Month: April 2021

Well, it was finally my turn, right when 33% of people in the USA had been vaccinated. I registered on the portal on February 26, and on April 5, I received an invitation for vaccination. I was surprised that I could even make an appointment for the same day. No demand?

I arrived at the appointed time, and there was the parking at Dulles Town Center — a shopping center — completely packed. Muscovites might not understand, but I haven’t had to circle around looking for parking like this for years. I parked, and outside there was a line about 200 meters long, but it moved quickly – people were constantly walking in. Soon I was inside.

The shopping center — at least its first floor — was repurposed into a vaccination site. First, you approach one of the desks, where they check your appointment time and if you’re on the list. They give you a card, and you take this card to one of the desks with nurses.

All three vaccines — Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, and J&J — are available. I received Pfizer-BioNTech. As I understand, it’s the most common one they use.

After the shot, you are given 15 or 30 minutes to sit in a special area. If allergic reactions begin to occur, it often happens right after the shot, and there they can provide first aid. As someone who is not allergic, they told me to sit for 15 minutes, after which I went to find my car.

The conveyor-belt system is very cleverly organized. In the area where I sat, there were about 70 other people. Many walked through this area, thinking they might as well sit in a traffic jam on the way out. If the area fits 70 people (each sitting for 15 minutes), it means they are vaccinating about 250-300 people per hour, or a couple thousand a day.

Registering for vaccination is strictly through the website or phone. That is, the organizers manage the traffic: exactly as many people as the place can handle will show up.

As I understand, they recently green-lighted everyone over 16 years old, and people are happy to go get vaccinated. It seems that we’ll get to 70% of the population vaccinated with at least one dose by June 15, and up to 90% by June 22.

I also include two photos from the GUM, where Nadia got vaccinated with Sputnik. In Russia, of course, there isn’t such a fuss. Vaccinations are only needed by those who believe in them and those who haven’t fallen ill. How such a large number of educated people can not believe in them — I cannot understand.

It is worth saying that among all our acquaintances in the USA, only a few have had COVID-19. While almost everyone we know in Russia had it at some time. Health to all those who haven’t yet, and — get vaccinated. At least you’ll be able to travel normally and there will be fewer restrictions.

I’ve figured out what I like most about my job:

1) Looking for the root cause of a problem in a complex system or finding a solution to a complex issue. This is what’s called troubleshooting, but often it doesn’t even require touching the keyboard. It also frequently falls into the category of reinventing the bicycle. In the first scenario, it’s somewhat like a puzzle, where the brain generates many potential solutions that compete with each other. Then the hands test these solutions and narrow down the options to consider. This mode often keeps me at work until very late at night. In the second case, it’s the desire to make something from scratch rather than using ready-made black boxes, to understand it. Correlates with point 3.

2) Creating something like this: I thought of it, and there it is working. Not only in programming but also in electronics and mechanics. Some twenty-something years ago, I wrote Tetris and a 3D editor. It was hard to explain why, but it was interesting. Well, okay, I even got paid some money for the 3D editor.

3) Learning something new, acquiring new skills and abilities up to a certain level. From this level onward, it becomes routine, and more interesting, unexplored topics take their place. A typical example – I once got into drums and guitar, and the initial steps were very interesting, but after a certain level, it wasn’t as much. Overall, piano and drawing also fall into this category.

These items are major. There’s one minor – loading my brain with a large number of parallel tasks and struggling to cope with them. Apparently, the brain gets some necessary substances from such a load.

What I dislike:

1) Any regular routine tasks. I have to do them, but I’m always surprised to find that there are people who enjoy them.

2) Participating in conversations that lag behind my personal pace and are not of interest to me personally. I lose focus and eventually stop listening altogether.

3) Doing things whose usefulness is unclear to me, but other people tell me they are beneficial, which I hardly believe. This is quite common in companies that simulate a whirlwind of activity.

4) Organizing the workspace. This includes everything – from the order on the desk to the order in the file system and browser windows.

Who shares my interests and disinterests?

Walked through the San Juan botanical garden, saw a sculpture, took a panoramic photo, and printed it at home. I’m attaching a video from the Blender screen. It shows that the resolution of the 3D model is much better than my printer’s ability to capture details and printing technology (unfortunately).

The American green frog really likes turtles

Roosters are here, chickens are here, pigeons are here, but no seagulls at all! How can this be explained? Isn’t the ocean all around? Not in Puerto Rico, nor, as they say, in the Dominican Republic.

Asked on Reddit why coffee in the States is so-so, trying to find out what exactly is done differently here that makes it distinct from coffee elsewhere, but my post got removed for the reason “This community does not want to live up to ‘elitist coffee snob’ stereotypes, and has asked mods to enforce this”. So I never found out 🙂

Checkmate in two moves. White to move. Beautiful puzzle

Walking through the old town

Just noticed that both our shampoo and conditioner are VEGAN and CRUELTY-FREE. It’s claimed that this means they weren’t tested on animals. Two questions: do they allow for shampoos that could harm animals in testing? If so, who are the cruelty-free products tested on, us?

Masha’s video garnered almost TWO MILLION views in exactly one month (since March 2nd). Four days ago, another account (teenswth) reposted it, and there it gained another almost half a million. Ordinary videos (in my opinion, often more interesting) typically attract from a hundred to several thousand views (on an account with 3300 followers)

I really don’t understand why this video deserved 2.5 million views in a month, but apparently, I don’t quite grasp the audience of social networks and the workings of Instagram reels.

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