These are your options:

A) Stay home. Avoid contact.
B) Support local business, go out.

If Option A is wrong, people lose jobs and some businesses close.
If Option B is wrong, people die.

Foremost, I’d rather not have people die. But I definitely don’t want my friends in the service industry to get pinched, so here are some ideas to keep being a part of society without being in society.

Servers: Most of them are on Venmo. If you would otherwise go out to eat but are staying in, kick them a few bucks that you would tip them anyway. Same for bartenders. $5, $10 or $20 … it really adds up. Set a daily or weekly calendar reminder.

Gift cards: You can buy gift cards at most restaurants. So do that if you would otherwise go out for dinner. (And restaurant owners: please make them available to purchase online.)

As for booze, there are solutions to drinking at home. It’s called drinking at home.

Liquor: Buy your spirits from Knoxville-local distilleries. PostModern is making an excellent gin and a ton of other great liquors and amaros and so on. Knox Whiskey Works makes a pretty decent vodka and other stuff. Both will happily sell you booze there, or your can go to your local liquor store. Downtown Wine and Spirits is taking orders for pickup, for example.

Beer: Most breweries will put their beer in crowlers, or big bottles, so go buy some and take those home. I bet that if you call ahead, they’ll even have it waiting. Also, beer nerds, this is why we cellar beers. Now is your time. Seize it.

Artisans – Jewelry makers, crafters, tradesfolk, artists and so on all will continue working. And nearly all of them have online shops and presences. Use a little down time to knock out birthday shopping, maybe get a little something for yourself … or just brighten the corners. (Speaking of, it’s also a nice time to knock out spring cleaning.)

Yoga instructors – they’re going online, too. One of my absolute favorite people, Jill Bartine, has gone online with some class instruction and there’s a chance that others you know have, too. Throw them some cash for their hard work. Namaste, peeps.

Shopping – We’re going to shop online, and you probably know that smile.amazon.com will donate to your local charity. I pick usually pick Legacy Parks. Locally, here around Knoxville, Simpson’s Meats in Athens will deliver top-quality meats to your doorstep. There are other similar places, so please share those with friends.

This isn’t impossible, but it’s also deathly unwise to visit public places in any capacity. That is, if you care about your friends in the service industry and elsewhere enough to keep them alive. Life > money.

(Full disclosure, I myself have been out getting drinks lately, but in limited interaction and controlled environments.)

For the fraction of you feeling some contrition, here’s what you can do. Go back to the top of this article, read it again and do some of the suggested actions. If you really care about your service industry people, then put your money where your mouth is – without the benefit of drinking the beer, eating the food or taking dumb photos (actually that last part is kind of fun). And be extremely judicious about what you post on social media, particularly with regard to messages like “do you feel healthy? Go out!” … that’s dangerous.

Let me put on my journalist hat for a moment and speak directly to you.

Symptoms for this virus do not appear in all people, yet they can be contagious. That means you can feel perfectly fine yet go out and spread this virus to people who can catch it and die.

I’m happy to provide you with the factual evidence to supports that, how it has spread in other countries, the empirical epidemiology that buttresses that point, and what the CDC, WHO and other medical experts say about this, but I find it easier to take complicated information and distill it down. It’s why these posts are usually short. I’ve only built a career out of finding information and presenting that to people for the betterment of their lives. And in almost every circumstance I’ve done it impartially, though emphatically, and with a detachment that allows you to make up your mind. Except now. There is one takeaway.

If you go out, people will die.

I don’t tell you what to do that often, other than “try this beer.” In this case, however, there is one more takeaway. Stay home. Do not go out. The sooner we do that, the sooner this thing will blow over, and the sooner we can get back to getting drinks, hanging out and posting more dumb shit on social media.

… end rant.