Welcome, day of rest

© Matt Davies-Newsday and Andrews McMeel 

News blues…

Just a matter of time before third wave hits SA – so predicts Prof Salim Abdool Karim: “Based on what we have seen so far with the second wave in SA and third wave in about a dozen countries so far, it is very likely we’ll have a third wave here.”
He suggests there’s more than a 50% chance of a new variant, in which case a third wave would be “substantial. … If we only see minor mutations without significant immune escape, then the third wave may not be as severe. Our levels of naturally induced immunity from the first and second waves will play a part in this.” 

Healthy planet, anyone?

UK-centric and wonderful … see and listen to birds and bird sounds 

South African birds and their songs – challenge yourself….

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

I began what feels like a daunting task: contacting the travel agency with whom I traveled here. Their over-riding response to my email queries about applying my unused funds to my return trip?

Thank you for contacting [us].Your business and feedback are very important to us. … expect a response regarding this matter within 48 hours. ! Due to the outbreak COVID-19 we are experiencing an unprecedented volume of calls and requests. This has significantly delayed our response time. Please bear with us as we work to help all of our customers during this global crisis. We thank you for your patience.

My patience is thin. This is the same response I received when I contacted them in May, 2020 due to my Covid-19-cancelled flights … and in June… and in July … and in August…. It’s the exact same message I receive now, 10 months later.
Just the idea of pursuing this agency for information and to put my refund towards my next flight is exhausting. Nevertheless, after more than a year pursuing various KZN bureaucracies, I've developed tenacity....

Weatherings

Yesterday was another stinking hot 31C summer day in KZN – and no rain to cool things down.
Gone are my “salad days” – childhood and youth in South Africa - when I hardly noticed stinking hot 31C summer day as “inclement” weather.
These days, however, the weather forecast is one of my first daily go-to apps. My heart sinks when predictions indicate temperatures in the upper 20s and higher.
I tremble as I learn more about predictions in the future of global weather and climate. 
We, the people, appear particularly unwilling (or unable?) to grapple with issues of climate, climate change, and other ecological changes. We ignore predictions and continue blithely to act as if “nothing” much will really change.

News blues…

Last summer California fought unprecedented fires. This winter, Texas faces unprecedented ice storms and deep freeze. What’s clear to anyone willing to pay attention: few are prepared for the chaos of coming climate crisis.

An analysis of US Department of Energy data published in September found weather-related power outages are up by 67% since 2000. Climate change is expected to continue fueling hotter heatwaves, more bitter winter storms and more ferocious hurricanes in the coming decades. As both California and Texas have discovered in recent years, power plants, generators and electrical lines are not designed to withstand the catastrophes to come. And all the while, the fossil fuels that both states rely on to power these faulty systems are driving the climate crisis, and hastening infrastructural collapse.
“We’re already seeing the effects of climate change,” said Sascha von Meier, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. “There will be more of this and it will get worse.” 

Related but not “officially” recognized by “elected leaders”:
The planet
Prof Sir Robert Watson is one of the UK’s most eminent environmental scientists who led the UN’s scientific organisations for climate and biodiversity, is a former chief scientific adviser at the UK’s environment department, held senior positions at Nasa and the World Bank, and worked for then-president Bill Clinton.
Upon hearing that the British government will not block a new coalmine in Cumbria (“that’s absolutely ridiculous”) Watson said with great irony, “We’re going to lead Cop26 in Glasgow, we really care about climate change…but, by the way, we won’t override the council in Cumbria, and we’ll have a new coalmine.’” He added, “You get these wonderful statements by governments and then they have an action that goes completely against [their statements].” 
Human health
Outbreaks of the H5N8 strain of bird flu has been detected for the first time among seven workers who were infected at a Russian poultry plant. In recent months, the strain has been reported in Russia, Europe, China, the Middle East and north Africa, but only in poultry. 

My advice to fellow humans?
Educate yourself on how to prepare for a future our “elected leaders” are unprepared to acknowledge. And build resilience, in yourself, your children, and your loved ones. We’re gonna need it.

Healthy planet, anyone?

Photo essay: Lockdown in Brighton, UK 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

I’m dreaming of a … California summer….
Now that I’ve dared entertain the notion of re-entering my own life, caring for my own life tasks and my own personal business, it’s as if a spell cast over me has broken.
For more than one year, I’ve lived in my mother’s house and dealt with issues raised by her life decisions/lack of decision. It’s been a wild ride. (Remember, for example, her “faithful” domestic worker’s son threatening to kill me, shoot me, rape me - this, after he’d served 5 years of a 7-year prison sentence for rape .)
Since I daring to imagine re-entering my own life, dealing with my own taxes (deadline to file taxes in US is April 15), living on and maintaining my houseboat again, even finding short-term income-generating work, the idea of returning to California holds steady in my imagination.
Yes, there are many things to complete before I purchase an airplane ticket, and many considerations - who can I line up to visit and/or communicate with my mother while I’m away? What if she dies while I’m away? -  but do have the right and a responsibility to my own life….

***

I’m hosting potential buyers of “stuff” – water pump, welding kit, pillar drill, and lots and lots of nails, screws, electrical switches. This activity stimulates me to permit myself actually to buy a ticket, get on an airplane, and return to my own life!
Nevertheless, I tremble at how I’ll tell my mother that I’m leaving.
I’m “it” for her day-to-day visits, and her day-to-day life decisions. I’m confident that, once I’ve sold the “household stuff” and begun to implement whatever plan will deal with the house, I can accomplish remotely most of the day-to-day bill paying, etc. Rather, it is my mother’s day-to-day life that gives me pause.
Can I persuade my brother to visit twice a week? His health is such that he cannot drive anymore. He’ll need someone to drive him the 20 to 30-minute each way. I’ll pay for his petrol.
Can I persuade my nephew, my mother’s favorite person in the world, to phone her or leave WhatsApp audio message after I depart when he’s not done so in the last 10 weeks?

One of the less-alluring aspects of my mother’s personality that regularly regurgitates in my life? She selectively weeds out full disclosure and presents to others a picture of how I victimize her.
For example, yesterday, I returned a phone call my mother received from one of her acquaintances. I explained to him that she loves to hear from him but she’s unable – too weak - to respond. I asked, would he continue to call her and be prepared to talk to her yet not expect a response? He was agreeable. Then he asked me why she was still in “that place”?
Apparently, prior to her fall, she’d expressed to him how terrible the Care Center was and how much she hated it, that I’d forced her into it, fired her ultra-faithful domestic worker, taken away her dogs, abandoned her….
Sigh.
I offered an alternative view to her friend and filled in details she’d conveniently forgotten to share - himself living in a care center.
“That does sound like your mother,” he said.

Yes, elderly people feel disempowered by and resentful of their growing frailty. Ditto their dependence on others.
I sympathize. After all, “growing old is not for the squeamish….”
I’m also reconciled, after a lifetime of the same, to my mother undermining my efforts and diminishing who I am.
I’m disappointed. But the upside? I’m a functioning adult. I've learned to weather this kind of emotional betrayal and I can handle disappointment.

She’s trained me well.
Thank you, mother.

A change in the weather

Family in Texas reports its still cold near Houston but things are looking up. They're cold, but not frozen.
In this part of KZN, we're facing a 31C day. Just the thought of it exhausts.

News blues…

SA has recorded 1,500,677 cumulative cases of Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic in 2020.
Health minister Zweli Mkhize said in an update on Friday evening that the death toll in the country had climbed to 48,859. 
There were 151 more Covid-19 related deaths reported in the past 24-hour cycle. The deaths according to province were: Eastern Cape (12), Free State (21), Gauteng (43), KwaZulu-Natal (40), Limpopo (one), Mpumalanga (eight), North West (zero), Northern Cape (zero) and Western Cape (26).
The US, meanwhile, approaches half a million dead. The US confirmed infection rate – more than 27 million in a population of 328 million , is almost more than two thirds greater than the next highest toll, India, population 1.3 billion.

The US, meanwhile, approaches half a million dead. The US confirmed infection rate of more than 27 million in a population of 328+ million is almost more than two thirds greater than the next highest toll, India, population 1.36 billion.

***

Comedian Jimmy Kimmel nails Texas Senator Ted Cruz who fled the weather disaster in his state…  (9:00 mins)

Healthy planet, anyone?

“… in the US, recent research has revealed, that global heating harms Black and Latino children before they are even born, as well as in the first years of their lives.

The analysis of dozens of medical studies found women of color, particularly Black women, and their babies are most likely to suffer low birth weights, pre-term births and stillbirths from climate-driven threats. Hot temperatures can cause strain upon women and their unborn children, while heat can also react with pollutants from cars and power plants to create ozone, a ground-level pollutant that can cause an array of health problems.
“This pollution cause placental inflammation and affects the baby,” said Pacheco. “This can cause impacts in childhood but also bad outcomes when they are adults, such as heart and kidney disease. Even what we would consider limited exposures can affect the development of the baby.”
The climate crisis is shaping the lives of Black children and children of color before they take their first breath, but it doesn’t stop there. Once a Black or Latino child is born, there is a good chance they will live in a neighborhood that gets even hotter than nearby, whiter suburbs. Researchers have found that in US cities including New York, Dallas and Miami, poorer areas with more residents of color can be get up to 20F hotter in summer than wealthier, whiter districts in the same city. 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

More and more people I know in the US have been or are in the process of being vaccinated. Hooray!
I’d like to be vaccinated but that’s not the reason I’m beginning to plan my return to California. 

I must return – soon – to take care of many outstanding business and tax-related issues. 

I’m considering travelling early April even as I grapple with how to ensure my mother’s continued well-being and how to manage the house and domestic workers if the house has not sold. And how to manage the sale from a distance when the house finally sells.
My mother was tracking well when I saw her yesterday. Both her eyes open and she continues to try to communicate.
The Care Center has ended the regime of spraying the facility against coronavirus. That’s good news for residents – and visitors – who had to escape the building for the duration.

Another day under lockdown

The beginning of week 48. In 32 more days, South Africans will have spent one year under some form of lockdown.
A silly joke:
     Time flies like the wind
     Fruit flies like bananas….

News blues…

(c) Covid-19 dashboard

  
Vaccination rollout begins in SA 
US state by state vaccination rollout 

***

Healthy planet, anyone?

New ideas and innovations in the fight against microplastics:

Microplastics have been found in rain, Arctic ice cores, inside the fish we eat, as well as in fruit and vegetables. New research suggests 136,000 tons of microplastics are ejected from the ocean each year, ending up in the air we breathe. They are in human placentas, our wastewater, and our drinking water. All plastic waste, regardless of size, is detrimental to the environment, but microplastics pose a special challenge given their minuscule size (some are 150 times smaller than a human hair) and ability to enter the food chain.

Read, “Magnets, vacuums and tiny nets: the new fight against microplastics” >> 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

One of the pleasures of this time of year in KZN – late summer – is the blossoming coral shrub in the garden. The shrub variety sprawls so I trim back the thorny limbs and cut off the blossoms to display in my bedroom. 
More than 100 species of Erythrina trees and shrubs  – aka coral– aka lucky bean tree, gewone koraalboom (Afrikaans) umsinsi (Zulu) – grow around the world.

A decorative tree, it is also an important ecosystem component, providing food and shelter for a variety of birds, animals and insects. Many birds and insects feed on the nectar. Vervet monkeys eat the flower buds. Kudu, klipspringer, black rhino and baboons graze on the leaves. Black rhinos, elephants and baboons eat the bark. Bush pigs eat the roots, and the brown-headed parrot eats and disperses the seed. Birds such as barbets and woodpeckers nest in the trunks of dead trees, and swarms of bees often inhabit hollow trunks. Erythrina lysistemon is also widely used and enjoyed by mankind. They have been regarded as royal trees, and were planted on the graves of Zulu chiefs. They were planted as living fences around kraals, homesteads and waterholes.
As the photo shows, it produces stunning flowers. It also produces pea-like pods that twist into sculptural shapes to eject the black and red seeds. 
I gather both pods and seeds and sprinkle them with scented oils to create aromatic mini sculptures.

***

My mother, still weak, was nevertheless brighter yesterday during my visit. She follows what I’m saying – updates on the dogs and the (slow but steady) trickle of potential house buyers (no firm offers yet) – but still cannot clearly articulate her comments.

Crazy daddio!

Worldwide (Map) 
February 2021 - 109,885,600 confirmed infections; 2,430,000 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 92,314,000 confirmed infections; 1,977,900 deaths

US (Map)
February 2021 - 27,824,660 confirmed infections; 490,450 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 23,071,100 confirmed infections; 384,635 deaths

SA (Coronavirus portal)
February 18, 2021 – 1,496,440 confirmed infections; 48,480 deaths
January 14, 2021 – 1,278,305 confirmed infections; 35,140 deaths

News blues…

The first batch of Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines arrived in South Africa on Tuesday night. 
The South African Medical Association (SAMA) says the vaccine will be administered at 17 sites.
Some healthcare workers should receive their jabs on Wednesday.
Meanwhile,

As SA began the first phase of its Covid-19 vaccination programme, health authorities would have also been buoyed by another day where new infections and the positivity rate remained low.
Health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize confirmed on Wednesday night that 2,320 new cases were recorded in 24 hours. These were from 35,413 tests, at a positivity rate of 6.55% — again well below the 10%-12% range that Mkhize has previously cited as being of concern. 

***

Despite the state of Texas presenting enormous potential for renewable energy, renewables are pooh poohed.
Texas politicians, from the governor down, pan renewable energy in favor of fossil fuel. Texas is rich in oil and natural gas – and that industry contributes massively to conservative and right-wing politicians. Together, oil and gas money and politicians have created an “independent energy supply” grid – disconnected from the nation-wide grid.
The Texas independent grid is failing, massively and publicly, during the freak snowstorms. Texas politicians, however, spin reality and constantly pump out lies that blame “windmills.”
The truth? Fossil and nuclear fuel industries failed when instrumentation froze and became inoperable. 
Moreover, for more than 10 years Texas has ignored reports that predicted power grid emergency….  (2:44 mins) 

An oldie but goodie… “Can the world run on renewable energy” from 2015 offers information and data worth reading.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Four years ago, I asked a Texas real estate agent - selling property upon which my family planned to build a house – about Texas’ installation of solar and renewable energy. Her response: “We don’t do that in this state.
Too bad, eh?

***

Yesterday turned into a rout. I wasn’t able to visit my mother due to families coming around to view the house and my continued efforts to sell tools and machinery.
The latter sets me off on another rant about apparently accepted South Africanisms: making appointments and not following through.
I took a phone call from the adult son of a friend’s landlord who is an independent contractor. He expressed interest in a welding kit and other tools for sale. We set a time for him to drop by and I texted/sms’d him the address. 

Keep in mind, despite families dropping with a view to purchase the house, cars parked willy nilly, dogs barking…I made an effort to ensure the independent contractor could easily access the garage where the tools are located and, at the appointed hour I waited. 

And waited.
He never showed.
I’d put off visiting my mother, delayed a trip to the grocery store, opened the upper security gate… and waited….
At 7:00pm that night, he texted/sms’d that he’d “forgotten”….
If there’s anything consistent in South Africa, it’s this behavior from so-called business people and South Africans in general
Do the people on the other end of the appointment – those waiting – simply ignore confirmed appointment and go about their business?
Why can’t I do that?
It would make my life a lot easier to follow suit but ….

Things that matter

News blues…

“Wearing masks, washing hands… those things matter,” says President Joe Biden. Hear! Hear! (Hear him during the first 3-plus minutes of this interview clip) 

***

In South Africa, a new Covid wrinkle: blood donations potentially spreading the virus.

A startling statistic emerged on Friday with the publication of a report led by the SA National Blood Service and the Western Cape Blood Service.:
Almost two-thirds of Eastern Cape residents may already have had Covid-19, with antibodies picked up in blood donations done in late January. 

As Texas (where my son and his family live) faces unprecedented snow and the rest of central and eastern United States freezes, another right-wing attack on renewable energy heats up. Chris Hayes expresses his incredulity as the next battle front opens in America’s Culture Wars  (7:35 mins)

***

The world has lost one-third of its forest, but an end of deforestation is possible 

© Our World in Data 

In the above chart we see how the cover of the earth’s surface has changed over the past 10,000 years. This is shortly after the end of the last great ice age, through to the present day.
Let’s start at the top. You see that of the 14.9 billion hectares of land on the planet, only 71% of it is habitable – the other 29% is either covered by ice and glaciers, or is barren land such as deserts, salt flats, or dunes. I have therefore excluded these categories so we can focus on how habitable land is used.
The bar chart just below shows the earth’s surface cover just after the end of the last ice age.2 10,000 years ago 57% of the world’s habitable land was covered by forest. That’s 6 billion hectares. Today, only 4 billion hectares are left. The world has lost one-third of its forest – an area twice the size of the United States.
Only 10% of this was lost in the first half of this period, until 5,000 years ago. The global population at this time was small and growing very slowly – there were fewer than 50 million people in the world. The amount of land per person that was needed to produce enough food was not small – in fact, it was much larger than today. But a small global population overall meant there was little pressure on forests to make space for land to grow food, and as wood for energy.
If we fast-forward to 1700 when the global population had increased more than ten-fold, to 603 million. The amount of land used for agriculture – land to grow crops as well as grazing land for livestock – was expanding. You will notice in the chart that this was not only expanding into previously forested land, but also other land uses such as wild grasslands and shrubbery. Still, more than half of the world’s habitable land was forested.
The turn of the 20th century is when global forest loss reached the halfway point: half of total forest loss occurred from 8,000BC to 1900; the other half occurred in the last century alone. This emphasises two important points:

• First, it reiterates that deforestation is not a new problem: relatively small populations of the past were capable of driving a large amount of forest loss. By 1900, there were 1.65 billion people in the world (five times fewer than we have today) but for most of the previous period, humans were deforesting the world with only tens or hundreds of millions. Even with the most basic of lifestyles compared to today’s standards, the per capita footprint of our ancestors would have been large. Low agricultural productivity and a reliance on wood for fuel meant that large amounts of land had to be cleared for basic provisions.
• Second, it makes clear how much deforestation accelerated over the last century. In just over 100 years the world lost as much forest as it had in the previous 9,000 years. An area the size of the United States. From the chart we see that this was driven by the continued expansion of land for agriculture. By 1950, there was almost as much agricultural land as forest – 43% of habitable land. By 2018, this had increased to 46% while forests shrank to 38%. When we think of the growing pressures on land from modern populations we often picture sprawling megacities. But urban land accounts for just 1% of global habitable land. Humanity’s biggest footprint is due to what we eat, not where we live.

Read “The world has lost one-third of its forest, but an end of deforestation is possible ” >> 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

And… after yet another potential house buyer decided against buying, yet another potential buyer will visit today.
Hope springs eternal...
I’m reduced to wild imaginings and “what ifs”: what if this place never sells (at a reasonable price)? What if I can never return to California? What if I’m stuck living someone else’s life (my mother’s)?
On the plus side, a friend shared two WhatsApp local sales groups with me. A seller places photos and details of a sales item – one per WhatsApp message – on the message board and interested buyers make offers. 
It might work.
I’ll give it a try.

Short and (somewhat) sweet

News blues…

New infection rates slowly drop in many US states and the new administration’s doubling down on insisting Americans wear masks and practice social distancing is paying off.

But with only 4% of the US population fully vaccinated, experts say Americans must continue safety precautions at full force to prevent highly contagious variants from undoing all the progress. 

Not only does the US have the highest rates of Covid infections and deaths in the world, its experiencing political turmoil and, now, devastating weather with an unprecedented cold front and snow. 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

The potential buyer of my mother’s house – the one who’d signed the papers but asked for the weekend to think things over – dropped out. Despite his soon-to-wed son wanting the house, his dad – the money guy – said he “couldn’t see his kids running up and down the many steps.” There are “many steps” – the house is built on a slope and has three levels – and I can see his point. Disappointing, nevertheless. So, back to the “for sale” notice boards.

© Gary Larsen, the Far Side

I continue sorting through items stored in the garage: thousands of assorted nails, screws, hooks, and who-knows-whats, dozens of assorted electrical switches and fitting, scores of tools from hammers, screwdrivers, rasps, drill bits, many light fittings, plus a heavy duty “pillar drill”, a welding kit replete with acetylene and oxygen tanks and 2-wheel pushcart.
Big question: how to sell these items?
A major drawback to selling is my lack of familiarity with how things are done here. I have few contacts, little experience, and I’m a woman in a misogynist society.
I could sell online with Gumtree (SA’s version of Craigslist), but based on my thwarted experience trying to purchase a ceramic kiln I hold little faith in this venue. Buyers enquire from some impractical far-flung regions - Cape Town, or Pretoria, or Oudtshoorn, or Mtubatuba….(One potential buyer of a patio heater enquired from Birmingham, UK.) Or interested local buyers will make an appointment to view items then never show up. (Alas, a common South Africanism.)
I consulted with a friend about hosting an American-style garage sale. Her advice? Hire a couple of security guards to ensure my overall physical safety and protect myself and others from Covid by providing and enforcing the use of hand sanitizers, masks, etc.
Physical safety goes beyond the day-long sales period. It include recognizing potential thieves targeting the house for further “investigation.” This house has CCTV-style cameras and laser beams, but determined house thieves easily bypass safety measures.

***

Yesterday’s visit with my mother was short. By the time her physical needs were taken care of, she was exhausted and fell to sleep.