The Daily Parker

Actually, things seem to have quieted down. Bars and restaurants in Illinois closed last night at 9pm, and my company has moved to mandatory work-from-home, so things could not be quieter for me. I'm also an introvert with a dog and gigabit Internet, meaning I have a need to leave my house several times a day and something to do inside. (I'm also working, and in fact cracked a difficult nut yesterday that made today very productive.)

Outside of my house:

• New Republic's Nick Martin asks, why should we be more productive right now?
• Illinois recorded its first COVID-19 death as cases doubled overnight.
• Amtrak has significantly reduced service nationwide. In Chicago, reports are that Metra will cut service tomorrow.
• Politico reports on a transition exercise held a few days before President Trump took office that presaged the current crisis. Only trouble is, 75% of the attendees have left the administration since the drill, and the president appears not to have retained anything from it.
• Julia Ioffe, writing for GQ, examines the SARS-CoV-2 testing crisis and how it happened.
• Illinois is holding its primary election today, dammit. Updates after polls close.

Finally, I was able to get everyone on board with a new date for Apollo After Hours. That only took five days...and 80 emails...