20200404 - Corona Virus Part 3

Greetings once again from our little tin can! Wendy and I are doing great! The chest tightness that I reported last week has fixed itself, and I'm back to normal. I had a conversation with my cardiologist this past week as part of my annual checkup with him. He tells me that he's retiring and I'm selfishly sorry to hear that, but I'm happy for him. I started seeing Dr. Kohl in 2017 after my heart attack (see Feb 10 2017 story). He's been very forthright with me, telling me truths. I will miss him, though I look forward to spreading some humor to his replacement. I'm feeling very nostalgic lately, due to Facebook posts from a few cousins. My brother, Carl, cancelled his plans for a 50th wedding celebration in May. I gave him a call to talk about it and I ended up talking about myself. I wish that I could have called Mick, as well; I do miss him and his wife, Dorothy.

Our marvelous state of Florida is on lockdown now, unless you're a preacher with a deranged congregation - in that case, you can gather as much as you want. Seriously. The governor of Florida put out a clarifying order to his Stay at Home order stating that churches were necessary businesses and that they could meet in groups of any number. Part of his clarifying order included a provision that local leaders could not create orders that contradicted his order. Looks like the governor doesn't want to be re-elected. I think that these Stay at Home orders will keep getting looser and looser until one day, once all of us have had a bout of COVID-19, the orders will be rescinded and people will ask, "why was that still on the books?" That's how the "blue laws" were rescinded. Our federal government has been in the news for pilfering masks and ordering 3M not to fill orders outside the US. If there ever was a time to set aside nationalism, it is now, and yet, it proliferates. On politics, I will share this quote:

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter. -- Winston Churchill

Ok, here's the numbers today. Worldwide - 1,162,834 cases with 62,489 deaths; US - 277,161 cases with 7,392 deaths; Florida - 10,268 cases with 191 deaths. The number of COVID-19 cases has increased by 13% since yesterday for the United States, and 14% for Florida. This is appreciably better than the 30-40% day over day growth rates in mid-March. It has extended the decade factor out to 12 days. The decade factor is the amount of time it takes for the number of cases to multiply by a factor of ten. I expect the US to be past one million cases during the next week.

The big picture on all the political moves is that we are trying to buy time. Not for a vaccine - even though the US is moving forward with two candidates, those will likely help the next generation. This generation will have to deal with 80% of the people contracting the virus, with 3% of that total dying from it. By buying time, we're trying to improve the mortality rate. We are hoping that there will be a hospital bed and a ventilator available when it's our turn. That's really the long and short of it. Unfortunately, there will be fewer health care professionals available as doctors and nurses themselves come down with COVID-19, which means that our limitation isn't the equipment or the facilities - it's the people. I do pray that should Wendy or I require hospitalization, that there are enough doctors and nurses to go around.

The DJIA is down this week, opening last Monday at 21,678 and closing Friday afternoon at 21,055. The price of gasoline nearby our home is $1.75/gal. Congress is working on a second stimulus bill, and we are due to receive our first check from the federal government in two weeks. I've read that our president wanted his signature on the checks - I'm glad that mine will be directly deposited.

I ventured into Sam's Club this past week looking for toilet paper. There weren't any of the usual brands - that area was clean. However, there were cases of the extra large mega rolls that restaurants and gas stations normally have. Near there, I struck up a conversation with another gentleman. He was also looking for toilet paper.Though I had no prejudice in picking up these industrial sized rolls, he certainly did. He asked one of the workers if they sold the dispensers for the extra large rolls. Hearing "No", he decided not to get it. Huge question marks appeared above my head - he came in here to get toilet paper and they had toilet paper, so he left with no toilet paper?! Who follows inane logic like that? Well, I've had a conversation with one guy that does.

I picked up a gizmo that allows us to put our laptop on the TV screen. It's a SharePro by Iogear. There's two pieces to it, a receiver that gets hooked up in the HDMI port on the TV and a transmitter that gets connected to the HDMI port of the laptop. It works great! We use it for meetings. Since becoming a recluse, I've desperately missed conversations with other humans. I get to see my wife, but there has been little contact outside of that. Now, when Wendy connects to meetings using Zoom, I can watch on the TV and see everyone and hear their interaction. It's very nice. Carl thought that he may try Zoom as a substitute for the breakfast he had panned for his 50th wedding anniversary. I think that would be great. Maybe I could have our daughter and grandkids join in. It would really be nice to see everyone, even if it's from a distance.

Long distance run around
Long time waiting to feel the sound
I still remember the dream there
I still remember the time you said goodbye
Did we really tell lies?
Letting in the sunshine
Did we really count to one hundred?
-- Jon Anderson, "Long Distance Run Around", Fragile, Yes, 1971

20200328 - Corona Virus Part 2

Welcome to week two of our self-isolation in our little tin can. This week, Pinellas county issued a "Safer-at-home" order. That has effectively cleared our streets. The beaches have been shut down since last Friday night, and now only "essential" businesses remain open - gas stations, groceries, banks, and restaurants if it's to-go or delivery. We have stopped going out for our meals, which is fine by me, because Wendy is a stellar cook! I came down with something on Thursday - a pain in my chest - I don't have a temperature nor is it a "cardiac" kind of pain. It presents itself when I sneeze, cough, hiccup, burp, or move in an unusual way. I called my PCP about it yesterday and her order was to stay at home for 24 hours and see if it improves. Tylenol has been helping with it, so I'm staying on that course. On Monday, I'm to have a tele-doc with my cardiologist, and I'll ask him if there's anything needed. I told the PA that relayed my PCP's orders that if I feel that it's escalating over the weekend, then I'll just go to the hospital. She informed me that no, I won't - there's a pre-screening that's required before going to the hospital, and she gave me that number. She then relayed that another man wanted to go to the hospital, and he had all of the symptoms of COVID-19, but they wouldn't accept him because he was too young. [Sigh] Our medical facilities have definitely deteriorated. Now, we won't even try.
The total number of COVID-19 cases in the US as of yesterday was 104,126 with a total of 1,696 deaths determined to be from the virus. That's an increase of 22% day-over-day for the total number infected and a 31% day-over-day for the number of deaths. For the US as a whole, 0.03% of the population has become infected and deaths have impacted 0.0005%. The decade factor, the number of days for the number of cases to multiply by a factor of ten, has lengthened to between 8 and 9 days. We will soon be near a million cases. Already, there are hospitals issuing general DNR orders, where doctors are determining who lives and who dies - sounds like euthanasia to me. New York City has the largest number of cases in the US, and now those folks are migrating, either due to fear from the lack of medical care, or just taking a chance that they will better survive somewhere else. The governor of the state of Texas has banned people from New York and other states from entering his state. I don't think that he gets it - banning will only avoid the eventuality, not avert it. There are numerous places working on antidotes, treatments, and cures. Reminds me of the elixirs sold by panhandlers in days gone by. Fact is, it will take over a year to validate clinical trials for a treatment. That will be too late, because if the numbers that I'm observing hold, we will have one million infected in the US in a little over a week. The best treatment now is ventilators, but there are too few of them. Automotive manufacturers are supposed to be making them, but we will need hundreds of thousands before Easter. GM said that they could re-tool a plant in Indiana in a month. We will be nearing 30% of the population by that time.

“Wherever the art of Medicine is loved, there is also a love of Humanity. ”
― Hippocrates

I should also mention that the stock market has improved this week. It was at 19028 on Monday morning, and it finished at 21623 on Friday afternoon. That is after the $2 trillion appropriation from congress this past week, along with numerous actions by the Fed. Personally, I don't see anything as a stable buy, since this is a shot-in-the-arm, not a cure. Because of the movement restrictions, 3.3 million people filed for unemployment in the US last week. That's 1% of the population. I can't help but think that this will be the way of life through the summer. Some argue that the corona virus is seasonal, though there's nothing that demonstrates that. It will race through the population if it continues unabated, perhaps being throttled by the lack of available hosts. Way back when, I suggested to my daughter that would be June. Her guess was early May.

"The two most powerful warriors are patience and time"
-- Leo Tostoy

20200321 - Corona Virus Part 1

Wendy and I have been in self-quarantine inside our little tin can all week. We have tried to get out and see the sun for lunch, when we hit a drive-thru and an occasional pizza for dinner. My employer, Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC) has shut down our office buildings so we are all working-from-home for now. On Friday, I received a communication that said the remote work arrangement will continue until at least April 30th. My setup is quite nice - a desk in the room adjacent to the kitchen, bathrooms nearby, decent internet. Wendy is always so conscious of me working, so she tip-toes around trying not to disturb me. She is also very cognizant of my COPD and she tries not to use the cleaning chemicals while I'm in the house. With the extension of me working from home until April 30, I may need to take an afternoon off and go outside until the chemicals dissipate.

The total number of cases of COVID-19 in the US yesterday was 19,383. This was a 41% increase over the previous day. Currently, the total number of infections multiplies by a factor of ten every eight days. At that rate, we will be topping a million infections in the US before Easter. To try and combat this, the state of Florida has instituted some strong measures - all bars are closed, all beaches are closed, which interrupted the spring-breakers, and all restaurants are takeout or delivery only. This is going to really hurt small business, since they won't have the cash reserves to weather months of this. On another note, the stock market continues to crash, with the DOW wiping out four years of growth by free-falling -30%. Unemployment for March is expected to be around 20%, where it once was 3%. The only thing that I'm sure of is that it will get worse before it gets better.

I don't look forward to the social dynamic as this virus progresses. I can foresee the battle between those that want freedom and those that want martial law. It will be another line of segregation in this fractured society we ironically call the United States.

Nobody left to run with anymore.
Nobody wants to do the crazy things that we used to do before
Nobody left to run with anymore.
-- Dickey Betts, "Nobody to run with", Where It All Begins, The Allman Brothers Band, 1994

Selfie

Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every ‘superstar,’ every ‘supreme leader,’ every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
- Carl Sagan

30th anniversary of Voyager 1's picture of earth from the orbit of Saturn. My thanks to Earth Sky for covering this event.

2/1

My planned posts for the month of February:

1. If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else. - Booker T. Washington
2. Each of you, as an individual, must pick your own goals. Listen to others, but do not become a blind follower. -Thurgood Marshall
3. Each person must live their life as a model for others. - Rosa Parks
4. I can accept failure. Everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying. - Michael Jordan
5. Just don’t give up what you’re trying to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong. - Ella Fitzgerald
6. Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. - Barak Obama
7. I swear to the Lord I still can’t see why democracy means everybody but me. - Langston Hughes
8. I changed what I could, and what I couldn't, I endured. - Dorothy Vaughn
9. Diversity is not about how we differ. Diversity is about embracing one another’s uniqueness. - Ola Joseph
10. Have a vision of excellence, a dream of success, and work like hell. - Dr. Samuel DuBois Cook
11. In order to succeed, you have to do well and perform well. Don't do less and accept less. Put in the time and complete the task. You want to be a contributing member to every group you are part of. - Jeanette Epps
12. My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together. - Desmond Tutu
13. If the only time you think of me as a scientist is during Black History Month, then I must not be doing my job as a scientist. - Neil deGrasse Tyson
14. I'm always interested in learning something new. - Katherine Johnson
15. Life is not a spectator sport. If you’re going to spend your whole life in the grandstand just watching what goes on, in my opinion you’re wasting your life. - Jackie Robinson
16. If you don’t have confidence, you’ll always find a way not to win. - Carl Lewis
17. Never be limited by other people's imaginations. - Dr. Mae Jemison
18. Life has two rules: number 1, never quit! Number 2, always remember rule number one. - Duke Ellington
19. Every time you state what you want or believe, you’re the first to hear it. It’s a message to both you and others about what you think is possible. Don’t put a ceiling on yourself. - Oprah Winfrey
20. If you know whence you came, there is really no limit to where you can go. - James Baldwin
21. The greatest challenge that I faced in becoming a neurosurgeon was believing it was possible. - Alexa Canady
22. You are your best thing. - Toni Morrison
23. A good head and a good heart are always a formidable combination. - Nelson Mandela
24. Whatever we believe about ourselves and our ability comes true for us. - Susan L. Taylor
25. More and more, when I single out the person out who inspired me most, I go back to my grandfather. - James Earl Jones
26. We all require and want respect, man or woman, black or white. It’s our basic human right. - Aretha Franklin
27. Have a vision. Be demanding. - Colin Powell
28. My success and failures make me who I am. - Janet Emerson Bashen
29. The time is always right to do what is right. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Thanks to Parade for publishing this web site. It made the task of finding these quotes much easier.
My fav is #22.

To Mick!

In Color - Jamey Johnson

I said, grandpa what's this picture here
It's all black and white, it ain't real clear
Is that you there? He said yeah, I was 11

Times were tough back in '35
That's me and uncle Joe just tryin' to survive
A cotton farm in a great depression

If it looks like we were scared to death
Like a couple of kids just tryin' to save each other
You should've seen it in color

Oh, and this one here was taken over seas
In the middle of hell in 1943
In the winter time you can almost see my breath

That was my tail gunner ole Johnny Magee
He was a high school teacher from New Orleans
And he had my back right through the day we left

If it looks like we were scared to death
Like a couple of kids just tryin' to save each other
You should've seen it in color

A picture's worth a thousand words
But you can't see what those shades of gray keep covered
You should've seen it in color

This one is my favorite one
This is me and grandma in the summer sun
All dressed up, the day we said our vows

You can't tell it here but it was hot that June
And that rose was red and her eyes were blue
And just look at that smile, I was so proud
That's the story of my life right there in black and white

And if it looks like we were scared to death
Like a couple of kids just tryin' to save each other
You should've seen it in color

A pictures worth a thousand words
But you cant see what those shades of gray keep covered
You should have seen it in color
You should have seen it in color

Yeah, a pictures worth a thousand words
But you cant see what those shades of gray keep covered
You should have seen it in color

Context:

My nephew, Mike Scheider, did a cover of this song at Celebrations in Robinson Twp., PA on 1/11/2020 - the first anniversary of his father's passing. Mike changed the month to July, which was the anniversary month for his parents, Mick and Dorothy Scheider. 

I well up every time I think of this moment, because, to a large extent, I did see it "in color."

The Starfish Story

A favorite of mine.

Original Story by Loren Eisley

One day a man was walking along the beach, when he noticed a boy hurriedly picking up and gently throwing things into the ocean.

Approaching the boy, he asked, “Young man, what are you doing?”

The boy replied, “Throwing starfish back into the ocean. The surf is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them back, they’ll die.”

The man laughed to himself and said, “Don’t you realize there are miles and miles of beach and hundreds of starfish? You can’t make any difference!”

After listening politely, the boy bent down, picked up another starfish, and threw it into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said …

“I made a difference to that one.”