Category Archives: COVID19

05/7/20

Cheat From Home — Online Learning

Higher education has a new problem — how to administer and proctor tests in an online learning environment. How does online learning deal with cheat from home?

How does a professor ensure that her students are not cheating as they take those tests and final exams?

All of you engineers with your open book problem solving exams can just STFU with your superior attitudes and admonitions about how engineering is taught and tested. Yes, I’m an engineer and most of my exams were completely open book.

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05/5/20

Work From Home — Once They’ve Seen Paris

All desk bound or mind workers in the USA were “invited” to work from home — WFH — during the pendency of COVID19.

When American soldiers returned from World War I after having “seen Paris” the saying went: “How you going to keep them down on the farm once they’ve seen Paris?” It became a famous vaudeville song during the Roaring Twenties.

In fact, America became much more global and international. American changed irreversibly from the experiences of World War I Doughboys.

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05/3/20

COVID19 Reopening Facts

Long ago, I opined that the United States was facing 50 individual fights as it relates to COVID19.

Fifty Fights — COVID19 War

Now, I opine there will be a like number of “re-openings.” They will be guided by the facts. Let me use a couple of examples.

These numbers are for the time period 2-1-2010 to 5-1-2020. This is three months. These are CDC numbers comparing New York City versus the State of Texas.

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04/30/20

Re-Opening V Re-Visioning

Comes now the heady prospect that states within our glorious Union may soon be freed from COVID19 timeout and thereby businesses, both large and small, will be allowed to re-open.

What is the first task? Re-Visioning.

There will be no “one size fits all of y’all” plan as all states and businesses are different. Businesses are different.

What is painfully true is that the business environment we knew pre-COVID19 will not magically re-appear. There will be no going back to the past to define the future.

It is a new ballgame.

A new ballgame requires a new business plan. A new business plan requires a re-visit to the original Vision, Mission, Strategy, Tactics, Objectives, Values, and Culture of the company in light of the changed environment and marketplace.

Business planning building blocks graphic

The future will NOT be the past in a new dress or with a sleeker haircut or some great RayBans. It will be dramatically different.

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04/29/20

Japan Abandons China

Relations between Japan and China have always been dicey since before World War II, so a new development between them is not a huge surprise.

The nature of the development in this instance is.

Japan has funded a program — as part of its COVID19 economic stimulus package — to financially support companies who move their manufacturing from China back to Japan.

In addition, the program also supports companies who move their manufacturing from China to another Asian country whose main qualification is — Not Made In China.

This comes on the heels of a very simple impetus — the realization of how much Japanese manufacturing had moved from Japan to China.

Why did they move in the first place you ask? Cheap labor. Cheap cost of finished goods because of the cheap labor, prison labor, child labor, lower environmental standards (if any at all), and cheaper materials.

Japan acted pretty damn quick. No wasted time.

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04/28/20

Unmasking China

The world wants to know what exactly China knew about its most recent gift to the world — the virus that creates COVID19.

What did China know and when did they know it; and, why didn’t they  tell us?

China is bristling at all the attention. President Trump recently indicated his unhappiness with China for their failure to be forthcoming on the subject and said there would be consequences, but not until COVID19 has run its course.

Since before President Trump announced his candidacy in 2016, Donald J Trump has been a skeptic and a critic when it comes to China. It appears he was correct on all things pertinent to China.

We have a clear indication of the Chinese attitude when delving into their recent dialogue with Australia.

Australia and China are keen trading partners with more than 25% of Australian exports going to China. Australia annually sells China $235,000,000,000 of coal, iron ore, wine, beef, tourism and tertiary education.

Chinese tourists love Australia with more than 772,000 Chinese visiting Australia, staying on average 43 nights, and spending more than $12,000,000,000.

The second highest number of travelers come from New Zealand. These 534,000 New Zealanders spent on average 10 days and $2,600,000,000.

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04/23/20

Chipotle — Timing Is Everything

I never eat at Chipotle, but I have been following them for a long time. The thesis of this blog post is that Chipotle is doing a bang up job in evolving into a COVID19 casual food world.

But, they have had a lifetime of experience with food-borne illnesses and outbreaks.

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04/19/20

Church In The Age Of COVID19

I like going to church. It anchors the day and is an opportunity to open my mind and let some wisdom take root. I love a good sermon. I have gotten some good ones — actionable ones — through the years.

I was raised a conventional Catholic in the Latin rite of the Mass at parishes that had schools which I attended. I was an altar boy. I could swing a mean incense bowl, I received the offering, I assisted at Mass, I assisted the celebrant in robing, and, yes, I stole some altar wine — terrible stuff.

Oddly, most of the altar boys were pals and played basketball together, were golf caddiesm (Father Horan used to get us the job with the caddie master who had fought with the 101st Abn Div at Bastogne), and surfed together. It was an unusual kinship. We all drank the lousy wine together. I have never run into any of them since those days, but we had a lot of fun. I would love to know their stories.

I fell under the influence of those great Irish priests — Fathers Horan, O’Connor) and those demanding nuns (that tough little math teacher Sister Anne de Beaupre). Got striped by the nuns from time to time. Confessed my sins to the priests during Confession. The structure of the Catholic church and Catholic school was good for me. Those Catholic school girls were saucy.

Today, I go to a Southern Baptist Church — Lake Hills Church in Austin By God Texas. I go there because I like the message and messaging from the pastor, Mac Richard. I find his sermons universally actionable.

Today, I watched the service — as I have for seven weeks — on the computer livestreamed. The production values were excellent. LHC is extraordinarily computer literate and has been livestreaming services for years. The message was even better.

I miss dressing up for church — remember this is Austin By God Texas so “dressing up” means knife-edged, buttery soft, ancient khakis, a button down (linen during the summers), a blazer, and a pocket square.

But, I have to say that “going to church” in one’s PJs, with a cup of coffee, lying on my office couch — well, that is pretty damn convenient.

So, the big question is this — will I return to attending church? Or am I going to church henceforth from the comfortable couch in my office?

But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway?car