As the Covid-19 virus continues to mutate, experts believe it’s probably becoming more contagious, and cases US have started to rise once again, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/24/coronavirus-mutate-contagious-study-us-cases POTUS (President of the United States) ignores 32-plus million infections and more than 200,000 dead and calls coronavirus “harmless.”
That Trump is Trump is irrefutable; he ain’t gonna change.
Why people continue to believe him is mysterious. It appears that won’t change either.
Humans. Go figure.
News blues…
Finnish dogs respond to the call of the wild coronavirusFour Covid-19 sniffer dogs have begun work at Helsinki airport in a state-funded pilot scheme that Finnish researchers hope will provide a cheap, fast and effective alternative method of testing people for the virus.
A dog is capable of detecting the presence of the coronavirus within 10 seconds and the entire process takes less than a minute to complete, according to Anna Hielm-Björkman of the University of Helsinki, who is overseeing the trial. She said, “It’s very promising. If it works, it could prove a good screening method in other places” such as hospitals, care homes and at sporting and cultural events.
Healthy futures, anyone?
 |
| Lake Chad, in the Bol region, 200km from Chad’s capital city, N’Djamena, lies on the borders of Chad, Niger, Nigeria and Cameroon. Photo: Sia Kambou/AFP/Getty |
In a letter leaked to the Guardian, Chad’s tourism and culture minister wrote to Unesco, the body which awards the world heritage designation, asking to “postpone the process of registering Lake Chad on the world heritage list”. The letter says the government “has signed production-sharing agreements with certain oil companies whose allocated blocks affect the area of the nominated property”…The letter asks Unesco to “postpone the process” in order to “allow [us] to redefine and redesign the map to avoid any interference in the future”.The request follows a multiyear process involving the governments of Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria to jointly nominate the Lake Chad cultural landscape to the Unesco world heritage list. It has been nominated as both a natural and a cultural site.
… “It is important to recall that the goal of the inscription of a site on the world heritage list is to ensure conservation of its outstanding universal value for future generations,” a spokesperson for the Unesco world heritage site centre said. “A suspension of the inscription process is not contemplated among the possibilities offered by the provisions of the world heritage nomination process”.
If Chad decides to go ahead with oil exploitation, the process would have to be cancelled all together, Unesco said.
***
Scientists take temperatures of butterflies to uncover climate threat ***
In context, consider current CO2 levels in our atmosphereWeekly averages
19 September 2020: 411.47 ppm
This time last year: 408.48 ppm
10 years ago: 387.00 ppm
Pre-industrial base: 280
Safe level: 350
Atmospheric CO2 reading from Mauna Loa, Hawaii (part per million). Source: NOAA-ESRL.
Read more about CO2 levels.
I did not know “they” had moved my boat – from a covered slip (out of direct sun and direct rain) into an open slip.
It was 11am or so in California (SA time is 9 hours ahead of California) and I called the office. I talked to Peter - the brother of Rob, the major share owner - and he promised Rob would call me. I’ve met neither Peter nor Rob as they only recently purchased the marina.
I was asleep an hour or more later when Rob called. He explained the covered slip cost US$100 more per month than I was paying so, without telling me, they moved my houseboat into a cheaper slip. None of their cheaper covered slips accommodated my boat’s width (“beam”).
I purchased my houseboat in July 2019, 13 months ago. For eight of those 13 months Covid-19 has locked me down in South Africa. I’ll be in SA for at least another four months, engaged with selling my mother’s house, her move and wellbeing, etc.
Marina-owner Rob also asked me how I learned about the move “so soon.” I mentioned that person I’d considered a friend-in-the-making. By the call’s end, Rob had led me to believe he’d look into a solution that would protect my boat from the full onslaught of sun and rain – despite my state of unemployment/lack of income due to pandemic.
That remains to be seen.
I filled in the person I’d thought a friend-in-the-making about my call with Rob.
Yikes!
He was angry. Accused me of using him as “a source of information,” called me a “snitch,” implied I’d exposed “a confidential source.”
Oh, oh. In what strange inter-cultural predicament have I landed?
Just what I do not want nor need: international intrigue. Another saga.
***
Some of the best reporting the environment comes from the Guardian News . Usually, I’d not promote a news or other outlet on this blog, but these are perilous times…
41 days to save the Earth …
… the Guardian is all in. Are you? On November 4, a day after the presidential election, the US will formally withdraw from the Paris agreement on constraining global heating. It’s urgent that we tell the world what this means, and the Guardian is pulling out all the stops to do so. Will you help us by supporting our journalism?
With millions are flocking to the Guardian every day, financial support from our readers is crucial in enabling us to produce open, fearless, independent reporting that addresses the climate emergency. It helps sustain the freedom we have to present the facts comprehensively, explain the details as they unfold, and interrogate the decisions made.
The Guardian recognises the climate emergency as the defining issue of our times. That’s why we have pledged to give climate change, wildlife extinction and pollution the sustained attention and prominence they demand, as a core part of our journalism.
At this pivotal moment for our planet, our independence enables us to always inform readers about threats, consequences and solutions based on scientific fact, not political prejudice or business interests. This makes us different. And we are equally determined to practice what we preach: we have divested from the oil and gas sectors, renounced fossil fuel advertising and committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2030.
We believe everyone deserves access to information that is fact-checked, and analysis that has authority and integrity. That’s why, unlike many others, we made a choice: to keep Guardian reporting open for all, regardless of where they live or what they can afford to pay. Our work would not be possible without our readers, who now support our work from 180 countries around the world. Every reader contribution, however big or small, is so valuable for our future. Support the Guardian from as little as $1 – and it only takes a minute. Thank you.
***
The Lincoln Project:
We, the people, will reject Donald Trump’s presidency on November 3rd. There will be no Trump coup in this country.Meidas Touch: Arizona Knows Honor (0:58 mins)
The American experiment, which has endured since 1776 — through civil war, world wars, and depressions — will not yield to a dime-store Mussolini who is faithless to his duty and is the worst president in American history.
He will be repudiated and humiliated by history’s judgment. It is our job to make that happen.
Donald Trump is threatening the peaceful transition of power because he is losing and he is weak. Let us finish him off.
Peaceful Transition (0:25 mins)
Nobody (0:25 mins)
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
32 degrees Centigrade (90F) here today. Tomorrow: 34C (93F). And, it’s only September.***
Late yesterday South Africa time, I received a text message from an acquaintance – I’d believed a friend-in-the-making - at the marina where my houseboat is docked: “Do you know they moved your boat?”I did not know “they” had moved my boat – from a covered slip (out of direct sun and direct rain) into an open slip.
It was 11am or so in California (SA time is 9 hours ahead of California) and I called the office. I talked to Peter - the brother of Rob, the major share owner - and he promised Rob would call me. I’ve met neither Peter nor Rob as they only recently purchased the marina.
I was asleep an hour or more later when Rob called. He explained the covered slip cost US$100 more per month than I was paying so, without telling me, they moved my houseboat into a cheaper slip. None of their cheaper covered slips accommodated my boat’s width (“beam”).
I purchased my houseboat in July 2019, 13 months ago. For eight of those 13 months Covid-19 has locked me down in South Africa. I’ll be in SA for at least another four months, engaged with selling my mother’s house, her move and wellbeing, etc.
Marina-owner Rob also asked me how I learned about the move “so soon.” I mentioned that person I’d considered a friend-in-the-making. By the call’s end, Rob had led me to believe he’d look into a solution that would protect my boat from the full onslaught of sun and rain – despite my state of unemployment/lack of income due to pandemic.
That remains to be seen.
I filled in the person I’d thought a friend-in-the-making about my call with Rob.
Yikes!
He was angry. Accused me of using him as “a source of information,” called me a “snitch,” implied I’d exposed “a confidential source.”
Oh, oh. In what strange inter-cultural predicament have I landed?
Just what I do not want nor need: international intrigue. Another saga.
