daily update, Saturday March 14

[edenfalling]

Today was A DAY. *flops exhaustedly onto keyboard*

So basically, Cornell had a plan for Covid-19, right? The plan was to start spring break early, on Monday the 16th (Cornell has a weirdly late spring break, because reasons) and then switch to online-only classes when break ended on April 6th. Except halfway through Friday -- literally halfway through; people got the message in the middle of classes -- they were like, "Nope! Actually we're closing as of 5pm today. Campus is shutting down. Dorms are closing. All undergrads, scram. A few Ph.D students and academic MS students can stay if they're doing on-site research, but all other grad students? You scram too. Bye!"

And everyone in the Cornell-adjacent community was like, what the actual fuck.

Because seriously, what the actual fuck.

So now everyone who lived on-campus but can't or won't leave Ithaca for whatever reason is scrambling to find off-campus sublets, and everyone who can/will leave Ithaca is scrambling to pack and/or ditch all their possessions and clear out ahead of any travel bans. It is a giant MESS.

Also Tompkins County reported our first confirmed Covid-19 case at 11am this morning, so that's fun.

Miss California and I spent the whole day fielding a lot of worried and confused phone calls, a lot of worried and confused tenants who came into the office, and a handful of worried and confused emails. Also a bunch of apartment tours, which were an extra mess because the tenants in two of the units we planned to show abruptly said "Nope, you cannot enter my home" after the report of the confirmed Covid-19 case went public, so we were left with building common areas and a small handful of apartments whose tenants were already absent for the semester for various reasons.

We are apparently not going to handle tenant package deliveries starting Wednesday, all the on-site fitness rooms will be closed as of Monday, and we're collecting non-perishable tenant possessions that they can't or don't want to take home or arrange to put in storage. So we have several boxes and crates of amazingly random stuff in our back room at the moment.

Miss California and I taped a paper bag full of small envelopes and pens to our front door, for tenants who want to turn in their keys while the office is closed tonight and Sunday -- because it's so early in the year that we haven't yet made, let alone distributed, our standard move-out packages. All we had time for was a mass email Friday evening and, you know, a paper bag taped to the front door.

I reiterate: what the actual fuck.

...

I didn't get any writing done, for obvious reasons. I also didn't get any ficlets crossposted to AO3, again for obvious reasons. I am unsure whether I want to work on either of those projects tonight, or whether I just want to fall into bed and scream quietly into my pillow for a bit.

Because it has been A DAY.

...

(Oh, and I got a haircut this morning. Life continues and good things still happen!)

Comments

[sholio]

My sister works at Cornell (she currently has no idea if she's supposed to work from home or come in to work on Monday, because reasons) and we were talking about this a bit earlier. She pointed out that it's absolutely bizarre that nowhere has contingency plans for this - municipalities and schools have plans for terrorists and shooters and fires and tornadoes, so why on earth has no one apparently EVER said "What would we do in case of an outbreak of contagious disease?" But apparently no one ever has!

The sheer amount of chaos and poor communication in all of this has been really bizarre. On the one hand I know all of these institutions are having to deal with something that's new to them. But it's also not THAT new?!!

Anyway ... I guess we'll all muddle through as we need to!

[edenfalling]

It has been completely -- and unnecessarily! -- chaotic around here, and so far as I know, everyone is still uncertain what's going to happen this coming week.

I guess after this most organizations will create epidemic/pandemic contingency plans, but the middle of a crisis is really not the best time to realize you have no idea how to cope with said crisis. *headdesk*

[rthstewart]

WHUT? I mean, did they learn nothing from the fiasco that's been going on all week?

My spawn's at Skidmore and it's been pretty good. We got notice on the 9th -- all the students were already away on Spring break, that spring break was extended from the 16th to the 23rd to give time to transition to online learning and that there would be an update on the 12th. Thursday the email came out, we're shutting down, here are your assigned days for move out -- but we recognize this isn't going to work for some of you so please contact us and we've negotiated low hotel rates. Unlike Williams and Princeton, as far as know, they haven't offered help with air fares and storage but they are a helluva lot better than what you are enduring.
Put crowbars in your damn endowments you cretins.
Stay safe. Not really an option when you have to deal with people but do the best you can.

Did your church cancel services?

[edenfalling]

I am fairly sure they panicked! Which may mostly be related to Cornell straight-up not having the capacity to treat students on-campus if more than a handful come down with serious cases... and the local Ithaca hospital is not very large either and will likely have their hands full with local residents if/when Covid-19 gets a solid foothold here. According to my barber, his dermatologists are postponing appointments since their offices are being converted into an emergency clinic, as a precautionary measure.

I think Cornell is attempting to make some provisions for travel and storage reimbursements after kicking everyone off campus, but details remain unclear and I'm fairly sure they're not reimbursing anyone for "lost" rent on off-campus housing, which I'm sure will thrill our tenants to learn. *wry*

My church has moved entirely online for at least a few weeks. We're live-streaming services and having all committee meetings (and hopefully small group ministry gatherings) via our organizational Zoom account.

[domarzione]

At my downstate university, we pulled a similar shenanigan. Monday-Tuesday no classes! Remote classes the rest of the week and then the week after spring break! And then suddenly by Thursday it was "please leave! We will give you $500 to defray expenses of your sudden departure!" and lots of seniors prancing around in caps and gowns taking pictures for a graduation they'll never have.

(I'm staff and we're SOL, but it's kinda fun-weird watching the exodus because university campuses get more pleasant the fewer students around.)

[edenfalling]

College towns in general get much more pleasant when the students are gone! :)

But the early exodus is very bad for local businesses, since students dump a LOT of money into Ithaca's economy, and being even tangentially involved in trying to manage the mass departures has been chaotic, to say the least. :/

[wistfulmemory]

That's super frustrating, especially with how sudden the change was and how drastic it is. I hope everyone is able to figure things out quickly, and life settles down for you.

[edenfalling]

At least my tax prep job seems to be continuing on as usual? Though we're all waiting in frustration to hear whether the tax filing deadline will be extended or not, since that's been floating up in the air for like a week now.

Collegetown is going to feel very strange these next few weeks, with so many residents gone and a bunch of the rest spending most of the day shut up in their rooms self-isolating.