Coronavirus SARS-Cov2 COVID-19

covid-19

OK, I have been really lax with this blog and not written anything for a long, long time, but this is an important message for all and any readers.

This will not be the usual post, but I just wanted to get this out to people, especially following the President’s speech last night which was lackluster at best, and unforgivably misleading, at worst.

COVID-19 is here in the US. It has been spreading within the community for 15 days already, according to CDC.

Unchecked, the infection rate will be exponential, doubling every day or so.

It is more infectious and more fatal than the ‘flu, although it does affect older people much worse than younger people.

Younger people can spread it to older people, and we do not know the extent of the spread in the US yet since the CDC and FDA were woefully slow in closing to use their own test and releasing it too late.

Likely there are tens of thousands of people infected and spreading it already, possibly more.

It is important that people understand the seriousness of this situation.

The following article is a superb analysis of the pandemic:

Please Read This Analysis of the Coronavirus Impact

Please, please read it if you can. It not, or TLDR, then skip to Chart 23 at the and also read the text beneath.

Please take care, practice “social distancing” and #NowWashYourHands

~Richard

March 12, 2020 0

Flourishing Fungi

We have had a lot of rain over the last few weeks, which is not unusual for our part of Eastern Pennsylvania, where summer downpours and storms and the normal climate. As we live in a wooded area we have a lot of leaf litter and decaying branches and twigs on the ground which, coupled with the high humidity, makes an excellent environment for fungi to flourish.

One thing about these mycological wonders though is that you have to be quick to catch them as some species seem to pop up, mature and die down again in a day or two! I went out to mow the lawn in the morning and noticed a few different types and then went out in the early evening (almost too late as the light was failing) but I did manage to get quite a few serviceable shots of the variety that inhabit our property with my trusty Panasonic GX8. needless to say, a lot of these have gone already, a mere 24 hours later!

As I mentioned on my previous post, if anyone can help me to identify any of these I would be most grateful!

180729_Fungi1 180729_Fungi2 180729_Fungi3 180729_Fungi4 180729_Fungi5 180729_Fungi6 180729_Fungi7 180729_Fungi8

~Richard

July 29, 2018 0

Haiku ~ Web working

I was inspired to write this haiku after a mammoth software training session that was of limited success and significant frustration for those of us who were unfortunate enough to be attending “remotely” using a web share application…

Staccato mumbling

With frozen, jerky screen shares

Ah, online meeting!

My choice of image – the valves seated inside a dusty old radio – seems strangely appropriate…

~Richard

June 6, 2018 0

Haiku ~ The Wedding

Today another Royal couple were created for the House of Windsor (or rather, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, until the political change) and also for the paparazzi. After months of build up we will see further weeks of pictures of the wedding followed by the usual “is she pregnant yet?” speculation for months on end up until the point at least two royal sproglets are dutifully produced to (Royal) Order.

Unsurprisingly, I didn’t watch the wedding, but instead decided to use the opportunity to celebrate the day by restarting my blog (yet again – I’ve been very busy) with the following haiku.

Enjoy, or not, the choice is yours!):

Worldwide coverage.

Amid pomp and vanity,

Privileged couple wed

Having said all this, I obviously wish them all the best for a long and happy future together.

~Richard

May 19, 2018 3

Haiku ~ Bitcoin

It’s funny how things pan out. I was searching Amazon for a new powered USB hub as my last one seems to work no longer, and I am shown USB devices to mine bitcoins. Further reading and I stumble upon this alarming article from The Guardian explaining the effects on this activity as “…a competition to waste the most electricity possible by doing pointless arithmetic quintillions of times a second.”

Has the world gone (even more) stark, raving mad?

Heating our planet

To feed insatiable greed:

Cryptocurrency

~Richard

March 26, 2018 3

Haiku ~ St. Valentine’s Day

The last week or more has been hard on the psyche for many of us. As a parent with children at college and high school the murderous acts on February 14th hit hard. To some extent we had become numb to the almost daily news stories concerning gun killings in the country where we chose to live. In a sad way I guess that was the final part of our becoming citizens. This event though was different for some reason and I feel that a sense of despair has finally soaked into my bones.

I thought long and hard about this subject over the last few days as I have been traveling and had more time to ponder than usual, and I have summed up my thoughts in the most succinct way I know how, with reference to that other infamous massacre on the same day…

89 years on
St Valentine’s Day again
When will Love prevail?

~ Richard

February 23, 2018 0

Haiku ~ connections

I decided to write this haiku as I sat in the departure area of San Diego Airport following an unexpected flight delay, presumably due to the bad weather in the mid-west. My flight was initially delayed for 2 hours, then 3, making my connection at Phoenix impossible, so I tried to reschedule the flight.

Like many airports San Diego offers “free WiFi” but, again like many airports, it very rarely works, based on my experience on a half dozen trips over the last 3 months. I fail to understand why, but it seems a common problem, as Phoenix also has a signal that routinely drops. Perhaps they are in cahoots with the phone service providers so we have to use our data plans when stuck in a place we just want to get through.

Anyhow, I used my waiting time to write this as homage to the poor service…

Broken connections,

Communication delays.

“Free” Airport WiFi…

180211_AirportWifi — Note: I don’t take photos in airports these days, due to security concerns, but as they are much the same all over the US I include one I took a few years back at Philadelphia Airport while waiting for another flight…

~Richard

February 11, 2018 1

Haiku ~ Groundhog Day

It is that time of the year again. A little bit of fun in Punxatawney that yields a surprisingly inaccurate result…

Phil sees his shadow

Predicting Accuracy

39%

By Cephas (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

~Richard

February 2, 2018 2

Haiku ~ January 31st

A frozen morning

Birds call for the struggling sun

One twelfth completed

~Richard

January 31, 2018 2

Haiku ~ Bootstrapping

Haiku: Bootstrapping

The concept of bootstrapping, or “pulling oneself up by the bootstraps,” means to get yourself out of a situation by using the resources you have at hand. In computer parlance this has been shortened to “booting” and is the term used to describe when a system is initially activated and then starts up using existing hardware and firmware prior to loading the operating system.

Anyhow, I thought I’d extend this concept a little today using my iPhone’s predictive texting to generate a Haiku.

Staring with the word haiku, I selected one of the 3 suggested words that followed and repeated this until my bootstrapped haiku was created:

Haiku is the art

And the sunset in my house

Is so much better

And here’s the screenshot to prove it…

180119_Haiku_Autotext

~Richard

January 19, 2018 2

searching4theshot

Coronavirus SARS-Cov2 COVID-19

Flourishing Fungi

Haiku ~ Web working

Haiku ~ The Wedding

Haiku ~ Bitcoin