Monthly Archives: July 2020
Promises, Promises . . .
Finally, the WuFlu update I’ve been promising you.
One month after statewide mask mandate, California’s daily COVID case average has increased by 162%
The website of Johns Hopkins University, which offers pandemic tracking tools for every U.S. state, says average daily cases in California have increased from 3,385 on the day of Newsom’s order to 8,889 as of July 16, an increase of 162%.
So of course the governor of California mandated even more stringent mask wearing protocols.
Tanzania Kicks Out W.H.O. After Goat, Quail & Papaya Samples Came COVID-19 Positive
Or maybe the WuFlu is just much more contagious than we thought?
People are more likely to contract coronavirus at home, study finds
A study published in the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on July 16 looked in detail at 5,706 “index patients” who had tested positive for the coronavirus and more than 59,000 people who came into contact with them.
The findings showed just two out of 100 infected people had caught the virus from non-household contacts, while 10 in 100 had contracted the disease from their own families.
So you’re 5X more likely to catch WuFlu from a family member than a stranger. But yet we’re still told to ‘huddle in place’.
Mt. Juliet, TN man says even with no test, he’s informed he is COVID-19 positive by state
So maybe it was a quail or a goat involved.
CORONAVIRUS DATA IN TEXAS & FLORIDA PROVE HOW DISASTROUS NEW YORK HANDLED PANDEMIC
Florida and Texas are on track to have the same number of confirmed cases as the state of New York — which has more cases than anywhere in the country.
Yet, Texas and Florida will have 1/10th of the death rate of New York. Actually Florida has 1/8th and Texas has about 1/13th of the death rate of New York.
Yet New York’s lockdown is much more stringent than either Florida or Texas. Why is that?
You may have seen the recent news that currently they have 85 babies under the age of one year in Nueces County that have all tested positive for CoVid-19.
However you have to read a lot deeper to find out those 85 alleged cases represent the total number that occurred over the last 5 months.
Or that all but one of those infants were diagnosed over 3 months ago. And that none were hospitalized for CoVid, but merely tested positive when they were admitted for other reasons.
Or that only one died and that was from an unrelated problem.
Finally, should you wear a mask over your mask?
Here’s the Mayo Clinic’s take on the mask situation.
COVID-19: How much protection do face masks offer?
I mentioned the other day looking at the WalMart mask selection because I was curious about the valves you see on some masks and wondered what they really did. And as it turns out that on the cheap masks, the ‘valve’ is just a cover over the holes, so it’s not obvious that they’re just holes. But it certainly makes it easier to breathe, I guess.
And it’s not much better on the expensive N95 masks either.
Some N95 masks, and even some cloth masks, have one-way valves that make them easier to breathe through. But because the valve releases unfiltered air when the wearer breathes out, this type of mask doesn’t prevent the wearer from spreading the virus.
One person said that his wife, who works at a hospital, was told to wear a masks over her N95 mask.
And of course since masks work so well, Broward County FL has apparently mandated that masks must be worn in the privacy of your own home.
Section 4A of the emergency order states the following;
“All persons who reside on any residential property, whether single family or multi-family, and irrespective of whether they own or rent the property, must ensure that all persons on the residential property, including guests, comply with all applicable guidelines of any Broward County Emergency Order, including the facial covering requirements.
Don’t you feel safer now?
Here are a couple of more blogs from our This Day in History series.
July 21, 2010
The Rally – Early Bird Day 2…
Today we decided to try another well-known restaurant here in the Louisville area, although in this case it’s actually in Indiana, which of course is just right across the Ohio River from Louisville. So we left about 11:15 am heading about 25 miles north and out in the country to the Joe Huber Family Farm and Restaurant.
The Huber family has owned this 200 acre farm since 1843, but the restaurant got its start in 1967 when the family begin advertising “Pick Your Own” fruits and vegetables. It turns out that the customers were hungry after picking in the fields, so the family began serving box lunches.
Then in 1983 they built the restaurant that began it all. Today it’s a tourist destination, with a petting zoo, gardens, rides, gift shops, and meeting halls for wedding receptions, reunions, and company picnics.
And the restaurant is great! Here’s my Country Platter Dinner.
It had Fried Chicken, Country Ham, Corn, Cole Slaw, Chicken N Dumplings, Mashed Potatoes, and Green Beans. And It was “All You Can Eat”
Believe me, this was all I could eat. In fact I had to take some home.
And the grounds were very nice, too.
After a great meal, we got back to rig about 2 pm, and it seemed like a good time for a nap.
Then, about 3:30 pm we went over to look at the new RV’s on display. These next two photos are of 2010 American Eagle, the same one as our 1999 Eagle. This one lists for $580,000.00. Guess we’ll have to wait for that Mega-Millions winning ticket.
One of the other rigs we looked at was this Prevost from Parliament Coach in Florida.
We really need a place to store our crystal glassware!
And what’s even better, you can buy it today for half price, only $975,000. What a deal!
Then about 6 pm we walked over to Freedom Hall to see the Monarchs, a 60’s rock and roll group. Two of the band are original members from when the band formed in 1960. They had a number of hits, including “Look Homeward, Angel”, which made it to #13 on the Billboard Chart. They toured with Dick Clark, The Beach Boys, The Righteous Brothers, Dion, and Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, among others. I remember seeing them in Birmingham, AL in 1965 on the Dick Clark’s Cavalcade of Stars. And they still sound good.
After the concert we walked back across the parking lot to our truck, passing a display of old RV’s.
This one looks like the one from Lucy and Desi’s “The Long, Long, Trailer”.
We got back to the rig about 9 pm and started planning our day tomorrow.
More then…
July 21, 2013
Riding the Soo Locks . . .
For our first morning here in Sault Ste. Marie, Jan and I set outside and drank our coffee while we watched the big boats go by. This has got to be one of the nice views we’ve had in an RV park.
Even Mister got some sun with us.
Since it was such a nice day, we decided to take the Soo Locks Boat Tour this afternoon so about 2:15 we drove down the road about a block to the tour boat dock to make the 2:30 tour.
The first place we passed was our site at the Elk’s Lodge here. Shows you what a great view we have here.
And then right down the road we passed the Soo Locks Campground. It’s a pretty big park, but only a few sites are as good as ours.
This is a crane barge, capable of lifting 300 tons. It’s used to lift the enormous lock gates when repairs are necessary.
Here we are entering the lock that will raise us to the level of Lake Superior. Lake Huron is 21 feet below Superior, and before the locks were built, a 3 mile line of rapids covered the area. At that time they would haul the boats around the rapids on skids.
This lock holds 10 million gallons and it takes about 10 minutes to raise our tour boat to the upper level. There are no pumps involved in moving the water. To fill the lock they just open valves under the lock and let the water from the high side run in. To empty it, they just open valves at the other end and dump the water out the low side.
The only electricity used is to open and close the lock gates and valves, and uses only about 11 cents worth. For this reason passage through the locks is free, no matter if you are a row boat, or a big taconite (iron ore) freighter like the American Century below.
The American Century is 1000 feet long and 105 feet wide, and clears the locks with only a few feet on each side.
Once we were 21 feet higher, the gates opened and the safety boom moves out of the way. The boom prevents runaway boats from crashing into the lock gates and damaging or destroying them.
So now we were out into wide open Lake Superior.
Next up we passed a big steel mill that uses some the taconite ore brought in on the big freighters.
A large moving crane scoops up the ore from the piles
and then dumps it into the train car that takes it to the blast furnace.
Coming back, we came through a smaller set of locks on the Canadian side. The original large lock here was damaged about 50 years and set idle for a good while. It was decided that it was uneconomical to repair it, so they actually built a new, smaller lock inside the old one.
Only 238 feet long it is used for pleasure boats, tour boats, and other small craft.
Finally headed back to our dock, we passed the US Niagara, Admiral Perry’s relief flagship in the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. Sunk on purpose in 1820, it was refloated in 1913 and suffering through several abortive restorations before finally ending up like this. During the summer it travels the Great Lakes as an ambassador for the state of Pennsylvania.
Jan even had a moose sighting, so she was happy.
By the time we got back to the dock and in our car, it was almost 5pm so we headed out to Applebee’s for dinner.
Not sure what we’ll do tomorrow. We might have some thunderstorms rolling in so we’ll have to wait and see.
Thought for the Day:
“‘Necessity’ is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.” – William Pitt, 1783
Back To The Moon . . .
51 years ago today, in Tuscaloosa, AL, with our 14 month old son Chris in our laps, Jan and I spent the day sitting in the living room of our only friends who had a color TV, watching the Apollo 11 moon landing.
Of course, since all the video from the moon was in black & white, I’m not sure watching it on a color TV made much difference.
At that time I was still in school, but with my father working for Boeing at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL, and Jan’s father working for Rocketdyne at the Cape, I was determined that someday I would work for NASA too.
And though it took me nine years, in December 1978 Jan and I, and our two kids, moved from Montgomery, AL to Houston where I went to work for a NASA contractor at JSC.
And by the time the Space Shuttle was flying, I found myself in charge of processing the in-flight video coming down live from the Shuttle and sending it out to the world for others to see, kind of completing the circle.
While I was at NASA, one thing I heard over and over, from former astronauts, present astronauts, engineers and technicians, was “We made it to the moon. Why did we leave and never go back?”
But now it looks like SpaceX has us back on track again.
This is a time-lapse shot of a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch on the left and the return and landing of the 1st stage back to the Cape.
Another in our famous Where We Were 9 Years Ago Today series..
July 20, 2011
On to Billings . . .
After coffee and bagels, and a nice quiet night, we pulled out of Riverfront RV Park in Garrison about 9 am heading for Billings, MT about 270 miles away.
And just like yesterday, we had some beautiful rolling vistas along the way.
After smooth roads and an uneventful drive we pulled into the Billings Trailer Village RV Park in Billings about 2:30 and got set up. This is our 4th time to stay here and we always feel welcome. Of course the first two times we came through here in 2008 on our way to and from Alaska, we got snowed in for a week both times.
Hopefully that won’t happen this time.
While I was setting up outside, Jan let Mister out, who immediately jumped down on the pavement and started yowling, and looking down at his feet. After a couple of seconds Jan grabbed him up and put him on the grass. Dumb cat didn’t have enough sense to get off hot asphalt. He just stood there and cried.
About 3 pm Jan called her friend Linda to get a ‘when and where’ for dinner tonight.
Since the ‘when’ was 5:30 we figured we’d have enough time to get our Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club shopping out of the way beforehand, so off we went.
The ‘where’ for dinner was the HuHot Mongolian Grill, one of our favorite places when we’re in town. You start out with an empty bowl and then fill it your choice of different meats, veggies, fruits, and sauces, and then give it to the grill guy. He cooks it all up on this big grill and gives it back to you on a big platter.
Hmmm! Hmmm! Good!
Linda is a longtime friends of ours. She and Jan worked at the same hospital in Houston years ago, until one day Linda decided she wanted some different scenery, so she up and moved to Billings, MT, of all places.
After dinner we went over to Linda’s house to meet her new cat, and sat around and talked for a while, catching up.
We didn’t stay long because it had been a long day, and we’ll see Linda again in a week or so when we come back through Billings, after our Yellowstone/Grand Tetons excursion, and on our way through North Dakota.
Tomorrow we’ve got a short 100 mile run down to Cody, WY to meet up with our friends Al and Adrienne, who are workamping there.
Thought for the Day:
Freedom has a ring to it. And a slight recoil.
