Life has a way of making the foreseeable what never happens; and the unforeseeable what your life is about. “Appaloosa”
COVID-19 by the Numbers 6/30/2020 7:33p
Over 10 million COVID-19 cases, and more than one-half million deaths, worldwide.
I continue to be amazed at how many people I communicate with, via Social Media, who are unwilling to believe these numbers. They get their information from strangely named sources with highly visible agendas and are unwilling to believe that our Administration is lying to us. They are unwilling to accept the information found on traditional news outlets.
While a young reporter for The Washington Post in 1972, Carl Bernstein was teamed up with Bob Woodward; the two did much of the original news reporting on the Watergate scandal. These scandals led to numerous government investigations and the eventual resignation of President Richard Nixon. The work of Woodward and Bernstein was called “maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time” by longtime journalism figure Gene Roberts.[1]
The Post is one of p45’s favorite targets for being called “Fake News.” The reality is that the name “Fake News” is applied to any reporting that the president doesn’t like.
Confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States surpassed 2.5 million on Sunday as a crushing new wave of infections continued to bear down throughout the country’s South and West. Across the nation, 40,587 new daily cases were reported.
Florida, Texas and Arizona are emerging as the country’s latest epicenters after reporting record numbers of new infections for weeks in a row. Positivity rates and hospitalizations have also spiked. On Sunday [6/28], Arizona (3,857) and Georgia (2,225) hit new one-day case highs.
A record surge in new cases is the clearest sign yet of the historic failure in the United States to control the virus — exposing a crisis in governance extending from the Oval Office to state capitals to city councils.
The faltering response in the United States remains a subject of global shock and fascination, with one prominent French virologist saying Sunday the situation was “explosive.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/06/28/coronavirus-live-updates-us/
Meanwhile, the president is playing golf…
mjarts face masks at Redbubble
Life has a way of making the foreseeable what never happens; and the unforeseeable what your life is about. “Appaloosa”
Yes, I’m being repetitious; this may be my theme for a long time.
I turn 68 next month; I probably have “underlying medical conditions,” as the posts from the Oregon Health Authority publish in regard to COVID-19 deaths. Consequently, I am considered ‘at risk’—which sometimes feels like another name for “old.”
Since I am not allowed to volunteer anywhere, because of this classification, I am doing what I able to do. It appears that Face Masks are going to be with us for a long time… Unpleasant to think about it as it may be, we may need to wear face masks for the rest of our lives. I have designed a number of Face Masks, based on illustrations I’ve created in the past. I will be posting each design on Social Media over the next weeks. I have created 15 designs already; more designs are in the works.
The nature of viruses is that they are not alive, so they cannot be killed. The virus is a microscopic organism that exists to replicate; with COVID-19, the replication occurs in the lungs. Face Masks are not intended to keep you safe from COVID-19; they are intended to keep people around you safe. The COVID-19 virus can exist in our lungs for 2-3 weeks before we are aware of symptoms. It is not known at this time whether having recovered from the virus, we become immune—we don’t know whether we can catch the virus again. This is a Novel virus—one that is brand new [novel]; it has only existed for 7+ months. In spite of contrary messaging coming from politicians, COVID-19 is not ‘the flu’ that comes through our lives every fall. COVID-19 is deadly, for about 5% of the population that contracts the virus [8% of those tested]. If one survives being on a ventilator in a COVID ward, recovery may take months. Epidemiologists have not yet learned what causes some people to be asymptomatic—no discernable symptoms—nor what causes some people to die. People who are asymptomatic can still infect others. That is why we are ordered to wear masks.
You who are reading this: if you have been indoors among groups of people that aren’t wearing masks—political events or concerts—in the last two weeks, you may be infected and you are not aware of it. If you are infected, and go to public places without a mask, you can infect others. You may be infecting a grandparent or parent, or a family member.
For the foreseeable future, this is our New Normal.
This isn’t me; nor is it real
I damaged my spine when I was in high school—landed wrong in PE causing my legs to circle over my back, in an attempt at folding me in the wrong direction. I remember hearing my spine crackle like a zipper. It seems that my parents believed that if one can make it to the doctor, one does not need to see a doctor [probable financial reasons—I don’t even know if health insurance existed in the late 60s]. For many weeks, in order to turn my head to look sideways, I had to rotate my entire body. I was probably 16 or 17—youth brings a power of recovery that slowly disappears over time.
I received my last traffic citation when I turned forty—sort of a bizarre birthday present. The law enforcement officers, and the ambulance people, when they looked at my driver’s license, regretted their need to cite me for turning into an oncoming car—which wasn’t there when a began the turn… a blind corner of sorts. [we stopped traffic on the highway that goes over Mount Hood, so a helicopter could land] This was the third vehicle that I was in, that was totaled by another vehicle.
At that point, I decided there would never be a reason in the future, for me to rush, while driving.
I also worked as a less-than-careful carpenter for a decade or so. My guess was that the damage began in high school and was aggravated multiple times over 20+ years. I have been on pain medication for 50 years; plus, antidepressants. More meds, starting in 2009—”idiopathic polyneuropathy”—this is doctor speak for, ‘your neurological system is messed up, and we have no idea why’. I finally ‘found’ a neurologist who was willing to admit the latter phrase. I received a letter from him, a day or two ago, saying that because of COVID-19, he and his family were moving to the East Coast, to care for a mother. expletive deleted.
Beginning in 2009, ‘New Normal’ has occurred in my life every two years, in May or June, almost like clockwork. “New Normal’ began occurring more rapidly last year. I’m on my third New Normal since the beginning of 2019. It sucks.
The World has entered into New Normal.
Even in the Amazon Rainforest.
Greed, avarice, an unreasonable desire for wealth. Investment bankers, hedge fund managers and billionaires don’t want there to be a New Normal. The Military-Industrial Complex does not want a New Normal, as perhaps the last honest Republican President—Dwight D. Eisenhower—warned in his last address to the American public. They want the Old Normal, where they could get rich without having to deal with consequences.
Four months. 129,971 deaths in America. [ https://factba.se/topic/calendar ]
For two of those months, we Sheltered In Place, went without earnings, we avoided contact with other people. We collapsed the American economy. Two months which could have been used to create a path toward living with COVID-19 until a vaccine can be created and found to work. The European Union and Asian countries followed plans and are living with the COVID-19 virus. People continue to become infected; but the hospitals can handle the patient load. People are back at work in altered surroundings to minimize the spread of COVID-19. The European Union is rebuilding their economies. The European Union is banning Americans from travel to the E.U.
Memorial Day 2020 in the US. People partied like it was 2019. No Social Distancing; no Face Masks; no Sheltering In Place. This coming weekend is the Fourth of July. Will people party like it was 2019? States are recording the highest number of new infections since the end of March. Hospitals in various parts of the country are filled to capacity with COVID-19 cases; hospitals are running out of supplies. It is as if we were back at the end of March instead of the beginning of July. The two months where a plan could have been made were wasted on doing nothing. There is no Federal plan for dealing with the Pandemic. Governors are having to come up with their own plans for their states, with very little support from the Federal government.
We have the ability to imagine a New Normal; one that provides equity and justice. This has been proven in the last month. Black Lives Matter protests have brought positive benefits to the country. People who want a New Normal that provides Equity and Justice need to vote. We need to encourage voting.
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Tags: commercial, depression, faith, freelance illustration, illustration, intolerance, material poverty, mental-health, Nerve Pain, Neuropathy, pain, persistence, personal excellence, Polyneuropathy, self-employment, surviving
Chronicles in Ordinary Time 