Originally posted by: Jerry Ice 33
That is a fair argument. It definitely was not a hoax; I never said that. I just think we way overdid things and kept doing them, led my idiot politicians. I highly doubt continuing schools would have caused that many more deaths. Why did police and grocery store employees work then? Why everybody but the teachers?
So am I going to regret staying downtown at Golden Gate later this month? I'm just going by myself or one of my old workmates may join me. It is strictly a gambling trip. I'm kind of going off some of LVA members tips on this one. No restaurants at GG but I can simply walk to Cira or D to use those restaurant credits. I'll eat at Four Queens as well. And I do plan on having a car to go play poker that various places. I've read the hotel rooms can be noisy......but in Jan? I have to believe Fremont street is a bit quieter.
I usually just set up base camp at Southpoint and literally everything is there for me. But I'm up for an adventure here.
To answer your question--it's possible to have virtual classrooms but not virtual crime prevention (though surveillance cameras and such can sub in for actual police presence in some situations), and certainly not virtual food. That bag of virtual tortilla chips I bought had no flavor at all.
Furthermore, teachers were in an almost unique position of being exposed, and in very close proximity to, several hundred persons (the kids, mostly) per day. Not many other jobs carried that same risk (one that comes to mind is flight attendant, but then...no one was flying).
In each case, in each instance, authorities had to decide, usually with woefully insufficient data due to the pandemic's unprecedented nature, which activities to allow, which to restrict, and which to prevent--with the absolute certainty that any such mandate, no matter how trivial, would lead to a firestorm of bitching. Portland (and mostly, the rest of Oregon) went into complete lockdown a good two weeks before anyone else did. We had one of the lowest death and hospitalization rates in the country--so much that we accepted covid patients from FREEDUMB! states like Idaho and Wyoming. So I respect the awful problems our authorities had to wrestle with and their good faith in trying to find solutions--even at ghastly political cost for some.
GG/Circa/D are unpleasant places for me--high prices, crummy gambling, noise, and NOISE. But you'll be near the 4Q, the Plaza, etc. As far as the FSE goes, it's no quieter when the crowds are smaller, as the noise comes from the unbearably loud soundtracks that accompany the light shows and the often not-too-bad bands that play there on the weekends. But every hotel on Fremoint has some rooms that are MUCH less exposed to the FSE than others. Some hotels refer to the quieter rooms as "premium" or some such and charge more. Ask! If you don't mention it, you'll automatically get one of the worst, noisiest rooms.
Eating pickin's are surprisingly slim downtown if you want decent value, but heck, play VP at the 4Q and earn enough comps to chow down at Magnolia's, etc. And while the plain old gambling may suck (as it does everywhere these days), you might be pleasantly surprised at how much action the poker room at the GNug offers.
