8 wrote:

I should have been more specific about my question. How as the Coronavirus effected your Mystery Shopping? Not the stock market.

new thread for that purpose now.

@MFJohnston wrote:

There are now six dead in the county where I live.... There is a suspected case at the middle school that feeds into my high school......

I keep believing I've caught it. Constant coughing and chest pains. But, the symptoms don't really fit.

Super Tuesday could be dicey: lots of people + tight spacing + long waits/lines

Will the virus spread like gangbusters tomorrow?

But this is in general chat. Anything goes, and no one was off-topic.

@shopper8 wrote:

I should have been more specific about my question. How as the Coronavirus effected your Mystery Shopping? Not the stock market.

My shopping has been curtailed. Last week I was ill with what I think of as Coronavirus lite----flu like symptoms, chills, joint pain, and congestion. The thought of applying for jobs tired me out. I am feeling better but still tire easily.

Glad you are feeling better, Rho. The coronavirus is not affecting my shopping. My husband getting on a plane in a few weeks to go to a training seminar in another state is a little worriesome, however.

JASFLALMT didn't mean that the subject was off topic. I didn't ask the question right in the beginning. I was more concerned about shopping. However my Son-in-law is a day trader, so I know a little, tiny bit about the stock market.

A neighboring school district has announced that classes will be conducted online for the next two weeks. The UW (University of Washington) is going online (only) for the rest of Winter Quarter... Bellevue College, which is about a mile from my school is also going online.... My school has training for online teaching next Wednesday....

If they shut down my school, the word is that I will be expected to self-quarantine....

In anticipation of local self-quarantine possibilities, I bought some extra staples. NO not TP or bottled water. Canned tomatoes, canned pinto and black beans, all purpose flour, ground beef, lentils, onions, celery, chicken; canned tuna, corn bread mix, baking soda; those sorts of things. I have plenty of noodles and pasta on hand and will add a small supply of packaged, long shelf life milk when I am out tomorrow.

Then I spent the day making things to freeze, like lentil soup with Italian meatballs; poached, boneless chicken thighs, etc. Later, when those large batches are cool, I will package then in smaller quantities for bases for future meals. Oh, also made a quantity of yellow rice, which freezes well and will be handy for chicken or lamb dishes later.

More cooking "ahead" tomorrow, when the ground beef will be sauteed with garlic and onions and, again, packaged and frozen in useful amounts for use in chili and pasta sauce. I am conserving freezer space by not actually preparing large batches of finished dishes, like chili. The exception is the lentil soup, which I made a ton of before I figured out the space conservation strategy. If there is no need to quarantine, nothing will be wated, since these are pretty much what I would create meals with in ordinary times.

On Monday I will call my insurance carrier and ask them to authorize refills of several items that would ordinarily not be covered unless I waited several weeks. Of course, it is in their best interest to keep their insured clients out of "harm's way," so I will be curious to see how they react to this request. On second thought, I might just ask my pharmacist to make that call.

No panic here, just making preparations in a calm manner.

@MFJohnston wrote:

A neighboring school district has announced that classes will be conducted online for the next two weeks. The UW (University of Washington) is going online (only) for the rest of Winter Quarter... Bellevue College, which is about a mile from my school is also going online.... My school has training for online teaching next Wednesday....

If they shut down my school, the word is that I will be expected to self-quarantine....

Our superintendent sent out a letter to the community about a plan if we close. We had an emergency meeting this week. They are offering Saturday training. We are in an area with a new case that spread, and a few districts closed this week.

Despite my earlier claim that stocks were the main effect on me...it's now specifically affecting my MSing.

The hotel I had earmarked for Milan in July has cancelled it's shop for this round, as have a lot of nicer properties in Europe. Even if things have cleared up over there by summertime and I can take my planned vacation, it looks like I may be on my own for a few nights. Luckily hotel pricing is also really depressed in Italy at the moment....

None of this crap is going to resolve quickly. But it's not going to affect me too much, as I will continue on with daily life. If I get exposed, I will likely be okay as I have a pretty strong immune system. I have plenty of other family members and friends for whom I am concerned about, however.

I heard on NPR about this guy who they tested and asked that he self-quarantine until the test results came back. He went to a party. His test results came back afterwards as positive, so now they are trying to get in touch with all of the people who attended the party.

Also SXSW was canceled? Oh yeah, and there was a guy in Australia who went to a Tool concert after being tested, then his tests came back positive. So, that's a lot of potential exposure.

It might be a long while. The typical flu hates warmer weather, so the expectations are that this is going to subside (and potentially re-emerge in the fall). However, this is a new thing, so they just don't know what's going to happen. Will warmer weather help dissipate the virus? Who knows.

Well, since I've had a cold I've been home watching netflix all week not sharing my germs . I started shopping today and I've now added changing clothes when I get home from my routes along with all the hand washing and not touching my face. I'd like to be using hand sanitizer between shops but there is none available so I'm wiping down surfaces with wipes.

I am completely baffled by the people at Costco standing in line to buy water. Bleach, sanitizers, cleaning supplies, medicines, even food in case you are put in quarantine make sense. But what, they think we will lose municipal water? Don't get me wrong I'm in earthquake country and having bottled water can only be good but still it seems strange. I always have a stockpile of supplies since I buy with coupons and sales but admit needed to pick up bleach this week.

@wwin wrote:

Well, since I've had a cold I've been home watching netflix all week not sharing my germs . I started shopping today and I've now added changing clothes when I get home from my routes along with all the hand washing and not touching my face. I'd like to be using hand sanitizer between shops but there is none available so I'm wiping down surfaces with wipes.

I am completely baffled by the people at Costco standing in line to buy water. Bleach, sanitizers, cleaning supplies, medicines, even food in case you are put in quarantine make sense. But what, they think we will lose municipal water? Don't get me wrong I'm in earthquake country and having bottled water can only be good but still it seems strange. I always have a stockpile of supplies since I buy with coupons and sales but admit needed to pick up bleach this week.

Where I live, people buy bottled water to drink all the time in their homes. It is ridiculous. They think that they will be quarantined and need to have bottled water since they "can't" drink tap water.

Do they think that things might get so bad that common services might get disrupted like gas, electric, water, garbage pickup? If everyone gets the virus and they're supposed to be quarantined, maybe they think no one will be around to provide basic services? I dunno. They had an announcement on the news here today that stores will be limiting the amount of certain items one person can purchase. Like 3 hand sanitizers per person. Toilet paper is another hot commodity.

And, yet, NONE of the staple foods that I listed above were in short supply at the very busy Aldi where I shopped. In addition, the shelves holding things that I did not buy were also full: coffee, ordinary hand soap, all sorts of baking products, laundry detergent, frozen foods, cereal, corn meal, canned veggies and soups, etc, were all on ample supply, on one of the busiest shopping afternoons of the week. There was even a fair supply of TP and I did not see any carts piled high with that, lol.

Bergamot oil and tea tree oil are anti viral, and both available at walmart or ? Make sure you also buy a decent size diffuser. Start diffusing your indoor breathing air. Get a few bottles of the oil, since it's affordable. Pick up a few bottles of hydrogen peroxide while you're there.This will also help disinfect surfaces. Likewise vinegar.
We are not dining out or attending gatherings. No carry outs, deli, shared food, and were staying in as much as possible. Produce must be washed in a water/peroxide solution before consumption.
I am still shopping, but will avoid shops that place me around large groups of people.
Be well everyone.

Having my eldest stepdaughter's party today with many family members and friends. I prepared all the food myself. We will have hand sanitizer on every table at the club. No confirmed cases in Ohio...yet. So postponing wouldn't have done any good and we weren't going to cancel it. I was more concerned about a friend's daughter who contracted mono and was in the hospital. They aren't coming to the party, which is a relief.

I have several carryout shops and a dining shop to do this month. Probably will stick to preparing my own food at home once the virus hits Ohio.

Two of my Demos were cancelled. Cancelled at all Krogers, Frys, and other stores that I'm not familiar with.
My Lowes merch job was cancelled. In two years, I've not experienced any cancellations.

Ka Ching loss to me

@JASFLALMT wrote:

I heard on NPR about this guy who they tested and asked that he self-quarantine until the test results came back. He went to a party. His test results came back afterwards as positive, so now they are trying to get in touch with all of the people who attended the party.

Yeah, it was a Dartmouth Medical Center employee who had just returned from Italy. He decided to ignore the request to self quarantine, and went to a business party up in neighboring Vermont. Here's an article about it. Some people must have low concern for their fellow man! (and/or woman!) [nypost.com]