Smokin'

News blues

The surge in pediatric infections worries doctors as Delta makes a growing number of kids very sick. On the cusp of flu season, doctors say Covid's potential impact on kids is "beyond what flu would ever do." 
The Best Way to Keep Your Kids Safe from Delta? Get the adults in your community vaccinated. 

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Couple of weeks ago, I wrote of the Lambda variant. Sorry to say, it is heeeere…. First cases of COVID Lambda variant reported in north Louisiana 
Buckle up.
More importantly, get vaccinated….

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The Lincoln Project, Last Week on the Republican Party (part 2) (1:28 mins)

Healthy planet, anyone?

So much bad news. It’s time for some unexpected news – about birds. Gotta love ‘em.

Hair from dogs, raccoons and even humans has been found in the nests of birds, which scientists believe makes the nests better insulated. For a long time, scientists assumed that birds had to collect hair that had been shed or scavenge it from mammal carcasses. However, a new study, published last week in the journal Ecology, shows that several species of bird, including chickadees and titmice, don’t just scavenge hair, they steal it.

Read >>  “Sneaky Thieves Steal Hair from Foxes, Raccoons, Dogs, Even You It’s simple: Mammals have hair or fur. Birds want it.” 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

I rose early to apply the first coat of roof paint to the houseboat. As I painted, I noticed the weather wasn’t conforming to the weather report. The day, instead of bright and sunny, appeared foggy or overcast. I continue to work until I’d applied the first coat then, bathed in sweat, I packed up the tools, cleaned the brushes, and made my way to the shower. After that, I consulted the online weather forecast. What I’d assumed was fog or low clouds was smoke from the fires burning around California. This time of the year, until now until mid to late October, the wind blows offshore. This means Californians will be subjected to smoke for the next several months.

Our quality of healthy life will nosedive. 

And the Air Quality Index (AQI) shows that. Earlier in the day, the AQI reached 187, then dropped to 157, then 107. (AQI increments by 50 so from 1 to 50 is classified “good”.) 

Interestingly, as I write this, it’s at 93 - “moderate” - although in this area the smoke haze is actually thicker than an hour previous and the air smells of smoke.

I was out of the country last year when Californians hunkered down under vast clouds of thick smoke so it’s a new experience, not pleasant but the sign of the times… 

That news deflates… 

and that's perfectly expressed by what was, two days ago, an astonishingly lovely blossom on my barrel cactus. Today? Deflated. 

Not sure if this is its regular lifecycle – I’ve never seen it blossom before.)

Nevertheless, I’ve applied the first coat of roof paint. Tomorrow I plan to do the second coat. Smoke permitting.
It’s hard work … both to paint and to breathe.

Attention requested

News blues…

President Cyril Ramaphosa and health minister Zweli Mkhize's tease at dropping to level 1 lockdown and easing restrictions further.

According to Ramaphosa, some of the proposals are from religious leaders who are requesting an extension in the number of people who may attend gatherings… the sports sector, the entertainment, hotels and tourism industry had also submitted proposals.
“We are considering all of that as we do an evaluation of where the infection rate is. We will be able to give consideration to all of these proposals and get advice,” said Ramaphosa.  “This is where we will need advice from the Medical Advisory Committee as well as from our [National Joint Operational and Intelligence Structure] NATJoints, which is the real engine of monitoring our coronavirus approach.

This, even as SA records 113 new Covid-19 deaths and approaches more than 650,000 confirmed infections. The recovery rate is close to 573,003 or close to 89 percent.  The latest pandemic update confirmed the death of 97 more patients in the past 24-hours: 17 from KwaZulu-Natal, 21 from Gauteng, seven from Eastern Cape, four from Free State, one from Limpopo, 26 from Mpumalanga, 15 from North West and six from the Western Cape.

Healthy futures, anyone

All the world’s people must begin to grapple with the reality of climate change. That we’re amid climate change is the reality that must shift from the ideological to the practical, despite denier politicians, denier corporations, denier citizens….

After touring the fire damage in the North Complex Fire near Oroville in Northern California, Governor Gavin Newsom was in no mood for one of his usual, careful media statements. “If you do not believe in science,” Newsom said bluntly while standing in the ashes of what once was a Butte County forest, “I hope you believe observed reality.”
“The hots are getting a lot hotter and the wets are getting a lot wetter. The science is absolute. The data is self evident. We have to own that reality and we have to own the response to that reality.”
Last year by this time, 118,000 acres had burned, he observed. This year, it’s over 3 million acres charred. The state is currently battling five of the 20 most destructive fires in the last century. The debate is over in terms of climate change. If you don’t believe that, just come to the state of California.”

Last week, it was predominantly California that suffered devastating wildfires. This week, it’s the west coast, from southern California to Washington, with Oregon and Oregonians experiencing fire nightmares. 
Cry, beloved west coast.

Deadly wildfires raging Friday in Oregon, Washington and California made two major West Coast cities — Portland, Oregon, and Seattle — the places with the worst air quality in the world.
Portland had an air quality index of over 200 on Friday — more than that of any other major city in the world, according to IQAir, a Swiss air quality technology company that operates a real-time air pollution monitoring platform.
Seattle ranked second, with an AQI of around 190. 

My hometown-away-from-home, the island city of Alameda in the San Francisco Bay, recently experienced an AQI of 235.
All Bay Area friends, within the inner bay, and outside it, report ash falling like snowflakes, and cooler than usual temperatures. But no rain.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Anyone who is a daughter knows the kind of tension common among mothers and daughters. I’m no exception. Lockdown in SA initially exacerbated the tensions between me and my mother. Moreover, I’ve little in common with her chosen lifestyle – multiple dogs, domestic workers, huge house and garden. To me – independent, focused on art and ideas – that lifestyle is enigmatic, cumbersome, confining….
Yet, here I am, the “go-to” person expected to maintain this lifestyle. It’s a challenge to which the pandemic and Lockdown has added layers of complexity.
Over the last 170 days, my mom left the house once: last week, a trip to the vet’s clinic to put down her three elderly dogs. She’s unfamiliar with the lengths to which the public and neighbors conform or not, to pandemic regulations. Nor is she invested in ensuring her domestic workers conform. That was left to me. And, when I instituted regulations to ensure safety, especially the safety of my 87-year-old mother, my efforts were undermined, even chastised. This sticky situation was exacerbated by domestic workers reluctant to accept and conform to Lockdown regulations in general and more so to those of the household.
Next week, however, things look up: one domestic worker – the most reluctant – leaves my mother’s employ after 38 years.
Next day, I move my mother’s good to her new home in the Care Center.
Day after that, I move my mom and her dog.
Then, preparation for sale of house begins….

Lockdowner

Thirty-six-plus hours without an Internet connection and this Lockedowner has gone from stir-crazy to full-on crazy.
I could not visit the local café that provides internet connection as the café closed at 2:00pm. And its closed all day Sunday.
Not having access to the Internet – adjusting to its absence and the involuntary changes forced on my daily routine – highlight my Internet dependence… although “addiction” might be the more apt term.
Neither a cigarette smoker nor a regular imbiber of alcohol, I sympathize deeply with South Africans involuntarily forced to forgo those pleasures due to Lockdown Level 3’s nation-wide ban on alcohol and cigarettes. (The ban on both items lifted with Level 2.) 

News blues… 

According to family and friends in California, air quality degraded to numbers well-above 280, into 300 in some area, on the Air Quality Index .

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Much of what must happen over the next few weeks and months - relocate my mother, deal with the Labor Department, distribute, sell, donate furnishings, rehome dogs, sell the house, return to California - must be carefully planned.
Planning and teamwork come naturally to me; for years planning and teamwork earned me a living as a project manager in California’s high-tech industry.
Planning and teamwork does not come naturally to my mother. For decades, she was a one-woman show. She was frequently indecisive and insecure, but she ruled her roost with an iron fist.
On the micro, intra-family level, our different styles offer potential conflict and misunderstanding.
On the macro, inter-cultural level, I’m handicapped by my limited understanding of – and hair-trigger frustration with - South Africa’s bureaucracy.
Layer a pandemic and Lockdown over an already complex situation and… I quaver.
Am I up to this challenge?
Can I be kind yet forceful, master my frustration, cope with the social isolation, ignore criticism of disengaged extended family, maintain my dignity and self-respect, and demonstrate compassion?
I hope so.

un-Netted

Twenty-four-plus hours without an Internet connection makes any already-stir-crazy Lockedowner more stir-crazy.

News blues…

“I can’t breathe….” Across the United States, this infamous phrase encapsulates horror, tragedy, injustice, police brutality, and shame. It denotes the brutal police tactic of an officer of the law placing a knee upon the neck of a human being – and not infrequently, removing it only after the victim has suffocated.
“I can’t breathe” takes on a whole new, tragic meaning as California’s wider Bay Area - home to more than 7.1 million pairs of lungs - suffers an extra-ordinary fire season with some 560 fires, many the largest blazes in the state’s history.  Family and friends report difficulty breathing amid the worst smoke pollution in the state’s history.
Air quality at Concord/Walnut Creek – 25 miles inland from the bay – fluctuates above 220 on the Air Quality Index:  “unhealthy for sensitive groups.”
Does “sensitive” mean “oxygen dependent”? Is there a parallel between the brutal police tactic of placing a knee upon the neck of a human being and the brutal tactic of politicians, corporations, and governments effectively refusing to address climate change?
Given explosive fires as a symptom of climate change, is climate change inaction akin to placing a metaphoric knee on the neck of living creatures everywhere, depriving them of oxygen by ensuring a high CO2/ methane/ pollution-laded atmosphere?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

I purchase a monthly data plan from a local ISP and carefully titrate my usage to ensure data lasts the entire month.
Back in February, before my life had been threatened by my mother’s domestic worker’s son, I had given – naively it turns out – both domestic workers access to the data plan. I trusted they’d use it as lightly as they did their own limited, pay-as-you-go plan: for SMS (“text”) and WhatsApp.
Alas.
The same domestic worker whose son threatened to kill me has abused this trust.
Last month, I ran out of data before the end of the month, suspected excessive data usage by others, and asked the ISP host to change my password. He didn’t respond and, fully occupied seeking a care center for my mother, I dropped the issue.
This month, as usual, I carefully logged my data usage. I was on track to run out of data on 31 August. Instead, 11 days before the end of the month, I ran out of data.
Early Friday morning, I queried the ISP host who said I’d used 4 gigs more than my plan provides. Records indicate the domestic worker has used upward of 11 gigs and shut down my account.

Already stressed by family circumstances, and Lockdown Level 2, and this isolating rural neighborhood, 11 days without Internet threatens my sanity!
I depend upon technology to 1) communicate with my American family and friends, 2) conduct online research for freelance writing, 3) stay current with world news, 4) read online magazines, 5) download library e-books, 6) break the monotony of Lockdown, and, 7) defuse the stress of dealing with my elderly mother, her two domestic workers and one gardener, large garden, and her seven pampered, poopin’ and peein’ pooches.
At least this time, I know that the lack of Internet connectivity is due to abuse, not the usual mysterious, unfathomable, illogical, overly bureaucratic South African-ism….
Despite informing the ISP host early Friday morning that my Internet was down, he waited until Saturday morning – 24 hours later - to inform me he doesn’t work weekends.
I could, he said, reconnect today – Saturday - by buying an additional plan and waiting until Monday for him to drop by and change the password.
Or, I could not reconnect until Monday when he’d drop by and change the password and I could buy an additional plan.
Neither option meets my needs - or my level of anger.
A third option? Forgo buying more data for the rest of the month. I’d take my business to a local café where Internet connection comes free with the purchase of a decaf latte (imbibed around a face mask).
This option feels as if I’m punishing myself by way of passive-aggressively punishing a lackadaisical businessperson.
Ouch!
In California, I live forty miles from Silicon Valley – the world’s center of high-tech, high-end customer service, and high-end competition between businesses to provide high-end customer service.
In rural KwaZulu Natal, I live 14,000 miles from Silicon Valley and a million miles from mediocre customer service, with no competition between businesses.
Usually, I find South Africa’s low-tech, half-assed business attitudes acceptably old-fashioned, even quaint.
Today? Not so much.
Let me say it in American: I am pissed off!
Or, more politely: I am PO’d.
I’m PO’d that I’m disconnected for days from an online world that sustains me during a difficult time.
I’m PO’d at the abuse of my Internet account by a domestic worker.
I’m PO’d that I allowed someone who has repeatedly proved herself arrogant and less than honest to use my generosity. And I’m PO’d that my mother recognizes this arrogance and dishonesty, but refuses to address it.
I’m PO’d at the ISP host’s business habits. What service business owner – less than a quarter mile away - makes a good customer (who has referred new customers) “wait until Monday”?
Today, I’ve finally reached overwhelming frustration with Lockdown.

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Thirty-six hours after seeing her new home at the lovely community with a comfortable and welcoming care center, where semi-domesticated wild animals roam, my mother is still on track to move.
Moreover, I emailed the matron yesterday and confirmed the move-in date – September 15 - and asked to hold the smaller room for my mother. (I could not convince my mother to take the larger, more accommodating room. Ah well. I tried. Win some /lose some!). Might this “lifestyle change” actually happen?
Could I have pulled off a miracle? During a pandemic?