Day 0

Yesterday was our last day at work/school for an indefinite amount of time.

Goodbye for now, ordinary day. Some photos to remember you by.

Sunrise.

Walk to the train station part 1.

Walk to the train station, part 2.

Walk to the train station, part 3.

Train station.

On the platform.

On the train.

Watching the city fly by.

Hopping off.

Shuttle bus.

Arrival on campus.

Jonathan off to his school.

And I turn right towards my building.

Along the Rainforest Walk.

Monash University art, GCF and maths buildings.

Enter from the geology rock garden.

My lovely office, with its math books...

... walls of whiteboards...

Big window.

I will miss you, ordinary day, usual space.

But today, I'd rather be here at home.

Day -1

It's official: Schools will be closing in Victoria on Tuesday. This comes as the number of new cases keep increasing: 28 Thursday, 51 Friday, 67 Saturday. And the third confirmed case likely due to community spreading.

That means Jonathan's last day is tomorrow.

That means my last day is tomorrow.

I'll meet Jonathan in the afternoon with an extra large bag, and we'll empty his locker. And carry everything home on the train, because we still don't have a car, even in a pandemic.

"It's irresponsible to be taking the train these days," said a colleague last week, whom we used to see regularly on our commute. Just one of several irresponsible behaviours we have perpetuated since January. 

It's ok. The trains and buses are pretty empty these days, and smell of disinfectant when we hop on them in the morning.

"Do you smell that?" I asked Jonathan on Friday morning. "It smells like cleaning."

"It smells like coronavirus," he replied.

I'll wear a mask. I'll wash my hands when I arrive. Jonathan will wash his hands. I won't meet anyone in my building. I'll shut myself in my office until Jonathan is ready to go. Meetings by Zoom.

The current estimates are that we will be shut down for six months.

We're ok. Not great, but ok. We didn't panic-buy food. We don't have a one-year supply. But we have a couple of months of supplies. And the Prime Minister reminded us on Thursday that Australia grows food for 75 million people, with a population of only 25 million. There is no reason for the food supply to be disrupted. We'll be ok. Still, we'll slowly -- not in panic -- buy an extra bag of flour, an extra jar of oil, as we can. A little more each time we go. We'll be ok.

We get to shelter-in-place adjacent to a 100 acre park. For at least a little while, we can walk its paths if we stay away from others. If we are completely confined, we can watch the seasons change from our windows.

You see how ok we will be?

Why, then, do I feel like weeping?

Not this year: or Covid-19

Every year since we moved here I think I may have written a post about the Grand Prix, which is held in a park within walking distance of our house. One weekend per year, we are bombarded by noise. Oh the noise noise noise noise! There is the whining of the cars as they zoom around the track. Then the boom of the fighter jets flying low over the crowds. The buzzing of the antique planes. Tickets for Sunday's race are well out of our price range, but back in 2016, just to say we did it, Jonathan and I paid for general admission tickets for the Saturday qualifying race:
http://clownandpoker.blogspot.com/2016/03/australian-grand-prix.html

This year, the Grand Prix opened as usual on Thursday afternoon. But by Friday morning, they were told by the Victorian Health Minister that crowds would be banned from attending. And the people on one of the teams tested positive. So the race was cancelled. Just like that.

***

Tim has spent two weeks of every March for years and years and years watching March Madness basketball in the US with a friend. He had tickets to fly out at the end of this week. And then things started looking sketchy and unhealthy in the US. Tim called on Monday to inquire: what would be the penalty for cancelling his airline tickets? A $300 fee. So he decided to wait and see. He called again on Wednesday. No fee. Tickets cancelled. So no March Madness for Tim this year.

But wait! By Thursday, we found out there would be no March Madness for anyone this year! Madness!

***

The situation is changing so rapidly, we don't know what to think. Someone on Twitter posted that watching a pandemic spread is like watching a car wreck in slow motion. Classes were delayed a week at Monash, and then moved to online-only for the first week of the semester. But currently students are still scheduled to come back on Monday for face-to-face instruction. That's going to put thousands of people back on the buses with me and Jonathan. I'm worried.

***

I'm not the only one worried. My Head of School (like a department chair in the US) skipped a couple of important meetings to try to get our department ready for university closures.

***

Easter events, sporting events, all cancelled.

Jonathan and I have been sharing articles about exponential growth, and the effects of quarantine and social isolation on the death rate. There are clear practices that keep the infections down to a level that hospitals can handle.

Why haven't they cancelled school yet?

***

We were paying very close attention to the horror coming out of China a few weeks ago, when I was still trying to decide if I would re-book my tickets to Germany. First just Wuhan was shut down. Then all of China shut down. Tim's Shanghai office was shut down. Work-related travel to Australasia was cancelled.

At first it was just those coming from China that were bringing the disease to Australia. Then two people from Iran tested positive. Travel from Iran shut down! Then Italy. And now nearly all the new cases have come from the US. Shut it down! Shut it down! The virus is growing rampant and unrestrained in the US. Why are we still letting them in?

Today we had our first confirmed case of community spread. It has been confirmed that the disease is no longer contained in Australia. That changes everything in this country. And possibly nothing. Back to school on Monday. Just without the buzz of the formula one cars this weekend.

***

My throat hurts.

Last week

Last week, with coauthors, I put a 44 page research paper up on a preprint server, based on work we had been doing for a few years. It's the work I describe in this movie, which my university made about me back in November:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnaEG0BpRos

The next day, we submitted a grant proposal to the Australian Research Council. Their rate of funding is low, but we've been funded before. I hope we're funded again. We won't know until November or later.

And then a couple of days after that, I finished a draft of the textbook I've been working on, off and on, for about ten years. On Friday, I also posted it to a preprint server. I'll submit it for publication in about 1.5 weeks now.

Also on Friday, letter in hand, I showed up to take an Australian citizenship interview and test. And I passed. Now I only have to wait for an invitation to a citizenship ceremony, when I will be sworn in as an Australian citizen. I'll keep my US citizenship as well, so I can pay taxes in two countries for the rest of my life.

Then Saturday morning I was up early thinking about faith, but you probably already heard about that one.

In any case, it was a productive week.


Yes, I am kind of exhausted.