Posts from — April 2020

The only problem with this sign for social distancing is that this is prom time for gators and the bull gators should be kept a good further away than 6 feet, but a nice try on behalf of Leon County.

Republicans wonder why they are losing the senior vote:

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) referred to his state as a “waiting room” for seniors who will soon die.

The Florida governor made the remarks at a coronavirus briefing on Sunday after noting that some nursing home patients had been infected by asymptomatic COVID-19 carriers.

“Florida is ground zero for the nursing home, we’re God’s waiting room,” he explained. “We have a huge number of facilities, a huge number of residents.”

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis discussed reopening Florida with Trump because he didn’t want to be thrown under the same bus as Brian Kemp of Georgia for reopening without getting the permission of Don Donald.

DeSantis has started to make moves but he isn’t including South Florida in those changes as that’s where the majority of cases are found.

The Florida Department of Health doesn’t count non-residents in its reporting. This means it is undercounting the cases in Florida health facilities and the number of deaths that occur in the state.

It’s Hexennacht, but there is no Blocksberg available for dancing down here and it is so soggy that bonfires are out of the question.

Of course the Church grabbed this holiday too and called it Walpurgisnacht in honor of one of their Anglo-Saxon saints, rather than good German witches [Hexen]. The Celts celebrate Beltaine at this time of the year. It is considered the beginning of summer in much of Europe.

Archæoastronomy

It took four different Presidents a couple of decades to get 58,318 Americans killed in the Vietnam War.

Under the Trump administration in just less than four months this year the COVID-19 virus has managed to cause: 1,011,877 Cases and 58,351 Deaths.
Last updated: April 28, 2020 at 7:45 p.m. ET
Source: Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering.

To date not a single state has seen 14 days of a decreasing number of new cases, but several have decided to reopen in some degree.

At this point it is reasonable to assume we are going to see over 100,000 deaths and that we are going to have to shut down again in the fall as the second wave hits. If your state permits it, apply for a mail-in ballot now. My local supervisor of elections has sent out cards to get people to use mail-in ballots.

Today is World Penguin Day. Krill is the appropriate gift – well for a penguin…

It is ANZAC Day in Australia and New Zealand, which is similar to the American Veterans Day, in that it began as a remembrance of World War I, and has become more generalized over the years.

“Anzac Day commemorates the involvement of Australian and New Zealand troops in a World War I campaign on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey.”

The Gallipoli Campaign began as a Winston Churchill [then First Lord of the Admiralty] plan that spun out of control and got a lot of people killed on both sides with nothing much changing, but then, that was quite common in World War I.

Peter Weir made a movie, Gallipoli, which, if nothing else, proves that Sergeant Alvin York, and T.E. Lawrence weren’t the only people who fought in World War I.

[Note: The date is April 25 which April 24 in the US because of the time difference.]

Saint George is the patron saint of England, Georgia [the country], Bulgaria, Portugal, Catalonia, and the city of Moscow. Orthodox countries tend to celebrate George on November 23^rd.

PETA condemns George for his senseless slaughter of dragons. The YWCA condemns the condemnation and wants to know when PETA is going to volunteer to be DragonChow™

“The date as decided by UNESCO as it was also the death and birth anniversary of William Shakespeare, a world famous author. The date also coincided with the death anniversary of Miguel de Cervantes, who was a noted Spanish author. Some other well known authors whose birth or death anniversary falls on this day are Maurice Druon, Josep Pla and Halldor Laxness.”

A known symptom of the COVID-19 virus is the lack of taste…

[What’s with the baboon-faced lion?]

She’s the only planet we have, if we blow it, we can’t pack up and move.

There’s no Plan[et] B.

Wikipedia has an Earth Day entry, with links to other sites.

Lieutenant HRH Princess Elizabeth

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer was right when she identified the protests that blocked traffic in her capital as political. Actually I thought the existence of all the Trump flags was a big tell. Idaho state Rep. Heather Scott is sharing her view of the “stay-at-home” orders:

A Republican state lawmaker compared Idaho Gov. Brad Little (R) to Adolf Hitler because she said that stay-at-home orders during the coronavirus pandemic are akin to Nazi extermination camps.

During an interview with a Texas podcaster last week, Idaho state Rep. Heather Scott called the economic shutdown “no different than Nazi Germany.”

“And when you have government telling you that your business is essential or non-essential, yours is non-essential and someone else’s is essential, we have a problem there,” Scott explained. “I mean, that’s no different than Nazi Germany where you had government telling people either you were an essential worker or a non-essential worker, and non-essential workers got put on a train.”

Heather, I hate to introduce logic here, but try this test: Go into the bathroom and turn on the shower. If hydrogen cyanide gas comes out you are in a Nazi extermination camp. If water comes out, take a long shower and a nap – it might help you.

At one of these Trump rallies/protests there were signs about haircuts. WTF, people are in the street risking infection because they want a haircut‽ I thought this sort of thinking went out with Disco. In addition to COVID-19 testing, IQ testing wouldn’t be out of line.

Property and Excise are 13 today.

Tax Day has been moved to July 15^th but here’s the theme music for the day on YouTube.

As if the CNN article, Florida’s governor keeps hitting new lows in the battle against coronavirus, wasn’t bad enough, Ron DeSantis has shown up on the BBC: World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) has resumed airing live matches after being deemed an “essential service” in Florida.

Ron DeSantis assumes he is Florida’s governor because Trump endorsed him after DeSantis sucked up to an extent that caused extreme gastrointestinal distress. The ad DeSantis ran with his young children should have caused a visit from the Families & Children abuse investigators. The other relevant information that you need to understand this mess is that the McMahon family, who own the WWE, are friends with Trump. Trump chose Linda McMahon to head the Small Business Administration. DeSantis did it because he believes (or knows) that Trump likes the idea.

This is what happens when you have small children – you dye your kitchen.

Yes, the festival of Easter, goddess of the Spring, is celebrated this time of year with the traditional symbols of fertility, the egg and the rabbit, by the people who settled around the Baltic Sea – the Teutons, Slavs, Finns, Prussians, Letts, et al. It is a festival of plenty after the hardships of winter, with the promise of new growth.

Of course, later groups took the celebration and turned it to other purposes, but I doubt Easter minds.

[An oldie from Easters past]