Week 60
Day 420 Thursday, May 20 - Still waiting...
Worldwide (Map)
May 20, 2021 – 164,620,000 confirmed infections; 3,413,350 deathsVaccinations: this week - 1,536,031,895; last week - 1,357,850,000
March 25, 2021 – 124,894,200 confirmed infections; 2,746,000 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 100,920,100 confirmed infections; 2,175,500 deaths
December 31, 2020 – 82,656000 confirmed infections; 1,8040100 deaths
US (Map)
May 20, 2021 – 33,026,300 confirmed infections; 587,870 deaths
March 25, 2021 – 30,011,600 confirmed infections; 545,300 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 25,600,000 confirmed infections; 429,160 deaths
December 31, 2020 – 19,737,200 confirmed infections; 342,260 deaths
SA (Tracker)
May 20, 2021 – 1,621,370 confirmed infections; 55,510 deaths
March 25, 2021 – 1,540,010, confirmed infections; 52,372 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 1,430,650 confirmed infections; 42,550 deaths
December 31, 2020 – 1,039,165 confirmed infections; 28,035 deaths
Tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
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| © Nick Andeson, Tribune Content Agency |
***
New! The Franklin Project (2:40 mins) The Lincoln Project: Allegiance (0:25 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
The Plastic Waste Makers index reveals the companies who produce the polymers that become throwaway plastic items, from face masks to plastic bags and bottles, which at the end of their short life pollute the oceans or are burned or thrown into landfill.Read “Twenty firms produce 55% of world’s plastic waste, report reveals. Plastic Waste Makers index identifies those driving climate crisis with virgin polymer production” >>
Australia leads a list of countries for generating the most single-use plastic waste on a per capita basis, ahead of the United States, South Korea and Britain.
ExxonMobil is the greatest single-use plastic waste polluter in the world, contributing 5.9m tonnes to the global waste mountain…. The largest chemicals company in the world, Dow, which is based in the US, created 5.5m tonnes of plastic waste, while China’s oil and gas enterprise, Sinopec, created 5.3m tonnes.
Eleven of the companies are based in Asia, four in Europe, three in North America, one in Latin America, and one in the Middle East. Their plastic production is funded by leading banks, chief among which are Barclays, HSBC, Bank of America, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Last minute jitters. This will be the very last time I travel via a third party. Next time I go directly to the airline to reserve a ticket.This, because the third party agent I’ve used for the last few years – FlyUs – has done a MISERABLE job of responding to my queries. First, they cancelled my flight last year – due to Covid lockdown so understandable. But anytime I’ve tried to contact them since then, there’s been a wall of silence. Cannot phone them – “due to increase in call volume… call back later”. No satisfaction via email – a wall of website “loops”. The message on My Booking states my flights are “not confirmed” yet also, somehow, confirmed. So which is it? Just now, tried to contact the airline directly to get some sort of coherence on the status of my flights.
Moreover, to add to my insecurity, “The biggest mistakes travelers make right now”
I can’t help feeling the more I look forward to returning to California, the less secure I feel about actually getting there. It is almost exactly a year since my flight was cancelled due to lockdown. A lot has happened in this year. What if it’s not over for me? What if something else delays my flight this time? What if….
***
Other than fretting? I’m prepping the garden for winter, raking up leaves and grass clippings and spreading them as mulch over strawberries, iris, succulents, you name it. And, inevitably, trying to foresee what can/will go off course while I’m away and forestall it. This includes ensuring I engage “someone” to renew vehicle licenses – due August 31. Turns out, an enterprising local woman has made a business of standing in line for people like me. Her motto? I que for you. I’ll fill out the paperwork and leave it with her to “que” for me – and my mother – to ensure our vehicle paperwork is completed on time.
***
Getting darker here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 15: sunrise 6:35am; sunset 5:15pm.
May 20: sunrise 6:39am; sunset 5:12pm.
Week 59
Day 415 Saturday, May 15 - Watching, waiting...
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| © Fiore, KQED |
As the date for my planned departure comes closer, I become more anxious about Covid news. While the US trends towards lifting mask compliance due to what looks like a successful anti-Covid vaccination program, South Africa may be trending towards a third wave of infection.
News blues
[According to SA’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD)] the number of new Covid-19 infections from …May 3 to 9 showed an overall 46% increase compared to the previous week, April 26 to May 2.
The Northern Cape (68%), Gauteng (63%) and Limpopo (47%) topped the list of provinces with new cases.
There has also been an increase in hospital admissions and Covid-19-related deaths increased by 18% compared to the previous week, with the Eastern Cape and Western Cape (both 21%), Gauteng (20%) and KwaZulu-Natal (19%) accounting for 81% of all reported fatalities.
At a provincial level, the NICD said Free State was now experiencing a third wave.
Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, North West and the Western Cape are showing sustained increases.
Northern Cape never met the technical criterion for exiting the second wave and has experienced a significant resurgence in recent weeks. https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2021-05-14-sa-not-in-third-wave-yet-says-nicd--but-here-are-provinces-at-risk/
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| Confirmed Cases: 1 602 031 Confirmed Deaths: 54 968 Confirmed Recoveries: 1 519 734 Vaccines Administered: 430 730 Updated 10:00, 13 May 2021 |
Tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
… health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize said the Free State had now technically crossed the line and entered a third wave of coronavirus infections. The number of new daily cases has been slowly increasing over the last few weeks. He also confirmed that the B.1.617.2 variant first found in India, had now arrived in South Africa, along with a variant first found in the UK (so far most scientists have said they believe the B.1.617 variant poses no greater risk to our population than other variants, and that the current vaccines work against this variant).Read “Covid-19 vaccination roll-out: South Africa’s greatest political event of 2021” >>
While Mkhize stressed it is still possible to avoid a third wave of the disease, it does appear the risk of a new wave of infections has increased.
In the meantime, the Sisonke study, which is due to deliver half a million shots-in-arms, still has almost 100-thousand injections to go, aiming to complete that goal by Monday.
***
I regularly receive information about and invitations for vaccinations from the State of California where Gov. Gavin Newsom said the outdoor mask mandate will be lifted June 15 if cases and hospitalizations continue to drop and some guidelines will remain for indoor locations….“… we will be updating our mask guidelines ... outdoor masking ... if we reach that threshold where we hope to be," the governor said. "For indoor activities we will still likely have some mask guidelines and mandates. But we hope sooner than later that those will be lifted as well."I’m in the process of making a vaccination appointment and, if all goes according to plan, I’ll get “the jab” the day after I arrive. (Who knows, perhaps I can shop for groceries myself – instead of my friend using my list and shop for me.)
Excerpts from emails urging me to get the jab:
Appointments for a first dose of Pfizer are available through Sutter Health at the Alameda County Fairgrounds Drive-Through Point of Dispensing (POD) site on May 15th, 2021.
…
These appointments are for 1st doses of Pfizer or Moderna
Walk-ups are not accepted – you must book an appointment
… Important information for your appointment:Oh boy! After 1.5 years in South Africa, I appreciate planning…
This is a Drive-Through Vaccination Clinic only so please plan accordingly If you are under the age of 18:
- Your parent or legal guardian will need to consent on your behalf.
- If you receive an appointment, your parent or legal guardian will also need to be present with you on site in order for you to receive a vaccination.
- You need to bring the following to your COVID-19 vaccination appointment:
- Photo Identification (ID). Your photo ID does not have to be government issued.
- Appointment Confirmation. If you have an appointment, print the confirmation or provide it on your phone.
- Mask. Please remember to wear a mask and practice social distancing.
***
The Lincoln Project: Civility (0:40 mins) MeidasTouch: The Rules of the Demagogue (1:46 mins)
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Close to one year ago, my mother’s longtime live-in domestic worker’s adult son, drunk, threaten to kill me, rape me, shoot me, “f**k me in the a**. (Disconcerting from someone who’d spent 5 years in prison for rape.) This, because I’d dared tell the jobless, drunk, 40-year-old that he could no longer sponge off my mother nor live on her property.The saga of the drunk son and his belligerent-towards-me-domestic-worker mother continued for weeks. (Backstory )
I was granted a restraining order and he has not been near my mother’s property since.
After my mother moved to the Care Center, the longtime, live-in domestic worker was retrenched (retired/laid off). Xhosa, she returned to the Transkei, the land of her birth. Her drunk son elected to stay in the area and live off money she sent. Rumor tells he regularly made a drunken nuisance of himself in the local township of Mpophomeni, that residents urged his mother to get him out of town before he was attacked, or worse.
As of Monday this week, he has “disappeared” with speculation running from “someone” driving him far from town and dumping him … “someone” attacking him and he lies, unidentified, in local hospital (“police are asking people for his ID book”) … or “someone” killing him and his body hasn’t turned up – yet (or is that why police seek his ID book?).
***
Now that it appears I may enjoy spring in my houseboat on the Sacramento Delta, my imagination is flourishing. Plans include having the pontoons inspected for wear, then revamping the houseboat to squeeze our more living space and greater comfort. First, though, I’ll have to convince the many spiders who take up residence in the marina to abandon the webs they’re spun on my boat. Fish generally enjoy my spring cleaning and hover at the water’s surface to eat slow spiders. I’ll also enjoy the sight of cliff swallows arriving from their migration from Chile. And check on the two cliff swallows that return to a well-made cup-shaped mud nest built above the pontoons under my boat. I look forward to seeing them again.***
Two more weeks of tracking winter days here….Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 13: sunrise 6:35am; sunset 5:15pm.
May 15: sunrise 6:36am; sunset 5:14pm.
Day 413 Thursday, May 13 - Here we are
Here we are, more than 400 days into a pandemic. Who knew, back in June last year, we’d still be locked down?The mind-boggling numbers back then:
- June 25, 2020 - worldwide: 9,409,000 confirmed infections; 482,190 deaths
June 19, 2020 - worldwide: 8,489,000 confirmed infections; 454,007 deaths - June 25, 2020 - US: 2,381,540 infections; 121,980 deaths
June 19, 2020 - US: 2,191,100 confirmed infections; 118,435 deaths - June 25, 2020 - SA: 111,800 confirmed infections; 2,205 deaths
June 19, 2020 - SA: 83,890 confirmed infections; 1,737 deaths
Today's numbers:
Worldwide (Map)
May 13, 2021 – 160,450,550 confirmed infections; 3,331,300 deaths
Vaccine doses administered: 1,357,850,000
April 29, 2021 – 149,206,600 confirmed infections; 3,146,300 deaths
Worldwide (Map)
May 13, 2021 – 160,450,550 confirmed infections; 3,331,300 deaths
Vaccine doses administered: 1,357,850,000
April 29, 2021 – 149,206,600 confirmed infections; 3,146,300 deaths
US (Map)
May 13, 2021 – 32,814,500 confirmed infections; 583,700 deaths
April 29, 2021 – 32,229,350 confirmed infections; 574,350 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
May 13, 2021 – 1,602,100 confirmed infections; 54,970 deaths
April 29, 2021 – 1,578,500 confirmed infections; 54,290 deaths
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues
Herd immunity” is achieved when a large enough portion of a community becomes immune to a disease (either through natural infection or vaccination) that there’s nowhere left for the virus to spread. There may still be small outbreaks, but they would be contained. (That’s different than eradicating the disease altogether, which has only ever been done twice in global history, with smallpox and rinderpest, a bovine disease that decimated southern Africa’s cattle from 1896 through 1899.) So, is coronavirus here to stay? What to know…***
India, already reeling from Covid shows signs of yet more trauma, this time a deadly fungus:
A rare black fungus that invades the brain is being increasingly seen in vulnerable patients in India, including those with Covid-19, as the health system continues to struggle in the midst of the pandemic.Read “What is the deadly ‘black fungus’ seen in Covid patients in India?” >>
…The fungus, called mucormycosis, “is very serious, has a high mortality, and you need surgery and lots of drugs to get on top of it once it takes hold”, said Prof Peter Collignon, who sits on the World Health Organization’s expert committee on antibiotic resistance and infectious diseases.
The disease is caused by a group of moulds, called mucormycetes, that live throughout the environment including in soil and on plants. Mucormycosis is seen throughout the world, including in the US and Australia. It can be acquired in hospitals – most commonly by vulnerable transplant patients – when the moulds get on hospital linens, travel through ventilation systems, or are transmitted on adhesives.
“They’re a family of fungus that gets into your sinuses and deposit there, and they can get into the air spaces in your head,” Collignon said.
***
The glory of humor in dire times: an interview with Gary Trudeau of the cartoon, Doonesbury (4:17 mins) The Lincoln Project:
- Whaaat? On oldie but goodie? McConnell denounces Trump (1;21 mins)
- Stefanik (1:21 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
Guardian News series on our disappearing glaciers- Melting ice reveals first world war relics in Italian Alps. Accelerating retreat of glaciers in Lombardy and Trentino Alto-Aldige reveals preserved history of ‘White War’
- Glacial lakes threaten millions with flooding as planet heats up
- Receding glaciers causing rivers to suddenly disappear. Global phenomenon known as river piracy demands urgent adaptation from ecosystems and people who rely on their flow
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
If only I could chill! I hoped that pressure of trying to sell my mother’s house would diminish after we/I took it off the market for the interim. Alas, it turns out cultural norms in this country still have the power to reduce me to a quivering mass of anger.Preface to what I’m about to relate: After living in California for about a decade, I returned to college to earn under- and graduate degrees. By then, I’d experienced many bouts of culture shock and, paying attention to what I’d learned, I wrote my undergraduate thesis on that topic. I worked on graduate level studies of cultural shock as an adult learning experience. It was a wonderful, fascinating and very enlightening course of study that continues to serve me every day of my life …
But “knowing” what one is experiences only helps reduce – not extinguish – the negative sides of an experience.
I’ve complained about South African small businesspeople not showing up anywhere near the agreed upon day, and/or not showing up at all. I remind myself that, after decades in the US, I’ve taken on that culture’s view of time: linear, with a definitive beginning and end, and limited in supply. Working as a project manager made me especially attuned to “on time and on budget” focus on milestones and deadlines…
The US can be described as a monochronic culture that values orderliness and agrees that there’s appropriate time and place for everything. Most Americans hold the belief that “time is money” and do not value interruptions.
South Africa, I realize, is a polychronic culture that perceives time as cyclical and endless, a go with the “flow” attitude in which time-based schedule are followed loosely – if at all - and changes or interruptions are viewed as a normal part of the routine.
Here, it’s known as “African time” – and, if I don’t catch myself, it drives me crazy. That’s when I remind myself: “only 2 more weeks”… then I’m back to California, my family, my houseboat, and summer….
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 10: sunrise 6:33am; sunset 5:17pm.
May 13: sunrise 6:35am; sunset 5:15pm.
As I prepare to return to California, I’m hypersensitive to the reality of contracting Covid-19. For more than a year, I’ve hunkered down, worn a mask, kept my distance from other humans, and, luckily, not contracted the potentially fatal malady. I’m highly motivated to remain coronavirus-free.
I’ve complained about South African small businesspeople not showing up anywhere near the agreed upon day, and/or not showing up at all. I remind myself that, after decades in the US, I’ve taken on that culture’s view of time: linear, with a definitive beginning and end, and limited in supply. Working as a project manager made me especially attuned to “on time and on budget” focus on milestones and deadlines…
The US can be described as a monochronic culture that values orderliness and agrees that there’s appropriate time and place for everything. Most Americans hold the belief that “time is money” and do not value interruptions.
South Africa, I realize, is a polychronic culture that perceives time as cyclical and endless, a go with the “flow” attitude in which time-based schedule are followed loosely – if at all - and changes or interruptions are viewed as a normal part of the routine.
Here, it’s known as “African time” – and, if I don’t catch myself, it drives me crazy. That’s when I remind myself: “only 2 more weeks”… then I’m back to California, my family, my houseboat, and summer….
***
Getting darker here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 10: sunrise 6:33am; sunset 5:17pm.
May 13: sunrise 6:35am; sunset 5:15pm.
Day 410 Monday, May 10 - What if?
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| © Counterpoint.com |
What if that’s not enough?
What if, after purchasing my tickets and various travel insurance policies, my pre-flight Covid test signals I’m positive for the virus?
What if I’m forced to remain here?
What if I’m forced to remain here?
Hmmm, best to work at keeping a level head…
Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday said he has “no doubt” that the number of Americans killed by COVID-19 is much higher than what has been officially reported, after a recent study counted nearly double the amount recorded by federal health officials.
It’s estimated up to 900,000 Americans have dies from Covid as “Public health experts agree that official COVID-19 death tolls are undercounts, but there is disagreement over how high the actual tolls are.”
News blues
United States:Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday said he has “no doubt” that the number of Americans killed by COVID-19 is much higher than what has been officially reported, after a recent study counted nearly double the amount recorded by federal health officials.
It’s estimated up to 900,000 Americans have dies from Covid as “Public health experts agree that official COVID-19 death tolls are undercounts, but there is disagreement over how high the actual tolls are.”
***
Africa: Africa has suffered about three million COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic—at least officially. The continent’s comparatively low number of reported cases has puzzled scientists and prompted many theories about its exceptionalism, from its young population to its countries’ rapid and aggressive lockdowns.Statistics from around the world concur. View a chart mapping excess deaths and track cases.
But numerous seroprevalence surveys, which use blood tests to identify whether people have antibodies from prior infection with the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), point to a significant underestimation of African countries’ COVID burden. Undercounting could increase the risk of the disease spreading widely, hinder vaccine rollout and uptake, and ultimately threaten global efforts to control the pandemic, experts warn. Wherever the virus is circulating—especially in regions with little access to vaccines—new mutations are likely to arise, and it is crucial to identify them quickly.
As covid-19 has spread around the world, people have become grimly familiar with the death tolls that their governments publish each day. Unfortunately, the total number of fatalities caused by the pandemic may be even higher, for several reasons. First, the official statistics in many countries exclude victims who did not test positive for coronavirus before dying—which can be a substantial majority in places with little capacity for testing. Second, hospitals and civil registries may not process death certificates for several days, or even weeks, which creates lags in the data. And third, the pandemic has made it harder for doctors to treat other conditions and discouraged people from going to hospital, which may have indirectly caused an increase in fatalities from diseases other than covid-19.Further tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
To reiterate what most humans know but cannot figure out how, collectively, to address: fossil fuels, cattle and rotting waste produce greenhouse gas responsible for 30% of global heatingSlashing methane emissions is vital to tackling the climate crisis and rapidly curbing the extreme weather already hitting people across the world today, according to a new UN report…that found that methane emissions could be almost halved by 2030 using existing technology and at reasonable cost. A significant proportion of the actions would actually make money, such as capturing methane gas leaks at fossil fuel sites.Read “Cutting methane emissions is quickest way to slow global heating – UN report” >>
***
A reminder: “The explosive growth of the human population—from 2.5 billion to 6 billion since the second half of the 20th century—may have already started changing how infectious diseases emerge” Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I began my birthday – Saturday - paying more attention to the garden at my mother’s house. Since taking the house off the market, my enthusiasm for gardening has returned and I weeded, cleared, and sorted through piles of discarded wood, most of which is recyclable.After that, I visited my mother at the Care Center (tight lockdown reigns again and I needed prior permission to visit). She was tired and, after dropping asleep twice in ten minutes, I let her catch up on her sleep.
I returned to my own place and continued trimming the overgrown hedge. My initial plan had been to purchase an electric hedge trimmer and carve animal shapes into the hedge. Indeed, I started with a bison, or a wildebeest, depending on one’s perspective, then, put aside my hedge aspirations as more pressing tasks demanded attention. I returned to hedge clipping after a contract gardener failed to show up. Hedge clipping, particularly for a hedge with branches reaching above the roof line, is hard work. I divided the work over two days. It’s finished, now, though the hedge has the semi-bald, chopped look of a child’s doll after the child discovers scissors and haircuts.
I returned to my own place and continued trimming the overgrown hedge. My initial plan had been to purchase an electric hedge trimmer and carve animal shapes into the hedge. Indeed, I started with a bison, or a wildebeest, depending on one’s perspective, then, put aside my hedge aspirations as more pressing tasks demanded attention. I returned to hedge clipping after a contract gardener failed to show up. Hedge clipping, particularly for a hedge with branches reaching above the roof line, is hard work. I divided the work over two days. It’s finished, now, though the hedge has the semi-bald, chopped look of a child’s doll after the child discovers scissors and haircuts.
Ah well, a gal does her best….
Red red wine, Bob Marley version (5:30 mins)
Hmmm, best not to overthink….
Meantime, days are sunny, bright, and warm. Nights? Not so much. Late fall means shorter days and less sunlight…
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 10: sunrise 6:33am; sunset 5:17pm.
Week 58
Worldwide (Map)
May 6, 2021 – 154,775,000,0xx confirmed infections; 3,237,590 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 56,188,000 confirmed infections; 1,348,600 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 41,150,000 confirmed infections; 1,130.410 deaths
US (Map)
May 6, 2021 – 32,557,300,xx confirmed infections; 579,300 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 11,525,600 confirmed infections; 250,485 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 8,333,595 confirmed infections; 222,100 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
May 6, 2021 – 1,588,225 confirmed infections; 54,560 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 757,145 confirmed infections; 20,556 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 708,360 confirmed infections; 18,750 deaths
Tracking Covid-19:
Likely a juvenile, its eyes and jaw appeared a lighter shade of green. Google suggested it was a Common Green Snake.
I’ve seen far fewer snakes in the Midlands than I saw when I grew up in Valley of 1000 Hills of KwaZulu Natal. There, one regularly – daily? - spotted large, venomous snakes – puff- and night-adders, boomslang, mambas, ringhals (spitting cobra) along with occasional non-venomous mole and grass snakes.
Five years, off and on, in the Midlands, and I’ve seen six snakes: two gorgeous rhombic night adders, two green snakes (likely Common Green Snakes), and two Common Brown River Snakes. (Does “common” refer to the shade of brown, the shade of the river, the frequency of the snake, all the above? LOL!)
I’ve been gone so long from California that I had not realized Google provides photos and descriptions of TJ items! (TJ’s website is not half as nourishing as Google-searching for items.)
Most of the plastic in our oceans comes from land-based sources: by weight, 70 percent to 80 percent is plastic that is transported from land to the sea via rivers or coastlines. The other 20 percent to 30 percent comes from marine sources such as fishing nets, lines, ropes, and abandoned vessels.
The Ocean Cleanup Project’s beautiful interactive map encourages you to explore plastic inputs from each of the world’s rivers.
Very interesting data. Most interesting to me? Given its consumer-orientation, the US and US rivers are, by far, not emitters of plastics via rivers.
Listen to oldies on this happy topic:
***
A SA postal service story: a Christmas card arrived for my mother. Posted in England well before Christmas, 2020 it arrived 6 May, 2021.
***
This year, my solitary birthday was one-of-a-kind. Sunlight poured the French doors into the living room/kitchen (shut tight to prevent dogs from entering and begging). As I cooked a delicious meal, I sipped a claret wine (similar to a cabernet) and, by lunch, I was nicely buzzed. (A glassful does it: I’m not much of a wine drinker.) A wine buzz is conducive to reviewing the past year and I concluded 2020/2021 has been a “learning experience par excellence.”Red red wine, Bob Marley version (5:30 mins)
***
I found a small gecko among my blankets as I made my bed. I tossed a sock over him/her/it and, as I laid the creature on the windowsill, wondered, first, how it become entangled in my blankets and, second, if a gecko can find its way into my bed, could a snake do so, too?Hmmm, best not to overthink….
Meantime, days are sunny, bright, and warm. Nights? Not so much. Late fall means shorter days and less sunlight…
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 10: sunrise 6:33am; sunset 5:17pm.
Week 58
Day 406 Thursday, May 6 - Choices
Worldwide (Map) May 6, 2021 – 154,775,000,0xx confirmed infections; 3,237,590 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 56,188,000 confirmed infections; 1,348,600 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 41,150,000 confirmed infections; 1,130.410 deaths
US (Map)
May 6, 2021 – 32,557,300,xx confirmed infections; 579,300 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 11,525,600 confirmed infections; 250,485 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 8,333,595 confirmed infections; 222,100 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
May 6, 2021 – 1,588,225 confirmed infections; 54,560 deaths
November 19, 2020 – 757,145 confirmed infections; 20,556 deaths
October 22, 2020 – 708,360 confirmed infections; 18,750 deaths
Tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
News blues
Over the past six months, a battle has been brewing over intellectual property and patents on vaccines. Some – many US Congress people included, who receive corporate political donations from pharmaceutical companies – find the idea of sharing human ingenuity during a pandemic anathema and refuse to back the trend. Others, including US President Biden – back the suggestion to share patents.India and South Africa were the leading voices in a group of about 60 countries which for the last six months has been trying to get the patents on vaccines set aside. However, they met with strong opposition from the previous US administration of Donald Trump, the UK and the EU.Let’s hear a giant cheer for sharing….
… Biden, has taken a different tack… backed a waiver during the 2020 presidential campaign and reiterated his support on Wednesday. The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) called the move a "monumental moment" in the fight against Covid-19….”
Local news blues
The post back on January 10, 2021 – Covid closes in - mentioned two cases of Covid-19 infection in the Care Center where my mother resides. Details of patients were confidential, but the grapevine reported both patients recovered.
During my visit last Monday, my mother complained that Center caregivers wear masks and that she, my mother, cannot hear what they’re saying. (Ironic, as even with my ear an inch from my mother’s mouth, I cannot hear what she is saying….) I explained to her, again, the need for masks, updated her on the pandemic’s effects upon India, and reminded her that even the carefully monitored Center had experienced two infections.
The resident sitting in the Laz-i-boy next to my mother overheard my explanation (through my own mask) and said, “I was one of the residents infected!”
About 70-years-old, a recent amputee, and suffering skin cancer on his bald scalp – he described that experience: no sense of smell; no interest in food – “tasted horribly salty or horribly sugary”; unable to breath without additional oxygen; painful lungs; general malaise.
He’s the first person I’ve met with firsthand experience.
Alas, not only is it Mother’s Day, it’s also my birthday. Moreover, I’ve yet to share my travel plans with my mother – or that my brother was admitted to hospital.
I’m highly motivated to pass my pre-flight Covid test and return to California. I have no intention of exposing myself to an infection that could, potentially, keep me here.
Thank the gods Care Center staff accept and play WhatsApp audio messages to residents. I frequently communicate with my mother via WhatsApp – and will continue to do so in California. Nevertheless, it feels ‘cold’ to inform her via audio message that 1) her beloved son is in hospital, and 2) that I plan to board 3 planes – in Pietermaritzburg, Johannesburg, and Heathrow – and skedaddle back to California.
I’ve requested permission to visit my mother on my birthday and, weather permitting, take her for a wheelchair ride. Depending on how she’s doing, I will break the news to her in person.
Never have I more looked forward to shots!
During my visit last Monday, my mother complained that Center caregivers wear masks and that she, my mother, cannot hear what they’re saying. (Ironic, as even with my ear an inch from my mother’s mouth, I cannot hear what she is saying….) I explained to her, again, the need for masks, updated her on the pandemic’s effects upon India, and reminded her that even the carefully monitored Center had experienced two infections.
The resident sitting in the Laz-i-boy next to my mother overheard my explanation (through my own mask) and said, “I was one of the residents infected!”
About 70-years-old, a recent amputee, and suffering skin cancer on his bald scalp – he described that experience: no sense of smell; no interest in food – “tasted horribly salty or horribly sugary”; unable to breath without additional oxygen; painful lungs; general malaise.
He’s the first person I’ve met with firsthand experience.
***
On May 4, I received an email from the Care Center with the following excerpts:
As of last week, our staff began receiving COVID Vaccinations… and will continue to do so until all are vaccinated.The email goes on to describe the tighter restrictions.
Yesterday, however, one of our clinic Sisters tested positive. She’s been sick since Saturday and is isolated at home. While not a Care Centre staff member, she interacts with our staff and some residents and her office is located in the Care Centre.
Two Care Centre residents who recently visited with family members – and those family members – also tested positive. Both residents will isolate for the next days, both are doing well, and neither shows symptoms.
Random COVID tests are regularly conducted in the Care Centre and we are happy to advise that there are no positive cases at this time.
This Sunday is Mother’s Day. If you wish to see your Mom please phone to make an appointment or to advise if you plan to take her out.
Due to recent exposures… we must return to strict lockdown until May 12, 2021…
Alas, not only is it Mother’s Day, it’s also my birthday. Moreover, I’ve yet to share my travel plans with my mother – or that my brother was admitted to hospital.
I’m highly motivated to pass my pre-flight Covid test and return to California. I have no intention of exposing myself to an infection that could, potentially, keep me here.
Thank the gods Care Center staff accept and play WhatsApp audio messages to residents. I frequently communicate with my mother via WhatsApp – and will continue to do so in California. Nevertheless, it feels ‘cold’ to inform her via audio message that 1) her beloved son is in hospital, and 2) that I plan to board 3 planes – in Pietermaritzburg, Johannesburg, and Heathrow – and skedaddle back to California.
I’ve requested permission to visit my mother on my birthday and, weather permitting, take her for a wheelchair ride. Depending on how she’s doing, I will break the news to her in person.
***
If all goes well, on May 11, I will make an online appointment at any of several clinics in the San Francisco Bay Area to receive the first of two free Pfizer “shots” (vaccinations). After the initial shot, onsite clinicians will make an appointment for my second shot 3 weeks later. Never have I more looked forward to shots!
***
The Lincoln Project: Swamp Thing (0:56 mins)
Lincoln Project Town Hall – Republican Party (1:20 mins)
I head the domestic worker shriek, “Inyoka!”
Snake!
I grabbed my cellphone camera and dashed upstairs where a lovely, slender, 12-to-14-inch bright green snake coiled in the passageway.
Lincoln Project Town Hall – Republican Party (1:20 mins)
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Autumn/fall days are here: cooler evenings and nights and warm sunlit days with a tendency toward chilly in the shade. This is a glorious time of year in the Midlands. Snakes like it too.I head the domestic worker shriek, “Inyoka!”
Snake!
I grabbed my cellphone camera and dashed upstairs where a lovely, slender, 12-to-14-inch bright green snake coiled in the passageway.
I’ve seen far fewer snakes in the Midlands than I saw when I grew up in Valley of 1000 Hills of KwaZulu Natal. There, one regularly – daily? - spotted large, venomous snakes – puff- and night-adders, boomslang, mambas, ringhals (spitting cobra) along with occasional non-venomous mole and grass snakes.
Five years, off and on, in the Midlands, and I’ve seen six snakes: two gorgeous rhombic night adders, two green snakes (likely Common Green Snakes), and two Common Brown River Snakes. (Does “common” refer to the shade of brown, the shade of the river, the frequency of the snake, all the above? LOL!)
According to herpetologists, snakes are viewed more frequently during autumn as they seek shelter for their winter hibernation.
The decision is a huge weight lifted from my shoulders. The stress, uncertainty, and anger I’ve experienced for months is disappearing. Moreover, I’m enjoying working in the garden again, feel creative, generous with my time and energy. I’m once more nourished by pruning, weeding, transplanting, and imagining what may unexpectedly sprout in the garden after winter.
I depart for California in 25 days… with yet many more “Miles to go before I sleep…”. My mojo is back….
At first, we argued about how each of us wanted me to format the grocery list. He wanted a straight Word-formatted list. My preference had been to create a fancy, bells and whistles list that, as I worked on it, allowed me to imagine the look, feel, and taste of foods I’ve missed for more than 485 days.
***
In consultation with my mother, we agreed that seven months trying to sell this house with little success, we’d take it off the market for now. The decision is a huge weight lifted from my shoulders. The stress, uncertainty, and anger I’ve experienced for months is disappearing. Moreover, I’m enjoying working in the garden again, feel creative, generous with my time and energy. I’m once more nourished by pruning, weeding, transplanting, and imagining what may unexpectedly sprout in the garden after winter.
I depart for California in 25 days… with yet many more “Miles to go before I sleep…”. My mojo is back….
***
Since purchasing return tickets, my California friend and I regularly discuss a list of food items he will purchase from Trader Joe’s and deposit in my vehicle when I return to my houseboat. (Monday’s post outlines safety protocols he insists upon before allowing me near him or his home .) At first, we argued about how each of us wanted me to format the grocery list. He wanted a straight Word-formatted list. My preference had been to create a fancy, bells and whistles list that, as I worked on it, allowed me to imagine the look, feel, and taste of foods I’ve missed for more than 485 days.
First on that list?
Laceys Cookies Dark Chocolate Almond
 |
| (c) Trader Joe's Laceys Cookies Dark Chocolate Almond. Food porn! Yum! Thank you, Google! |
I’ve been gone so long from California that I had not realized Google provides photos and descriptions of TJ items! (TJ’s website is not half as nourishing as Google-searching for items.)
Since that discovery, no more arguing over formatting of my grocery list. He’ll get explicit photos to guide him and I have the satisfaction of food porn until I’m driving the real thing to my houseboat.
(FYI for readers unfamiliar with the US and its hype-consumerism. American shoppers have multiple brands and multiple versions of most food items: multiple choices of dairy, for example, from full fat, low fat, non-fat, even non-dairy. Multiple diets: “junk”, healthy, meat eater, veggie, vegan, non-GMO, non-dairy, etc.
In America, shopping for groceries requires full attention, total concentration, scrutinizing of labels, scratching, sniffing… and buying, usually constrained not by actual need but by how much money one can afford to spend.
Freedom. Ain’t it great? (Confusing, too. I’ve heard shagging-dog stories about people from other countries being overwhelmed by the stress of such variety choice – and high-tailing it “back home”….)
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 6: sunrise 6:30am; sunset 5:20pm.
(FYI for readers unfamiliar with the US and its hype-consumerism. American shoppers have multiple brands and multiple versions of most food items: multiple choices of dairy, for example, from full fat, low fat, non-fat, even non-dairy. Multiple diets: “junk”, healthy, meat eater, veggie, vegan, non-GMO, non-dairy, etc.
In America, shopping for groceries requires full attention, total concentration, scrutinizing of labels, scratching, sniffing… and buying, usually constrained not by actual need but by how much money one can afford to spend.
Freedom. Ain’t it great? (Confusing, too. I’ve heard shagging-dog stories about people from other countries being overwhelmed by the stress of such variety choice – and high-tailing it “back home”….)
***
Getting darker here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
May 6: sunrise 6:30am; sunset 5:20pm.
Day 403 Monday, May 3 - Fly me to SFO...
News blues
First batch of Pfizer vaccine arrives in South Africa***
Tracking Covid-19:- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
Recent political ad from MeidasTouch: Voices (1:15 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
 |
| © Our World in Data |
…higher-resolution modeling of global riverine plastics… found that rivers emitted around 1 million tonnes of plastics into the oceans in 2015 (with an uncertainty ranging from 0.8 to 2.7 million tonnes). Around one-third of the 100,000 river outlets that they modeled contributed to this. The other two-thirds emitted almost no plastic to the ocean. It’s an important point because we might think that most, if not all, rivers are contributing to the problem. This is not the case.Read “Where does the plastics in our oceans come from?” >>
But, importantly, the latest research suggests that smaller rivers play a much larger role than previously thought. In this chart
(c) Meijer et al
we see the comparison of the latest research (in red) with the two earlier studies which mapped global riverine inputs. This chart shows how many of the top-emitting rivers (on the x-axis) make up a given percentage of plastic inputs (y-axis). Note that the number of rivers on the x-axis is given on a logarithmic scale.
… the latest research suggests that the top ten emitting rivers contribute a much smaller amount than previously thought: just 18% of plastics compared to 56% and 91% from previous studies. And to account for 80% of river plastics we need to include the top 1,656 rivers. This compares to previous studies which suggested the largest five or 162 rivers were responsible for 80%.
This makes a massive difference to how we tackle plastic pollution. If five rivers were responsible for most of the problem then we should focus the majority of our efforts there. A targeted approach. But if this comprises thousands of rivers we’re going to need to cast a much wider net of mitigation efforts.
The Ocean Cleanup Project’s beautiful interactive map encourages you to explore plastic inputs from each of the world’s rivers.
Very interesting data. Most interesting to me? Given its consumer-orientation, the US and US rivers are, by far, not emitters of plastics via rivers.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I did it! I booked tickets to return to San Francisco Bay Area. I’m going home!Listen to oldies on this happy topic:
- Going mobile (3:36 mins)
- I got a ticket to ride (3 2:55 mins)
- Coming into Los Angeles (3:03 mins)
- Fly like an eagle (3:15 mins)
- I believe I can fly (5:30 mins)
- Learning to fly (4:22 mins)
Head to my daughter’s place to hole up for the night. Next day, go for the first appointment of two for the Pfizer vaccinations. My daughter will make the appointment for me before I arrive.
After that, still wearing face shield and mask, I'll head to the BART train station nearest the friend who has kept my vehicle in good shape during my absence.
Among the first to have received the two-step Pfizer vaccination, this friend has made clear that – until I’ve had both vaccinations - I’m not invited to stay in his home. He plans to shop for and place essential groceries in my van and, maintaining needed social distance at the train station, point out the location of my vehicle so I can drive to my houseboat.
This is the reality of political corruption and the results of politicians draining the country’s coffers, particularly SOEs - State-owned Enterprises - of vitally needed funds in a country with 55.75 percent unemployed and largely uneducated youth.
Recent stories of endemic corruption in South Africa: "Millions Out, Billions In (Part One): Businessman Thulani Majola’s investment in ANC and EFF kept everyone sweet "
Even as the Zondo commission warns, “ANC must confront 'painful truths' about its non-response to state capture…” news regularly breaks about of Eskom’s ongoing corruption. I’ve railed about Eskom in this blog. It’s the SOE that regularly imposes “load shedding” – power outages - even as it seeks to raise the cost of electricity. The latest, “Power utility’s R178 000 000 000 dodgy tender tsunami.”
Cry, the beloved country?
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
Related news: Recent numbers in South Africa include 1,674 Covid-19 more infections, for a cumulative total of infections since the start of the pandemic at 1,581,210.
Over the past 24-hours, the tally of deaths in Eastern Cape stands at three, Free State one, Gauteng seven , KwaZulu-Natal four, Limpopo 0, Mpumalanga three, North West 0, Northern Cape 0 and Western Cape one.
The total number of deaths in SA stands at 54,350; recoveries at 1,505,620; number of tests conducted to date, 10,654,870.
Tracking Covid-19:
The Lincoln Project:
After that, still wearing face shield and mask, I'll head to the BART train station nearest the friend who has kept my vehicle in good shape during my absence.
Among the first to have received the two-step Pfizer vaccination, this friend has made clear that – until I’ve had both vaccinations - I’m not invited to stay in his home. He plans to shop for and place essential groceries in my van and, maintaining needed social distance at the train station, point out the location of my vehicle so I can drive to my houseboat.
***
The grim humor of flying commercial in South Africa? Airlines carrying travelers on the short, one hour flight to Johannesburg offer insurance to “Receive a full refund of airfare and taxes if the airline you are flying with is liquidated prior to departure.” This is the reality of political corruption and the results of politicians draining the country’s coffers, particularly SOEs - State-owned Enterprises - of vitally needed funds in a country with 55.75 percent unemployed and largely uneducated youth.
Recent stories of endemic corruption in South Africa: "Millions Out, Billions In (Part One): Businessman Thulani Majola’s investment in ANC and EFF kept everyone sweet "
Even as the Zondo commission warns, “ANC must confront 'painful truths' about its non-response to state capture…” news regularly breaks about of Eskom’s ongoing corruption. I’ve railed about Eskom in this blog. It’s the SOE that regularly imposes “load shedding” – power outages - even as it seeks to raise the cost of electricity. The latest, “Power utility’s R178 000 000 000 dodgy tender tsunami.”
Cry, the beloved country?
***
Longer nights, shorter days.…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
April 25: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
May 3: sunrise 6:29am; sunset 5:22pm.
Day 401, Saturday May 1 - SOS India
News blues
“What’s happening in India is an indication that South Africans can’t become complacent and think that we are going to get natural immunity and be protected."Related news: Recent numbers in South Africa include 1,674 Covid-19 more infections, for a cumulative total of infections since the start of the pandemic at 1,581,210.
Over the past 24-hours, the tally of deaths in Eastern Cape stands at three, Free State one, Gauteng seven , KwaZulu-Natal four, Limpopo 0, Mpumalanga three, North West 0, Northern Cape 0 and Western Cape one.
The total number of deaths in SA stands at 54,350; recoveries at 1,505,620; number of tests conducted to date, 10,654,870.
***
Thirty-nine percent of the US adult population has been fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That’s more than 100 million fully vaccinated Americans. Congrats, America and Americans! Maybe time to share the success and the bounty? The US and other wealthy countries appear hesitatant on this logical conclusion. The BBC’s podcast “How to vaccinate the world.”
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
An excellent view of life in and out of the US from the perspective of an American re-pat… (30:50 mins)The Lincoln Project:
First 100 (0:55 mins)
Florida man (1:35 mins)
Her return flight to California, again through Doha via Johannesburg, also had a group of travelers outfitted in haz mat suits. Judging by what showed of their faces, she determined the travelers were Indian and surmised they were traveling to India. Smart travelers. If haz mat suits are appropriate anywhere, they’re de rigueur for India:
Recover soon, India!
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 18: sunrise 6:19am; sunset 5:36pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
April 29, 2021 – 149,206,600 confirmed infections; 3,146,300 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 64,469,710 confirmed infections; 1,492,100 deaths
US (Map)
April 29, 2021 – 32,229,350 confirmed infections; 574,350 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 13,920,000 confirmed infections; 273,370 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
April 29, 2021 – 1,578,500 confirmed infections; 54,290 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 796,475 confirmed infections; 21,710 deaths
Tracking Covid-19:
Florida man (1:35 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
Peek into our a-mazing planet and its critters: Starlings over Rome – 10 million of ‘em… But… there’s the poop problem…. (5:00 mins)Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
On her flights to South Africa, my daughter had an extensive stopover in Doha, Qatar. (This, to avoid a stopover at Oliver Tambo airport in Johannesburg where her risk of exposure to Covid was, she deemed, greater than it was in Doha.) She reports Doha transited a group of Japanese travelers in the airport outfitted in haz mat suits.Her return flight to California, again through Doha via Johannesburg, also had a group of travelers outfitted in haz mat suits. Judging by what showed of their faces, she determined the travelers were Indian and surmised they were traveling to India. Smart travelers. If haz mat suits are appropriate anywhere, they’re de rigueur for India:
…reporting 379,257 new cases on Thursday, a new global record and 3,645 deaths, the highest number of Covid-19 deaths the country has reported in a single day…. The University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluations suggests the death toll could peak at more than 13,000 a day - more than four times the current daily death toll.Be safe, travelers! (Countries around the world are banning flights coming from India and/or changing travel rules and regulations to become more stringent for Indian travelers everywhere.)
Recover soon, India!
***
Temperatures here in KZN dropped over the last few days and its getting darker and darker…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 18: sunrise 6:19am; sunset 5:36pm.
May 1: sunrise 6:27am; sunset 5:24pm.
Week 57 - Day 399 Thursday, April 29 - Consequences
Worldwide (Map)April 29, 2021 – 149,206,600 confirmed infections; 3,146,300 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 64,469,710 confirmed infections; 1,492,100 deaths
US (Map)
April 29, 2021 – 32,229,350 confirmed infections; 574,350 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 13,920,000 confirmed infections; 273,370 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
April 29, 2021 – 1,578,500 confirmed infections; 54,290 deaths
December 3, 2020 – 796,475 confirmed infections; 21,710 deaths
Tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues
India: “We are facing very bad times, very bad times….” (2:00 mins).India’s overall rate of infection is lower than the US but the US – crazy politics and all - is, at last, getting a handle on the pandemic. India is not, at least not yet. Scenes in video above give a sense of how bad things can get when a pandemic has the upper hand ….
The people paying attention know that coronavirus is a symptom of an over-stressed planet out of whack. The chamber of horrors in which India finds itself was not caused by any one man, or any single government. It’s a symptom of prevailing worldviews – and “What Happens When Rich People Do Nothing.” (I suggest an edit to this article’s title: “…when rich and/or clueless and/or feckless people do nothing…”
His Party (3:00 mins)
McCarthy (0:45 mins)
My research suggests that dumping toxics, by design or carelessness, has become a feature of “doing business” in our world. Various branches of the US government and business appear to act upon the aphorism “outta sight, outta mind.” Take the sampling up and down the California coast, for a regional example: Dumping and/or dispersing of toxic substances is a feature of American life. Nevertheless, it’s still shocking to learn that the Environmental Protection Agency, the US department tasked with protecting the environment is so, well, lax.
I’ve written much on this blog about the damage caused by toxics. For postings, see:
Sometimes I’m tempted to believe we humans have despoiled out planet beyond the possibility of cleanup. But I cannot afford, emotionally, psychologically, sor piritually to hold onto that belief.
We must clean up our only home.
Knowledge is power. It begins with you.
Seventy-two hours before her departure, she complied with her pre-flight Covid test. After that, we mulled how to spend her final days. This, after she’d driven the Chana bakkie to a local recycling plant where we recycled piles of various gauge electrical cable. (Driving is a thrill for her: on the “wrong side of the road,” and “steering wheel on the wrong side of the vehicle,” and “Huh, I’m not used to driving a manual transmission….”
As a passenger, I’m terrified: IMHO, too few thoughtful drivers in this country.)
After mulling a visit to Pietermaritzburg’s botanical gardens, we settled, instead, on driving towards the Drakensberg, to the village of Underberg. (I’d hoped we’d have had enough time together actually to spend a night at one of the many Drakensberg hotels or B&Bs. Alas, we simply ran out of time. Too many trips to scrap yards and recycling centers?)
The restaurant I’d visited once in the past, was hosting a private party so we sought another place. Slim pickings. We drove beyond Underberg to The Olde Duck, sat at an outdoor table under a willow tree, and enjoyed the view of the “’berg” on a perfect fall/autumn day.
We also visited the botanical gardens on the public holiday known as Freedom Day – a day to celebrate and contemplate election day 1994, the first time many – the majority? – of South Africans had the freedom to vote in an election. (That election resulted in Nelson Mandela becoming the first African elected as president in South Africa.)
The day my daughter departed South Africa, an audio message was sent to the community from a local security company reporting a hold up of a vehicle transporting at least 31 prisoners.
The message urged caution and described an incident that had occurred approximately 8 miles away from our town. Apparently, five men holding AK47s had stopped the prisoner transport vehicle, picked out and armed with AK 47s, had attacked a prison vehicle transporting a group of prisoners, and left the remaining prisoners to fend for themselves. Most had taken advantage of the situation and escaped the vehicle and were on the run.
By the time I returned from Shaka International Airport – about six hours after the prison break – six prisoners had turned themselves into police custody. Never a dull moment in KZN!
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 29: sunrise 6:26am; sunset 5:26pm.
Trying too hard, UK retailer Marks & Spencer’s “do good for the environment” effort backfires. Turns out, releasing 30 million honeybees into the British countryside is not helpful to the environment – more likely, this effort “could damage ecosystems and deprive wild pollinators of valuable food sources.”
After that, breakfast at the Yellow Wood Café. The café, one of my favorite local historic sites, was hand built from local stone and reminds me of my childhood in a similar era building. My mother’s old place, largely hand built in local stone by my grandfather, was torn down to make room for industry.
A screen shot blurb for the Yellow wood Café website:
An information structure near the foot of the observation platform displays a poster titled “Howick Facts and Figures.”
"I'm afraid this is not the peak," said Dr. Giridhara R. Babu of the Public Health Foundation of India on Monday. "The kind of data that we see, (we are) at least two to three weeks away from the peak."Moreover, India is the world’s largest vaccine producer and, that it is struggling to overcome its latest COVID-19 surge is everyone’s problem. “Ninety-two developing nations rely on India, home to the Serum Institute, the world’s largest vaccine maker, for the doses to protect their own populations, a supply now constrained by India’s domestic obligations.”
Others say India may be approaching the peak now, sooner than Babu's estimate -- but with so many ill and so few supplies available, the country will see many more deaths before the second wave subsides.
The people paying attention know that coronavirus is a symptom of an over-stressed planet out of whack. The chamber of horrors in which India finds itself was not caused by any one man, or any single government. It’s a symptom of prevailing worldviews – and “What Happens When Rich People Do Nothing.” (I suggest an edit to this article’s title: “…when rich and/or clueless and/or feckless people do nothing…”
***
Meanwhile, over the last week, California has reported an average of 1,901 new cases per day, a 34 percent decrease from two weeks ago…. ***
By Wednesday, South Africa recorded 849 Covid-19 new cases in 24-hours with a cumulative total of 1,576,320.
Deaths, broken down by province: Eastern Cape five, Free State five, Gauteng three, KwaZulu-Natal one, Limpopo five, Mpumalanga 0, North West 0, Northern Cape two and Western Cape 17, bringing the total number of deaths since the star of the pandemic in the country to 54,186.
***
The Lincoln Project’s latest ads remind the public of the recent past:His Party (3:00 mins)
McCarthy (0:45 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
I am a longtime member on a Restoration Advisory Board that encourages local residents to overview the cleanup of toxic chemicals from the superfund site that is the former Naval Air Station, Alameda. As such, I’ve become aware of the volume of residual chemicals that the US Department of the Navy dumped on the 2,000-plus acres of landfill on the edges of the City of Alameda, California.My research suggests that dumping toxics, by design or carelessness, has become a feature of “doing business” in our world. Various branches of the US government and business appear to act upon the aphorism “outta sight, outta mind.” Take the sampling up and down the California coast, for a regional example: Dumping and/or dispersing of toxic substances is a feature of American life. Nevertheless, it’s still shocking to learn that the Environmental Protection Agency, the US department tasked with protecting the environment is so, well, lax.
Starting in 1973, the EPA issued chemical giants permits to discard thousands of drums of industrial chemical waste at the offshore site. The pollutants included chlorinated hydrocarbons, or CHCs, a family of toxic chemicals that can persist in the environment and become concentrated in marine organisms, potentially migrating up the food chain and posing a risk to human health. In the decades since, oil companies have built up a vast network of wells and seafloor pipelines in the same portion of the Gulf. The area’s largest producer is Shell Offshore Inc., a subsidiary of oil giant Royal Dutch Shell, which operates three platform rigs and three drillships in what’s known as the Mars-Ursa oil basin. Shell also happens to be one of the companies that received permits from the EPA to dump huge quantities of industrial chemical waste in the Gulf in the 1970s, albeit at a different location.Read more >>
I’ve written much on this blog about the damage caused by toxics. For postings, see:
- It’s “perfectly safe; it just kills plants”
- “Goodbye guineafowl, hello truck stop”
- “BP’s Hayward…”
- More on BP’s “responsive” and “responsible” ways
- Hate to say it … but “told you so”
- Play ball! ...on a radioactive site. Or, denial is a river in Egypt [on site at Naval Air Station, Alameda]
- Deep costs of war trauma
Sometimes I’m tempted to believe we humans have despoiled out planet beyond the possibility of cleanup. But I cannot afford, emotionally, psychologically, sor piritually to hold onto that belief.
We must clean up our only home.
Knowledge is power. It begins with you.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
My daughter is on her way back to California. Boo hoo! I already miss her. We enjoyed our two weeks together.Seventy-two hours before her departure, she complied with her pre-flight Covid test. After that, we mulled how to spend her final days. This, after she’d driven the Chana bakkie to a local recycling plant where we recycled piles of various gauge electrical cable. (Driving is a thrill for her: on the “wrong side of the road,” and “steering wheel on the wrong side of the vehicle,” and “Huh, I’m not used to driving a manual transmission….”
As a passenger, I’m terrified: IMHO, too few thoughtful drivers in this country.)
After mulling a visit to Pietermaritzburg’s botanical gardens, we settled, instead, on driving towards the Drakensberg, to the village of Underberg. (I’d hoped we’d have had enough time together actually to spend a night at one of the many Drakensberg hotels or B&Bs. Alas, we simply ran out of time. Too many trips to scrap yards and recycling centers?)
The restaurant I’d visited once in the past, was hosting a private party so we sought another place. Slim pickings. We drove beyond Underberg to The Olde Duck, sat at an outdoor table under a willow tree, and enjoyed the view of the “’berg” on a perfect fall/autumn day.
We also visited the botanical gardens on the public holiday known as Freedom Day – a day to celebrate and contemplate election day 1994, the first time many – the majority? – of South Africans had the freedom to vote in an election. (That election resulted in Nelson Mandela becoming the first African elected as president in South Africa.)
The day my daughter departed South Africa, an audio message was sent to the community from a local security company reporting a hold up of a vehicle transporting at least 31 prisoners.
The message urged caution and described an incident that had occurred approximately 8 miles away from our town. Apparently, five men holding AK47s had stopped the prisoner transport vehicle, picked out and armed with AK 47s, had attacked a prison vehicle transporting a group of prisoners, and left the remaining prisoners to fend for themselves. Most had taken advantage of the situation and escaped the vehicle and were on the run.
By the time I returned from Shaka International Airport – about six hours after the prison break – six prisoners had turned themselves into police custody. Never a dull moment in KZN!
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Long nights, shorter days here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 29: sunrise 6:26am; sunset 5:26pm.
Day 396 Monday, April 26 - Vaccine realities
News blues
Dr Fauci on where things are vis-Ã -vis vaccine, vaccination programs, booster shots. (From an American perspective but globally applicable. 10:55 mins)***
Good to know: COVID vaccines help produce antibodies ― and trigger another immune response that also fights the virus.
Much of the research regarding immunity against COVID-19 (which can be achieved either through vaccination or natural infection) has looked at antibodies. These little fighters go after the coronavirus and prevent it from binding to cells in our body and creating an infection. Some lab studies have found that antibodies don’t do as good of a job fighting variants, which has raised fears that the vaccines might not be able to keep us safe.Read more >>
But antibodies don’t tell the full story. … The immune system is very complex, and in addition to antibodies, there’s a whole other aspect, known as the cell-mediated immune response, that’s just as important…. This part helps create something called T-cells, which are crucial to preventing infections. The COVID-19 vaccines don’t just generate antibodies; they also prompt your immune system to produce T-cells.
“T-cells are the main line of defense against the virus,” said Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease specialist with UCSF. T-cells can identify many different parts of the coronavirus (some studies say up to 52 parts) and get rid of any cells that are carrying the virus. The cell-mediated immune response can also help our systems produce new antibodies if need be.
Mutations or not, T-cells will still be able to detect the virus and jump into action. …
So, why aren’t we all talking about how awesome T-cells are? They’re really hard to measure… [but] findings are exciting.
For one thing, all of the vaccine clinical trials found that participants produced strong T-cell responses after vaccination…
There’s also evidence that the variants probably aren’t going to have a very meaningful effect on the immunity we get from being fully vaccinated. Two recent studies found the T-cell response was unaffected by variants, and another paper found that while some antibodies diminished against variants, our T-cell response held up just fine.
When it comes to COVID-19, a robust T-cell response is the difference between a mild infection and serious disease, research shows. The cells can’t always prevent an infection, but they may be able to clear it out quickly so you don’t get badly sick.
***
Tracking Covid-19:- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
The helping hand strikes again. Or overkill leads to overkill…Trying too hard, UK retailer Marks & Spencer’s “do good for the environment” effort backfires. Turns out, releasing 30 million honeybees into the British countryside is not helpful to the environment – more likely, this effort “could damage ecosystems and deprive wild pollinators of valuable food sources.”
[M&S] placed up to 1,000 beehives on 25 farms to produce single-estate honey for customers as part of its five-year Farming with Nature programme. The bees are in cedar beehives, many made in the 1930s, with plenty of nectar nearby….Read more >>
But the announcement has been met with dismay by some bee experts and conservationists. “Such and [sic] opportunity missed M&S, this is greenwashing or beewashing at its most blatant,” tweeted Gill Perkins, chief executive of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust.
Critics say M&S should focus on restoring native habitats instead of releasing millions of honeybees, which are just one of the nearly 270 bee species in the UK, many of which are in sharp decline. “They are actually ending up doing something that may damage the environment,” said Matt Shardlow, head of the conservation charity Buglife.
***
Then, entirely missing an essential truth of the current pandemic – humans are stressing our planet to extremes, ignoring and disrespecting nature, developing wild spaces, over-developing domestic spaces, forcing human and non-human species into too-close contact - global economies are forecasted to pour stimulus money into fossil fuels as part of Covid recovery.
Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency has warned, the IEA, and one of the world’s leading authorities on energy and climate, warns carbon dioxide emissions are forecast to jump this year by the second biggest annual rise in history…. The leap will be second only to the massive rebound 10 years ago after the financial crisis, and will put climate hopes out of reach unless governments act quickly.Read more >>
Birol said, “This is shocking and very disturbing. On the one hand, governments today are saying climate change is their priority. But on the other hand, we are seeing the second biggest emissions rise in history.”
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
My daughter and I visited the community’s weekly Karkloof Farmers Market, purchased goods – goat cheese and blue cheese for me, locally crafted shoes for her – then sat outside for a cup of rooibos tea. All visitors to the market wore masks.After that, breakfast at the Yellow Wood Café. The café, one of my favorite local historic sites, was hand built from local stone and reminds me of my childhood in a similar era building. My mother’s old place, largely hand built in local stone by my grandfather, was torn down to make room for industry.
A screen shot blurb for the Yellow wood Café website:
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| Wildebeest |
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With the Howick Falls in the background, we watched a wildebeest leap over a fence to graze with the café’s domestic animals – donkeys, Shetland ponies, sheep, and pigs. Howick Falls in the background.
Howick Falls was once a tourist destination of note. Ditto the Howick Falls Hotel and the various historical buildings nearby and across the road. These days, tourist buses seldom appear, tourists are rare, even tourist-centric craftspeople are thin in the ground. The area, generally, presents an atmosphere of desperation and depression.
An information structure near the foot of the observation platform displays a poster titled “Howick Facts and Figures.”
A closeup of the facts and figures, however, lists a litany of deaths and suicides over the years!
Hmmm....
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 22: sunrise 6:22am; sunset 5:32pm.
Additionally, more than a dozen people died when an oxygen-fed fire ripped through a coronavirus ward fire in a hospital intensive care unit and killed 13 COVID-19 patients in the Virar area on the outskirts of Mumbai.
Read the article >>
South Africa plans to begin issuing Johnson & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine to the general public next month after settling a contractual dispute with the U.S. drugmaker.
Joe Biden pledges a drastic reduction in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2030… but no specific targets for agriculture – accounting for 10 percent of all U.S. emissions with discharges mostly stem from fertilizers, livestock and manure.
A Fact Sheet focusing on Biden’s climate pledge…
A dream daughter, she accompanied me to the local scrap metal recycling yard yesterday and, after taking the Covid test required for air travel on Monday, we plan to visit the local landfill site. She’s a chip off ye olde blocke!
Today, we head to the local farmers market …then back home to display on the lawn near the public road items such as planks. Passers by stop and glean what they want from the collection. Such recycling – home grown and localized – is a perfect way of recycling goods too useful for the landfill yet no quite good enough to sell.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 24: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
Worldwide (Map)
April 22, 2021 – 143,503,705 confirmed infections; 3,056,000 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 60,334,000 confirmed infections; 1,420,500 deaths
US (Map)
April 22, 2021 – 31,862,100 confirmed infections; 569,500 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 12,771,000 confirmed infections; 262,145 deaths
SA (Tracker)
April 22, 2021 – 1,568,500 confirmed infections; 53,900 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 775,510 confirmed infections; 21,2010 deaths
Down memory lane with a post from one year ago - April 23, 2020: Try it; what have you got to lose?
Tracking Covid-19:
1. New U.S. emissions target
2. China and the U.S.
3. Brazil
4. Big Money Pledges
5. Intellectual property rights
Read the article >>
The ministry also recorded at least 38 Covid-19 related deaths on Wednesday, bringing the country’s total recorded death toll to 15,098.
There are currently 109,447 Covid-19 patients hospitalized across the county, with 517 cases in ICUs.
Iraq started its Covid-19 vaccine rollout on March 27, with 300,000 people having been vaccinated since — less than 1% of the nation’s total population of 40,150,000.
The Iraqi government eased lockdown restrictions last month, saying the country faced serious economic challenges.
While data from the Health Ministry suggest that over 800 children under age 9 have died of Covid-19, including about 500 babies, experts say the real death toll is higher because cases are underreported because of a lack of widespread coronavirus testing, according to the BBC, which first reported the story.
An Idea Called America (0:55 mins)
Truthless (0:55 mins)
Coming soon… meanwhile, watch the promo clip.
The film can be watched in hundreds of countries via Amazon Prime/Amazon, iTunes and Google Play and is subtitled in 8 languages.
She helps me understand how stressed – and angry – I am these days, and how short is my fuse. (Anger, frustration, and isolation are – I guess – hallmarks of life under Covid for a re-pat (repatriating) with a “troubled” extended family….)
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 22: sunrise 6:22am; sunset 5:32pm.
Tracking Covid-19, however, remains with us:
***
Day by day, dark and darker in the southern hemisphere…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 22: sunrise 6:22am; sunset 5:32pm.
Day 394 Saturday, April 24 - Mixed bag
News blues
India. A disaster’s unfolding in India with 6 million Covid infections - second only to the United States in a country of nearly 1.4 billion people. The country recorded 332,730 new cases on Friday, marking the highest daily case count globally. The United States is second, having recorded a high of 300,310 cases on January 2.Additionally, more than a dozen people died when an oxygen-fed fire ripped through a coronavirus ward fire in a hospital intensive care unit and killed 13 COVID-19 patients in the Virar area on the outskirts of Mumbai.
Read the article >>
***
***
Tracking Covid-19:- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
 |
| © Kal - The Economist |
Joe Biden pledges a drastic reduction in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2030… but no specific targets for agriculture – accounting for 10 percent of all U.S. emissions with discharges mostly stem from fertilizers, livestock and manure.
A Fact Sheet focusing on Biden’s climate pledge…
…notes that agriculture is both a source of greenhouse gases and potentially a key piece of the solution by capturing and storing heat-trapping carbon dioxide in forests and farmland. Environmental advocates … say the White House needs to address both sides of that equation to make a dent in global warming.Read “White House dances around a big contributor to climate change: Agriculture” >>
“It’s difficult to make concrete pledges in terms of using ag as a carbon sink… you can be more concrete around reducing fertilizer use [and] trying to address emissions around these large-scale hog and dairy operations.”
[Yet the] Biden administration is leaning heavily toward awarding financial bonuses for farmers, ranchers and foresters who retool their operations to suck carbon from the atmosphere. The White House blueprint specifically calls for “incentives” to reduce methane and nitrous oxide emissions through new farm practices and technologies.
***
President Cyril Ramaphosa told the delegates of US President Joe Biden’s Leaders Summit on Climate that emissions in South Africa would begin to fall by 2025, rather than peak and plateau that same year, adding that South Africa had introduced new target ranges that were more ambitious than before. “Firstly the top of the 2030 range has been reduced by 28% or 174 million metric tonnes, which is a very significant reduction. Second, according to our previous nationally determined contribution, South Africa’s emissions will peak and plateau in 2025 and decline only from 2035. … South Africa’s emissions will begin to decline from 2025, effectively shifting our emissions decline 10 years earlier.”
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Like me, my daughter eschews tourist-rich spots and heads to shopping malls only under duress.A dream daughter, she accompanied me to the local scrap metal recycling yard yesterday and, after taking the Covid test required for air travel on Monday, we plan to visit the local landfill site. She’s a chip off ye olde blocke!
Today, we head to the local farmers market …then back home to display on the lawn near the public road items such as planks. Passers by stop and glean what they want from the collection. Such recycling – home grown and localized – is a perfect way of recycling goods too useful for the landfill yet no quite good enough to sell.
***
Getting darker here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 24: sunrise 6:23am; sunset 5:30pm.
Week 56 - Day 392 Thursday, April 22 - Earth Day
Mission Blue calls for ocean-loving volunteers
to dive into the Great Reef Census
“The world is blue, if you look at it from space that image alone should inspire us to think that we too are sea creatures.” Dr Sylvia Earle, Mission Blue
***
And... back to Covid… today’s Covid-19 stats compared to six months ago...Worldwide (Map)
April 22, 2021 – 143,503,705 confirmed infections; 3,056,000 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 60,334,000 confirmed infections; 1,420,500 deaths
US (Map)
April 22, 2021 – 31,862,100 confirmed infections; 569,500 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 12,771,000 confirmed infections; 262,145 deaths
SA (Tracker)
April 22, 2021 – 1,568,500 confirmed infections; 53,900 deaths
November 26, 2020 – 775,510 confirmed infections; 21,2010 deaths
Down memory lane with a post from one year ago - April 23, 2020: Try it; what have you got to lose?
Tracking Covid-19:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues
Forty top world leaders gather online for the first big climate confab since 2019. From an American point of view, five key policies and political dynamics to watch:1. New U.S. emissions target
2. China and the U.S.
3. Brazil
4. Big Money Pledges
5. Intellectual property rights
Read the article >>
***
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a news briefing in Geneva on Monday that, for eight consecutive weeks, Covid-19 infections are rising at an alarming rate and that more than 5.2 million new cases of Covid-19 were recorded last week - the most in a single week since the pandemic began. Tedros warned that the pace of the pandemic is accelerating, even as some countries tout their own improved vaccination programs. ***
India: According to a CNN tally of figures from the Indian Ministry of Health, India reported 295,041 cases of coronavirus and 2,023 deaths Wednesday, its highest rise in cases and highest death increase recorded in a single day since the beginning of the pandemic.
Healthcare and other essential services across India are close to collapse as a second coronavirus wave that started in mid-March tears through the country with devastating speed.
Graveyards are running out of space, hospitals are turning away patients, and desperate families are pleading for help on social media for beds and medicine.
"The volume is humongous," said Jalil Parkar, a senior pulmonary consultant at the Lilavati Hospital in Mumbai, which had to convert its lobby into an additional Covid ward. "It's just like a tsunami."
"Things are out of control," said Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy in New Delhi.
"There's no oxygen. A hospital bed is hard to find. It's impossible to get a test. You have to wait over a week. And pretty much every system that could break down in the health care system has broken down….”
***
Iraq has just topped 1 million Covid-19 cases for the first time after setting the highest single-day record with 8,696 new cases announced on Wednesday, according to the daily health ministry report. The ministry also recorded at least 38 Covid-19 related deaths on Wednesday, bringing the country’s total recorded death toll to 15,098.
There are currently 109,447 Covid-19 patients hospitalized across the county, with 517 cases in ICUs.
Iraq started its Covid-19 vaccine rollout on March 27, with 300,000 people having been vaccinated since — less than 1% of the nation’s total population of 40,150,000.
The Iraqi government eased lockdown restrictions last month, saying the country faced serious economic challenges.
***
Brazil: The coronavirus has killed an estimated 1,300 babies in Brazil since the beginning of the pandemic, even though there's overwhelming evidence that Covid-19 rarely kills young children.While data from the Health Ministry suggest that over 800 children under age 9 have died of Covid-19, including about 500 babies, experts say the real death toll is higher because cases are underreported because of a lack of widespread coronavirus testing, according to the BBC, which first reported the story.
***
The Lincoln Project:An Idea Called America (0:55 mins)
Truthless (0:55 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
 |
| (c) Our World in Data’s Biodiversity |
A diverse range of mammals once roamed the planet. Since the rise of humans, wild mammal biomass has declined by 85%. Our history with them has been a zero-sum game: we either hunted them or destroyed their habitats with the expansion of agricultural lands.
But, for the first time in human history, we have the opportunity to turn this into a net-sum game: we can produce enough food from a smaller land area, making it possible for them to flourish again. Our World in Data’s Biodiversity research looks at the long-term decline of wild mammals.
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Environmental Documentary "Current Sea" explores the illegal fishing trade (trawling) in Cambodia and the individuals who risk it all to intervene. The film follows the story of ocean activist and Kep Archipelago Hope Spot Champion Paul Ferber, and investigative journalist, Matt Blomberg, in their dangerous efforts to create a marine conservation area and combat the relentless tide of illegal fishing. Coming soon… meanwhile, watch the promo clip.
The film can be watched in hundreds of countries via Amazon Prime/Amazon, iTunes and Google Play and is subtitled in 8 languages.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
It is wonderful to host my daughter here, albeit for too short a time (she departs on Wednesday next week).She helps me understand how stressed – and angry – I am these days, and how short is my fuse. (Anger, frustration, and isolation are – I guess – hallmarks of life under Covid for a re-pat (repatriating) with a “troubled” extended family….)
My daughter does not pooh-pooh, under-estimate, or undermine how much I’ve tried to ameliorate the difficulties my mother faces nor under-estimate how much resistance I face. What a treat!
She’s great company and has a good sense of humor.
In my daughter’s company, whole half-hours, even hours, pass when I don’t think of the 1.5 years spent away from my California home, 1.5 years lost income, 1.5 years of not seeing family and friends….
Moreover, my daughter is fascinated by tasks I never thought anyone (besides me) would have to complete. For example, now that that Chana – Chinese designed and built pick-up truck – is repaired, my daughter intends to help me load that vehicle with metal items and drive them to the scrap yard. She’s also looking forward to driving a load of unusable items – aka “junk” - to the local dump, or “landfill” as it is known around here. Landfills a la South Africa are often located in former lovely valleys commandeered to filled to the brim and higher with rubbish. Landfills are frequented by “rag pickers,” self-employed workers who glean what they can from the debris, clean, repair, and sell it. The rag-picking life is tough, but people here are happy to have the work and the opportunity to make a small living at trolling through the castoffs of other, more materially advantaged people.
She’s great company and has a good sense of humor.
In my daughter’s company, whole half-hours, even hours, pass when I don’t think of the 1.5 years spent away from my California home, 1.5 years lost income, 1.5 years of not seeing family and friends….
Moreover, my daughter is fascinated by tasks I never thought anyone (besides me) would have to complete. For example, now that that Chana – Chinese designed and built pick-up truck – is repaired, my daughter intends to help me load that vehicle with metal items and drive them to the scrap yard. She’s also looking forward to driving a load of unusable items – aka “junk” - to the local dump, or “landfill” as it is known around here. Landfills a la South Africa are often located in former lovely valleys commandeered to filled to the brim and higher with rubbish. Landfills are frequented by “rag pickers,” self-employed workers who glean what they can from the debris, clean, repair, and sell it. The rag-picking life is tough, but people here are happy to have the work and the opportunity to make a small living at trolling through the castoffs of other, more materially advantaged people.
***
We went zip lining in the Karkloof canopy: |
| A view of the Karkloof from a high platform in the canopy. (click to enlarge) |
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| The zip line mystery: who will appear through the virgin foliage? (click to enlarge) |
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| Poster of the different indigenous trees found in the Karkloof canopy. (click to enlarge and read) |
We also saw a solitary Samango monkey. Alas, my Canon camera choose that moment to disobey my finger pressure on the shutter. Alas, I took no photo of the rare primate, but Google to the rescue
Here I am, zip lining onto a platform.
***
Getting even darker here…Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 14: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
April 22: sunrise 6:22am; sunset 5:32pm.
Day 389 Monday, April 19 - Living life
Something new: No news is good news Monday.Tracking Covid-19, however, remains with us:
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
The Lincoln Project:- Hawley Complicit (0:34 mins)
- Hawley vs. Himself (0:55 mins)
- Rally Recap (1:15 mins)
- It Never Ended (3:10 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
Plastic bags … always with us.UK’s ‘bag for a week’ habit is no green alternative – rather, it has created more problems for the environment. Supermarket ‘bags for life’ must cost more to cut plastic use, urge campaigners.
The US is responsible for around 327 billion bags ending up in the sea every year. Single use plastic is responsible for killing over 100,000 marine animals a year. Plastic bags contribute to these deaths by entangling wildlife and being mistaken for food by larger animals such as whales and turtles.
More facts on plastic bags:
Continued on …to Nottingham Road – a village known locally as “Notties”. Takeaway: there’s no there there. Well, there’s more of a there there in Notties than there is in, say, Curry’s Post. Anyone (like me) looking for an actual center of town in Curry’s Post won’t find a center, or even a grandiose post. Rather, there are hundreds of posts… supporting electric fences but no actual Curry’s Post. But I digress.
On our way home, we visited the Mandela Capture Site . My overwhelming feeling was sadness - so many lives wasted – and anger – such hope and expectations for a better life for the majority dashed. Rather than selfless leaders, South Africans got Jacob Zuma.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 19: sunrise 6:20am; sunset 5:35pm.
Folks from California, however, find the weather balmy. My daughter basks in what locals call “cold”: “this is a perfect temperature, she says.
Moreover, the local monkey troop that has been conspicuously absent over the last days, appeared yesterday and put on a show for the visitor from California, hooting and hollerin’ and leaping and balancing along the overhead cable.
I’d been warned that, in the winter, wild animals might eat my garden plants – particularly tubers and bulbs. That this zebra went for the blue chalk stick succulent makes me wary of winter…. What else don’t I know about the culinary habits of domesticated zebras? And impala? And Warthogs?
Another interested house buyer in the wings, this one an entity representing a home for under-privileged children. They find the house to be perfect for their needs, plus they “prayed to the Lord” to show them a space that includes enough room to create a children’s work shop area, a stream, and enough garden space for children to play. My mom’s house offers all that.
Now I must “pray to the Lord” that He supplies charity of thought to the banker with decision-making-power to grant a bond (mortgage).
Other buyers will view the house over the weekend.
My philosophy these days?
Been there, done that; show me the bond!
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 18: sunrise 6:19am; sunset 5:36pm.
Worldwide (Map)
US (Map)
April 15, 2021 – 31,421,361 confirmed infections; 564,402 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 10,258,100 confirmed infections; 239,700 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
April 15, 2021 – 1,560.000 confirmed infections; 53,500 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 740,255 confirmed infections; 19,951 deaths
Australia’s bushfires were devastating for bee populations. But steady rain and community efforts are seeing the return of the pollinators.
Read the article >>
'No one explained': fracking brings pollution, not wealth, to Navajo land Navajo Nation members received ‘a pittance’ for access to their land. Then came the spills and fires.
Read “No one explained…” >>
Last week I gleefully reported a successful sale of my mother’s house. This week? Not so much. The buyers changed their minds – and we’re back to square one.
But this week started off with a trip to Shaka International Airport to pick up my daughter.
But this week started off with a trip to Shaka International Airport to pick up my daughter. Since she arrived late in the day, we chose to spend the night in Durban rather than run the gauntlet of death that SA’s N3.
Sunrise was glorious.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
The new infections came from 30,560 tests, at a positivity rate of 4.14%.
April 8: South Africa had secured 51 million doses of vaccines from Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and Pfizer BioNTech in the battle against Covid-19.
According to health minister Zweli Mkhize the country was still on track with its vaccination strategy and the second phase will start on May 17.
Bill Gates as farmer is, however, a stretch.
An extended family – grandparents, parents, uncles, aunts, and kids – viewed the house yesterday, loved it, stood around and bounced around their ideas for who would live where, and shared their visions with one another. It was a treat seeing a family work closely together on making decisions with far-reaching implications. That done, they said we could expect to hear from them by Monday and they departed the property.
Fewer than 15 minutes later, the head of the family called to make a good offer: 90 percent cash down, 10 percent bank bond/mortgage.
It’s an offer I can take to my mother and expect her to accept.
I’m dazed.
I’m amazed.
I’m thankful. It happened.
We have an offer on the house.
Now I work towards keeping things on track and moving forward, organize around the document transfer as I ensure the domestic worker and the gardener are retrenched according to labor law … and that the dogs get humane care.
It’s all do-able.
What’s the glittering and waving on the horizon? By golly, it’s my family in California and Texas waving to welcome my return.
Imagine! After almost two years cooling my heals under lockdown, I’ll see them again.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 11: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
South African Liquor Brands Association researchers do not believe that the decline of trauma admissions can be causally linked to the different levels of alcohol restrictions. Rather, they argue the theory fails to address alcohol restrictions that coincided with other lockdown restrictions that may also have had an impact on trauma admissions.
Read the article >>
(Editorial comment: Not to be skeptical but… the South African Liquor Brands Association proving alcohol-abuse isn’t to blame?
And, for the first time in four years – the lost years of the Trump era - US EPA again has a website providing the public a gateway to information on climate change and climate solutions.
One does one’s best….
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
April 9: sunrise 6:13am; sunset 5:45pm.
SA passes 10-million mark for number of Covid-19 tests done as the country recorded 756 new Covid-19 infections on Wednesday, as well as 79 deaths
Read more >>
The other realtor tells me he’ll bring a “very, very interested” cash client to view on Saturday.
Meanwhile, with the advent of fall/autumn days with rain and cooler weather, khaki and other weeds spread their prolific seeds thither and yon. After 6 weeks of subpar attention to the garden, I found an affordable garden service. It comes with a story:
“Jane” is a mother and local small businesswoman with a take-away (“to go”) shop. Her husband, after two years of incompetent medical care, succumbed to a spider bite. (Yes! Life in SA’s medical system ain’t a walk in the park.) Jane needs extra income and branch into providing gardening services. With her nephew and a couple of other young males contracting with her, she’s building a clientele.
I found Jane through a neighbor and, yesterday, her two-man team arrived – with their own tools, refreshments, and lunch. Jane’s service fee for two workers for one day is equivalent to the gardener’s weekly costs – using our equipment and petrol, plus the gardener’s breakfast and lunch – and I clear prolific water lilies as he’s “scared of snakes.”
Yesterday’s work was interrupted by rain although Jane’s team theoretically stays until the work is finished. (Ours is a big garden and gardening is never done.)
I’m relieved to have one worrisome item off my long list of worrisome items.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
My primary delay was involuntary: hard lockdown due to pandemic. Then settling my 87-year-old mother into a Care Center, now the delay is trying to sell her house.
December 9, 2020, I accepted the keys to my new home: a small, one-bedroom, new semi-detached home with garden. I could move in anytime.
Four months later, I’ve never slept there. Indeed, to date, the longest chunk of time I’ve ever spent there is five or six daylight hours. I am semi moved in – chairs, sofa, bed frame sans mattress, but no stove, no fridge, no hot water kettle, no coffee maker.
To maintain security and a semblance of normality for the long-term domestic worker, four dogs, and the neighborhood’s troop of marauding vervet monkeys, I sleep at my mother’s house with its 30 steps, 6 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, separate cottage, three levels of garden - includes a stream with two malfunctioning culverts (one totally block, one so-so blocked) - a double garage, shed and two lean-tos stuffed with miscellany, one small swimming pool with finicky filer, and a garden pond overgrown with invasive pond lilies…
Expense decrees I choose between paying for Internet at my new place and forgo it at my mother’s house. I chose to connect my new home. This means that most mornings I depart my mother’s house for my new home, carrying my laptop, my (failing) iPhone 6, various batteries and cables associated with keeping those items charged, a handwritten list of the day’s tasks, a snack, and whatever tools I need for the day.
With a nine hour time difference between SA and California and a seven hour time difference between SA and Texas, I forgo regular phone calls to the States, too. (By the time I arrive at my new place, only one night owl friend is awake to chat.)
- More than 1 million plastic bags end up in the trash every minute.
- 100,000 marine animals are killed by plastic bags.
- Up to one trillion plastic bags are used worldwide each year – that’s 160,000 a second.
- If you linked them end to end they would circle the globe 4,200 times.
- Around 10% of those will end up in our oceans.
- Less than 1 in 7 plastic bags are recycled.
- The US is responsible for around 327 billion bags that end up in the seas.
- A plastic bag is used on average for 15 minutes.
- It can take anything between 20-1000 years for a plastic bag to break up. Articles on plastic bags:
- Trying to Recycle That Plastic Bag? The Odds Are Nine to One It’s Not Happening
- If you know your recycling, you probably already know that most communities don’t accept plastic bags in their curbside bins. And if you recycle like a pro, you may know that plastic bag recycling is a thing you can do at most local grocery stores or superstores.
But here’s where it gets confusing. Does that mean just the bags from that store? Or can you recycle more? Most drop-off bag collections accept polyethylene film. This includes high-density polyethylene (HDPE or #2 plastic) and low-density polyethylene (#4 plastic or LDPE). It’s great if your bags have markings on them, but since most do not, it’s good to know some general guidelines. - Are South Africa’s shopping bags really being recycled?
***
Photo essay: ‘Forests are not renewable’: the felling of Sweden’s ancient trees. Forests cover 70% of the country, but many argue the Swedish model of replacing old-growth forests with monoculture plantations is bad for biodiversity. Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
The Midlands Meander is:…a region in beautiful KwaZulu Natal that stretches from just beyond Mooi River in the north, Hilton in the south, Karkloof in the east and the foothills of the Drakensberg in the west.We dropped in on The Midlands Meander site known as the Piggly Wiggly – an outdoorsy combo of restaurants, wine cellar, ice cream parlor, candle shop, live snake show, and small train for kids. Bought a bottle of wine, Shiraz.
… An easy one-hour drive from Durban and four and a half hours on the N3 highway from Johannesburg, there is much to explore and do in the Midlands. For all that is on offer, life is lived at a gentler pace, we take time to chat to strangers in the trading store and we grow our own vegetables.
Continued on …to Nottingham Road – a village known locally as “Notties”. Takeaway: there’s no there there. Well, there’s more of a there there in Notties than there is in, say, Curry’s Post. Anyone (like me) looking for an actual center of town in Curry’s Post won’t find a center, or even a grandiose post. Rather, there are hundreds of posts… supporting electric fences but no actual Curry’s Post. But I digress.
On our way home, we visited the Mandela Capture Site . My overwhelming feeling was sadness - so many lives wasted – and anger – such hope and expectations for a better life for the majority dashed. Rather than selfless leaders, South Africans got Jacob Zuma.
***
Getting darker each dayFeb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 19: sunrise 6:20am; sunset 5:35pm.
Day 388 Sunday April 18 - Dead at 38
News blues…
Global Death Toll From COVID-19 Tops 3 Million amid repeated setbacks in the worldwide vaccination campaign and a deepening crisis in places such as Brazil, India and France.The number of lives lost, as compiled by Johns Hopkins University, is about equal to the population of Kyiv, Ukraine; Caracas, Venezuela; or metropolitan Lisbon, Portugal. It is bigger than Chicago (2.7 million) and equivalent to Philadelphia and Dallas combined.On the vaccine front, Albert Bourla, CEO of the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, says it’s “likely” those vaccinated with the company’s COVID-19 inoculation will need a third shot sometime within 12 months after getting the initial two doses and will potentially need a new shot every year thereafter. This, because COVID-19 resembles the flu more than it does a virus like polio.
And the true number is believed to be significantly higher because of possible government concealment and the many cases overlooked in the early stages of the outbreak that began in Wuhan, China, at the end of 2019.
“A likely scenario is that there will be likely a need for a third dose, somewhere between six and 12 months, and then from there, there will be an annual revaccination, but all of that needs to be confirmed,” Bourla said during the event. He added: “There are vaccines like polio where one dose is enough, and there are vaccines like flu that you need every year.”Read the article >>
More than 102 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine have been distributed in the U.S. thus far, and more than 38 million people have been fully vaccinated.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
The Lincoln Project:- Proud Boys (0:52 mins)
- 100 Days (0:25 mins)
- Officer Brian Sicknick (0:25 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
Following a visit to Shanghai by US climate envoy John Kerry, former US secretary of state, the US and China have “committed to cooperating” on the pressing issue of climate change.The statement from Kerry and China’s special envoy for climate change Xie Zhenhua, “The United States and China are committed to cooperating with each other and with other countries to tackle the climate crisis, which must be addressed with the seriousness and urgency that it demands.”
The joint statement listed multiple avenues of cooperation between the US and China, the world’s top two economies that together account for nearly half of the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for climate change. It stressed “enhancing their respective actions and cooperating in multilateral processes, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement”.
The nations also agreed to discuss specific “concrete” emission reduction actions including energy storage, carbon capture and hydrogen, and agreed to take action to maximise financing for developing countries to switch to low-carbon energy sources.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Temperatures have plummeted. Local folks are digging out winter wear as a cold spell rolls over the area.Folks from California, however, find the weather balmy. My daughter basks in what locals call “cold”: “this is a perfect temperature, she says.
Moreover, the local monkey troop that has been conspicuously absent over the last days, appeared yesterday and put on a show for the visitor from California, hooting and hollerin’ and leaping and balancing along the overhead cable.
Thank you for the show, monkeys.
No information forthcoming on what killed the 38-year-old, previously healthy man.
South Africa’s state-run hospitals? You check in but you don’t check out….
***
The appalling news? The gardener, sick for weeks with no conclusive diagnosis, taken 3 weeks ago by ambulance to hospital where he has, apparently, had multiple episodes of un- and semi-consciousness, died 5:00am yesterday morning. No information forthcoming on what killed the 38-year-old, previously healthy man.
South Africa’s state-run hospitals? You check in but you don’t check out….
***
My small garden is almost sufficiently protected by hedge that grazing zebra, impala, and warthogs avoid it. Nevertheless, one adult male zebra wandered in then stretched its long neck over assorted potted succulents to gnash through several branches of blue chalk stick succulent before I spotted and discouraged the animal. |
| Blue chalk stick succulent |
 |
| Gourmet zebra sampling blue chalk stick succulent. |
I’d been warned that, in the winter, wild animals might eat my garden plants – particularly tubers and bulbs. That this zebra went for the blue chalk stick succulent makes me wary of winter…. What else don’t I know about the culinary habits of domesticated zebras? And impala? And Warthogs?
***
Out with the old, in with the new? Another interested house buyer in the wings, this one an entity representing a home for under-privileged children. They find the house to be perfect for their needs, plus they “prayed to the Lord” to show them a space that includes enough room to create a children’s work shop area, a stream, and enough garden space for children to play. My mom’s house offers all that.
Now I must “pray to the Lord” that He supplies charity of thought to the banker with decision-making-power to grant a bond (mortgage).
Other buyers will view the house over the weekend.
My philosophy these days?
Been there, done that; show me the bond!
***
Getting darker each dayFeb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 18: sunrise 6:19am; sunset 5:36pm.
Day 385 Thursday April 15 - Ups and downs
 |
| © Nneka Okorocha View more art on Covid-19 vaccine hesitancy and disinformation |
Worldwide (Map)
April 15, 2021 – 138,278,420 confirmed infections; 2,973,058 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 52,070,000 confirmed infections; 1,274,000 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 52,070,000 confirmed infections; 1,274,000 deaths
US (Map)
April 15, 2021 – 31,421,361 confirmed infections; 564,402 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 10,258,100 confirmed infections; 239,700 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
April 15, 2021 – 1,560.000 confirmed infections; 53,500 deaths
November 12, 2020 – 740,255 confirmed infections; 19,951 deaths
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues…
-
Another vaccine setback: Johnson & Johnson:
South Africa suspends rollout of Johnson & Johnson Covid vaccine
Over the next few days, the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority, the South African Medical Research Council and the Department of Health will decide how to proceed with South Africa’s vaccination roll-out after use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was suspended, pending an investigation into six cases of blood clots reported in the United States. Read the article >>
- End the J&J Pause: the J&J vaccine is not a tainted cantaloupe. Our regulators are not fools. But they have a peculiar sense of responsibility that leads them to adopt a fraidy-cat level of caution.
- 3 Different Futures for the Johnson & Johnson Vaccine. A pause is just that—a pause—in which health officials can reevaluate the data at hand.
Healthy planet, anyone?
“… without pollinators there’s no ecosystem at all…”Australia’s bushfires were devastating for bee populations. But steady rain and community efforts are seeing the return of the pollinators.
Read the article >>
'No one explained': fracking brings pollution, not wealth, to Navajo land Navajo Nation members received ‘a pittance’ for access to their land. Then came the spills and fires.
Read “No one explained…” >>
***
As South African officials try to convince South Africans that nuclear energy will “save us”, a reality check: no country in the world, even the most organized, knows how to manage the toxic legacy bequeathed by energy once said to be “too cheap to monitor”. Japan is way more organized than South Africa – a country that mismanages it’s coal-based energy production and delivery. Imagine SA with nuke plants. Groan.
Japan will release more than 1 million tonnes of contaminated water from the destroyed Fukushima nuclear station into the sea, the government said on Tuesday, a move opposed by neighbours including South Korea and its own fishing industry.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Taking the bad with the good: a lesson.Last week I gleefully reported a successful sale of my mother’s house. This week? Not so much. The buyers changed their minds – and we’re back to square one.
But this week started off with a trip to Shaka International Airport to pick up my daughter.
But this week started off with a trip to Shaka International Airport to pick up my daughter. Since she arrived late in the day, we chose to spend the night in Durban rather than run the gauntlet of death that SA’s N3.
Sunrise was glorious.
***
Days are getting shorter here: Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 15: sunrise 6:18am; sunset 5:39pm.
Day 381 - Sunday, April 11 - Vaccine hesitancy FYI
 |
| © Rich Black View more art on Covid-19 vaccine hesitancy and disinformation |
News blues…
Forget trying to convince Anti-Vaxxers about vaccine efficacy. Rather, focus on 'Hesitant Vaxxers', the group that wants to learn more about the COVID-19 vaccine and its side effects before getting a shot. After all, 'Hesitant Vaxxers' are still open to being convinced.According to William Schaffner, professor of preventive medicine and infectious disease at Vanderbilt University, hesitant vaxxers want to learn more about the benefits of vaccination, while anti-vaxxers have already made up their minds.Read more >>
“I’ve learned that you’ll never change the opinion of someone who’s truly against vaccination,” Schaffner said. “The more logic and reason you use, the more they dig in their heels.” Those who are hesitant, on the other hand, “just want to understand vaccines better.”
***
April 9, SA had 1,267 new Covid-19 cases recorded in the past 24 hours, and 53 more deaths. The new infections came from 30,560 tests, at a positivity rate of 4.14%.
April 8: South Africa had secured 51 million doses of vaccines from Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and Pfizer BioNTech in the battle against Covid-19.
According to health minister Zweli Mkhize the country was still on track with its vaccination strategy and the second phase will start on May 17.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
I am not a fan of, nor do I ascribe to, the Bill-Gates-as-Devil-Incarnate conspiracy theory. Bill Gates is an ultrarich guy and, IMHO, displays many of the features of ultrarich guys while also promoting a handful of quasi-progressive ideas and solutions. His climate change ideas are better than those of many ultrarich guys ‘n gals and worse than many truly progressive-though-not-ultrarich guys ‘n gals.Bill Gates as farmer is, however, a stretch.
… So why did the Land Report dub LINK him “Farmer Bill” this year? The third richest man on the planet doesn’t have a green thumb. Nor does he put in the back-breaking labor humble people do to grow our food and who get far less praise for it. That kind of hard work isn’t what made him rich. Gates’ achievement, according to the report, is that he’s largest private owner of farmland in the US. A 2018 purchase of 14,500 acres of prime eastern Washington farmland – which is traditional Yakama territory – for $171m helped him get that title.Read “Bill Gates is the biggest private owner of farmland in the United States. Why?”
In total, Gates owns approximately 242,000 acres of farmland with assets totaling LINK more than $690m. To put that into perspective, that’s nearly the size of Hong Kong and twice the acreage of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe…. A white man owns more farmland than my entire Native nation!
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I thought the day would never come when serious buyers made a serious offer on the house. I was wrong.An extended family – grandparents, parents, uncles, aunts, and kids – viewed the house yesterday, loved it, stood around and bounced around their ideas for who would live where, and shared their visions with one another. It was a treat seeing a family work closely together on making decisions with far-reaching implications. That done, they said we could expect to hear from them by Monday and they departed the property.
Fewer than 15 minutes later, the head of the family called to make a good offer: 90 percent cash down, 10 percent bank bond/mortgage.
It’s an offer I can take to my mother and expect her to accept.
I’m dazed.
I’m amazed.
I’m thankful. It happened.
We have an offer on the house.
Now I work towards keeping things on track and moving forward, organize around the document transfer as I ensure the domestic worker and the gardener are retrenched according to labor law … and that the dogs get humane care.
It’s all do-able.
What’s the glittering and waving on the horizon? By golly, it’s my family in California and Texas waving to welcome my return.
Imagine! After almost two years cooling my heals under lockdown, I’ll see them again.
***
If all goes according to plan, I’ll “get outta Dodge” – American for “leaving town” – before South African days get too short and nights get too long. It happens quickly. Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
April 11: sunrise 6:14am; sunset 5:43pm.
Day 379 - Friday, April 9 - Mercy, mercy me
News blues…
Setting out to prove there’s a “lack of a scientific basis” and to question the widely held view that there is a clear causal link between simultaneous lockdown-related alcohol bans and the apparent decline in hospital trauma admissions, the South African Liquor Brands Association released results of research it commissioned several months ago.South African Liquor Brands Association researchers do not believe that the decline of trauma admissions can be causally linked to the different levels of alcohol restrictions. Rather, they argue the theory fails to address alcohol restrictions that coincided with other lockdown restrictions that may also have had an impact on trauma admissions.
Read the article >>
(Editorial comment: Not to be skeptical but… the South African Liquor Brands Association proving alcohol-abuse isn’t to blame?
Hmmm.
Surely, if research is accurate, a different, not-quite-so-self-interested organization should have been commissioned to conduct the research. South Africans, after all, have a less-than-stellar reputation with alcohol. Review results of a population-based survey on alcohol abuse in South Africa.)
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
The Lincoln Project: Another “inside the Beltway” view of Matt Gaetz: Stain (0:55 mins) Healthy planet, anyone?
“Poison is the wind that blows from the north and south and east” are lyrics from Marvin Gaye’s 1971 single “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” (3:16 mins). Gaye wasn’t known as an environmental scientist, but he provides a stark and useful environmental analysis, complete with warnings of overcrowding and climate change.The song doesn’t explicitly mention race, but its place in Gaye’s What’s Going On album portrays a black Vietnam veteran, coming back to his segregated community and envisioning the hell that people endure.
This builds on the 2016 report “Racial isolation and exposure to airborne particulate matter and ozone in understudied US populations: Environmental justice applications of downscaled numerical model output”
***
A new report from the Environmental Protection Agency finds that people of color are much more likely to live near polluters and breathe polluted air—even as the agency seeks to roll back regulations on pollution. This builds on the 2016 report “Racial isolation and exposure to airborne particulate matter and ozone in understudied US populations: Environmental justice applications of downscaled numerical model output”
And, for the first time in four years – the lost years of the Trump era - US EPA again has a website providing the public a gateway to information on climate change and climate solutions.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Now that I’ve decided I must return to California to take care of my own life and responsibilities, the pressure is on. So much to do (try to do) to ensure the smooth operation of business while I’m gone. I face new anxieties and, as usual, little to no support from immediate SA family.One does one’s best….
***
Latest news of the gardener is not good. He remains hospitalized. His wife reports he’s “asleep” most of the time.***
Days getting shorter and shorter and nightfall earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
April 9: sunrise 6:13am; sunset 5:45pm.
Day 378 - Thursday, April 8 - Time flies...
Silly- but truism: Time flies like the wind/Fruit flies like bananas.My intention was to post more frequently this end-of-Lockdown-Week 54. Alas, life here has been a task fest, one task after another clamoring for attention. Along with lack of Internet connection at my primary abode, posting, like everything associated with getting online, is problematic.
The pandemic, however, marches on,
The pandemic, however, marches on,
Below, today’s numbers of infections and deaths compared to 6 months ago:
Worldwide (Map)
April 8, 2021 – 133,132,000 confirmed infections: 2,888,000 deaths
October 8, 2020 – 36,069,000 confirmed infections; 1,055,000 deaths
US (Map)
April 8, 2021 – 30,923,000 confirmed infections: 559,116 deaths
October 8 – 7,550,000 confirmed infections; 212,000 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
April 8, 2021 – 1,553,610 confirmed infections: 53,111 deaths
October 8 – 685,155 confirmed infections; 17,250 deaths
The global scramble to produce enough Covid-19 vaccine for 7 billion people is about to get even tougher, as drugmakers and countries ready a second round of shots to combat the growing threat of virus variants.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues…
On the vaccine front:The global scramble to produce enough Covid-19 vaccine for 7 billion people is about to get even tougher, as drugmakers and countries ready a second round of shots to combat the growing threat of virus variants.
SA passes 10-million mark for number of Covid-19 tests done as the country recorded 756 new Covid-19 infections on Wednesday, as well as 79 deaths
***
The Lincoln Project: A bit “inside the Beltway” but... Matt Gaetz (1:03mins) Healthy planet, anyone?
Carbon dioxide levels in atmosphere reach record high. Concentrations are 50% above pre-industrial levels despite dip in emissions during Covid pandemic***
What would a tropical reef look like if it could escape the man-made perils of global heating and overfishing?
A new study in the journal Ecology and Evolution suggests it would look like Rowley Shoals, an isolated archipelago of reefs 260km off Australia’s north-west coast.Read more >>
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
House still not sold. The one purchaser who made an offer has decided that, since we’ve had no “better” offer than his, he can dictate new terms. We’ve a clause that states if any better offer comes along before he is granted a bond/mortgage, we can accept that offer. He has not yet applied for a bond.The other realtor tells me he’ll bring a “very, very interested” cash client to view on Saturday.
Hold thumbs!
(The issue is not lack on interested buyers, but that interested buyers cannot get a bond/mortgage. I suspect the above purchaser – the dictator – might not get a bond. I admit that, disappointing as it might be in the long term, I’d be happy enough - on behalf of my mother - if his bond application failed.
(The issue is not lack on interested buyers, but that interested buyers cannot get a bond/mortgage. I suspect the above purchaser – the dictator – might not get a bond. I admit that, disappointing as it might be in the long term, I’d be happy enough - on behalf of my mother - if his bond application failed.
I do not like dictators or folks who take financial advantage.
Yes, I know that’s the way of the world. It is not, however, my way.
***
The gardener remains in hospital. To date, I’ve heard no solid diagnosis on his condition. Speculation among neighbors? A stroke. Malnourishment. HIV. You name it, he’s got it. Meanwhile, with the advent of fall/autumn days with rain and cooler weather, khaki and other weeds spread their prolific seeds thither and yon. After 6 weeks of subpar attention to the garden, I found an affordable garden service. It comes with a story:
“Jane” is a mother and local small businesswoman with a take-away (“to go”) shop. Her husband, after two years of incompetent medical care, succumbed to a spider bite. (Yes! Life in SA’s medical system ain’t a walk in the park.) Jane needs extra income and branch into providing gardening services. With her nephew and a couple of other young males contracting with her, she’s building a clientele.
I found Jane through a neighbor and, yesterday, her two-man team arrived – with their own tools, refreshments, and lunch. Jane’s service fee for two workers for one day is equivalent to the gardener’s weekly costs – using our equipment and petrol, plus the gardener’s breakfast and lunch – and I clear prolific water lilies as he’s “scared of snakes.”
Yesterday’s work was interrupted by rain although Jane’s team theoretically stays until the work is finished. (Ours is a big garden and gardening is never done.)
I’m relieved to have one worrisome item off my long list of worrisome items.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 8: sunrise 6:12am; sunset 5:46pm.
Day 374 Sunday, April 4 - Sunday morning, coming down
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I departed California January 2020 and arrived here for a three-month visit. Fifteen months later and I’m still here.My primary delay was involuntary: hard lockdown due to pandemic. Then settling my 87-year-old mother into a Care Center, now the delay is trying to sell her house.
December 9, 2020, I accepted the keys to my new home: a small, one-bedroom, new semi-detached home with garden. I could move in anytime.
Four months later, I’ve never slept there. Indeed, to date, the longest chunk of time I’ve ever spent there is five or six daylight hours. I am semi moved in – chairs, sofa, bed frame sans mattress, but no stove, no fridge, no hot water kettle, no coffee maker.
To maintain security and a semblance of normality for the long-term domestic worker, four dogs, and the neighborhood’s troop of marauding vervet monkeys, I sleep at my mother’s house with its 30 steps, 6 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, separate cottage, three levels of garden - includes a stream with two malfunctioning culverts (one totally block, one so-so blocked) - a double garage, shed and two lean-tos stuffed with miscellany, one small swimming pool with finicky filer, and a garden pond overgrown with invasive pond lilies…
Expense decrees I choose between paying for Internet at my new place and forgo it at my mother’s house. I chose to connect my new home. This means that most mornings I depart my mother’s house for my new home, carrying my laptop, my (failing) iPhone 6, various batteries and cables associated with keeping those items charged, a handwritten list of the day’s tasks, a snack, and whatever tools I need for the day.
With a nine hour time difference between SA and California and a seven hour time difference between SA and Texas, I forgo regular phone calls to the States, too. (By the time I arrive at my new place, only one night owl friend is awake to chat.)
Most days, I visit my mother during the Care Center’s tight lockdown schedule, between 10 and 11 a.m. I also exercise, garden, and, masked and sanitized, maintain sufficient social distance to conduct the business required to sell my mother’s house and property.
I return to my mother’s house early afternoon to relieve the domestic worker, clean the pool, sort through more miscellany, and continue prepping the property for sale.
This is a cumbersome and increasingly burdensome way to live.
California’s hot property market lulled me into believing, naively, that my mother’s house would sell quickly. It’s been six months and, while buyers have expressed interest, we’ve had no offers solid enough to attract the bank bond/mortgage paperwork to complete the deal.
I’ve must return to California to tend to my own life and responsibilities.
For more than a year, I’ve earned no income, but pay a monthly marina fee for my houseboat moored in a sun-drenched slip and collecting algae and invasive water plants. I also pay storage fees, vehicle insurance, and further assorted fees associated with California living.
I return to my mother’s house early afternoon to relieve the domestic worker, clean the pool, sort through more miscellany, and continue prepping the property for sale.
This is a cumbersome and increasingly burdensome way to live.
California’s hot property market lulled me into believing, naively, that my mother’s house would sell quickly. It’s been six months and, while buyers have expressed interest, we’ve had no offers solid enough to attract the bank bond/mortgage paperwork to complete the deal.
I’ve must return to California to tend to my own life and responsibilities.
For more than a year, I’ve earned no income, but pay a monthly marina fee for my houseboat moored in a sun-drenched slip and collecting algae and invasive water plants. I also pay storage fees, vehicle insurance, and further assorted fees associated with California living.
Maintaining my mental health and a semblance balance is increasingly difficult.
The “little things” threaten to tip me over the edge.
Take my iPhone 6. I’m reliant on – addicted to? – reading library books on my phone’s Kindle app. Alas, Apple, in its infinite push toward profit, not people, decreed that it would no longer support the iPhone 6, originally produced with a poorly designed internal battery.
In the face of the phone’s continuing failure, I’ve limped along with it attached to an external battery – itself recently replaced with a locally sourced external battery.
It’s easy, in my schlepp to and from locations, to leave behind an item.
Yesterday, despite checking and rechecking, I departed my new place without the single most important item - the lightening cable that enables charging the phone so I can read Kindle books when I'm awake at night.
Reading allows me to constructively engage and “park” my mind rather than lie in the dark in bed and fret about the future, my friends and family, my mother, my daughter’s impending visit during a pandemic, and other ongoing day-to-day troubles.
Last night, I worried about how I’d survive a whole night without my iPhone/Kindle security “blankie.”
After tossing and turning for hours in the dark under my mosquito net, I opted for the big pharma rescue: a mild sleeping pill.
Great move!
I slept well. Moreover, I’ve glimpsed into the longings, fear, panic, and sheer emptiness that must accompany anyone addicted to anything. And thank the gods I’m not addicted to anything more dangerous than an iPhone and Kindle app. Nevertheless, not to push my luck, I hopped out of bed early and headed to my new place …and my charger cable/security blankie.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 4: sunrise 6:10am; sunset 5:51pm.
The “little things” threaten to tip me over the edge.
Take my iPhone 6. I’m reliant on – addicted to? – reading library books on my phone’s Kindle app. Alas, Apple, in its infinite push toward profit, not people, decreed that it would no longer support the iPhone 6, originally produced with a poorly designed internal battery.
In the face of the phone’s continuing failure, I’ve limped along with it attached to an external battery – itself recently replaced with a locally sourced external battery.
It’s easy, in my schlepp to and from locations, to leave behind an item.
Yesterday, despite checking and rechecking, I departed my new place without the single most important item - the lightening cable that enables charging the phone so I can read Kindle books when I'm awake at night.
Reading allows me to constructively engage and “park” my mind rather than lie in the dark in bed and fret about the future, my friends and family, my mother, my daughter’s impending visit during a pandemic, and other ongoing day-to-day troubles.
Last night, I worried about how I’d survive a whole night without my iPhone/Kindle security “blankie.”
After tossing and turning for hours in the dark under my mosquito net, I opted for the big pharma rescue: a mild sleeping pill.
Great move!
I slept well. Moreover, I’ve glimpsed into the longings, fear, panic, and sheer emptiness that must accompany anyone addicted to anything. And thank the gods I’m not addicted to anything more dangerous than an iPhone and Kindle app. Nevertheless, not to push my luck, I hopped out of bed early and headed to my new place …and my charger cable/security blankie.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 4: sunrise 6:10am; sunset 5:51pm.
Day 372 Friday, April 2 - Trust the system?
 |
| © Jen Sorensen |
***
It’s hard to understand a man like Alex Berenson who lies consistently about a pandemic and, on his way, sews distrust in a system already faltering under loads of misinformation. Yet here he is, “The Pandemic’s Wrongest Man. In a crowded field of wrongness, he stands out.”
Dr Swan was interviewed recently:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 27: sunrise 6:0xam; sunset 6:0xpm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
Year 2 - Week 53
Worldwide (Map)
US (Map)
Kudos then, a year into Covid-19, for admitting that, when it comes to coronavirus, “We just don’t know” what comes next.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm
Kudos then, a year into Covid-19, to Dr Anthony Fauci for admitting that, when it comes to coronavirus, “We just don’t know” what comes next.
The best thing about today?
News blues…
As SA records 1,294 new Covid-19 infections and 51 fatalities in the past 24 hours, a vaccination program appears to be in the works for Africa.Africa has secured 400 million doses of J&J Covid-19 vaccines — enough to vaccinate more than half its target of 750m people — as it edges towards the third wave of infections, said Africa CDC director, Dr John Nkengasong, at his weekly coronavirus update on Thursday.South Africans are one step closer to vaccinations, too. I even know someone who will be vaccinated next Thursday. She’s a health care work not in direct contact with Covid patients – that is, not in a hospital setting – but in a health care setting. Things are looking up!
More than 4.2 million cases of Covid-19 have been reported in Africa and more than 1,120,000 deaths, accounting for 4% of deaths reported globally. Africa has reported 3% of the world’s Covid-19 cases.
***
America is entering its fourth coronavirus surge. And this time, it appears to be driven by an even deadlier variant of the virus. Luckily, the country is prepared, having already vaccinated tens of millions of people. “If we act quickly, this surge could be merely a blip for the United State….”Read “The Fourth Surge Is Upon Us. This Time, It’s Different.A deadlier and more transmissible variant has taken root, but now we have the tools to stop it if we want.”
Those who haven’t yet gotten their first dose remain particularly at risk… and, unfortunately, many of the regions seeing outbreaks are home to major vaccine-distribution inequities. … two strategies the country can use to snuff out the current rise in cases:
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
Dr Shanna Swan, professor of environmental medicine and public health at Mount Sinai school of medicine in New York City, studies fertility trends. In 2017 she documented how average sperm counts among western men have more than halved in the past 40 years. Count Down is her new book.Dr Swan was interviewed recently:
You’ve spent more than 20 years examining the effects of hormone disrupting chemicals on reproductive health. Are you now sounding the alarm?
SS: I am directly speaking to this hidden problem people don’t like to talk about, which is their sub-fertility or reproductive problems, and how that is tied to the environment. People are recognising we have a reproductive health crisis, but they say it’s because of delayed childbearing, choice or lifestyle – it can’t be chemical. I want people to recognise it can. I am not saying other factors aren’t involved. But I am saying chemicals play a major causal role. It is difficult to use that word, “cause”, but it’s a body of evidence. We have mechanisms, animal studies, and multiple human studies.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
A surge, that’s what I’m experiencing: a surge in desire to return to California, a surge to make a deal “finished and klaar” on my mother’s house, a surge of responsibility for my own life’s version of “death and taxes.” With an eye toward returning to California with my daughter – she arrives next week – I’m working even harder to accomplish necessary tasks: sell household items, give away what can’t be sold, and dump the rest. But as I’ve repeatedly learned over the past year: what can do wrong, will go wrong.- The gardener’s illness, incompletely diagnosed as this, that, or the other thing, ranging from candida to HIV, worked Monday and reported he was “coming right.” Alas, on his way home after work, he semi-collapsed. Next morning, an ambulance was called to his home after he suffered severe vomiting, diarrhea, cramps, and physical incapacity. He was rushed to a local hospital then taken to a second, more efficient, hospital. Later that day, his wife reported “his brain was bad.” Diagnosis? Meningitis. He was returned to the first hospital...where he remains.
I suspect meningitis may be an opportunistic infection after he suffered 5 to 6 weeks of debilitating – and misdiagnosed – illness. Meanwhile, I must find a temporary, affordable gardening service to keep weeds at bay. The lower lawn is strewn with miscellaneous “stuff” – from many meters of mixed electrical and fencing wire, planks, poles, assorted tools, window frames…. I continue sorting this miscellany into piles to auction, give away (how? To whom?) and dump (how?). The latest problem – besides having no help to accomplish any of this? The “bakkie”/pick-up truck has a petrol/”gas” leak and should be driven only by someone with a surge of interest in a gruesome death. And that ain’t me. The past year has taught “pool gal” much about maintaining a pool and filter on a shoestring yet… another challenge. Efficient filtering of water requires sufficiency of water. The pool currently has an insufficiency of water. Water is expensive. Nevertheless, I must add more. Accordingly, I located and laid out the household’s elderly hosepipe. Alas, its length is just short of reaching the pool. Moreover, it is absent the pipe fitting required to attach pipe to faucet. Was it one on many similar fittings added to the big bag of sprinkler and plumbing fittings sent last week to the auction? It's Easter weekend: local hardware stores shuttered until next Tuesday.-
The local print weekly reports fire damage to a small school and that building materials are needed. This household has building materials available. But how to bring together need and availability? The bakkie/pick up has a petrol leak. I’ll phone next week and, if the school is not closed for Good Friday … or due to Covid … I’ll suggest they find someone to fetch the materials.
***
My mother continues to improve… and trying to climb out of her Laziboy and walk. I guess Easter, with its history of miracles, is thetime to try for another miracle. Meantime, I’m encouraging more practical efforts: stretching arms and legs, drinking fluids, and practicing writing with a pen.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 27: sunrise 6:0xam; sunset 6:0xpm.
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm.
April 2: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:53pm.
Year 2 - Week 53
Day 371 Thursday, April 1 - Catching up
Worldwide (Map) February 25, 2021 -128,260,000 confirmed infections; 2,805,000 deaths
February 25, 2020 - 112,534,400 confirmed infections; 2,905,000 deaths
January 21 – 96,830,000 confirmed infections; 2,074,000 deathsUS (Map)
February 25, 2021 - 30,394,000 confirmed infections; 551,000 deaths
February 25, 2020 - 28,335,000 confirmed infections; 505,850 deaths January 21 – 24,450,000 confirmed infections; 406,100 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
SA (Coronavirus portal)
February 25, 2021 - 1,547,000 confirmed infections; 52,790 deaths
February 25, 2020 - 1,507,450 confirmed infections; 49,525 deaths
January 21 – 1,370,000 confirmed infections’ 38,900 deaths
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
News blues…
President Ramaphosa addresses and updates the nation on Covid-19 Lockdown (27:40 mins) :Alert Level 1 remains in place, however measures put in place for Easter weekend to combat a rise in infections
- Curfew remains midnight to 4am
- Public spaces such as beaches, parks, and dams remain open, but subject to usual health protocols – social distancing, wearing masks, sanitizing
- Funerals restricted to 100 attendees, maximum of 2 hour services
- Inter-provincial travel permitted though caution required
- Alcohol restrictions: sale at offsite locations prohibited Easter Friday through Monday. Onsite sales – restaurants, bars, shebeens – allowed, subject to licenses
- Easter religious gatherings restricted to 250 people indoors and 500 outdoors
- Small venues: no more than 50 percent of capacity allowed.
***
***
This week’s news controversy:
It was supposed to offer insight into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic, but since its release last Tuesday, the long-awaited World Health Organization investigation has drawn criticism from governments around the world over accusations it is incomplete and lacks transparency. Here’s an excerpt from Tuesday’s story:
It was supposed to offer insight into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic, but since its release last Tuesday, the long-awaited World Health Organization investigation has drawn criticism from governments around the world over accusations it is incomplete and lacks transparency. Here’s an excerpt from Tuesday’s story:
According to a draft copy of the joint WHO-China study on the origins of COVID-19, transmission of the virus from bats to humans through another animal is the most likely scenario and that a lab leak is “extremely unlikely.”And... here’s the (inevitable?) news blowback:
…researchers listed four scenarios in order of likelihood for the emergence of the virus named SARS-CoV-2. Topping the list was transmission through a second animal, which they said was likely to very likely. They evaluated direct spread from bats to humans as likely, and said that spread through “cold-chain” food products was possible but not likely.
The closest relative of the virus that causes COVID-19 has been found in bats, which are known to carry coronaviruses. However, the report says that “the evolutionary distance between these bat viruses and SARS-CoV-2 is estimated to be several decades, suggesting a missing link.”
…
The draft report is inconclusive on whether the outbreak started at a Wuhan seafood market that had one of the earliest clusters of cases in December 2019.
The discovery of other cases before the Huanan market outbreak suggests it may have started elsewhere. But the report notes there could have been milder cases that went undetected and that could be a link between the market and earlier cases.
“No firm conclusion therefore about the role of the Huanan market in the origin of the outbreak, or how the infection was introduced into the market, can currently be drawn,” the report says.
As the pandemic spread globally, China found samples of the virus on the packaging of frozen food coming into the country and, in some cases, have tracked localized outbreaks to them.
Read “WHO Report Says Coronavirus Likely Spread From Animals To Humans. According to a draft copy obtained by The Associated Press, a lab leak is “extremely unlikely” as the source of the virus.
In a joint statement, the United States and 13 other governments, including the United Kingdom, Australia and South Korea, expressed concerns over the study's limited access to "complete, original data and samples."
The European Union issued its own statement, expressing the same concerns in slightly softer language. The criticism follows an admission from WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, that investigators faced problems during their four-week mission to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus was first detected in December 2019.
In a news briefing Tuesday, Tedros appeared to contradict the study's central findings by suggesting the theory that the virus escaped from a Wuhan laboratory should be followed up - even though the report noted such a possibility was "extremely unlikely" and did not recommend further research on the hypothesis.
The WHO investigation, conducted more than a year after the initial outbreak, came under intense scrutiny from the outset. Some scientists and the US government have questioned the independence and credibility of the study, raising concerns over Chinese government influence. Beijing, meanwhile, has accused Washington and others of "politicizing" the origin of the virus.
Read “14 countries and WHO chief accuse China of withholding data from pandemic origins investigation” >>In a White House press conference Monday, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said she felt a sense of impending doom over the uptick in COVID-19 cases.
***
“I’m watching the cases tick up. I’m watching us have increased numbers of hyper-transmissible variants. I’m watching our travel numbers tick up, and the sense is, I’ve seen what it looks like to anticipate the oncoming surge,” Walensky said. “And what I really would hate to have happen is to have another oncoming surge just as we’re reaching towards getting so many more people vaccinated. You know, we’re still losing people at 1,000 deaths a day. And so I just can’t face another surge when there’s so much optimism right at our fingertips.” (1:22 mins)
***
In the macrocosm, for people who’ve had the privilege of making their own life decisions, aka “following your bliss …”, not knowing is the most difficult state of being to accept.Kudos then, a year into Covid-19, for admitting that, when it comes to coronavirus, “We just don’t know” what comes next.
The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic may drag on for years, but the nightmare of last year—of an entirely new viral illness, emerging in a specific sociopolitical context—is behind us. Instead we’re facing a new set of challenges, and they are not easily comparable to what has come before. It’s worth considering a new way of thinking about the period of the pandemic now ahead of us—one that leads us neither to complacency nor to paralyzing despair. In many ways COVID-19 is already over. What lies ahead is COVID-21.
Diseases are not static things. Pathogens change, hosts change, and environments change. In the case of COVID, all three are now different than they were in 2020. What began as one coronavirus has infected well over 100 million people and evolved into new forms that appear to transmit more readily and infect us in subtly different ways. Our immune systems have changed as well, as a result of fending off infections. And, of course, our lifestyles have changed, as have social standards, medical systems, and public-health programs.
COVID-21 is the product of all these changes in aggregate.
Read “Covid-19 is different now” >>
***
The Lincoln Project: “Rupert” (0:55 mins)
"Why we fight" (0:55 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
Photo essay: The Great Vaccination CampaignMeanwhile, back at the ranch…
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm
April 1: sunrise 6:09am; sunset 5:54pm
Day 368 Monday, March 29 - Fall days
New blog posting routine: posts no longer daily…News blues…
In the macrocosm, for people who’ve had the privilege of making their own decisions, aka “following your bliss …”, not knowing is the most difficult truth to accept.Kudos then, a year into Covid-19, to Dr Anthony Fauci for admitting that, when it comes to coronavirus, “We just don’t know” what comes next.
The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic may drag on for years, but the nightmare of last year—of an entirely new viral illness, emerging in a specific sociopolitical context—is behind us. Instead we’re facing a new set of challenges, and they are not easily comparable to what has come before. It’s worth considering a new way of thinking about the period of the pandemic now ahead of us—one that leads us neither to complacency nor to paralyzing despair.
In many ways COVID-19 is already over. What lies ahead is COVID-21.
Diseases are not static things. Pathogens change, hosts change, and environments change. In the case of COVID, all three are now different than they were in 2020. What began as one coronavirus has infected well over 100 million people and evolved into new forms that appear to transmit more readily and infect us in subtly different ways.
Our immune systems have changed as well, as a result of fending off infections. And, of course, our lifestyles have changed, as have social standards, medical systems, and public-health programs.
COVID-21 is the product of all these changes in aggregate.
Read “Covid-19 is different now” >>
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
According to a draft copy of the joint WHO-China study on the origins of COVID-19, transmission of the virus from bats to humans through another animal is the most likely scenario and that a lab leak is “extremely unlikely.”…researchers listed four scenarios in order of likelihood for the emergence of the virus named SARS-CoV-2. Topping the list was transmission through a second animal, which they said was likely to very likely. They evaluated direct spread from bats to humans as likely, and said that spread through “cold-chain” food products was possible but not likely.
The closest relative of the virus that causes COVID-19 has been found in bats, which are known to carry coronaviruses. However, the report says that “the evolutionary distance between these bat viruses and SARS-CoV-2 is estimated to be several decades, suggesting a missing link.”
…
The draft report is inconclusive on whether the outbreak started at a Wuhan seafood market that had one of the earliest clusters of cases in December 2019.
The discovery of other cases before the Huanan market outbreak suggests it may have started elsewhere. But the report notes there could have been milder cases that went undetected and that could be a link between the market and earlier cases.
“No firm conclusion therefore about the role of the Huanan market in the origin of the outbreak, or how the infection was introduced into the market, can currently be drawn,” the report says.
As the pandemic spread globally, China found samples of the virus on the packaging of frozen food coming into the country and, in some cases, have tracked localized outbreaks to them.
Read “WHO Report Says Coronavirus Likely Spread From Animals To Humans. According to a draft copy obtained by The Associated Press, a lab leak is “extremely unlikely” as the source of the virus.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Monday morning blues…The best thing about today?
The weather. April and May are the best weather months: crisp, sunny, low humidity…
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
As we begin yet another year of lockdown, I will blog post, not every day, but several times a week. Turns out, a year-long habit of posting early each morning is hard habit to break: daily posting has been “baked” into my daily routine. I’ll slowly developed a new routine. Meanwhile… yet another post….
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall is earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 29: sunrise 6:07am; sunset 5:58pm.
Day 366 Saturday, March 27 - Slowly, slowly...
Blog posting about the pandemic each day for the past year focused my attention on something other than the probability of being infected with Covid-19 and immediate tasks related to my mother and her property.As we begin yet another year of lockdown, I will blog post, not every day, but several times a week. Turns out, a year-long habit of posting early each morning is hard habit to break: daily posting has been “baked” into my daily routine. I’ll slowly developed a new routine. Meanwhile… yet another post….
News blues…
As the first four million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine shipped in March throughout the United States, experts lauded qualities that make it more practical: Unlike its mRNA predecessors, this vaccine doesn’t require ultra-cold storage and needs only a single dose to protect people against serious COVID-19 outcomes — including, most importantly, death.
These attributes mean it could be more easily deployed to reach communities that have been left behind as an inequitable vaccine rollout has overly favored white people. But there’s a catch. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine has an overall efficacy lower than the other two vaccines that have been authorized for emergency use in the country. And that fact has raised concerns that marginalized communities — including Black, Latino, and indigenous people with the highest risk of serious COVID-19 outcomes and a history of medical mistreatment — would be steered toward the vaccine with the lowest level of protection against severe and mild disease.
Read “The complex debate over how to equitably distribute the different vaccines” >>
***
Yesterday's post reported 600 new infections around South Africa. Twenty-four hours later: “SA recorded 1,516 new Covid-19 cases, along with 67 more fatalities"Let's be careful out there....
On the plus side, hedge provides privacy and I appreciate privacy. But…
Last week, I solved my “hedge problem”: I decided to trim it into quirky shapes, perhaps a dragon, a snake, or a wildebeest, or curling waves big enough to surf…
I set off to search for an electric hedge clipper. Alas, after visiting all the stores that either sell or rent hedge clippers, I found nothing suitable, Instead, I brought home a pair of manual hedge clippers. (I’m thankful I did not find the “perfect” electric hedge clippers of my dreams. If I had, I’d probably have sawed off a hand or an arm by now. That would have ended my routine of blog posting anything on any schedule!)
After examining the hedges from all angles, I began trimming a small segment in front of my outdoor patio. A curling wave is evident on my side of the hedge.
One dilemma: am I responsible for trimming the other, public side of the hedge, too? If so, can I clip it according to my whim?
Meanwhile, today, weather permitting, I’ll trim another adjacent segment of hedge. Another wave.
Before and after photos to follow…
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
March 26: sunrise 6:06am; sunset 6:00pm.
March 27: sunrise 6:0xam; sunset 6:0xpm.
Read “Jangamo Bay in Mozambique declared Mission Blue Hope Spot” >>
Couple of days after my daughter purchased her ticket to ride the news breaks about a fast moving and upcoming “third wave” of Covid infections expected in Eastern Cape. (Wednesday’s post shares a letter about the woeful state of Eastern Cape’s medical system .) My daughter will not be near Eastern Cape, but no that no assurance that virus from Eastern Cape will not be near her/us in KZN. Should she cancel her trip?
After a year of lockdown, it is difficult to remain emotionally and psychologically balanced. More so when even the institutions one usually believes are skewed toward the rich and powerful but at least (mostly) work as one expects are now in jeopardy of total failure. Take Zuma’s ongoing efforts to destroy an already rickety justice system in South Africa … or ongoing Republicans efforts to deny Americans’ right to vote ... Or Trump former lawyer Stephanie Powell’s defense that “reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact…”
Ya can't make this stuff up.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
***
Down but not out – The Lincoln Project returns with The Donfather Part II (2:15 mins) Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I’m not a hedge person – that is, under normal conditions, hedge is the last type of vegetation I’d plant. I did, however, inherit healthy hedges growing around two sides of my new home. This means, each time I park my vehicle I look at a wall of fast-growing hedge. Any time I’m in my garden, I look at a wall of fast-growing hedge; ditto, when I’m in my patio/sunroom.On the plus side, hedge provides privacy and I appreciate privacy. But…
Last week, I solved my “hedge problem”: I decided to trim it into quirky shapes, perhaps a dragon, a snake, or a wildebeest, or curling waves big enough to surf…
I set off to search for an electric hedge clipper. Alas, after visiting all the stores that either sell or rent hedge clippers, I found nothing suitable, Instead, I brought home a pair of manual hedge clippers. (I’m thankful I did not find the “perfect” electric hedge clippers of my dreams. If I had, I’d probably have sawed off a hand or an arm by now. That would have ended my routine of blog posting anything on any schedule!)
After examining the hedges from all angles, I began trimming a small segment in front of my outdoor patio. A curling wave is evident on my side of the hedge.
One dilemma: am I responsible for trimming the other, public side of the hedge, too? If so, can I clip it according to my whim?
Meanwhile, today, weather permitting, I’ll trim another adjacent segment of hedge. Another wave.
Before and after photos to follow…
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
March 26: sunrise 6:06am; sunset 6:00pm.
March 27: sunrise 6:0xam; sunset 6:0xpm.
Day 365 Friday, March 26 - Some days...
An oldie but goodie: U2 – Some days are better than others (audio only 4:08 mins)News blues…
SA records 163 Covid-19 deaths in 24 hoursOf the new deaths, 71 were recorded in Limpopo, 37 were in the North West, 24 were in Gauteng, 16 were in the Northern Cape, nine were in the Free State, five were in KwaZulu-Natal and one was in the Western Cape. There were no cases recorded in the Eastern Cape or Mpumalanga.
According to health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize, there were 1,467,254 recoveries recorded to date, at a recovery rate of 95%.
There have also been 220,129 health workers vaccinated so far.
***
Beware! Experts expect third wave to hit by end of March
The third Covid-19 wave is due to hit the two big Eastern Cape metros of Nelson Mandela Bay and Buffalo City by the end of March/beginning of April.This is sooner than expected and we are confident of the prediction as it is based on a range of local and regional data and on a year of national modelling, from the time Covid-19 hit SA in March 2020.
This scientific evidence informs us about the waves and how we can anticipate them.
If we act in time, and ensure all the prevention protocols are being followed, and the health services facilities and processes are in place, we can control the spread of the virus.
If we do not act in time, the virus will run rampant, our facilities will be overwhelmed and in all probability it will lead to a peak in the number of deaths.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
The expansive coast along Mozambique’s Jangamo Bay offers a warm welcome to its visitors with serene blue waters, rolling sand dunes and idyllic palm trees. Local nonprofit marine conservation organization Love The Oceans https://lovetheoceans.org/ has been working to transform this fishing-fueled economy into an economy supported by ecotourism backed by a healthy marine ecosystem.Read “Jangamo Bay in Mozambique declared Mission Blue Hope Spot” >>
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Nothing more than usual going on but … some days are better than others.Couple of days after my daughter purchased her ticket to ride the news breaks about a fast moving and upcoming “third wave” of Covid infections expected in Eastern Cape. (Wednesday’s post shares a letter about the woeful state of Eastern Cape’s medical system .) My daughter will not be near Eastern Cape, but no that no assurance that virus from Eastern Cape will not be near her/us in KZN. Should she cancel her trip?
After a year of lockdown, it is difficult to remain emotionally and psychologically balanced. More so when even the institutions one usually believes are skewed toward the rich and powerful but at least (mostly) work as one expects are now in jeopardy of total failure. Take Zuma’s ongoing efforts to destroy an already rickety justice system in South Africa … or ongoing Republicans efforts to deny Americans’ right to vote ... Or Trump former lawyer Stephanie Powell’s defense that “reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact…”
Ya can't make this stuff up.
Crazy times.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
Back then, South Africa had confirmed 61 cases of the disease. Ramaphosa said 50 of those cases were contracted by people who had traveled abroad, but the rest were contracted within South Africa. “It is concerning that we are now dealing with internal transmission of the virus.”
The disease, the president said, could have a “potentially lasting” effect on South Africa.
Midnight tonight, one year ago, South Africans began the first full day of what was then planned as a three-week nationwide lockdown aimed at stemming a potential pandemic. At that time, deaths from the new and lethal SARS infection topped 900. News from that day
Who could have guessed, back then, that numbers of infections and deaths would reach the rates shown below?
Worldwide (Map)
March 25, 2021 – 124,894,200 confirmed infections; 2,746,000 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 100,920,100 confirmed infections; 2,175,500 deaths
December 31 – 82,656000 confirmed infections; 1,8040100 deaths
November 26 – 60,334,000 confirmed infections; 1,420,500 deaths
US (Map)
March 25, 2021 – 30,011,600 confirmed infections; 545,300 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 25,600,000 confirmed infections; 429,160 deaths
December 31 – 19,737,200 confirmed infections; 342,260 deaths
November 26 – 12,771,000 confirmed infections; 262,145 deaths
SA (Tracker)
March 25, 2021 – 1,540,010, confirmed infections; 52,372 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 1,430,650 confirmed infections; 42,550 deaths
December 31 – 1,039,165 confirmed infections; 28,035 deaths
November 26 – 775,510 confirmed infections; 21,2010 deaths
One sales agreement is out for signatures by the proposed buyers; another, far better offer is purported on its way from another set of buyers for my review; today, the realtor will bring yet another set of buyers to view the property.
Alas, none of this means anything until bond/mortgage applications are processed, approved, signed, and funds on the way to the conveyancer (title company). Even then, it takes at minimum 3 to 4 months to hand over the property to the new owner(s). Considering conditions accorded by the pandemic - municipal offices responding with days-long shutdowns, and rumors of a third or a fourth wave of infections, and maybe vaccinations on the horizon - next year? the year after? - paperwork could drag on beyond 5 to 6 months.
Keeping this and my own life’s needs in mind, I meet today with a local attorney who can more easily respond to needs dictated by changing conditions as well as meet with my mother in the Care Center. (The office of the attorney handling my mother’s estate is at an impractical distance from this town. If, for example, I’m in California, who will drive paperwork to/from that office without further delaying the process?)
My mother is making remarkable progress although she’s not convinced that the Center’s morning exercise program is conducive to her better health. (Even before her fall she refused to join the group.)
While it’s unlikely she’ll ever gain enough strength to walk again, she can almost reach out, pick up, and carry to her mouth the small containers of fruit juice I bring her. That’s progress: drinking fluids is key to flushing her system of meds from surgery.
She’s also easier to understand although she continues to whisper. (That’s not new: talking softly has been her MO for years.)
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 17: sunrise 5:xxam; sunset 6:1xpm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:03pm.
***
But at least the sun also rises and sets, albeit indicating the approach of winter...:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:01pm.
LOCKDOWN YEAR 1 ENDS
Week 52 - Day 364 Thursday, March 25 - One down, one to go?
On February 13, 2020 South Africa declared a “national state of disaster” due to COVID-19. President Ramaphosa said, “Given the scale and the speed at which the virus is spreading, it is now clear that no country is immune from the disease or will be spared its severe impact.”Back then, South Africa had confirmed 61 cases of the disease. Ramaphosa said 50 of those cases were contracted by people who had traveled abroad, but the rest were contracted within South Africa. “It is concerning that we are now dealing with internal transmission of the virus.”
The disease, the president said, could have a “potentially lasting” effect on South Africa.
Midnight tonight, one year ago, South Africans began the first full day of what was then planned as a three-week nationwide lockdown aimed at stemming a potential pandemic. At that time, deaths from the new and lethal SARS infection topped 900. News from that day
Who could have guessed, back then, that numbers of infections and deaths would reach the rates shown below?
Worldwide (Map)
March 25, 2021 – 124,894,200 confirmed infections; 2,746,000 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 100,920,100 confirmed infections; 2,175,500 deaths
December 31 – 82,656000 confirmed infections; 1,8040100 deaths
November 26 – 60,334,000 confirmed infections; 1,420,500 deaths
US (Map)
March 25, 2021 – 30,011,600 confirmed infections; 545,300 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 25,600,000 confirmed infections; 429,160 deaths
December 31 – 19,737,200 confirmed infections; 342,260 deaths
November 26 – 12,771,000 confirmed infections; 262,145 deaths
SA (Tracker)
March 25, 2021 – 1,540,010, confirmed infections; 52,372 deaths
January 28, 2021 – 1,430,650 confirmed infections; 42,550 deaths
December 31 – 1,039,165 confirmed infections; 28,035 deaths
November 26 – 775,510 confirmed infections; 21,2010 deaths
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
Rainforest Action Network, the Sierra Club, the Indigenous Environmental Network and several other nonprofits recently published “Banking on climate chaos” and indicate that,…the world’s largest banks have funneled $3.8 trillion into the fossil fuel industry over the last five years [and that banks have] … provided more financing to oil, gas and coal companies in 2020 than they did in 2016, the year countries signed the Paris climate agreement and committed to rapidly reducing emissions to keep global temperature rises below 2 degrees Celsius.
Financing was 9% lower overall in 2020 than in 2019 because the pandemic cut demand for fossil fuels. But the first half of 2020 saw the highest level of fossil fuel financing in any half-year since the Paris Agreement.
“Major banks around the world, led by U.S. banks in particular, are fueling climate chaos by dumping trillions of dollars into the fossil fuels that are causing the crisis.”
JPMorgan Chase provided $51.3 billion of fossil fuel financing in 2020 — 20% less than 2019 but enough to keep its position as the world’s biggest fossil fuel financer. The bank, which has called climate change “the critical issue of our time” and says it has “long supported the goals of the Paris Agreement,” has provided nearly $317 billion to fossil fuel companies since 2016.
Citigroup is the second-largest financer, providing a total of $237.5 billion from 2016 to 2020.
[Both JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup declined to comment on the report.]
Though U.S. banks dominate fossil fuel financing, European banks are also big.
French bank BNP Paribas, which has pledged to be a leader in climate strategy, provided $40.8 billion in fossil fuel financing in 2020, an increase of 41% from the previous year. Since 2016, the bank’s fossil fuel financing has risen 142%, according to the report. A BNP Paribas spokesperson said: “During the Covid-19 crisis, all sectors of the economy needed support and BNP Paribas, like other banks, played an important stabilizing role…. However, BNP Paribas supported the oil and gas sector to a lower extent than other sectors of activity.” …
A striking finding … was the increase in financing for the 100 biggest companies that are expanding fossil fuels — including those involved in controversial pipeline projects.
The report examined financing by sector and found a mixed picture. Financing for the top 35 companies involved in tar sands — one of the most environmentally destructive fossil fuels to extract and process — decreased 27% since 2019, to $16 billion.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Raining again. Not that I’m complaining. KZN summer rain is a joy: warm, often accompanied by thunder and lightning – even hail – and water, water, everywhere.***
Two steps forward, one step back with the sale of the house. One sales agreement is out for signatures by the proposed buyers; another, far better offer is purported on its way from another set of buyers for my review; today, the realtor will bring yet another set of buyers to view the property.
Alas, none of this means anything until bond/mortgage applications are processed, approved, signed, and funds on the way to the conveyancer (title company). Even then, it takes at minimum 3 to 4 months to hand over the property to the new owner(s). Considering conditions accorded by the pandemic - municipal offices responding with days-long shutdowns, and rumors of a third or a fourth wave of infections, and maybe vaccinations on the horizon - next year? the year after? - paperwork could drag on beyond 5 to 6 months.
Keeping this and my own life’s needs in mind, I meet today with a local attorney who can more easily respond to needs dictated by changing conditions as well as meet with my mother in the Care Center. (The office of the attorney handling my mother’s estate is at an impractical distance from this town. If, for example, I’m in California, who will drive paperwork to/from that office without further delaying the process?)
My mother is making remarkable progress although she’s not convinced that the Center’s morning exercise program is conducive to her better health. (Even before her fall she refused to join the group.)
While it’s unlikely she’ll ever gain enough strength to walk again, she can almost reach out, pick up, and carry to her mouth the small containers of fruit juice I bring her. That’s progress: drinking fluids is key to flushing her system of meds from surgery.
She’s also easier to understand although she continues to whisper. (That’s not new: talking softly has been her MO for years.)
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 17: sunrise 5:xxam; sunset 6:1xpm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
March 25: sunrise 6:05am; sunset 6:03pm.
Day 363 Wednesday, March 24 - Equality
News blues…
When does the right to health care become an empty promise?Excerpts from a letter to SA’s minister of health from concerned citizens regarding the collapse of Eastern Cape’s health care system:
I’m allowing myself to feel optimism. Nestled in that feeling, though, is worry and, yes, guilt. Can I really skip back to my life in California, my family and friends, my houseboat, a short-term job, vaccination against Covid-19… and leave my mother (feeling abandoned) in the Care Center?
While health care is “officially” free to South Africans who cannot afford or do not have access to private health care, the health care system is overwhelmed and, like too many SA institutions and bureaucracies, under-funded with an overall lack of bureaucratic competence.
After paying, yet again, market prices for the gardener to visit a doctor – as opposed to days-long visit to the local, over-whelmed hospital where he’ll run the risk of exposure to Covid-19 (see article, above) – I received a response from the doctor on the letter that accompanied the gardener. Among other things, I’d asked for more information on his illness and what he could and could not eat (given the initial diagnosis of gastro-enteritis).
I received back a note of pablum – a list of aliment that included sebaceous dermatitis and candida - and, tucked in amid that list, a recommendation that he be “tested to rule out retrovirus”. In other words, HIV.
Gulp.
This is a 38-year-old man with stay-at-home wife and two young children.
What happens to them if he has HIV?
It’s a hideous thought.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
** March 24: sunrise 6:04am; sunset 6:04pm.
Other than offering “thoughts and prayers” there’s little to indicate Congress will tighten gun laws across the country.
And also got word from a different realtor that her client is interested in purchasing too. An asking price offer.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
Miami Beach Police fired pepper balls into crowds of partiers and arrested at least a dozen people late Saturday as the city took extraordinary measures to crack down on spring breakers who officials have said are out of control.
And I thought Donald Trump was awful! (Hint: he was. Birds of a feather and all that...)
March 20 was the formal southern hemisphere equinox.*
When does the right to healthcare become an empty promise, minister? Is it when 66% of patients at a rural hospital die of Covid-19 related illnesses because help doesn’t come in time? Or was it when you discovered they were lying about the true death rate in the province – what doesn’t get reported can’t hurt anyone, right?Read the letter >>
…Premier Oscar Mabuyane defended the wrecking ball that was Health MEC Sindiswa Gomba to the end, saying she did her best – and while this probably is best practice in South African politics it has done nothing to protect the right to healthcare.
…There is a resignation that has set in under the people of the province, that having to deal with the Department of Health has become yet another burden on lives already burdened by poverty, extreme levels of unemployment and crime. The year 2020 added Covid-19 and its brutal death toll to the list. It has pushed a health system teetering on the edge over the cliff.
...Primary healthcare has become a battlefield with pensioners describing their battle to get their chronic medicine as the “survival of the fittest”. Often the cost of transport is the cost of healthcare – and that is not free.
… Mobile clinics are operating without water and electricity – with no stock of antiretrovirals and TB medicine, and with patients having to relieve themselves in the veld or ask residents in nearby homes to use their toilets. When patients line up and wait in vain for a doctor to arrive, they are told that they must try again on another day or write a letter to put in the suggestions box. Patients at district hospitals often don’t get food.
Another patient was recently sexually assaulted by a nurse.
… When will the government say enough is enough?
Emergency medical services remain in crisis. Many hospitals have lost their managers after run-ins with the unions.
At maternity units, exhausted doctors are presented with A4 handwritten lists of more than 20 Caesarean sections that must be done “immediately” because they are life-threatening, but in theatre they have no proper gowns and not a pair of surgical scissors that works. They have to run the theatre for 24 hours a day and due to a shortage of porters, the few specialists left now also fetch and return their own patients.
Nurses must cut open the sleeves of the gowns because they would otherwise not be usable. ... As an act of desperation and with dire staff shortages, as fatally high as 60% in some units, heads of tertiary units in Nelson Mandela Bay were forced to refuse taking in medical students due to start their rotation at the end of the month. …
…The drainage system at Port Elizabeth/Gqeberha’s Provincial Hospital has become infested with superbugs and there is nothing anybody can do as the head office in Bhisho has refused to replace it for the past 10 years.
…When will you intervene? Will it be when someone finally realises that a lot is going wrong in a province that has to pay R920-million in medico-legal claims in a single year? Or will it be when the medical waste company finally refuses to collect medical waste due to non-payment, creating a public hazard? Will it be when you see the open bags of hazardous medical waste lying on the grounds of a hospital?
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Another step closer to Skyping the agency that’s held my return ticket to San Francisco since the pandemic shut down international flights.I’m allowing myself to feel optimism. Nestled in that feeling, though, is worry and, yes, guilt. Can I really skip back to my life in California, my family and friends, my houseboat, a short-term job, vaccination against Covid-19… and leave my mother (feeling abandoned) in the Care Center?
***
Staying with the theme of today’s post – SA failing health care system – a closer look into that system as I try to understand what ails the gardener. As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, he’s been ill for more than six weeks: stomach pain, extreme fatigue, aching legs and knees, extreme loss of weight….While health care is “officially” free to South Africans who cannot afford or do not have access to private health care, the health care system is overwhelmed and, like too many SA institutions and bureaucracies, under-funded with an overall lack of bureaucratic competence.
After paying, yet again, market prices for the gardener to visit a doctor – as opposed to days-long visit to the local, over-whelmed hospital where he’ll run the risk of exposure to Covid-19 (see article, above) – I received a response from the doctor on the letter that accompanied the gardener. Among other things, I’d asked for more information on his illness and what he could and could not eat (given the initial diagnosis of gastro-enteritis).
I received back a note of pablum – a list of aliment that included sebaceous dermatitis and candida - and, tucked in amid that list, a recommendation that he be “tested to rule out retrovirus”. In other words, HIV.
Gulp.
This is a 38-year-old man with stay-at-home wife and two young children.
What happens to them if he has HIV?
It’s a hideous thought.
***
While today is not the officially recognized equinox - day and night of equal duration –but it is that day.** Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
** March 24: sunrise 6:04am; sunset 6:04pm.
Day 362 Tuesday, March 23 - Thoughts and prayers
News blues…
Amid a pandemic, the American Way of Life is returning: Another mass shooting - that’s 2 in 2 weeks.Other than offering “thoughts and prayers” there’s little to indicate Congress will tighten gun laws across the country.
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
I’ve no wireless connection at my mother’s house so I must drive to my new place to access the Internet. Lack of Internet connection is very apparent in this country. Only someone privileged enough to usually have easy Internet access can understand the experience of how cut off from the rest of world one feels when Internet connection is sparse. Internet is addictive.***
Things in my life might be looking up. I met with one realtor today regarding clarifications and modifications to a purchase offer on my mother’s house. It included an in-depth discussion of continuing the sales trajectory if I returned to California. That makes me feel very hopeful. And hopeful is good. And also got word from a different realtor that her client is interested in purchasing too. An asking price offer.
***
Shorter days, longer nights. It’s real! Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:05pm.
Day 361 Monday, March 22 - Mixed metaphors
News blues…
Cresting the third wave between a rock and a hard place?SA’s deputy health minister Joe Phaahla recently admitted the department would not meet its target of vaccinating 1.5-million health-care workers. Instead, he said it was likely that 700,000 would be vaccinated by the end of April.American youth, meanwhile, parties on…”
Professor Glenda Gray, a co-lead investigator for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) vaccine trial, predicted this week that 500,000 health-care workers would be vaccinated by the end of April - if there were no delays.
With fears of a third wave likely to erupt at the end of April, this means most of SA's health-care workers will still be unprotected.
Miami Beach Police fired pepper balls into crowds of partiers and arrested at least a dozen people late Saturday as the city took extraordinary measures to crack down on spring breakers who officials have said are out of control.
Saturday night, hundreds of mostly maskless people remained in the streets well after the 8 p.m. curfew. With sirens blaring, police opened fire with pepper balls - a chemical irritant similar to paint balls -- into the crowd, causing a stampede of people fleeingIndia reports 46,951 new coronavirus cases, the highest single-day rise since November 12 and the sixth consecutive daily increase in infections….
The country has recorded a total of 11,646,081 cases, including 159,967 fatalities, since the beginning of the pandemic.Brazil experiences a surge of Coronavirus cases with the country's health systems increasingly overwhelmed. In nearly every state across Brazil, occupancy rates in intensive care units (ICUs) are at or above 80%. Some of them are at or above 90%, and a few have have exceeded 100% occupancy, forcing them to turn some patients away.
The jump in infections comes almost a year since India's first nationwide lockdown.
State governors, city mayors and local medical personnel now say they are running out of supplies to treat even the Covid-19 patients who have been allocated precious ICU beds. Stocks of medicines that facilitate intubation could vanish in the next two weeks, according to a report from the National Council of Municipal Health Secretaries. And Brazil's National Association of Private Hospitals (ANAHP) has predicted that private hospitals will run out of medicines necessary for intubating Covid-19 patients by Monday.The president of the country advises Brazilians: “Enough fussing and whining. How much longer will the crying go on?”
And I thought Donald Trump was awful! (Hint: he was. Birds of a feather and all that...)
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Plotting my getaway. I’ve still have too little information to make a firm decision about returning to California next month, but I’m trying out various possibilities. One possibility is hiring a house-sitter. Another is offering free accommodation to a manager type person. This option is risky. Manager type people tend to not manage, or over manage, as soon as one’s back is turned. They tend also to refuse to depart when the agreed upon departure date arrives (claiming “squatters rights” is legitimate in SA).***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:March 20 was the formal southern hemisphere equinox.*
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
• March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:06pm.
Posting every day for 360 days has allowed a way to focus my mind and practice self-discipline. It’s kept me going during rough times.
A brief recap: I’d initially planned on visiting my mother for a couple of months, organizing her past and future affairs as I’ve done for the past decade, then returning to California to earn an income and live my life.
After the pandemic set in, South Africa locked down, and international flights were cancelled, I’m grateful that I started recording day-by-day events.
This unique opportunity allowed met to explore:
Thank you for following me on this journey.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
Learned yesterday that the first people who made an offer on this house, ZAR200,000 less than the asking price, bought a place in the same town, different neighborhood. That much of a reduction seemed outrageous then. Now? Not so much. Had I accepted it, I could have planned and perhaps executed my getaway by now. Imagine: a purchased ticket for a seat next to my daughter on the return flight to SFO. Instead, here I am: doing the best for my mother’s investment in this property, but stuck, stuck, stuck! Grrrrr!
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
Mutations are changes - basically typos - that occur in the genome of the virus as it makes copies of itself and moves from person to person.
Variants are a particular version of the virus that has a specific combination of mutations across its genome. A variant is of concern when we start to see it rising in frequency over the population, over a period of time. The variant first discovered in the U.K., the variant first discovered in South Africa, and the one found in Brazil. Reports now indicate that new variants have also been discovered in California and New York.
Read a basic breakdown on what we know so far about how these variants compare with each other ― as well as with the original version of the coronavirus >>
Counteroffer made to one interested house purchasing party. If that’s accepted, the paperwork goes to the lawyer to sign. (My mother is currently incapable of signing the documents.
I continue to figure out how to load assorted items onto the Chana (truck) to deliver to the recycling center, or the dump, or somewhere else. I’m increasingly reluctant to take on more heavy work as an injury could set me back in untold ways. Moreover, I do not have medical insurance in this country. Actually, my medical insurance ran out in the California, too, which means I’m out of affordable and effecting medical care anywhere on this planet. (Best not to dwell on that reality.)
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 19: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:09pm.
Week 51
The one year anniversary of lockdown approaches.
It’s been a hellava year, hasn’t it?
Worldwide (Map)
March 18, 2021 - 120,740,000 confirmed infections; 2,672,000 deaths
February 18, 2021 - 109,885,600 confirmed infections; 2,430,000 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 92,314,000 confirmed infections; 1,977,900 deaths
US (Map)
March 18, 2021 – 29,550,000 confirmed infections; 537,000 deaths
February 18, 2021 - 27,824,660 confirmed infections; 490,450 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 23,071,100 confirmed infections; 384,635 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
March 18, 2021 – 1,531,000 confirmed infections; 51,560 deaths
February 18, 2021 – 1,496,440 confirmed infections; 48,480 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 1,278,305 confirmed infections; 35,140 deaths
Fun fact: the more I uncover “stuff” – tools, tiles, railroad ties, other miscellany – the more stuff appears. A previously unsuspected trove of tools was revealed in a large, dust-strewn box in the controversial shed. I suspect that when my mother moved into this property, many items where never removed by the previous owner. Doing it now is a fulltime job.
Why is the shed controversial? Because realtors dispense contradictory advice about it.
One realtor is adamant that, because the shed is “not on plan,” the seller must tear it down. (In practical reality that means I must oversee the tearing down.)
Another realtor declares that, since the shed existed when my mother purchased the property, it can remain. Yet another realtor has yet to mention the shed at all, simply stating that her client’s offer is “as is” (aka “voetstoots”) – implying shed and all.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
The auctioneer’s truck comes this morning to pick up another batch of goods to auction. After several weeks, time permitting, of clearing the garage, the batch of goods nicely grouped – box of assorted nails, collections of assorted plumbing supplies, wall channel, doors, roofing, etc. – packaged, listed, and photographed will go. More news indicating possible forward momentum:
I received an email from my mother’s accountant that he’d sent SARS (revenue service) the package of documents – including a photograph of her holding her ID book – and that SARS might release her tax refund into her bank account. This, after 6 months of wrangling. The accountant reports it “can take up to 21 days to verify, but often takes less.” Hmmm. Over the past 355 days living in KZN I’ve developed a suspicious and skeptical mind when it comes to “official business.”
Several months ago, in an effort to surrender my mother’s elderly weapons, I’d carried three to a local gun shop. The gun shop couldn’t accept them for surrender but advised speaking to a certain warrant officer at the local SAPS (SA Police Service). The warrant officer advised me to download and have my mother sign the required documents that allow the turn in her (elderly) weapons for which she held licenses: a shotgun and a Beretta hand pistol, along with a bag of bullets.
I took his advice - thank the gods as my mother is currently unable to sign her name – but hesitated to carry a bagful of weapons in public and stand in line outside the police station with potential Covid spreaders. Instead, I asked my brother to finish that chore. He forgot. For months, the weapons and forms remained on the floor of my bedroom. After I cracked my small toe on the pile, I again requested my brother’s help. This time, he and his stepson complied. As of yesterday, elderly weapons and bullets are in the custody of local police ready for destruction. Sigh of relief.
Persistence has its advantages....
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 17: sunrise 6:00am; sunset 6:12pm.
Takeaway? “We need, as a world, to take on and be prepared for those next pandemics….”
Air quality indexes recorded a “hazardous” 999 rating on Monday as commuters travelled to work through the thick, dark air across China’s capital and further west.
It’s good (to appear ) to have options. I feel lighter in spirit.
The auction house pickup vehicle will arrive tomorrow morning to carry away yet another batch of material. I’ve still a long way to go to clear the garage and assorted sheds of miscellany (tools, planks, roofing, bags of coal (huh?), ropes of various sorts and gauges of wire….). Today is the day to finish preparations.
Alas, the gardener who, under ‘normal’ conditions is a natural ally to help with this task, remains ill.
About a month ago, he called in sick. I suspected Covid, but no, a doctor diagnosed either an ulcer or gastro enteritis – then settled on the latter.
Gastro “usually” resolves within a week, two at most. Our gardener – 38 years old - has been ill for 5 weeks. He’s lost at least 10kg/20lbs, his formerly round face is emaciated, his eyes dull, and he complains about weakness and pain in his knees and legs.
His prescribed medication is not helping. He shows few signs of regaining his health.
I sent him home early yesterday, after proposing a plan to which he’s agreed: he’d travel to the clinic and “insist” on an appoint for Wednesday. I’d pay for the appointment (amazing how much public health care here costs in both money and time…). Today, he’d arrive at the house an hour later than usual, help me sort goods to auction then he’d depart; that he’d not work tomorrow, instead get in line to wait for his doctor’s appointment. The friend for whom he’d usually work agreed to pay him for a sick day.
Let’s hope the doctor can pinpoint the ongoing, debilitating malady.
From my selfish point of view? What can go wrong, will go wrong. The gardener’s illness has dovetailed with the sale of this house – just when the house and garden ought to look its best, it is overcome with late summer weeds, long grass, and piles of “stuff” carried from my mother’s former life….
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
The biggest change in news coverage, though, is the absence of The Donald, aka the “sentient naartjie”. With Trump on the world stage, news – much of it mind-boggling – issued every minute of every day.
Now? Not so much. Today’s Trump news is all about investigations into his “business” practices, his presidency, his corruptions. And his golf games.
Trump-free news. What a concept.
The Ferry Building has a new life now, as a tourist destination with fancy shops and fine dining .
My adulthood in urban California, however, accustomed me to a new normal: municipal water always on tap, ditto electricity and natural gas.
Even after a year in South Africa it is … odd… to check a schedule each day to learn when my teeny part of the world will be without electricity.
The upside? I can count on electrical current throbbing through electrical lines and into my dwelling at some point of my day. That’s not true for 11 percent of South Africans https://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/11-of-sa-households-still-without-electricity-2013-11-14 .
If Eskom is to load shed, I’m happy that for the next couple of days at least, our power is off from 4am to 6:30am.
In KZN, days get shorter while nights get longer:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 15: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:14pm.
The faster vaccine production schedule is in part the result of an agreement by the pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co to help manufacture the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The unusual deal was brokered by the White House.
Another day of waiting to hear from potential house buyers.
The good news? My daughter plans to visit here, from California, next month. She’s had half of the dose of Covid vaccine and, if possible, will pick up on the trip she cancelled this time last year due to the, well, you know, the bleeping pandemic. I worry about her travelling and I’m dying to see her.
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
Yesterday, I was living with uncertainty.
Today, uncertainty has morphed into limbo.
Either no forward momentum – no house sale, for example – or simply stymied. An example of the latter: SARS will not accept a photo of my mother holding a sheet of paper with her case number and the date AND a photocopy of her ID book. (The sheet of paper with info is a SARS requirement.) Getting her to the point of wellness to take that photo took more than a week.
Alas, her ID book seems to have disappeared. Which means I must hunt for it.
Then, retake the photo – which means waiting for her to have a good-enough day that she can hold both the paper and the ID book. (If I find it. If not, she’ll not get her refund, the refund that will keep her financially afloat.)
I can make out that she’s saying her ID book is “in the drawer.” I’ve looked in every likely drawer – in this house, in her Care Center drawers…. No ID book. Today, I’ll look again.
It’s exhausting trying to do one’s best for a parent – and feeling as if one comes up short every time.
After seven years of my mother paying scant attention to her life’s administrative tasks, the task has fallen to me. I feel haunted.
Unsure if I can carry on.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
• March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
March 22: sunrise 6:03am; sunset 6:06pm.
Day 360 Sunday, March 21 - New plan afoot
***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
Enjoy science photos of the yearMeanwhile, back at the ranch…
This fifty-second week of lockdown in South Africa is an opportunity to reflect on the goal of this blog – and to modify my posting schedule.Posting every day for 360 days has allowed a way to focus my mind and practice self-discipline. It’s kept me going during rough times.
A brief recap: I’d initially planned on visiting my mother for a couple of months, organizing her past and future affairs as I’ve done for the past decade, then returning to California to earn an income and live my life.
After the pandemic set in, South Africa locked down, and international flights were cancelled, I’m grateful that I started recording day-by-day events.
This unique opportunity allowed met to explore:
- how local and international media presents information to Americans and South Africans
- tools to understand the intersection between our increasingly over-populated planet and the stress it places on our natural environments
- conclude that humans must collectively and coherently address our planet's ability holistically to support life.
Thank you for following me on this journey.
***
South African days getting shorter, nightfall last longer:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
March 21: sunrise 6:02am; sunset 6:07pm.
Day 359 Saturday, March 21 - Still a ways to go...
 |
| A male houbara bustard dances to attract females for mating in the United Arab Emirates’ al-Dhafra desert. Photograph: Karim Sahib/AFP/Getty Images. |
News blues…
In the US, the Covid-19 infection rate has begun to plateau rather than continue a downward trajectory. Dr Fauci warns this could indicate “a high risk that we’re going to get another resurgence. … We’ve seen that with previous surges. The other three that we’ve had in this country.” We “still have a ways to go….”***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Healthy planet, anyone?
 |
© Our World in Data – whose mission is to make data and research on the world’s largest problems understandable and accessible. |
People are becoming increasingly aware that their diet comes with a climate cost. But just how much of our greenhouse gas emissions comes from food?
… The chart above groups emissions into comparable parts of the food chain:
- Land use: this includes deforestation, peatland degradation and fires, and emissions from cultivated soils.
- Agricultural production: this includes emissions from synthetic fertilizers (and the energy used to manufacture them); manure; methane emissions from livestock and rice; aquaculture; and fuel use from on-farm machinery.
- Supply chain: this includes all emissions from food processing, packaging, transport, and retail, such as refrigeration.
- Post-retail: this is all the energy used by consumers for food preparation, such as refrigeration and cooking at home. It also includes emissions from consumer food waste. …
Read more on the complexities of how much of global greenhouse gas emissions come from food? >>
***
Photo essay: the week in wildlife Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
It’s official – my daughter arrives early April from San Francisco. Exciting! I’m dying to see her. Terrifying! All that virus floating around the planet.Learned yesterday that the first people who made an offer on this house, ZAR200,000 less than the asking price, bought a place in the same town, different neighborhood. That much of a reduction seemed outrageous then. Now? Not so much. Had I accepted it, I could have planned and perhaps executed my getaway by now. Imagine: a purchased ticket for a seat next to my daughter on the return flight to SFO. Instead, here I am: doing the best for my mother’s investment in this property, but stuck, stuck, stuck! Grrrrr!
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 20: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:08pm.
Day 358 Friday, March 19 - New year, new wave?
 |
| New strains (1.35 to 2:30 mins) |
Another week and South Africans would have spent one full year under some form of Lockdown. This, as the tracking project reports a fourth coronavirus wave is likely under way in the US state of Michigan. It’s the clearest sign that the pandemic’s reprieve could be faltering >>
News blues…
Terms such as coronavirus mutation, strain, and variants are often used interchangeably, but what’s the difference?Mutations are changes - basically typos - that occur in the genome of the virus as it makes copies of itself and moves from person to person.
Variants are a particular version of the virus that has a specific combination of mutations across its genome. A variant is of concern when we start to see it rising in frequency over the population, over a period of time. The variant first discovered in the U.K., the variant first discovered in South Africa, and the one found in Brazil. Reports now indicate that new variants have also been discovered in California and New York.
Read a basic breakdown on what we know so far about how these variants compare with each other ― as well as with the original version of the coronavirus >>
***
COVID-19 has inflicted devastating losses. It has also delivered certain blessings. 3 Ways the Pandemic Has Made the World Better >> ***
- Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide
- South African experts to follow for up-to-date and accurate Covid information…
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
One day of cool, wet weather… and we’re back to hot, humid weather.Counteroffer made to one interested house purchasing party. If that’s accepted, the paperwork goes to the lawyer to sign. (My mother is currently incapable of signing the documents.
I continue to figure out how to load assorted items onto the Chana (truck) to deliver to the recycling center, or the dump, or somewhere else. I’m increasingly reluctant to take on more heavy work as an injury could set me back in untold ways. Moreover, I do not have medical insurance in this country. Actually, my medical insurance ran out in the California, too, which means I’m out of affordable and effecting medical care anywhere on this planet. (Best not to dwell on that reality.)
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
March 19: sunrise 6:01am; sunset 6:09pm.
Week 51
Day 357 Thursday, March 18 - Dilemmas
The one year anniversary of lockdown approaches. It’s been a hellava year, hasn’t it?
Worldwide (Map)
March 18, 2021 - 120,740,000 confirmed infections; 2,672,000 deaths
February 18, 2021 - 109,885,600 confirmed infections; 2,430,000 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 92,314,000 confirmed infections; 1,977,900 deaths
US (Map)
March 18, 2021 – 29,550,000 confirmed infections; 537,000 deaths
February 18, 2021 - 27,824,660 confirmed infections; 490,450 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 23,071,100 confirmed infections; 384,635 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
March 18, 2021 – 1,531,000 confirmed infections; 51,560 deaths
February 18, 2021 – 1,496,440 confirmed infections; 48,480 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 1,278,305 confirmed infections; 35,140 deaths
***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide News blues…
Total number of vaccines administered in South Africa to date: 157,286 out of the 500,000 health workers targeted after SA kick-started the vaccination campaign with Johnson & Johnson's one-dose vaccine last month.According to health deputy minister Joe Phaahla, SA secured 20 million vaccines from Pfizer and additional supplies through the Covax facility and the African Union.Read more on this >>
However, the vaccines were not due to arrive as soon as the government had hoped and this could likely see SA missing its mark to vaccine 1.5 million people by the end of the month.
Healthy futures, anyone?
According to a groundbreaking study written by 26 marine biologists, climate experts and economists and published in Nature, bottom trawling, a widespread practice in which heavy nets are dragged along the seabed, pumps out 1 gigaton of carbon every year.Fishing boats that trawl the ocean floor release as much carbon dioxide as the entire aviation industry.Read more on this >>
The carbon is released from the seabed sediment into the water, and can increase ocean acidification, as well as adversely affecting productivity and biodiversity. Marine sediments are the largest pool of carbon storage in the world.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Another batch of items went off to the auction house.Fun fact: the more I uncover “stuff” – tools, tiles, railroad ties, other miscellany – the more stuff appears. A previously unsuspected trove of tools was revealed in a large, dust-strewn box in the controversial shed. I suspect that when my mother moved into this property, many items where never removed by the previous owner. Doing it now is a fulltime job.
Why is the shed controversial? Because realtors dispense contradictory advice about it.
One realtor is adamant that, because the shed is “not on plan,” the seller must tear it down. (In practical reality that means I must oversee the tearing down.)
Another realtor declares that, since the shed existed when my mother purchased the property, it can remain. Yet another realtor has yet to mention the shed at all, simply stating that her client’s offer is “as is” (aka “voetstoots”) – implying shed and all.
***
My daughter is one step closer to traveling from San Francisco Bay Area to KZN. She’s vaccinated and we’re confirming quarantine rules for both countries. Research on my end found a lab one town over that will administer pre-flight Covid test for her return to California. (An expensive test: ZAR850 - approx. US$56.)
I worry about the risk of travel under current conditions and I’m so looking forward to seeing her.
***
Dilemma: with the part time gardener ill or out of commission for the past several months, garden maintenance has slipped. Moreover, I’m doing more and more of the maintenance myself even as I prep, move, and sell “stuff”. I cannot go on this way. Legally I could although ethically I cannot layoff the gardener because he’s sick. I paid him throughout strict lockdown, then through his initial and ongoing illness, but I cannot continue to pay him and a fill-in gardener. But someone must tend the large garden and help with assorted tasks too heavy for me.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 18: sunrise 5:00am; sunset 6:11pm.
Day 356 Wednesday, March 17 - Persistence
 |
| © Mike Luckovich - 2021 Creators Syndicate |
News blues…
Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccination program grinds to a halt in virtually all of western Europe, as France, Spain, Germany, Italy and more than a dozen other countries pause rollout of that vaccine. This, they say, is a precautionary measure following concerns that the vaccine could be linked to blood clots; decisions that go against the advice of global health agencies. A few countries have stood by the vaccine - including the United Kingdom, where more than 11 million doses have already been administered, and where real-world data has shown vaccines are reducing infections and hospitalizations.***
More on fake vaccines around the world, including SA (5:28 mins)***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide Authorities in 219 countries and territories have reported about 120.7 million Covid 19 cases and 2.7 million deaths since China reported its first cases to the World Health Organization (WHO) in December 2019.
***
The Lincoln Project: Zero-Sum Game (0:55 mins)Healthy futures, anyone?
 |
| Satellite images show air pollution returning to pre-pandemic levels as restrictions loosen. These images, taken by the ESA using data from the Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite, show the monthly average nitrogen dioxide concentrations over China in February 2019, February 2020 and February 2021. Between February 2019 and February 2020, Beijing's nitrogen dioxide concentrations dropped 35%, the ESA said. In Chongqing, the drop was by 45%. As of February 2021, though, Beijing has returned to similar levels, while Chongqing has almost doubled its pre-Covid-19 numbers. |
"We expected air pollution to rebound as lockdowns are lifted across the globe," said Claus Zehner, ESA's Copernicus Sentinel-5P mission manager, in a statement. "Nitrogen dioxide concentrations in our atmosphere do not depend on human activity alone. Weather conditions such as wind speed and cloud cover also affect those levels, however a large quantity of these reductions are due to restrictions being eased. In the coming weeks and months, we expect increases of nitrogen dioxide concentrations also over Europe."
A similar trend is possible in the US.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Bliss-inducing rain tempers local high temperatures. Will rain affect today’s visit from a potential buyer? Eskom’s load shedding affected her visit yesterday: lack of electricity disabled her ability to make/receive phone calls; the visit was cancelled.The auctioneer’s truck comes this morning to pick up another batch of goods to auction. After several weeks, time permitting, of clearing the garage, the batch of goods nicely grouped – box of assorted nails, collections of assorted plumbing supplies, wall channel, doors, roofing, etc. – packaged, listed, and photographed will go. More news indicating possible forward momentum:
I received an email from my mother’s accountant that he’d sent SARS (revenue service) the package of documents – including a photograph of her holding her ID book – and that SARS might release her tax refund into her bank account. This, after 6 months of wrangling. The accountant reports it “can take up to 21 days to verify, but often takes less.” Hmmm. Over the past 355 days living in KZN I’ve developed a suspicious and skeptical mind when it comes to “official business.”
Several months ago, in an effort to surrender my mother’s elderly weapons, I’d carried three to a local gun shop. The gun shop couldn’t accept them for surrender but advised speaking to a certain warrant officer at the local SAPS (SA Police Service). The warrant officer advised me to download and have my mother sign the required documents that allow the turn in her (elderly) weapons for which she held licenses: a shotgun and a Beretta hand pistol, along with a bag of bullets.
I took his advice - thank the gods as my mother is currently unable to sign her name – but hesitated to carry a bagful of weapons in public and stand in line outside the police station with potential Covid spreaders. Instead, I asked my brother to finish that chore. He forgot. For months, the weapons and forms remained on the floor of my bedroom. After I cracked my small toe on the pile, I again requested my brother’s help. This time, he and his stepson complied. As of yesterday, elderly weapons and bullets are in the custody of local police ready for destruction. Sigh of relief.
Persistence has its advantages....
***
Remember Eskom and its ongoing program of load shedding? Now, courtesy of Eskom, a double whammy: South Africans must pay 15 percent more for the luxury of no electricity. Now that’s shoving a scam down the throats of people unable to resist.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 17: sunrise 6:00am; sunset 6:12pm.
Day 355 Tuesday, March 16 - Age of pandemics?
News blues…
From a South African perspective, an overview of Covid-19 with a focus on Long Covid and its effects. COVID-19: Our entrance into an age of pandemics. (16:45 mins)Takeaway? “We need, as a world, to take on and be prepared for those next pandemics….”
***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide Healthy futures, anyone?
Study of tree rings dating back to Roman empire concludes weather since 2014 has been extraordinary and recent European droughts 'worst in 2,000 years'The series of severe droughts and heatwaves in Europe since 2014 is the most extreme for more than 2,000 years.
The study analysed tree rings dating as far back as the Roman empire to create the longest such record to date. Scientists said global heating was the most probable cause of the recent rise in extreme heat.
The heatwaves have had devastating consequences, causing thousands of early deaths, destroying crops and igniting forest fires. Low river levels halted some shipping traffic and affected the cooling of nuclear power stations. Climate scientists predict more extreme and more frequent heatwaves and droughts in future.
Read more >>
***
In China, a massive sandstorm has combined with already high air pollution to turn the skies in Beijing an eerie orange, and send some air quality measurements off the charts.Air quality indexes recorded a “hazardous” 999 rating on Monday as commuters travelled to work through the thick, dark air across China’s capital and further west.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Today, as I review one purchase offer for my mother’s house, another couple will tour the place and, potentially, make a competing offer.It’s good (to appear ) to have options. I feel lighter in spirit.
The auction house pickup vehicle will arrive tomorrow morning to carry away yet another batch of material. I’ve still a long way to go to clear the garage and assorted sheds of miscellany (tools, planks, roofing, bags of coal (huh?), ropes of various sorts and gauges of wire….). Today is the day to finish preparations.
Alas, the gardener who, under ‘normal’ conditions is a natural ally to help with this task, remains ill.
About a month ago, he called in sick. I suspected Covid, but no, a doctor diagnosed either an ulcer or gastro enteritis – then settled on the latter.
Gastro “usually” resolves within a week, two at most. Our gardener – 38 years old - has been ill for 5 weeks. He’s lost at least 10kg/20lbs, his formerly round face is emaciated, his eyes dull, and he complains about weakness and pain in his knees and legs.
His prescribed medication is not helping. He shows few signs of regaining his health.
I sent him home early yesterday, after proposing a plan to which he’s agreed: he’d travel to the clinic and “insist” on an appoint for Wednesday. I’d pay for the appointment (amazing how much public health care here costs in both money and time…). Today, he’d arrive at the house an hour later than usual, help me sort goods to auction then he’d depart; that he’d not work tomorrow, instead get in line to wait for his doctor’s appointment. The friend for whom he’d usually work agreed to pay him for a sick day.
Let’s hope the doctor can pinpoint the ongoing, debilitating malady.
From my selfish point of view? What can go wrong, will go wrong. The gardener’s illness has dovetailed with the sale of this house – just when the house and garden ought to look its best, it is overcome with late summer weeds, long grass, and piles of “stuff” carried from my mother’s former life….
***
Days getting shorter, nights getting longer:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
March 16: sunrise 5:59am; sunset 6:13pm.
Day 354 Monday, March 15 - New normal
News blues…
Covid news continues as countries grapple with vaccine procurement and/or vaccination schedules.The biggest change in news coverage, though, is the absence of The Donald, aka the “sentient naartjie”. With Trump on the world stage, news – much of it mind-boggling – issued every minute of every day.
Now? Not so much. Today’s Trump news is all about investigations into his “business” practices, his presidency, his corruptions. And his golf games.
Trump-free news. What a concept.
***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide ***
Technology’s best use: reconstituted video shows San Francisco’s Market Street heading towards the Ferry Building a day before the 1906 earthquake. (14:07 mins) The Ferry Building has a new life now, as a tourist destination with fancy shops and fine dining .
Healthy futures, anyone?
It's unavoidable: we must ban fossil fuels to save our planet. Here are ideas on how we do it ….***
Photo essay: The biggest swarms of the insects in a generation that have devastated crops and grazing across Africa are now being turned into sustainable, high-protein animal fodder and fertilizer. Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
My childhood in rural South Africa tempered my view of “normality.” In apartheid South Africa, my ethnic and socio-economic culture provided many advantages, including running water (albeit then stored in tanks and dependent on sufficient rainfall) natural gas for cooking, and electricity (unless a thunderstorm knocked out the grid.).My adulthood in urban California, however, accustomed me to a new normal: municipal water always on tap, ditto electricity and natural gas.
Even after a year in South Africa it is … odd… to check a schedule each day to learn when my teeny part of the world will be without electricity.
The upside? I can count on electrical current throbbing through electrical lines and into my dwelling at some point of my day. That’s not true for 11 percent of South Africans https://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/11-of-sa-households-still-without-electricity-2013-11-14 .
If Eskom is to load shed, I’m happy that for the next couple of days at least, our power is off from 4am to 6:30am.
***
Day light savings time begins in California.In KZN, days get shorter while nights get longer:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 15: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:14pm.
Day 353 Sunday, March 14 - Stimulus
News blues…
I noticed a $1,400 deposit in my credit union account – active only after March 17.
***
After previously saying there would be enough doses of the coronavirus vaccine available to dose the entire adult population in the United States by the end of July (and he urged people to remain vigilant by wearing masks), Prez Joe Biden ups that date to the end of May.The faster vaccine production schedule is in part the result of an agreement by the pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co to help manufacture the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The unusual deal was brokered by the White House.
***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide Healthy futures, anyone?
Photo essay: Covid’s effect on people around the world***
New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, has received what may be her greatest accolade yet: a large insect named in her honour. Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Another hot day: 32 C.Another day of waiting to hear from potential house buyers.
The good news? My daughter plans to visit here, from California, next month. She’s had half of the dose of Covid vaccine and, if possible, will pick up on the trip she cancelled this time last year due to the, well, you know, the bleeping pandemic. I worry about her travelling and I’m dying to see her.
***
Today, begins daylight savings time in the US. Summer is on its way. South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 14: sunrise 5:58am; sunset 6:15pm.
Day 352 Saturday, March 13 - Limbo
 |
| The Velvet Bandit (San Rafael, California) Artists from Barcelona to California and beyond are hailing the hope that comes with shots that were developed in record time and are now being administered to millions of people worldwide every day. |
News blues…
Meet John Hollis, a man with super-antibodies against Covid-19 (4:24 mins)***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide Healthy futures, anyone?
It's unavoidable: we must ban fossil fuels to save our planet. Ideas on how we do itMeanwhile, back at the ranch…
Limbo. Living in limbo. That’s me.Yesterday, I was living with uncertainty.
Today, uncertainty has morphed into limbo.
Either no forward momentum – no house sale, for example – or simply stymied. An example of the latter: SARS will not accept a photo of my mother holding a sheet of paper with her case number and the date AND a photocopy of her ID book. (The sheet of paper with info is a SARS requirement.) Getting her to the point of wellness to take that photo took more than a week.
Alas, her ID book seems to have disappeared. Which means I must hunt for it.
Then, retake the photo – which means waiting for her to have a good-enough day that she can hold both the paper and the ID book. (If I find it. If not, she’ll not get her refund, the refund that will keep her financially afloat.)
I can make out that she’s saying her ID book is “in the drawer.” I’ve looked in every likely drawer – in this house, in her Care Center drawers…. No ID book. Today, I’ll look again.
It’s exhausting trying to do one’s best for a parent – and feeling as if one comes up short every time.
After seven years of my mother paying scant attention to her life’s administrative tasks, the task has fallen to me. I feel haunted.
Unsure if I can carry on.
The ID book that broke the camel's back?
***
Tomorrow begins daylight savings time in most US states. “Spring forward, fall back” means Californians set their time pieces forward one hour. And, for a week or two, Californians head to work, or school, etc., in the dark. And leave work, or school, etc., in daylight. That magical moment when one steps out of the workplace into sunshine. Summer’s afoot!
In South Africa, the days get shorter and nightfall earlier:
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 13: sunrise 5:57am; sunset 6:17pm.
One year of residing in KZN and I’ve accepted this fact of life.
We humans would fight to the death to maintain, rather than change, a tightly held point of view. Dr Fauci models another way of doing things.
According to Nigel Dudley, co-author of a paper in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), “Parks have emptied out to a large extent and there’s no money coming in,” raising concerns about the longer-term impact of falling tourism on conservation budgets.
This lifestyle is a nightmare for a former project manager, preferring to make things happen “on time and on budget.”
Gurus and sages might advise “living in the moment,” or “taking things one day at a time,” or similar trite-ism. Fighting reality is a losing battle – and there both wisdom in acceptance and a kind of joy in recognizing that, despite doing one’s best, one must practice – and is successfully practicing - patience.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
March 13: sunrise 5:57am; sunset 6:17pm.
Day 351 Friday, March 12 - Living with uncertainty
Five minutes before Eskom shut down our power from 6 to 8am today, my daily mug of coffee in my hand, I phoned my friend in California. As we reviewed the historical Covid-19 bill, just signed into law by Prez Biden, power outage began and my wireless dropped.One year of residing in KZN and I’ve accepted this fact of life.
News blues…
Another reason to respect Dr Fauci: hard as the media presses him, he avoids making predictions.We humans would fight to the death to maintain, rather than change, a tightly held point of view. Dr Fauci models another way of doing things.
Predicting the course of SARS-CoV-2 has been especially difficult… As Anthony Fauci [points out] pandemics themselves change depending on how we react to them. “It really is an evolution, in real time, of understanding something that you never experienced before,” he said. This is why he hates being asked about the future. “There are too many moving targets.” Despite the snippets that make it into headlines and sound bites, America’s most famous pandemic expert is extremely reluctant to make predictions about “returning to normal” at any specific time.
“The answer is, actually, we don’t know,” …but interviewers are rarely satisfied by that. He recounted a typical conversation: “But what’s your best guess? It’s dangerous to guess. But let’s say everything falls into place. When do you think that would be? Fall? Winter? You have variants. You have stumbling blocks. All right, give me the best-case scenario…. But very often the best-case scenario doesn’t come out. Well, let’s say you do get people vaccinated. When do you think we could get back to some form of normality? Well, what do you think ‘form of normality’ is? I mean, normality is the way it was back in October of 2019? Well, who knows how long that’s going to take. We may need to be wearing masks in 2022 if the variants come in and they sort of thwart our vaccination efforts to get everything under control.” Despite his consistent dodging and hedging, Fauci said, the human demand for certainty seems to drown out his actual answers. He imagines the headlines: “‘Fauci Says We’ll Have to Be Wearing Masks in 2022.’ No, I didn’t say that. ‘Fauci Says We’ll Be Back to Normal by the End of the Year.’ No, I didn’t say that either.” He sounded weary when we talked. “It’s dangerous to predict.”
We all want concise, concrete predictions. Attempting to minimize uncertainty is a universal human instinct … Yet efforts to eliminate uncertainty are bound to create more of it. Perhaps the most vexing lesson in epidemiology is that predictions themselves change the future. Bold forecasts have unintended consequences. When experts say that cases of COVID-19 are trending downward and the outlook for summer is rosy, for example, states start declaring victory and eliminating precautions. Even if you turn out to be exactly right about the capacity of a virus, people will react as it spreads, changing their behavior and altering prior patterns of transmission. Then, if you adjust your models and predictions accordingly, you are susceptible to criticism about “flip-flopping” or “changing your story.” Pandemic analysis is not a line of work for those afraid to update their conclusions as new evidence becomes available. It requires speaking despite uncertainty about the future, based on a keen eye for certainty in the present.
Read >> “The Pandemic Is Ending”
***
Tracking Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide ***
The Lincoln Project: Double Standard (0:55 mins) Healthy futures, anyone?
More than half of protected areas in Africa had been forced to halt or reduce field patrols and anti-poaching operations. A quarter of protected sites in Asia have had to reduce conservation activities, such as guards to protect against rhino and tiger poaching in Nepal.According to Nigel Dudley, co-author of a paper in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), “Parks have emptied out to a large extent and there’s no money coming in,” raising concerns about the longer-term impact of falling tourism on conservation budgets.
Bush meat hunting has also increased significantly due to both patrol reductions and growing poverty.
In the same publication, a survey of rangers in 60 countries showed that a fifth of them had lost their jobs due to pandemic-related budget cuts. Others had their salaries reduced or delayed.
… In one positive development, some animals appeared to enjoy the respite from visitors with more park sightings reported of some species such as a pig-sized endangered mammal called the Mountain Tapir in South America.
“That’s a lesson for us for longer-term management, that animals need to have a rest and that tourism is wonderful but can also bring problems… ”
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Revisiting uncertainty… I’m slowly acclimating to my new reality: Currently, I’m in charge of the direction of almost nothing in my life. Rather, I live in a zone of if/then scenarios: IF the house sells, THEN A, B, C; IF the house does not sell, THEN D, E, F. IF my mother can sign the needed documents for SARS THEN G, H, I; IF my mother cannot sign the needed documents for SARS THEN J, K, L. Each scenario has expected and unexpected consequences.This lifestyle is a nightmare for a former project manager, preferring to make things happen “on time and on budget.”
Gurus and sages might advise “living in the moment,” or “taking things one day at a time,” or similar trite-ism. Fighting reality is a losing battle – and there both wisdom in acceptance and a kind of joy in recognizing that, despite doing one’s best, one must practice – and is successfully practicing - patience.
***
South African days getting shorter while nightfall happens earlier:Feb 26: sunrise 5:47am; sunset 6:33pm.
March 2: sunrise 5:50am; sunset 6:29pm.
March 9: sunrise 5:55am; sunset 6:21pm.
March 12: sunrise 5:56am; sunset 6:18pm.
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