 Yeah, community matters, especially these days. I'm Jay Fidel, it's Think Tech, and we're talking about an analysis of our second survey which just came in in the first two weeks of May. It ended on May 15th. And we call that survey snapshots of life in lockdown. There's a certain poetry there. And we have Catherine Noor to help us again through we're examining the answers we got to try to make sense of it and learn by it. And we'll do surveys like this on a regular basis one a month anyway, and see what we can learn about our, what we wanna call it, our community. Okay, so the first question, Catherine. Oh, welcome to the show, Catherine. Oh, good afternoon. Thank you for doing this. Good afternoon, Jay. Thank you for inviting me. We so enjoy having you in these discussions. Catherine is the host of, what's the name of your show? Much more on medicine, much more on medicine, yeah. So, okay, the first one is are you working? Which seems like a basic enough question. And just looking at the color chart here, it looks like most people mean really 60% working at home. And the second category was, this is interesting, second category was, let me see if I can tell what is the second category. Oh yeah, of that, do we, we don't have the other, do we? Okay, we don't know what other was, but we know that most people were working at home. So what do you take from these answers, Catherine? Well, I'm not surprised at all because it seems like it is reflective of the stay-at-home order that people are working at home. And I'm actually working partly at home, even though I'm an exempt business and also working at my office. So I think that where it says I'm working in my regular job, those are probably exempt businesses or first responders, medical workers, or even restaurant workers who are performing services that are allowed. Yeah, interesting that 60% roughly working at home in this period between May 1st and May 15th, and only 15%, only 15% working in regular place of work. And only 1% was terminated or furloughed with severance. That's very interesting. And other probably refers to people who are retired and they're no longer in the workforce as well. Yeah, right, with different situations. So I guess that's Hawaii, we are productive. And my guess, don't you think my guess is the people who say they're working at home really are working at home. I mean, there's gotta be a little bit of soft on that, but for the most part, the people that I know, when they say they're working at home, they really are. One thing that this probably doesn't reflect is that I don't think that a lot of terminated restaurant workers or hotel workers are actually responding to this survey. Well, yeah, I think it's worth taking a moment to say that we have our mailing list as something approaching 8,000, and that's who we address it to. But I think beyond the 8,000, there are people who watch our shows and the link has appeared on our website, so it's not limited to our subscribers. But people who watch, the community that's responding here are people who watch Think Tech. And I guess it tells you a little about that community is what it tells you. Right, right, and they may not be the hotel workers or the restaurant workers or the airline workers. Right, right. They should start watching Think Tech immediately. They absolutely should. Okay, so question two, how are you spending your time at home? And in this case, we asked them to select all that apply. So working remotely, that was a pretty big one. Exercising, that was a pretty big one. And going online, that was a pretty big one. No surprise there, that's my personal experience too. So the largest category was working remotely, that's what people say they're doing. Exercising, I guess that means inside the house, although I take walks. What do you think of these answers, Catherine? Okay, I do have commentary here. Exercising, I think, includes from people's perspective, taking walks. And I think people feel cooped up and more people are going for walks. I'm doing a lot of Zumba on Zoom and a few other classes on Zoom. So I'm actually doing some of my, most of my exercise on my computer at home, but I do get out for long walks. And but one thing that's interesting here is the homeschooling aspect. I thought, my perception was that more people were having to deal with homeschooling. And this leads me to believe that people who are involved with homeschooling are just too busy to respond to a survey. You're right, again, it goes to who is our audience and who is responding. Online, 60% said yes. And no surprise there. And watching entertainment, 50%. I find that interesting that more people are online than are watching television or broadcast entertainment. That's interesting. I don't know if it's true, but it's interesting. Right, right. And doing creative things said, that's commendable. So there's 39%, that's pretty good. So the whole, I think people, at least the people who responded here are pretty constructive about the way they're spending their time, that's to their credit. I wonder if it stays, if we ask the same question, all things being equal, if we ask the same question a month or two or three months down the road, I know we get different answers to anything. Sure, and I think the creative aspect, I think that is pretty broad. It could mean writing, it could mean doing art, it could be actually even doing films and social media where you're having a creative element like YouTube or TikTok or doing creative projects with your children, that would be another thing as well. Okay, the third question, and this is about broadcast or online media. And we again said, select all that apply. So a lot of people watching movies and entertainment, but what's interesting is there are more people watching news and documentaries that are watching movies and entertainment or spending more of their time doing it. Sports, like this is not a lot of sports to watch, that's a problem. And religion, okay, well Hawaii is a pretty religious place but only 10 or 11% are watching religion and a very small number of people not watching at all. And my guess is that there are other people watching other things. That's why some 10 or 15% said other. But what I find interesting is that, and we talked about this with Hawaiian Electric a couple of times, watching television has become a major activity while you're home. And indeed, I think that the cable and the movie channels, they're doing gangbusters now. They're bringing all kinds of new movies, brand new movies that haven't opened at theaters because they're on theaters online and we're getting the best entertainment online that we've ever had, think about it. What are your thoughts? Well, this one was interesting to me because I think during a normal time in our lives that the sports would be a lot more. But the problem we have is obviously sports pretty much shut down and that all you have really is some repeat broadcasts and some eSports applications. But this kind of made me laugh because my brother who watches sports about 80% of the time and he's retired, he has found some ways to watch sports that are pretty creative. And, but I think this is very reflective of what's going on and I think no matter how many people respond this is what you're probably gonna get. I think the most interesting thing for me is the news and documentaries. Just like there's a lot of great movies on these days really so many good movies. There's also a lot of good documentaries. So if you care about what's going on in our strange and challenging and unhappy world, you wanna watch those documentaries. A lot of them are about COVID and other processes, political processes we ought to know about. And the news, to me, the news is watching those news channels. It's watching PBS NewsHour, it's watching MSNBC or CNN or oh my God, Fox News. It's watching all these news channels and if you add it all up there's more people watching news and documentaries or spending their time doing that than anything else. But there's gonna be an interesting shift and that is we're gonna be shifting more to animated material because the studios are not able to film right now. So there's not gonna be a lot of new material. However, I have read that there's an attempt to film some movies and TV in foreign places that don't have as much risk. So we'll have to see in a year we may not have as much new material to watch in entertainment. I hear you say that and I have this vision. We know that a lot of these wonderful movies that are coming online were made before COVID and they wouldn't exist. But there will be a huge rash of movies that are made about COVID or how the world is being affected. And I don't know how Hollywood or movie makers in general are gonna handle this and I have this really funny image in my head about how you have this very intense moment on a very intense movie and everybody's standing six feet apart. They're not touching each other. That's, you know what? I'm glad you mentioned that. I'm writing a novel and I think I've got to and there are COVID, it's during the COVID time and I've got to incorporate those kind of things in there, the drama six feet away. Drama has a different meaning now. Okay, so now we're in question four. I hope we got to move on here. Email is the biggest one. Video conferencing, a lot of people doing Zoom and the like working remotely, no surprise there. Shopping online, newspapers and newsletters even more than shopping and social media and Facebook and the like. So what does this tell us? It tells us that people are doing a lot of different things online and maybe they're becoming more sophisticated about the things they do and they're becoming diverse about the things they do. But I guess what it tells me you could lead a rich intellectual if not commercial life online now where maybe you didn't realize that these possibilities existed before. Absolutely, I think that it's interesting. I would think there would be more online shopping but I think people want to get out of the house and so they're actually getting out of the house to go to the grocery store and so maybe that's their shopping plus. They don't have as much need now that they're at home but the video conferencing, I am not surprised at that. I'm doing a ridiculous amount of Zoom right now and I think other people are having that same experience. You know, I think this is gonna stick afterward. Not only these individual things but the pattern of things that's gonna stick. We're gonna be spending more time online going forward. Okay, question five. Who are you at video conferencing with? Select all that apply. Okay, looks like the winner there is a toss up between co-workers and friends. Maybe sometimes they are the same and I guess other could mean anything in the world. Not that much with healthcare professionals, not that much with tech support professionals and some people, they don't conference with anybody. So I find this very interesting. And in our house, we try to have like social media meetings with our friends online and our family. Not as much, the friends are more important in terms of video conferencing and co-workers, that's part of your work. So that's a business issue. What do you learn from this chart, Catherine? Well, you know, other is pretty high and mine would be in other as well because I have, you can't call my other to be co-workers but it's more meetings and doing Zumba classes and doing webinars, things like that that are not included in the list. And I think a lot of people are finding that their Zoom calls don't really quite fit within co-workers, family or friends but I think that this makes a lot of sense. Yeah, you know, and again, it's dynamic. You wonder what would happen, all things being equal if you ask the same question to the same people a month from now, would it be the same? Probably not. And I think there's a blush thing here. You know, we've only been doing this stuff for about a month, two months max, like six weeks. And a lot of it was really thrilling at the beginning. Maybe it's a little less thrilling now. Right. And so maybe, you know, maybe having Zoom calls with your friends gets old after a while. Yeah, I think family and friends will drop off after a while. Yeah. How are you getting your food? Question six, I guess a big one is they just go to the food store because I think we have been led to believe the food store is relatively safe and you can do it without a tremendous amount of risk. Takeout, that's substantial too. Looking at the chart now. Food from family and friends. I know we do. People come and drop by at our house. Groceries delivered, it's only 14% is not that much. Shopping online, picking groceries up, delivering groceries, not that much. I think most people in Hawaii or at least the people we deal with go trundle on down to the supermarket and they buy what they need because it's not all that threatening and they figured they can get in and out without taking a risk and take out restaurants. We've got a lot of traffic to take out restaurants. I'm not doing that very much myself but I guess people, they like restaurants. Hawaii is a restaurant kind of place, you know? Yeah, I think people want to get out of their homes and I think going to the grocery store is something that they're allowed to do and to have an opportunity to get out. That's what they're doing. And I think people want to support the restaurants as well and take out. I didn't do that at first but now I'm doing more and more takeout just because now I'm kind of sick of eating groceries and I bet other people have the same situation and they're increasing their takeout. Yeah, this is going to change when the restaurants start opening. Who was telling me? One of our guests earlier today was that he, oh yeah, state of Florida. He goes to restaurants that have big separations between the tables. He and his wife love to go to good restaurants. They wear masks on the way in. They wear masks when they order. But when the food comes, obviously, they take off the masks. When they pay the bill, I think, when they pay the bill, they put the masks back on again. But you know what's interesting is I went to Alamoana over the weekend and not very much was open and I was really hungry but even though there were some restaurants open, my challenge was you can't sit down anywhere and you have to wear a mask. So I would order something and then go in my car and eat it and then go back and wander around the mall. And so my car has become my restaurant. Time for a good Clark cleaning in. Yeah, you know, I think the detailers will have a business after all this. There you go, a new business. Okay, question seven, we have to move along. How well are you eating? I'm eating right. I'm eating too much and I'm not eating enough is a very minor point. I'm not sure this is an honest answer because I think a lot of people are eating too much with snacks and this and that all day long, watching television all day long and or even working online, that you tend to have a little compulsion food near you and so forth. I saw a very funny photograph came around by a friend of mine and it had something in a group of people on a beach and this is supposed to be right after, you know, the social lockdown was terminated and they're all like 900 pounds. Right, right. Well, you know, I think the way people answered this was aspirational. They want to think that they're eating right but they're probably eating too much and the way I look at it is that people in America eat too much. So I think we should flip this and the ones that are eating right should be the green and the ones that are eating right should be the green. I bet you're right about that. Okay, question eight, how much exercise are you getting in the every day seems to be the winner every few days, that's the second and that could be aspirational too. Do you think that's really happening? I think that people are taking walks and I'm not really, you know, they might be walking a block, they might be walking a couple blocks. I'm pretty serious about exercise. So I probably would probably if I were to evaluate what they're doing, I'm not sure if I would call it exercise but I'm really happy that people are getting out there and moving, that's the most important thing. Yeah, well, it goes to your state of mind for sure. Okay, question nine, are you wearing face masks? And I guess if we look at the text on this, I wear a face mask only when I am outdoors, away from home. That's 34%. This I wear a face mask when I am indoors or outdoors away from home, 30%. Okay, well, it's roughly the same. And then I wear a face mask away from home only when I think I'm at risk. That's all this is reasonable, I think, isn't it? People are abiding by the suggestion as more than a suggestion, it's a rule. And they are taking reasonable steps through. And after all, what else can you do? This is the one thing you have like complete, well, social distancing, this is part of it. You have complete control over whether a mask or not wear a mask. And this does reflect my observations in getting out. When I'm at a grocery store, everyone's wearing a mask and usually wearing them properly. When I was at Alamoana, I saw a number of people wearing the masks improperly where they were under their chin or they had their nose sticking out or whatever. But I did, but I can reflect on that and say that the ones that had either taken off their mask or wearing it improperly were outside and they weren't inside. When they went inside, I believe that they would likely wear them properly. Yeah, well, inside it's more inside somebody else's space. It's the most dangerous of all because you don't know if the droplets are there. The last thing was the droplets can hang around, micro droplets for 15, 16 minutes. That's a long time. Now, this is interesting. Have you been ill? No, I have not been ill. And that's way, this is question 10, way up. That's 91 and change percent. I have not been ill. So the people who responded to our survey really have not been ill. And then the second one was I've had an illness other than coronavirus, only five percent. I don't think there was anybody here who said, yeah, I've been ill and I didn't know it was coronavirus. That's one percent. So luckily, the people who respond to the survey have been healthy. This is a very good thing. Yeah, I think that if we have most of our respondents living in Hawaii, although we don't know if that's the case, then the chance of having someone with COVID is fairly remote because we've only had 634 cases or something like that. And most people have recovered with maybe less than 50 active cases now and 17 deaths. But however, if you were to do this survey in New York or Chicago or California, you would very likely get very different answers. Oh, yeah. Well, to go back to the mask issue, I remember reading a couple of days ago that in the state of Michigan, there was a fellow who was in a retail store and he didn't have a mask on and the cashier asked him to put a mask on or wouldn't do the transaction for him unless he had a mask on. So he shot her dead. And that's what you have in some other states. Right. A whole different mindset. Absolutely. And because we do have a big Asian influence here, I think we've all experienced the culture of mask wearing for many years, where we see Japanese nationals that are visiting wearing masks and things like that. Or many people in Hawaii have actually visited Asian countries for mask wearing as a part of the culture. So it's not to protect yourself so much as to pay respect to the community and protect the community. Right. You shouldn't give them a cold. Yeah. So it works well for Hawaii. Well, Hawaii is in large part influenced by Asian cultures, and that's an example. OK, so has someone in your household been ill? And the good news there, it's about the same percentage Yeah, slightly less, but just really about the same. The household members have not been ill. And you know, that does tell you one thing that is on the list of recommendations is that the people in your household are essentially doing quarantine with you, staying home. And so those are the people you can trust best. It's not like some friend comes over and says, hey, let's schmooze together in your kitchen. That's different. Because you don't know who that person has been with. You don't know whether he's tracking something around. So anyway, it's no surprise to find that the number of healthy people who responded to the survey and who are in the same household is about the same. OK, have you been tested for coronavirus? It's a big question. OK, and it's 86%. I have no symptoms and have not been tested. That's good. And let's see how many people have been tested. Oh, 2% don't want to be tested. I find that very interesting and regressive. Wow. I've been tested and found negative 4%. I've been tested and found positive 0%. When do you get out of this, Katherine? Well, we know that you wouldn't be eligible for testing in Hawaii unless you had symptoms that were very specific. However, that's fine because even if you had no symptoms and had really no reason to be tested, you may not want to put the effort into it. So I'm not surprised that with the other answers and with our data that we would have this that people would not have symptoms and they would not have been tested. Although I'd like to be tested to find out if my cold that I had in February was COVID. Give you antibodies, whatnot. Right. This might change also going forward because hopefully there'll be a lot more testing. The way I think it's going to come up is the way it came up in Korea, which was successful at this, I mean, way more successful than we have been. If you had some symptoms, it would be free. If you had no symptoms but you were interested in being tested, it would cost you like $125. And that's going to be the average cost, I think, going forward. That's the way it's going to be handled when they do get testing worked out. The other thing in Korea is it's down to five minutes or 10 minutes. You stand there, wait for the results. Back a few weeks ago, I know people who were tested, they had to wait for 10 days, 11 days, 12 days before they knew the answer. That was ridiculous. But now in Korea, they have five minutes and hopefully soon enough the US will have five minutes too and that really helps you. Right. And they'll have home tests that you can do at home that you just buy it at longs and you submit it somewhere. And I don't think that's far off. All right. I hope not good. OK, question 13, how is your state of mind? Most people said that it's not that big a number actually. 56% said, I'm feeling fine in my state of mind. 28, almost 29 said I'm handling it, which I take to mean they're not feeling fine. And maybe they're not feeling all that great. I'm troubled, but I'm still OK. 12, almost 13%. Nobody said I think I need to talk to a professional. So I guess we can make the assumption, can't we, that if you cooped up for any length of time, you do go a little stir crazy. Right. But I think that the introverts are enjoying this. This is a time to be an introvert, actually. OK, we have a couple left now. Do you have enough money to continue to shelter in place that is stay home? And most people who answered our survey said I have enough for more than three months. And that's comforting, but that's our population who are responding. And that was 54%. But then it's a little troubling that we don't know about the rest of them. 7%, 7% said I have one month more. 6%, I have two months more. 12, almost 13%, I have three months more. And I don't know what the other was, but it just strikes me that there are a fair number of people out there, even among our survey responders, who really don't have that much money to continue this. Well, considering that 18% of our, I think it was 18% of the population applied for food stamps in Hawaii in the past month, I think I saw that today. I may have that wrong, but I think that tells you something about the condition of the economy. I don't think it's so good. I think these are a little bit more affluent than the general population. Yeah, well, this is another dynamic one. Can you imagine if all things being equal, we asked this in a month or two from now, it would be different? OK, question 15, the last one. How is this really a question that's important to me? Because I think we should be asking about this and further surveys and drilling down. How has your life changed since you started sheltering in place? And most people said my life is pretty much the same. Some said my life has gotten worse, but it's not remarkable. I mean, you don't get the feeling out of this that it's all in a cocktail. It's pretty much level here in Hawaii. Of course, it's only 44% said my life is pretty much the same. And only 21 and change said my life has gotten worse. What do you think this tells us about the real deal? Well, it might tell you that we have more affluent work at home people that are introverts. So I know that the people that my closest friends, they all are very happy with the new situation. They're enjoying being at home and they don't. They seem to be quite cheerful, but they're all introverts and they either are retired or they're working from home anyway. And this will be an interesting question to ask again next month of the month after and see people feel the same way. Well, that takes us to the last question we have, Katherine. And I really enjoy these discussions with you. I enjoy examining and connecting the thoughts with these survey answers. Thank you so much. Absolutely. Thank you, Jay. Next time soon. Take care. Stay safe. All right. Aloha.