Los Angeles March, 2020

It's surreal, looking at my blog right now. My last post was about Blade Runner and how it took place in 2019 Los Angeles. I felt like it was crazy to be living there at such a time. The futuristic, run down, rainy steampunk city didn't feel far from the truth.

It's now March, a few short months later, and things are quite different. The entire state of California is under a strict "stay at home" quarantine, advising people not to go outside. Over 3.2 million Americans applied for unemployment in the last few weeks, I believe the most ever in U.S. history. Myself included among those who applied. More news and updates are being released every hour of every day here; the top story today being that the United States has around 200,000 recorded cases of COVID-19, the most of any other country in the entire world. People are being forced to stay in their homes, ingesting more of the fear and paranoia that's going on outside through their cell phone screens. The anxiety in the air is so fucking thick here, you can probably take a spoon outside and scoop some out of the sky.

In all seriousness, the coronavirus is no joke. A large percent of the population is going to get it, and most of the probably will never even know that they had it. It may come in the form of a mild cold, or it might straight up kill you. People start to show symptoms and die 48 hours later. That is some scary shit, and it's enough to keep an entire world population under quarantine.

Once again, like it has so many times in the past, the only thing spreading faster than the coronavirus is the spread of misinformation and fake news. High level journalists and news sources fight for the top story, skewing words and headlines however they can so that you click on their link and see their ad and make them money. It's not about who has the most accurate, well written story; it's about who reports it the fastest and goes most viral with it.

Just last year I was living in British Columbia, Canada for school. After signing up for a simple, meager government health care plan I had the ability to go see a doctor, therapist or medical professional whenever I felt sick or needed help. I'm fortunate to even be on my family's heath care plan here in the United States, and even that plan doesn't cover me testing myself for the incredibly deadly and rampant pandemic virus, COVID-19. So many impoverished, uninsured Americans are utterly fucked right now.

Although the fictional events of Blade Runner world's "Blackout" take place in 2022, I can't help but wonder: has the time for our version of the blackout come? I wish I could avoid finding out, but it's hard to stay optimistic. Like many others right now, so much of my life has fallen out of my control in the last month. I would go batshit insane being bitter (bat pun intended), so it only makes sense to embrace whatever fate comes to me and try to enjoy life as best as I can in the meantime.

Read that book I've never had time to read before.

Finally finish that screenplay and start on that pilot.

Watch that show or movie that I've been meaning to watch for so long now.

Call that friend I haven't talked to in a long time.

Stay safe. Stay healthy. Talk more soon :)

- morgan