Some things I’m looking forward to in 2021: probable post-pandemic edition

Link post

• Fewer deaths all around

• A giant party at my house

• A portion of the research I feel bad about not doing just becoming irrelevant (e.g. what’s the evidence about surfaces now? Are we badly underestimating the harms of long covid?)

• Leaving my house in an unprepared fashion and seeing where it takes me

• Whatever it was that I used to do in places other than my house, that I actually can’t seem to remember or explicitly pinpoint and plan from a distance, but which I vaguely miss (possibly this is basically just 4)

• Seeing friends who live in faraway places such as Berkeley

• Going on a cross-country train and embracing the general lack of hygiene and space

• Seeing non-household friends without inadvertently spending a fraction of my attention on air dynamics and mask stability

• The stakes of everyday personal choices being lowered enough that people being thoughtless or foolish isn’t a critical threat to friendliness, harmony or anyone’s life

• Helping the economy of restaurants and cafes recover

• Casual minor encounters and non-encounters with strangers in shops, streets and cafes (and these being more of the meeting places of the world, and internet comments being less, for more people)

• Meeting new people regularly

• More distinct places and place-vibes to conveniently be in

• One fewer area to worry that I should be doing something better

• Listening to an audiobook on crowded public transit on the way to my downtown office, and then being at my office

• Reading and writing in notebooks in cafes

• The world feeling so big that you can go to other places and find people thinking about entirely different things

• Being dirty

• Crowded, dimly lit places with atmosphere and mild uncertainty

• Resolution of this episode

• Watching everyone else enjoy things coming back