An elderly and reluctant Frenchman was ejected from an Air Force fighter during a retirement day outing. I promise you, this isn’t clickbait.

As with every news outlet, Footwear News, looking for their coronavirus story, found it.

“We are literally making electricity out of thin air.” Almost by accident, Yao noticed the devices he was experimenting with were conducting electricity seemingly all by themselves.

An evangelical pastor in Virginia who vowed to keep preaching unless he was “in jail or the hospital” succumbed to Covid-19. Florida declared professional wrestling an “essential business” so matches could continue.

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci is everyone’s hero. A Connecticut toy company is making a Dr. Fauci plush doll. As of this writing, the petition to name him People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive had over 18,000 signatures.

Thousands protested Michigan’s stay-at-home laws and marched on the capital holding signs that unironically said Live Free or Die.

In Kenya, the Governor of Narobi said that they will be tucking a small bottle of Hennessy into the care packages going out to its citizens.

Stimulus checks from the US Treasury went out with the expected mix-ups. Scores of deceased received a check and one firefighter in Indiana was shocked to find himself $8.2 million richer instead of the expected $1700.

Just in time for the afore-mentioned stimulus checks, Apple announced the iPhone SE at a $399 price point. Meanwhile, if you were the proud owner of a top of the line Mac, a set of wheels would put you back $699.

The pandemic has postponed many trials winding thru the judicial system, including one for Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes.

Land o’ Lakes butter decided it was time to retire the Native American “maiden” from their packaging. The new package just has a lake.

Looking to spice up your next Zoom call? Invite this farmer’s lama or goat and totally confuse your colleagues.

The National Guard was called, in Vermont, to build a hospital, in four days.

Nudists sunbathing in the Czech Republic were reprimanded for not wearing masks. “Citizens can be without clothes in places designated for this purpose, but they must have their mouths covered,” said the police spokeswoman.

As the novelty of the daily presidential briefings wore off and we grew weary of hearing the president boast of his accomplishments, the nation found solace and sage advice in the twitter account of a frozen meat product.

A university in Japan is giving graduates the chance to walk the stage to receive their diploma, via a remote-controlled robot.

What’s weirder then playing professional sports to an empty stadium? Playing a professional sports to a stadium of robot mannequins.

While preparing for the onslaught of the Covid-19 pandemic, Congo was hoping to be able to announce the end to the Ebola outbreak. Then someone got Ebola.

An Australian astrophysicist was admitted to the hospital after getting magnets stuck up his nose while inventing a device to stop people from touching their faces during the coronavirus outbreak. “My partner took me to the hospital that she works in because she wanted all her colleagues to laugh at me.”

Due to the pandemic, the US Postal Service is suspending delivery of international mail to nearly two dozen countries including the Cayman Islands, Honduras, India, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and Botswana. Oh, and the US Postal Service is nearly out of money and it may impact their ability to deliver ballots in the upcoming election.

Tesla shared a prototype of a functional ventilator using spare parts from its automobile production line.

The New Zealand sex toy industry reported a spike in sales in the days leading up to that country’s lockdown. The largest retailer, the Adult Toy Megastore has been deemed an “essential business” by the government and allowed to stay open.

Honolulu police will use aerial drones to keep people off the beaches. A loudspeaker on the drone will announce “Aloha, the stay at home order is in effect. Please do not gather or sit on the beach.” No word on if there will be a Hawaiian music accompaniment.

Field hospital tents were set up in New York City’s Central Park in anticipation of an expected surge of Covid-19 patients. The last time this happened was during the Civil War. Later in the week, the naval hospital ship Comfort docked in New York harbor.

Comfort’s sister ship, the Mercy docked in Los Angeles harbor and was later attacked by a reality-challenged individual who attempted to ram the ship with a train.

The National Symphony Orchestra was let go by the Kennedy Center in Washington DC. Their last paycheck will be on April 3.

Kobe Bryant’s used towel from his last game with the Los Angeles Lakers sold at an auction for $33,000.

Home from school and stuck in social isolation, students from UPenn, BU, UCLA, Northwestern, Oberlin and other schools worked together to re-create their campus, online, in Minecraft. Many of these projects will now serve as a virtual stage for commencement ceremonies.

President Trump announced that Navy ships will be deployed near Venezuela to beef up counter-narcotics operations. A Venezuelan Navy offshore patrol vessel sank after ramming a cruise liner in the Caribbean Sea. The cruiser, which had a reinforced hull to sail through ice-filled waters, suffered minimal damage.

The coronavirus has taken out of commission one of the largest ships in the US Navy. The captain of the ship was later relieved of duty.

Tragedy struck as a truck carrying thousands of rolls of precious cargo crashed and burst into flames.

The New England Patriots flew their team plane to China to pick up a load of 1.2 million N95 masks and bring it home to hospital staff in Massachusetts.

A New Jersey paper delivery man took it upon himself to bring more than just the daily news and is now taking orders to deliver much needed groceries to his homebound, at-risk clientele.

The Pentagon confirmed that it’s working to provide FEMA with 100,000 “pouches to address mortuary contingencies.”

A group of MIT scientists have designed a ventilator that can be made from readily available hospital gear for about $500. Open Source communities are sharing designs for ventilators and masks.

A 104 year-old World War II veteran from Oregon became the oldest survivor of the coronavirus.

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics were officially postponed to 2021 – which presents a problem for those in charge of branding.

Air traffic coming in and out of Chicago Midway was shut down when three staff members tested positive for Covid-19. During the shutdown, “student pilots took advantage of the situation and began taking off and landing at MDW for fun.”

As the situation in Florida started to get worse, a correspondent for the Canadian magazine MacLeans picked up and left for home and wrote about it in Escape from Florida: My 2,400-km drive back to the sanity of Canada.

Things are so bad that even Waffle Houses, that stalwart institution of the South, is closing down under a Waffle House Index Red conditions.

With air travel dried up, the major airlines had to look for places to park their grounded planes. Delta took over several runways at Atlanta airport to park some of the 600 planes they put out of service.

Stuck indoors under a citywide shelter in place order, residents of San Francisco are delivering rolls of toilet paper by drone.

Faced with a world without live sports, casinos are scrambling for new things to bet on. In the “this will not end well” department, a Las Vegas casino is filing paperwork to take bets on the outcome of the presidential election.

Other businesses had to retool themselves including the movie theatre that is now in the popcorn business, the hockey equipment company that is making face shields for hospitals, and the sail maker that has redeployed their industrial sewing machines to make medical masks.

As more people are working from home, dress code only applies from the waist up for the videoconference. Walmart shared that shirt sales are up but pants and skirt sales are down.

By the end of the week, after many were finishing a second week of sheltering in place, with the pandemic overwhelming NYC hospitals and looming over New Orleans, Today show host Hoda Kotb (a Nola native) broke down after interviewing New Orleans Saints QB Drew Brees who just donated $5 million to help feed Louisiana during the crisis.

In that brief moment, Hoda let out the gasp of raw emotion we’ve all been holding back. The sheer magnitude of the growing disaster we know we will face in the coming weeks must be met with acts of courage and generosity that we hope will be just as infectious as the virus we are fighting.

We can only beat this by working together like never before. More than any war, this is a global fight against a common enemy. More so than global warming which is abstract and distant the coronavirus is not only global but immediate. If there is any silver lining on the horizon, it’s that this threat to our way of life is bringing us together, around the world, to work as one, like never ever before.

Stay safe everyone.