Our RV Adventures

It’s all the news here in Texas that due to a recent increase in WuFlu cases, Governor Abbot has dropped the state back down a level, with restaurants going back to 50% occupancy and bars having to close again.

But according to local health administrators, the governor may have jumped the gun. Not only has there been a big increase in testing, but it seems that since hospitals are now back to doing elective surgeries, anybody who comes into the hospital for appendicitis, cancer surgery, a broken arm, etc., and they also test positive for KungFlu, they’re listed as a virus hospitalization. Even if they’re completely asymptomatic.

Lindsey Rosales, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of State Health Services, confirmed to Just the News this week that the state is categorizing every inpatient in the state with a positive COVID-19 test as a COVID-19 hospitalization. 

“The number of hospitalized patients includes patients with a lab-confirmed case of COVID-19 even if the person is admitted to the hospital for a different reason,” Rosales said.

And despite the panic, hospitals are no where close to being overwhelmed.

The number of hospitalizations are “being misinterpreted,” said Houston Methodist CEO Marc Boom, “and, quite frankly, we’re concerned that there is a level of alarm in the community that is unwarranted right now.”

“We do have the capacity to care for many more patients, and have lots of fluidity and ability to manage,” Boom said.

He pointed out that his hospital one year ago was at 95% ICU capacity, similar to the numbers the hospital is seeing today. “It is completely normal for us to have ICU capacities that run in the 80s and 90s,” he said. “That’s how all hospitals operate.

So it seems like once again they’re playing with the numbers.

You can read the entire article here.

And as far as the whole ‘asymptomatic’ thing, it was big news in the last week about the Tyson Foods plant in Arkansas with hundreds testing positive . But when you actually look at the numbers, they tell a different story.

It was only 13% of the employees at two large plants that tested positive, and 95% were completely asymptomatic, i.e. they didn’t even know they had it until they were tested. And even more importantly, there were no hospitalizations and no deaths. You can read that article here.

Another in our Where We Were 3 Years Ago Today series.

June 26, 2017

I May Already Be A Winner . . .

Today was another stay-at-home, rest-up day preparing for when all of Jan’s relatives from Illinois converge on Brandi’s house in Katy.

We’ll go into Brandi’s on Wednesday morning as everyone starts drifting in. Jan’s sister, Debbie and her husband Jim are driving in from Illinois, while their daughter Tana, her finance Curtis, and Tana’s daughter Gwen, are flying in from doing the theme park thing in the Orlando area.

But Debbie and Jim’s son Jason, his wife Laura, and their kids Avery Jane, Ella, and Annisten, along with their other daughter, Christina, have been vacationing down in the Galveston area for the last week

In fact, Brandi, Lowell, Landon, and Miss Piper met them down in Galveston yesterday for fun, sun, and the water.

Jan and I are really looking forward to seeing Debbie and her family, since it’s been over 2 years.

Tomorrow I’m going to lift up the engine cover under the bed and see if I can reach the top bolt on the hydraulic fan motor that came loose last week in Pauls Valley, OK. I bought extra nuts and washers, but I don’t know yet if I can get to it. I guess we’ll see.

I’ve also been  thinking more about my rooftop AC not cooling well while we’re on the road, but works great when we’re parked.

 I think the idea is that air rushing pass the side vents will create a vacuum, pulling in the air from the rear vents.

But that air is normally considered a dead space, almost a vacuum area itself. That’s why race cars can draft behind each other. And also why you see more and more semi-trailers with those foldable flaps on the rear end to smooth out the air flow. Studies show around a 5.5% increase in fuel mileage when they’re used.

So I may try adding some flaps on the sides and top of the cover to see if that helps.

I may already be a winner, or at least that’s what Publisher’s Clearing House is telling me. I entered today for the big drawing for a prize of $2,000,000 up front, $10,000 a week for life, and a new car. Nice!

The next drawing is this Friday, the 30th, so I always wait until the last minute to sign up because I get flooded with emails about the drawing. And now they’re selling a lot of other stuff besides magazines, including pretty much all the ‘As Seen On TV’ stuff, like copper pans, expandable hoses, and cleaning products.

But I might already be a winner, right?

Thought for the Day:

Sometimes by losing a battle you find a new way to win the war.