My First Post

Hi! I’m Jack. I’m using this website as a creative outlet to help me with my web programming, writing, and research skills. I wish to regularly write articles on various topics that I find interesting, such as Data Science, Astronomy, and Music. I may also write posts describing my day, as well as what I think of my life as it is. With that said, I will now describe my day today.

Coronavirus

For the past several days, the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19 has dominated many aspects of my life, including my social, academic, work, and family lives.

Almost everyone has been affected by the virus socially, given that there is a national advisory in the United States to cancel any gatherings of fifty people or more (my heart goes out to those whose weddings or funerals were cancelled). In my case, my plans to visit my best friend were sidelined, but it turned out that he would be moving home in a few days, so I no longer have a motivation for visiting. Later this week, I want to go to Ocean City with some of my roommates and their friends, but as long as I am careful, I don’t think this excursion has to be cancelled.

As far as academic life is concerned, there is plenty to be skeptical of. My school, the University of Maryland, extended our spring break another week, and will transition to online classes until April 10. Personally, I don’t think that we will be returning to campus this semester. Using Zoom for lectures will be ineffectual for most of my courses, since they are computer science and math, but it will be interesting to see how my theater class will be taught. I don’t mind online classes, but what really peeves me is online conferences. This summer, I was supposed to go to the 236th AAS Meeting, but that has been moved online. I was really looking forward to travelling to Madison and meeting some astronomers, but I understand why they took these precautions.

COVID19 came in at an awkward time in terms of my work life. I have just accepted an offer from Evans & Chambers Technology as a Data Science / Web Developer intern, but because of the virus, their DC Headquarters is closed and I will be going through the onboarding process via video conference. I was looking forward to working with everyone in person, but it can’t be helped. Thankfully, their tech employees are used to video conferencing, so they should be able to give me advice on how to work productively over the net, a skill that many will need in the coming months.

With regards to my family life, everyone is healthy, and hopefully it will stay that way. I’m not concerned for most of my family, but because Dad and his Mother have Diabetes, they have a higher risk of dying than most should they contract the virus. It’s kind of scary to think about anything like that happening, but as long as we take the proper precautions, I’m sure everything will turn out alright.

That concludes today’s diary entry. Thank you for reading.