Hope you've been enjoying Day #700 of my Coronavirus Life Style — staying home most of the time, going almost nowhere. If you'd told me 700 days ago it would last 700 days with no certain end-date in sight, I would have thought it would be way more unpleasant than it has been. But as I'm sure I've mentioned here more than once, it hasn't been that bad; not for a professional writer who'd be spending a pretty high percentage of those days at home without a worldwide pandemic.
Next week, the great state of California will be lifting the mask mandates in indoor public places for those who are fully-vaccinated. That doesn't mean much here in Los Angeles where the city mask mandate is still in place. The L.A. Times is guesstimating that that mandate could end in late March…
L.A. County is averaging about 9,500 cases a day, according to a Times analysis of state data. Case rates in the county are dropping in half every week, [Public Health Director Barbara] Ferrer said. If this pace continues, the county would fall under the goal of 730 cases a day in early March and could exit the indoor mask order two weeks later, according to a Times analysis.
I'm not sure if the end of such mandates will make me more likely to go to public places (because it's deemed safe) or less likely (because I'd be around mostly-unmasked people) but I don't have to decide that now. Planning that kind of thing in advance hasn't worked out so well for the last 700 days.
I'm getting e-mails and calls asking about WonderCon Anaheim, which takes place April 1-3. Its organizers are pressing ahead with an in-person (albeit sanitized for our protection) event. Details on badges, hotel reservations and other such matters should be on that website shortly. Am I going to be there? Again, I don't have to decide that now. Anaheim is in Orange County, which will have no mask mandate after next week.