Tag Life

Bee Present

Michael 5 Comments

Do you ever do something and surprise yourself at how profound you are? Me neither, but I did something that really had me thinking for a few days. I kept saying to myself “Yeah, that’s me, damn it. I can do better!”

Many of you know that in an alternate universe I am co-founder of an education foundation, more life and self-preservation than education but you have to slot these things somewhere. One of our routines is a weekly social media fixture, A Moment of Motivation, in our words, “small doses of positivity.” (I came up with that!)

Motivation Posts (50)Let me tell you, it’s hard work to build up to a single motivating moment. In preparation for this morning’s release, I drafted the first iteration of image and theme: Be Kind, Be Present, Be Grateful.

Then started the series of texts back and forth. (You want motivation? You have to be motivated to work together when you’re separated by 2100 miles and three time-zones. But that’s a different story.) After discussion, major changes, minor refinements, lots word-smithing, my partner and I settled on: Don’t Be a Busy Bee – Bee in the Present. Now with an image and theme it was up to me to come up with a motivating message to accompany it. Here is the final form:

Motivation Posts (52)“Life is a busy place. We come here every morning and start the day with a mental list of things to do.
Meetings meals, classes, jobs, tests, housework, work work…stop! 
Stop doing and start being!
Sit, pray, meditate, experience nature, see the people around you. Be part of the world.
Stop making a living. Start making a life.
Be present!”

Now if you ask me, I say that’s excellent advice. Boy I wish I had thought of that forty years ago! Even without “work” I start each day asking myself, “What am I going to do today?” Did I learn anything from my experiences? Maybe from the experience of getting it wrong. How often as a young professional did I tell my young family, “See you later, I have a meeting. No nothing to do with work but the right people will be there and I have to make myself seen.” Or not thinking twice about taking on the extra project at work because it will look good on the resume. “So what if it means staying home and not joining everyone for a week at the shore? When will a chance like this come again?” What seemed like a justification for doing the work are the very same words I wish I had use to talk myself out of that work. Even today I tend to skew everything in terms of “what may be” rather than in the “what am I,” always looking at what could happen if I do or don’t do something, say or don’t say something, go or not go somewhere. Yes, we need to plan, we need to set goals and we need to be certain we do the things that will keep us around for a long time for those who love and need us. But we need to also see that the most important thing is why we are, not the who or what we are.   

We cannot simply concentrate on the task, like the bees setting out to gather nectar. Nor can we sit on the outside waiting for something to happen. We have to immerse ourselves in everything around us. We are part of the beauty of the world, and we are loved for that. Not for the work we accomplish or the words we write. We are loved because we are us. We belong because of who we are. When you wake tomorrow and ask yourself, “What am I going to do today?” make the first item on the to do list, “sit, pray, meditate, and experience,” and then repeat as necessary.

Stop making a living. Start making a life. Don’t be so busy. Be present!

(If you have the urge please follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn at @roamcare or visit our website http://www.roamcare.org)

Spring cleaning

Michael 2 Comments

I did some electronic spring cleaning tis morning. I fear this is a battle I’m doomed to lose. Of course by electronic spring cleaning I don’t mean deep cleaning my living space with robotic assistance. A robot vacuum might be fun to have around, but until they come up with one who can wash down the cabinets, keep the appliances sparkly, daily clean the bathroom, and tidy the bedroom – like Rosey on the Jetsons! – I’ll do the physical cleaning on my own for as long as I can. No, the spring cleaning was going through apps on the phone and tablets, reviewing bookmarks on the browsers, moving image and document files to cards or cloud storage or deleting them outright, and getting rid of those nasty cookies (which unfortunately eliminates the helpful ones also which is why I so rarely take that on).

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It went relatively smoothly except for one tablet which makes me wonder if I take things too literally.  The tablet in question is an older Samsung that I’ve threatened to put out to pasture at least once a month for the last several years. But I’m used to its quirks, it fits me and my expectations, and I guess I like it enough to poo-poo my attempts to use the newer but still not completely set up tab sitting on my desk (which is now certainly itself hopelessly outdated).

The odd thing about this particular, older unit is the help that it wants to provide, particularly at clean-up time. It knows its storage limits and can clue me in on where I can reclaim valuable storage space. What it has a hard time with is knowing what’s stored where. Let me explain. As an older tablet it has limited storage, only 16 GB, so each little chunk of that is valuable. It wants to be a helpful little thing so this morning it told me that 970 MB was holding onto pictures and videos. No need to have them there but also no need to use up space on the cloud account with them when I have plenty of room and can move them to the SD card. Except when I tap the icon to show me the detail of what makes up those 970 MB of treasured photos, it gets confused and shows me all the files the tablet can access – internal, card, and cloud storage. It very graciously tells me how much each destination holds but not which files are at which destinations. So I go through file by file to find what goes where Sigh.

Another thing the poor old piece wants to help with is shedding itself of unused or rarely used apps. Every handheld device has a means of displaying all its resident applications by frequency of access. Except this one hasn’t learned the English definitions for always, sometimes, rarely, and never. I’m just certain that it would get so confused trying to complete a survey it would give up after the first few questions. Anyway, it listed all my apps by often used, sometimes used, and rarely used. Except that they aren’t. My crossword app that I use daily was in the sometimes used pile while Facebook that I haven’t accessed in the last several months was among those often used.

After hours more than I wanted to devote to the project I feel good that all my electronic, connected devices are as trim as can be and for a short while I should be able to enjoy efficient downloads, speedy uploads, and generally smooth, glitch free surfing on the Internet on my own little intranet.

I just really hope I didn’t delete my WordPress account.  Well, here goes nothing! (Hmm, let me know if you didn’t get this.) (Thanks!)

opensesame

Michael 3 Comments

I had to change a password on one of the many password protected sites we access what seems hourly! I didn’t have to change it because it was that time whether that time is every month, every 6 months, or any time like the site feels like messing with you. I didn’t have to change it because I forgot my password. I had to change it because I kept mis-typing it. I am the king of typos! I’m lucky I can get through an entire sentence when I can actually see the letters taking shape on the screen in front of me. Hid everything behind ******************** and it’s a crapshoot if I got +#^ or +@&. Even if I see them I may not be able to tell if I have it right. But that’s a story for later – later in this post.

When I entered the “select your password” phase of reestablishing my password, the site provided me with their rules. Oddly, not all sites do that. This site, in addition to the upper and lower case letters, numbers, and special characters (why do they call them special, aren’t they the same symbols that have appeared on keyboards since the time keyboards were attached to typewriters? Can’t we just call them “symbols” or is that too symbolic?), this set of rules featured – for the first time ever, live on our stage! (sorry I got carried away – this set of rules included the querulous instruction to not end with a number. Naturally I can’t take an instruction like that and not dig deeper so I dug deeper.

Yes, it appears somebody who studies these sorts of things has determined that passwords ending in numbers are more likely to be hacked. I think maybe it has to do with something about some people’s predilection to serializing their passwords so like maybe they don’t forget them. You may have done it, or perhaps are doing it yourself. OpenSesame1, OpenSesame2, OpenSesame3, etc.  I also discovered that once very popular, opensesame has fallen way down the list of people’s password choices. Now this brings up a couple of questions. First of all, if passwords are supposed to be such closely guarded secrets, often under penalty of on-line death if revealed, how does anyone know what once was and what is no longer popular. (Many of the same sources even noted people are still out there using “password” for their passwords. -Same question fellas!) The other question I have about opensesame is why didn’t I ever think about that? What a great password! And so versatile. The user who selects opensesame or one of its variants (perhaps OpenSesame1, OpenSesame2, OpenSesame3, etc) might be an Antoine Galland fan, a lover of the Three Stooges, or trapped in the seventies singing their way to internet access with Kool and the Gang. Opportunity lost.

Anyway, back to the point of this post (yes, yes, go ahead and smirk), I can live with the odd rules, making my passwords at least 8 characters and not more than 20, using upper and lower cases, tossing in a few numbers as long as one isn’t at the end, even the inclusion of “special characters,” but can I at least see what I’m typing? It appears that the two most common methods of breaking the password code are guessing and “entry intercept” whereby a program, bug, virus, or some malevolent genie captures the keystrokes made to enter the password characters (special and otherwise) and shares them with the head virus writer, bug-programmer, or Ali Baba. So, while we’re struggling with trying to accurately enter jkwp9y%Roa&&fmMqrs!! the virus may see what we’re typing, but all we see is   ********************.

Now I ask you, is that fair?

Blog Art

One Hundred Days

Michael 3 Comments

If you are “lucky” enough to live in a city, county, state, country, homeowners’ association, etc., that elected a new representative, mayor, commissioner, dog catcher, etc. last fall who was installed in office in January, you are likely seeing stories here and about regarding so-and-so’s first 100 days. That seems to be a fun activity among pundits who have nothing much better to do in mid-April. I’ve never cared much for those types of stories. What can you do in 100 days?

Since the dawn of the Internet Era, hundred day projects although not all the rage, are no longer the sole purview of political hacks and the hacks who follow politics. Everybody can get in on the action. In fact, there is an on-line, on-going, on point 100 Day Project site that claims “thousands of people all around the world commit to 100 days of creating” every year. The ninth annual project period started Feb. 13, but according to their FAQs, any day is a good day to start.

I was glad to hear that because I started a 100 day project on January 9, which means my hundredth day is here! I didn’t put much planning into my activity. To be honest, it wasn’t planned at all! And it certainly began before January 9 but that’s the day I’m going with because that’s the day the official word came to me – I had COVID. I already wrote about the first 30 days I got to participate in this project and I will say the more recent 70 days have been much more fun. Let me tell you what I’ve been doing.

As I said then, I was and am still working the exercises given me to strengthen the muscles that help the lungs do what lungs do, and to increase my stamina and balance. Because the weather has been typical Western Pennsylvania Spring (temperatures ranging from 16⁰F to 72⁰F over 3 days, with wind, rain, sleet and snow often in the same day), I didn’t mind staying inside, far away from the maskless horde. I really needed something to do besides the official physician ordered activity. I tried other exercises, and I can attest that riding a bike to nowhere really is as dull as it sounds. On the occasional day of sun and warmth (at the same time!) I would venture outside to saunter on paved surfaces (of those 100 days, only 4 of them were completely precipitation free making a walk through the woods more like a slog through a bog), but it seemed if I was going to amuse myself, it would be an indoor activity.

They say with 100 days you can reinvent yourself.  I’m not sure who they are and what they started with, but I didn’t think I would be reinventing anything, not even a better mousetrap, in the time I had before “Real Spring” would roll around. So … I decided to revive an old hobby. Art. Actually I revised an old hobby. Once upon a time I was a sketcher. Yes, one of those pretentious twerps who would sit outside with a pad and a soft lead pencil and do more than doodle but less than draw. After I confirmed to myself that I still understood light, shadow, perspective, and representation, I took the plunge and added color. I went full-on painting. With the not quite miraculous miracle of overnight shipping, I had all the supplies I needed to transform a 20 year old drawer into Grandpa Moses.

I’ll never be confused with an old master, and the Tate won’t be keeping a wing open for my work, but I have to say I have enjoyed the last 70 days of my 100 day project and will be continuing it even if the weather ever turns to spring. (It is snowing as I write this. Just FYI. Ugh.)

Don’t think you can develop a talent in a short amount of time in the later years of your life? Please, don’t tell me that. I’m having too much fun. I just really wish I didn’t have to get COVID to figure this out!

66085821713__28E72589-3E88-4A64-8EE8-529861CAAE10    My first piece: “Young woman among trees”

The polarizing of America

Michael 2 Comments

At a time when most everybody in America is lining up, taking sides for the next us versus them battle, I read an interesting article last week that posits America is not as divided as some who may be benefiting from division would have you think. Joseph Ratliff, an editor at Allsides.com opened with a critique of a Washington Post article reviewing a recent survey of American priorities for education. (“How Media Bias Makes Polarization Appear Worse Than It Actually Is,” allsides.com, Apr 6, 2022) The gist of Mr. Ratliff’s commentary was although the Post headline “Democrats want to teach kids sex education. Republicans want to teach them patriotism” and lede highlighted significant differences on two education initiatives noted in the survey, it buried the striking agreement on 10 other initiatives, including respect for people of different races, languages besides English, and independent thinking.

Why is the division between the two controversial initiatives emphasized rather than the 10 that the ideological groups agree on? Because conflict sales. It may be healthier for the country and its populace that to note there is more consensus and commonality than discord and disagreement among Americans, but it is healthier for a new outlet’s bottom line to focus on the disparities, People pay more attention to news that can adversely affect them than positive reports. But people also want to know that others are even more adversely affected. This is reinforced in the “us versus them” manner of reporting, establishing clear lines between us and them so the outlet can rely on a consistent audience to present to its advertisers, sponsors, and contributors. By manipulating the importance of datasets and presenting what they feel is of importance to its consumers. outlets can honestly say they are not manipulating the data, only reporting it, although not necessarily all of it or not all of it until after the average reader/listening/surfer has reached his or her attention span limit.

The media has been able to take advantage of the average American to be unaware of much outside his or her own social network. An unawareness that has also been exploited by social media’s algorithms. This unawareness was described in detail in a report of a pair of surveys conducting in January of this year by YouGovAmerica. (“From millionaires to Muslims, small subgroups of the population seem much larger to many Americans,” yougov.com, Mar 15, 2022) When people’s average perceptions of group sizes are compared to actual population estimates, Americans tend to vastly overestimate the size of minority groups, but underestimate the size of majority groups. For example, people surveyed estimated that 19% of Americans make more than $500,000 per year when the actual is 1%, that 24% of Americans are gay, lesbian or bisexual when the actual percentage are 3, 3, and 4% respectively, that 37% of Americans are military veterans and the actual is 6%, and that 52% of Americans own a gun and the actual is 32%. Similar findings were noted for ethnic and religious minorities. However, when groups are clearly in the majority, Americans underestimate. Those surveyed estimated 49% of Americans own their house and the actual is 65%, that 61% of Americans have flown on a plane and the actual is 88%, and they estimated that 68% of Americans have a high school diploma or equivalent when the actual is 89%. It is important to recognize that Americans by and large cannot determine what is and is not prevalent because if the public cannot make that determination, the media can more easily skew reporting and maintain the polarization that benefits them.

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How do we avoid becoming pigeonholed by media influencers. Always read complete articles rather than just the headline or highlight. If you see a blurb on social media, go to the full article cited in the post and if a full article is not cited, consider the information suspect. And know your own susceptibility to misunderstanding. I recommend you review the YouGov survey results and see how you estimate common standards). The survey explored how people estimated groups in family, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, politics, income, and education.  Actual percentages were determined based on information from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the results of well-established polling firms.

Don’t be stuck on one side of “us versus them” when the middle group is actually where you will likely find most of your neighbors.

The envelope please…

Michael Leave a comment

And the envelope please…

Ah, Major Movie Award time. The Academy is cracking down in unauthorized used of the gold statuettes’ nickname but you know what Major Movie Award I mean. The Major Movie Award ceremony was last night and I missed it – again. Intentionally. I love movies and this year I actually saw most of the nominees for the Major Movie Award best picture award. But I love old movies a whole lot better and I dislike awards shows even more. Awards shows, awards banquets, recognition ceremonies, even graduations, but especially awards show when anybody who ever got lucky enough to be cast in a good movie demonstrates how valuable screenwriters are. Anyway, I didn’t watch the ceremonies but instead, as is my custom, I watched a couple Major Movie Award winners from 60 years ago.

In general, forty years is my cut off.  If a movie is still entertaining (and relevant, if possible), 40 years after it first hit the theaters, then that’s a good movie. I would say I’ll be re-watching this year’s winner in 40 years but in 40 years I’ll be well ensconced in the centenarian camp, so…that’s a maybe.

So with all this experience of watching long-lasting, significant award winning movies from 40, 50, 60, 100 years ago, you’d  think I could pick out this years winner effortlessly. Yeah, no. A hundred, 90, 60, 50 years ago, significant was defined differently. Right around 40 years ago, it started to be more important to have the right message than to have the right stuff. But that’s okay. That only holds true for the “big” awards.  The true magic in movies, the costumes, sets, music, and cinematography are still awarded on merit so there will always be good old movies to watch. Even forty years from now.

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It so happens that I am writing this before the Major Movie Awards ceremony and the announcement of best picture. So, given that I’ve seen them, what movie would I vote for if I were a member of the Major Movie Award voting bloc?  I will say I don’t think the one I would vote for will win, but it should.  I think several of the best picture nominees are definite possibilities for cinematography and costume and would be worthy of those honors. But those same movies have no story, no coherence, or are just not good enough to be “best.” And there are so many this year (10 nominees for best picture), the field is clearly watered down.  But I digress.

What movie would I vote for if I were a member of the Major Movie Award voting bloc? West Side Story. It will have a hard time getting to the podium.  Although remakes dominate moviedom, rarely do remakes get nominated for the best picture award. To win the award, the odds are greater than finder teeth in a hen, but just barely. Only twice has a best picture been a remake. (Ben-Hur in 1959 and The Departed in 2006). To make it an even higher mountain to climb, West Side Story is the first time a remake of a previous best picture winner (1961) has even been nominated for best picture.

So … if I don’t think the. Ivies I would vote for will win for best picture, where would I put my money? Although almost all of the rest of the world thinks, The Power of the Dog will be so honored, I think last night’s winner was CODA. But wouldn’t it be a hoot if Licorice Pizza walk away with it?

We could do this for the other 23 categories too but I have to get dinner on the table.

How did I do?

Read any good books lately?

Michael 3 Comments

There have been a lot of stories this year regarding book banning in America’s schools. Legislature has been presented in seven states and parents have approached dozens of school districts specifically to remove specific volumes or entire categories of books from school libraries. Legislation was introduced in Florida to not limit challenges to school library holdings to parents but allowing any individual to challenge any holding. In Texas, Llano County Commissioners Court forced the closure of the local public library (public library!) so librarians could review all reading material for their younger readers to make sure books are age appropriate. That’s just this year. And it’s only March. That’s following up on a flurry of year end interest around books and children. According to NPR, Texas State Representative Matt Krause put more than 850 books on a watch list, targeting materials he feels “might make students feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress because of their race or sex.” (npr.org, “A Texas lawmaker is targeting 850 books that he says could make students feel uneasy,” Oct. 28, 2021.) No word on whether he read those books.

Questioning whether the Honorable (Ha!) Krause read all 800+ books on his list isn’t me being ornery as usual. It’s a legitimate question. Not just by me but legitimized by those in the know. Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director for the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom said in a recent interview, “We’re now seeing challenges pop up based solely on social media posts. A video gets posted of a parent complaining at a school board meeting, and within days, we see challenges across the country using the same reasons. People are complaining because they saw it on social media, not because they actually engaged with the book.” (Triblive.com, “Book challenges are becoming more frequent, driven in part by social media,” March 14, 2022.)

My concern isn’t about the books being challenged. Book challenges and banning have been going on basically since there were books. It’s the way these challenges are being conducted. Small numbers of individuals uneducated in the library sciences making noisy demands of schools to conform to their (the uneducated small number of individuals’) idea of decorum based on what other uneducated small number of individuals are writing on Facebook, et.al.. In a recent CNN poll, only 12% of Americans believed parents “should have the most sway over which library books are on the shelves” and twice as many felt teachers and school personnel should have more control over library content. (cnn.com, “CNN Poll: Economy and education could shape how Americans vote in 2022,” Feb. 11, 2022.) In the past, challenges were based on the challenger’s personal experience with the book (that means he/she/it actually read the book) and may have actually been able to intelligently debate the content of the book and verbalize why he/she/it felt it (the book) was inappropriate. Now, the majority of challenges are opposing titles simply because they are on some list of ‘controversial’ books. I pointedly use “title” in that sentence because so often the title is all the “concerned” parent knows about the book.

There is no evidence that the current wave of book banning is accomplishing what I think the challengers to the titles are intending, that is a purge of all material contrary to their mores. I’m just not sure they know what their intentions are. Or possibly what mores are. And if anything, the publicity for these books, the classic titles and those barely known to anybody but the most dedicated librarians, has generated increased sales for the books.

We’ve seen when we let anybody with a computer and the ability to cut and paste how America responds to a global pandemic resulting in a death rate twice the rest of the worlds, how we’ve graciously accepted the transfer of power, and how we are politely carrying on primary election campaigns as we run up to the mid-term elections this fall. Perhaps the proposed bans shouldn’t be of books whose only intent is to encourage thought and generate intelligent discussion, we should instead be banning social media whose intent increasingly seems to be to pass off incomprehensible opinion as fact among those who never spent time in their school library back in the day when it was their school library.

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I’ll have mine with coffee please

Michael 2 Comments

This is the day sweet toothed snackers and pastry enthusiasts wait for every year – Pi Day, or as probably a large percentage of those pie eaters would write it out, and for as much as they care of its significance – Pie Day. Now that opens a whole new line of thought. Exactly what does pi actually do in the real world? And while we’re at it, why pi?

That second question is easier to answer. Everybody, even those insisting on it being Pie Day, knows pi (without the ‘e’) has something to do with math and some of those everybodies might even know it’s most closely associated with circles. Pi is the relationship of a circle’s, any circle’s circumference to its diameter. There’s a great two-minute video here that demonstrates that with a touch of humor and extra pepperoni. Although the concept of pi (again, without the ‘e’) was first demonstrated in the third century B.C., it wasn’t until 1706 on this side of the Common Era dividing line that British mathematician William Jones decided the Greek letter and symbol would make a dandy stand in for 3.14 etc.etc.etc. in calculations. But Leonhard Euler (yes, the is THE Euler) made it popular in his textbooks and justified the Greek Pi, corresponding to P, because pi is all about the perimeter (or circumference) of a circle. (In case you’re wondering, pie (with the ‘e’) has been around since about 6,000 B.C..)

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Now the first question isn’t actually hard to answer. It is hard to pin it down to less than a few hundred dozen applications that are possible only because somebody, sometime, somewhere worked out the calculations to make whatever it is work, using pi. These include radio waves that not only make AM radio possible, but blue tooth that is powering those high priced ear buds you have sitting on your desk.  Not straying too far from there, the GPS function of your phone wouldn’t be possible today if some engineer hadn’t tossed pi into an equation or three. And just that you can talk to your phone or home assistant is possible because voice recognition schemes all use pi to calculate and translate vocal waveforms into computerese. But, you ask, what can you do with it?

If you so wanted to, you could use pi to calculate how much water it takes to fill the kid’s backyard swimming pool, how much stain you need to cover the floor of the gazebo, or how much frosting to make to adequately decorate the surprise party birthday cake. Even more practical is determining what size electrical conduit to buy for that remodel you’re DIY-ing, or how much pie filling you need for the deep dish apple pie the kids are expecting after dinner. Yes, I know, there are charts and recipes for all these things. But now you know you could calculate the answer if all the computers in the world suddenly stopped working or worse, decided to take over and not talk to us anymore. Not too far-fetched you know. Didn’t you ever see “Colossus: The Forbin Project?” (Or one not so evil, like EMARAC from “Desk Set.” If the computers are going to take over, that’s the one I want, as long as Ms. Warriner comes with it.)

So now, go off and eat your pie today, today being Pi Day, or Pie Day if you must. And remember, ask not what pi can do for you, ask if you get whipped cream with it!

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The pursuit of clean, filtered air

Michael 2 Comments

I saw an interesting Tweet yesterday. “Going to the US in just a couple days. Planning to wear a mask whenever I’m in public. Looking for fun and creative (preferably not too political) reasons to give in case anyone asks why I’m wearing one.“

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The Tweeter(?) obviouslly lives outside the United States and wants to protect herself against a virus that is still raging, even though less actively than a few weeks ago, while visiting a country with a COVID death rate twice the rest of the world’s – and 82 times higher than her country! (WorldOMeter, “COVID Live – Coronavirus Statistics,” March 9, 2022)  According to a New York Times analysis of mortality, since the first Omicron case was reported in the United States in December 2021, Americans have been killed by the coronavirus at a rate at least 63 percent higher than other large, wealthy nations and was averaging about 2,500 deaths per day. (New York Times, “U.S. Has Far Higher Covid Death Rate Than Other Wealthy Countries.” Feb 1, 2022) The report went on to state that the only European countries with higher death rates are Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Greece, and the Czech Republic.

Oddly enough, even though the CDC changed their masking recommendations this month, the federal vaccine mandate was never enforced and now seems to be headed for reversal by the courts, and most limitations on businesses have been removed, people still want to protest them.  Brian Brase, the organizer of the so-called People’s Convoy that just burned countless gallons of gasoline and diesel circling Washington, DC, has called mandates an “infringement on their freedoms” as recently as this week. (Washington Post, “‘People’s Convoy’ organizers meet with GOP lawmakers amid pandemic-related demonstrations,” Mar 8, 2022).

You know that I recently was hospitalized with COVID pneumonia in spite of vaccines and mitigation (TRYing to stay 6 feet away from unmasked miscreants sneezing their offensive germs into public spaces like grocery stores and churches). I empathize with our aforementioned Tweeter because I will be going out in public still masked and standing a safe distance from those who aren’t. What should I say to them? Clearly somebody with more pickup truck parts than brains will come up to me and say, quite politely I’m sure, “What’s the f**k wrong with you, you retard? Act like an American and take that f**king mask off, a$$ho*e!” How do I know? Because it’s already happened, and it happened before the CDC issued new guidance. Months before the recent new guidance was released (which really requires people to have an understanding of the surge of cases in their particularly are and the relative burden placed on the local health care systems (read, too difficult for your average simian to even say, yet understand so let’s just concentrate on the no masks part)), the CDC guidelines recommended that those who were fully vaccinated, may attend small indoor gatherings with other fully vaccinated individuals without masking. This was interpreted as “you don’t need to wear no more masks any more yippee yahoo but let’s keep protesting masks anyway” by the under 65 (as in IQ score) crowd. And yes, I had been approached by inquiring sorts of that ilk, while in public with my mouth and nose stylishly clad in the latest surgical garb as to why I was wearing a mask. “Don’t you believe in science?”

Considering how adamant so many non-maskers were in demanding understanding on their positions and their rights to their freedom to breath the air as it was intended, I hope they will also understand why those of us who are medically challenged, immunocompromised, or just plain leery that a long term accord has been reached between the United States of America and SARS-COV-2, elect to exercise our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of breathing clean, filtered air.

And while we at it, it seems to me that those still calling masks, vaccines, and other life-saving measures “infringements on their freedoms,” need to spend some time in the Ukraine right now.

Things I was thinking about when I was thinking about the things I think, I think

Michael Leave a comment

It’s that time again when I have to get some things off my mind or I’ll go out of my mind, and that’s the first one. Going out of one’s mind (which admittedly falls trippingly off the tongue) is taken to mean losing it, going nuts, flipping your lip, and a half-bazillion other ways to say gone bonkers. “Don’t pay attention to him, he’s out of his mind.” “I need a day off or I’m going to go out of my mind.” But it’s actually possible to just go half out of one’s mind, “I was half out of my mind with worry” which usually conveys just a temporary inability to deal with a specific occurrence. That’s not to be confused with “having half a mind” which no less an authority than Merriam-Webster defines as “the feeling especially when angry and annoyed that one would like to do something while at the same time not really planning to do it.” It’s just all much too mindless for me.

This one gets a little politically incorrect (and if you ask me, all of politics is a little incorrect lately). Recently, I had the opportunity to read a magazine article that addressed a dispute between a person who wished to be addressed by the pronoun “they” and another person who was addressed as “she.” The columnist, clearly being a woke (and presumably politically correct) person that he/she/it is, honored the request. It was by far the most difficult piece of reporting I have ever read and I used to read military efficiency reports. I could never tell if the author was talking about one or both of the individuals at any given time. In one sentence the word “they” referred to both the individual and both individuals. Please can we stop with using “they” as a singular pronoun. As noted last week, the English language has over 600,000 words. If you don’t like the one people have been using, at least pick one of the more obscure ones. Or make up a new one. Clearly with over 600,000 words, English language users are not shy about doing that!

I don’t know if this is universal among anti-virus programs so maybe you can clear things up for me if you know. I run Norton-360 antivirus program and I swear, sometimes I wish I’d have opted for the virus. I can’t turn on any of my computers without having it pop up and remind me of some extra cost option I haven’t purchased, or pop up usually while I’m in the middle of entering a nice long string of something (data, words, pictures) to let me know it recently did its thing, all is well, and do I know there are extra cost options I haven’t purchased, or pop up while downloading a file, program, video, whatever and assure me that suchandsuch.somethingorother is safe and by the way, do I know there are still some extra cost options I haven’t yet purchased. If one of those options was a pop-up free version I’d write out the check today!

Another thing I don’t know if it is universal is that since I’ve had COVID, I cannot get warm. I can have the furnace on 68, 72, or 76 and I still want a hoodie (or two) on over my sweatshirt (or two). Oddly, or oddlier, it’s only my upper body. Throw an extra blanket on the bed and my legs get hot. I have got to get this in check before next winter because I refuse to be one of those over-testosteroned Neanderthals that walk around in blizzards with their flannel shirts, camo hats, Carhart jackets, and shorts! And I don’t even want a pick-up truck.

I seldom go on Facebook anymore and maybe this is why. On a recent rare excursion to the Land of Odds (odd balls!) I found a post that had great intentions, but, well, really now. You likely saw it or one of its cousins if you still visit there. It was titled(?) “Why Ukraine matters” and then went on for 1,000 words or so listing all of Ukraine’s attributes. How about. “Ukraine matters because Ukrainians live there. Ukrainians matter because they are people.”

Thank you for sticking around to the end. I know it’s a messy process when things just fall out of my head. I should be good for another couple months now.

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