As you know, the Greater Kansas City area Lockdown is scheduled to take effect at 12:01 a.m. tomorrow, Tuesday.
That’s great, but my questions are: Why not today? Why not yesterday?
Covid-19 is just as dangerous today as it’s going to be tomorrow and the next day, and if people think they’ve got some kind of pass to gather in groups today, or participate in activities they should be avoiding, it could easily contribute to the spread of this lethal virus.
As a matter of practicality, not much is going to change come tomorrow…You can still leave your house to get medicine or medical care, food or household supplies, and jog, walk or otherwise exercise as long as you keep your distance from others.
So, I don’t understand the magic of 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, and I haven’t seen an explanation. Anyone got a clue?
**
My own decision to Lock Down tighter than I already had came yesterday when I saw Judy Thomas’s online story in The Star yesterday about Dennis Wilson, a relatively healthy Johnson County man in his 70s who came down with Covid-19 in early March and died Saturday morning.
Until reading that story, Covid-19 had been, for me, primarily a story of escalating numbers and “hot spots,” which, fortunately, have not included Kansas City.
Dennis Wilson and son Luke
But when I read about Wilson, a Lenexa resident and a former school district superintendent in southeast Kansas (Labette) and Missouri (Lamar), it was like a hammer blow to the head. There was Wilson in a photo, sitting across from son Luke, both of them smiling, happy and relaxed.
That was whenever that photo was taken. But the reality of his final days was starkly different. His wife Joanna described those days in a sobering Facebook post…
“It has been an indescribably horrible week of immeasurable suffering on the part of the love of my life and then certainly on the part of our three children and our 6 grandchildren who could only watch helplessly from a distance.”
“…immeasurable suffering”…”watch helplessly from a distance.”
He probably suffocated slowly and then died alone…alone except for the eyeballs of masked nurses and doctors gazing down at him.
Before reading that story, my golf group had hoped to play one final round today at Minor Park. We had been exchanging emails, and it was unclear if the course was going to be open, but if it was, we planned to play.
After reading the story, I immediately went online and wrote to my friends, “I’m going to chuck golf and stay inside as much as possible.” I included a link to the story.
This morning came word that Minor and the other municipal courses were closing immediately and indefinitely.
Good move!
**
It looks like the two places drawing the biggest crowds these days are Costco and gun stores.
A friend went to the Midtown Costco over the weekend, and even before the store opened, the line (undoubtedly prompted by concerns about maintaining social distancing inside) was around the building. My friend left. That’s what I would have done, too. More than a week ago, after seeing videos of “toilet paper mania” at Costco stores, I decided I would stay away.
The mania strikes me as ridiculous, although I understand people’s urge to feel like they’re in control of something at a time when it’s “back to basics” worldwide.
But the guns…the guns…I don’t understand at all. Today, The Star’s Eric Adler has a story about “9-millimeter ammunition, rifles and handguns” flying off the shelves at Frontier Justice, a gun store in Lee’s Summit.
Kansas City Star photo
Adler quoted Bren Brown, president and owner of the store as saying…
“I think the biggest concern in times like this, that are uncertain, is what happens when people lose their jobs and they run out of food. Desperate times bring desperate measures and people want to be able to protect themselves and their loved ones which, of course, is their Second Amendment right.”
That quote conjures up the images that Second-Amendment fanatics see in their heads…And that is — and let’s say it exactly like it is — poor, desperate, East Side Kansas City residents (black!) arriving in hordes, bearing sticks and stones and AK-47s; storming suburban houses; killing and maiming residents; raiding their refrigerators and making off with whatever valuables they can lay their hands on.
It’s a terrible specter for the paranoid. Keeps ’em awake at night.
Where most of us are locking down, they are locking and loading.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
Two things. We’re told to stay 6 feet apart but then stand asshole to bellybutton in line at Costco. Worse yet, a friend on the KCKPD tells me that Nebraska Furniture Mart was packed. It was packed apparently by people wanting to die on a new couch or bedroom suite. I have to take his word for it because I’m in every high risk category they have and I am in for the duration.
Secondly, true gun nuts stocked up at the end of 1999 (Y2K you know) and then again when Obama became the world’s greatest weapons and ammunition salesman. So these latecomers are your pantywaist liberal pals freaking out about the black folks on the east side coming to steal that skid of toilet paper they bought so they could gouge their neighbors (who already own guns and were also planning on stealing it at gunpoint).
Smart move, hunker down, become anti-social and wait for it to blow over.
I too thought the timing of the Lock-down was a little strange until my wife announced to me she had to go to her office today to pick up some supplies in order to work from home. I suggest that since the lock-down came over the weekend, they wanted to make time for people to make arrangements at work.
As for the guns, as with hoarding toilet paper and bottled water, I doubt much thought was put into the purchase of ammunition by our second amendment zombies- more of a viral visceral call in times of social stress than a thought out plan. Kind of like our President.
You must be right about the grace period on the Lockdown, Calbo — giving people who have been going to work a chance to get their affairs in order, so to speak.
Costco has installed a smart orderly line for all who want to enter. No one is forced to stand within 6 feet of the person in front of them. And most adhere to that rule. Each basket is cleaned by employees and once in store it’s not too crowded. Very smart.
Your Costco report is encouraging, Pmarty.
“That quote conjures up the images that Second-Amendment fanatics see in their heads…”
They’re also images that most people — regardless of their Second Amendment stance — see on their TV every time there’s a major disaster and looters run wild. Katrina is just one example — http://www.nbcnews.com/id/9131493/ns/us_news-katrina_the_long_road_back/t/looters-take-advantage-new-orleans-mess#.XnkRcG5JmX0 — of how, “in some cases, looting took place in full view of police and National Guard troops.”
They remember those images and wonder, “If the police can’t protect me because too many of them are out sick with the coronavirus — or won’t because they know they’re outnumbered — who will?”
Some will choose to lock and load. Others will choose to lock up. When things get bad enough — and they periodically do — bad people of any color will simply break those locks and take what they want. You could simply stand by and let them. But what if the things they want to take include liberties with you or your loved ones? “Shame on you!” and other scolding won’t do much.
If looters are arrested, will they do time? Maybe. Maybe not — even if they commit second-degree murder or voluntary manslaughter, which sometimes results only in probation in Jackson County: https://www.kansascity.com/news/special-reports/many-probations/article856550.html. Law-abiding citizens could look at those cases and assume that they have decent odds of getting just a slap on the wrist if they kill someone trying to rob their home or business.
What he said…
The lockdown sounds awful. I’m guessing there are a lot of people who need time to prepare, i.e, will granny be ok in KC, or should we get her and bring her to our house outside KC? The guns, I just don’t get, but I’m sure it makes sense to the gun owners. I think people need to be in their comfort zones as much as possible. And some people do not have the financial resources to prepare for the lockdown.
I volunteer at Harvesters. Right now they are still asking us to come in and help pack food. There is a defined sign in procedure and brief questionnaire to help determine any exposure. If you are filling the slightest bit ill you are asked not to come. It was very light on volunteers last week as only three of the folks that work the volunteer time I do were there. There were additionally 3 college students and that was it. They kept those of us there very busy. And I expect that to be same this week. I am sure there will be a lot of need over the next several weeks.
Good for you, Bill…I volunteer at The Whole Person every other week, and my supervisor told me last week not to come in. He thought the agency should send most employees home. Maybe it has by now.
I like the idea I saw on tv of a temperature gun being pointed at each person’s head trying to gain entry to our grocery stores (or any public place). You have a temperature, you stay out!
In Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly’s executive order issued March 28, under the Manage section pertaining to “Essential Activities,” and in reference to the exercise of one’s constitutional rights, guns, ammo and such are listed ABOVE, not below, faith-based gatherings and activities. She needs to get reacquainted with the Bill of Rights I think. Either that or the NRA has already begun to gain control over her mind. Not good.