Warmer, and possibly a bit drier.
Yesterday got HOT in the sun. My weather station said 99F. It’s in a heat island, but will accurately reflect the temps in the driveway. So I avoided the driveway.
Moved stuff, gathered in some more stuff, and cleaned up pollen stuff from the trees. Between the tree pollen and the leaf mold, I’m not feeling great. And that is problematic because I’m monitoring for signs of sickness. Daughter 2 is suffering from a runny nose and sore throat too. No fevers for anyone in the house.
It’s been beautiful weather, and eerily quiet outside. The highway noise is significantly reduced and the lack of airplanes is noticeable. Feels like there should be chainsaws and generators running… but it’s not that sort of disaster.
It’s a disaster for sure. One unfolding in slow motion for the nation, and in super quick time for New Orleans and NYFC. From ‘nothing to see, go on about your business’ – to stacking bodies in freezer trailers in 3 weeks… that’s pretty quick.
It also points out the absurdity of the numbers from China.
That’s absurdity that will end up costing lives in the rest of the world, and appears to have probably cost a whole lot of Chinese lives too. Round two is getting underway and it will be interesting to see what their curve looks like this time around.
Interesting but not really helpful. Which is my feeling about a whole lot of reporting on speculation and models and expert opinion, especially expert opinion AFTER the fact. We’re at the point now where there is no way through but forward. And still the best advice I’ve seen is “try damn hard NOT to get this.”
Stay in, stay safe.
nick
UK Prime Minister has Covid-19. Currently mild symptoms.
Still no confirmed cases in our county but we got 10k test kits delivered yesterday so I don’t expect it to last.
Dropped by Aldi’s yesterday to pick up supplies for MIL. I was surprised to find the store fully stocked including paper products. Only thing missing was diced tomatoes, one of the items on my list. Wore my PPE as did the checkers.
Saw unleaded at $1.07, the lowest to date. Local news says it’s under a dollar in the city but you couldn’t pay me to go there now.
Yesterday my handyman did the yard and sprayed for weeds. He’s picking up the wife’s car this afternoon to take it to the custom body shop. They will fix some rust and make it show quality. I promised her this for Christmas. At least it keeps the auto guys employed.
Headed now for the range this morning while wife is doing dialysis. Cool morning but getting warm in the afternoon. No rain expected.
It’s easy to fall into a sense of complacency now. The wife wanted to go to the store a couple days ago to get milk and one other item. I finally convinced her that minimizing exposure is the point of this exercise. We have enough every day food for a month. I finally got her to agree that she would not go. I will have to go next week to refill a prescription – told her I would pick up items then and do our request shopping since I would be there anyways.
After thinking about it, her real issue isn’t the milk. It’s the shopping addiction. She always denies it, but she will stop at a store after work most days and at least once a weekend to pick up something. Habits are hard to break…
My son is handling it better. He does want to go back to school. He is a great student and enjoys school. It does help that his core group of friends are all gamers, so they are on discord calls for a lot of the day.
Plans never meet reality.
My food storage planning was based on our usage over the past few years. But the wife has been binge watching cooking shows for the past month and her cooking has changed. Previously, we might use a pound of Crisco shortening per month, now it’s 4 pound per week. Same with cooking oil usage and she’s now breading everything so our flour usage has tripled. I am seeing a huge drawdown in some items and not much in caned goods. I love her new cooking but it’s really messed with my storage plans.
I’ll add that the only venturing for the house we’ve done (except going to work) is keeping up my sons driving practice. I took him to the local elementary schools last weekend for more stick shift practice. Instead of the ATS, I had him try the 71 corvette. He kept saying that he wasn’t ready and he was obviously nervous. I finally convinced him that 1) he will do fine and 2) he won’t be going fast – he won’t even leave the parking lot. Overall, he did much better in the vette. The clutch has no power assist like a modern car, so you can really tell when it engages the flywheel. I think for the next lesson he will be able to drive us home.
Excellent! This is a dying skill that will come in handy in life. When we moved to the UK in the 90s we were surprised to find that the vast majority of autos there are manual. My first few cars were stick (IH scout and Nissan wagon) so I had experience but with the driver on the right you shift with the left hand. That took some getting used to.
I don’t venture out much. A couple of trips to Home Depot for supplies and such as we are in the middle of a project in the house. Once a week to the grocery store which is within an easy walk. I hae to go to the church twice a week for the broadcast and stream. In addition to the Sunday morning broadcast the church leaders have decided they want a Wednesday stream event. Something that only 12 people watched last time.
The last time we recorded the pastor was adamant he wanted a large TV next to him so he could things on Powerpoint. I told him that it would look terrible and he would not be in sync unless he had experience with doing so. He said he had done this in a classroom and it worked great. I reminded him this was not a classroom. He was not talking to anyone.
Well the results sucked. He did not keep up with advancing the PP slides. The entire screen was a bright white which affected the cameras adversely. The screen was either too bright and unreadable or it he was too dark if the screen was readable. There is also a large difference in white balance, he was either too orange or the screen was too blue.
He also made the mistake of putting too much on the screen, in letters that are too small. Serifed font, no drop shadow. Barely readable on the screen in HD. The broadcast is SD so the text will just be a smudge on the screen.
I am far from an expert on this crap. But I have learned a few things over the 11 years I have been doing this. I have also learned from many years past what works in PP and what doesn’t work. He did all the things that don’t work. Since they don’t listen to me I just let them fail and come back later and say they should have listened to me. Unfortunately that doubles up my work in the process.
Are you ready for Ration Cards/Stamps?
Our local paper, the Tri-City Herald (a McClatchy paper), is strongly hinting that delivery of the physical paper may stop soon. Their online version (eHerald) is a PITA to read and navigate. And what are we going to use to line our pet cages and use as a replacement for toilet paper?
So goobernor Jay has gone ahead and forbidden single-use grocery bags (plastic and paper). It’s unclear, but this may also include all non-reusable bags like for takeout/carryout. Just what we need to help prevent the spread of Covid-19. Thanks goobernor clueless.
I haven’t been out (except to cut the grass) in five days. I miss the movie theater. It’s one of the places I go on a regular basis. Luckily, I brought my 70″ TV to SA, the innertubes are working, and my Mac Mini is full of movies and shows if the ‘tubes go out.
MrsAtoz did her first podcast style rehearsal yesterday. We had lights and cameras from other projects, and she did it live to a select audience on Zoom. I hope we can sell school districts on it. We’ve done video assemblies/keynotes several times. Now, the districts need to figure out how to get it out to students and parents.
Watched ST:Picard finale last night. I guess they wanted an out if ratings tanked. I guess they didn’t. So long, Data. And Jeri Ryan is gorgeous! 52 is the new 32.
Seriously – I think she looks better now than she did back in her Voyager days. It might be partial hollywood makeup magic, but I don’t care.
Here comes the draconian ways:
LA Mayor To Businesses: Comply With Our Coronavirus Restrictions Or “Neighborhood Prosecutors” Will Cut Off Your Water And Power
Next up, police caning you for getting within 10′ of another person.
UK Health Secretary has Covid-19 (Senior Government Health Position). Currently minor symptoms.
The clutch has no power assist like a modern car, so you can really tell when it engages the flywheel.
Never even heard of power assist. What does it do? I can imagine, so what’s it like? I’m a stick shift guy 101%.
I finished up Picard yesterday and agree that Jeri Ryan seems more attractive than she did back in the day. Troi hasn’t aged that well; is she channeling Angelica Huston? All-in-all I enjoyed the first season, but I have to admit I prefer monster of the week and morality plays over story arcs. The special effects were, bar none, the best I’ve seen on either big or little screen.
Just one small complaint: Ditch the wigs! Troy looked like she had a mop on her head, Raffi could have had a nest of condors in her hair and no one would have known, and Jeri Ryan looked like Baby Jane Hudson. As someone once put it after the release of one of the Star Trek movies, next time around they should “Go baldly where no one has gone before”.
Sorry, I misspoke – meant to say hydraulically assisted.
@Paulthemanc,
the odd thing about the disease (or just the reporting) is how it’s tearing thru the wealthy and upper crust, while not wiping out the ghettos, favelas, shanty towns, etc.
Initially that makes sense if spread by air travel, and reporting fueled by envy and celebrity worship, but this should decimate (literally) the poor living in close conditions…. I guess we’ll see it as it moves thru India and south and central america.
n
Nick, the oddity can be explained by covid-19 being much more widespread than is generally thought. The poor have it, too, with generally mild symptoms but even when they’re sick it’s not diagnosed and is commingled with other flus, local pollution, and what-not, and the poor get on with their lives or just die of “whatever”. The rich and elite, by contrast, have preferential access to the test kits and so they are diagnosed with covid-19 at a much higher rate. Remember, the reports of morbidity and mortality are counts of tests performed, not of actual prevalence.
Social Distancing Pickup Lines:
If COVID-19 doesn’t take you out… Can I?
Is that hand sanitizer in your pocket or are you just happy to be within 6ft of me?
Since all the public libraries are closed, I’m checking you out instead.
Yo u can’t spell virus without U and I.
Baby, do you need toilet paper? Because I can be your Prince Charmin.
I saw you from across the bar. Stay there.
Without you my life is as empty as the supermarket shelf.
Hey Babe! Can I ship you a drink?
Yo u can’t spell quarantine without “U R A Q T”.
I really can’t stay.
Baby it’s COVID-19 outside
On average, 400 or so people die in NYC every day before COVID-19. So, an additional 100 shouldn’t have them stacking bodies in alternate locations. Now, the inability to have funerals and services might account for bodies stacking up, but I think that would be at the mortuary level not the morgue.
So goobernor Jay has gone ahead and forbidden single-use grocery bags (plastic and paper). It’s unclear, but this may also include all non-reusable bags like for takeout/carryout. Just what we need to help prevent the spread of Covid-19. Thanks goobernor clueless.
Costco doesn’t offer bags. Inslee is Costco’s chore boy.
He doesn’t know how to do anything else as Governor. In 2012, Perkins Coie couldn’t work their usual “ballots in a car trunk” magic like they did for Christine Gregoire because Rob McKenna, while a RINO, was a concern as a retired Perkins Coie partner; the Dems needed big money to run a real campaign. The rest, as they say, is history.
So many people are using Zoom/WebEx/GTM that Zoom’s conference number gets “All circuits are busy. Please try your call later.”
I don’t remember last time I heard that!
I also used the phrase “slow motion disaster” the other day. Storms and terrorist attacks happen like a giant wave hitting the shore. This pandemic is like watching the tide come in, each time you glance at the water it is a little higher up the beach. Closer and closer to where you placed your blanket and umbrella.
I hear about the infected, but I don’t know anyone (yet). Probably just a matter of time. I’m still going in to work (I’m considered essential) but about 2/3 of the company seem to be working from home any given day. I don’t interact with too many other humans. Tomorrow my whole family is planning to get “together” for coffee using an app called Zoom. Should be fun.
I have been dipping into some long term food storage since I haven’t been going to the store as much. Beans and toast two nights ago. The toast was from homemade bread (just flour, water, yeast, salt) and the B&M baked beans had a “best by” date of May 2016. All good.
A lot of the numbers we’re hearing don’t make sense, or conclusions based on them don’t make sense, or different numbers don’t make sense when examined together. I’m almost certain we’re being lied to, for any number of reasons. Some of the “oddities” might be misreporting and other unintentional glitches.
My ham radio lunch meeting happened over the air instead of in person…
n
Doubling every 3 days. That’s the critical idea.
Just barely making it today, means being overwhelmed in 2-3 days, and wiped out 3 days later.
Our fire/ems has been running the ambulance out of the station down the street from my house almost constantly these last couple of days. WAY more activity than I’m used to seeing. Lights, no sirens. In fact I’m not hearing anywhere near the normal level of sirens.
n
“…her real issue isn’t the milk. It’s the shopping addiction…”
This. Habits are hard to change. My wife likes to plan meals just a day or two in advance. It’s difficult to change to planning much farther in advance. Just a matter of what you’re used to.
In other news, the great TP shortage seems to be over here: the stuff is back in stock at the grocery stores.
Picard: I’ve downloaded all the episodes except for the finale, and I’m up to episode 4. I haven’t kept up with the Star Trek universe since TNG, so I’m sure I am missing some references, but it is pretty good. That said, I find the TV series format annoying: chop a story artificially into 30 minute chunks. Each chunk is framed by 5 minutes of “what happened” at the start and a contrived cliff-hanger at the end. The whole story could have been told in a single 3 hour movie. Ah, well, I’m just a grumpy geezer, so there…
@Ray: I feel for you. People who aren’t used to their tools shouldn’t insist on real-time experiments. I’ve been learning fast, since I have to do video lectures, and there’s still a lot of stuff I just can’t do. One of those things is to balance anything in the picture with my face. So I tend to do a quick intro where I am visible, and then switch to screen capture, with no pic of me. Also, if you’re busy using tools, it’s difficult to look at the camera.
Keep in mind there is very little excess capacity during normal times.
One of the things that shelter in place does is reduce the number of traffic accidents, workplace injuries, and just plain idiocy. That frees up resources for other uses. Cancelling all non-urgent medical procedures helps too and I’m sure a lot of people who would normally clog up ERs are staying away out of fear of CV (red hot cheetoes OD kids, I’m looking at you).
The steps taken ARE having an impact, it’s just unlikely to be enough. Hospitals aren’t begging people to make masks at home because the situation is normal, we’re just not seeing the whole picture so the elephant looks like a snake, or a tree…
n
I have done thousands of hours of presenter support, overseeing ppt, teleprompter, doing voice overs and announces, running video, video direction (so very little, ie. ‘calling cameras’), I’ve even run a camera with studio handles way back in the day….
Presenter support is HARD. Running the ppt while the president of honda north america is on stage takes full concentration. Running it while Joe the training monkey presents takes full concentration. Our ppt support guy made thousands of dollars a day and he was worth every penny. I never begrudged him a dime because I’d done his job and it sucks.
That’s why I recommend a couple of youtube creators for any beginning content creator. Louis Rossmann does apple board level repair and has been doing it for years on youtube. He’s refined his technique and presentation to be very good and very fast, while demonstrating exactly what he’s doing. Mustie1 does a lot of small engine repair and is the opposite of Louis. He puts a camera on a stick and just talks. One camera, one guy, and yet he is also VERY good at showing what needs to be shown and explaining what and why. He’s also refined his technique over thousands of videos. Neither guy does much “video” editing or graphic support. They both just take you along while they are doing what they do. I think that that is a very good approach and is conservative of their time and energy. Ask yourself, are you in the business of producing videos? or are you in the business of conveying the information and doing the work? That should guide how much effort you put into “production” vs. “screen time”.
nick
I think a lot has to do with the local media not wanting to be left. They find any connection, no matter how trivial, or distant, and try to make a story. All the local reporters are gunning for their jobs with visions of getting their spot on the major networks. Tabloid reporting with little accuracy or fact checking.
I have to do that in the process of broadcasting the church services. We use lower third graphics for identification purposes. Either identifying the individual or the name of the church. When the pastor is preaching we place scripture text in a picture-in-picture box in the lower part of the frame. Annoying trying to follow them sometimes when they just start reading. Or when they have given us the wrong verse. Or when they simply ad-lib and read something we were not informed.
We, as in the studio people, look like idiots as we got it wrong. Annoying to have people come up and ask us why we did not display verse so-and-so. I show them my list that was used to program the system and ask them to find that verse on the list.
I also tell the preacher that we have to cut him off at 11:58. No choice as we have a two minute playout and lose the broadcast line at 12:00. They will sometimes run over, I cut them off, and people will call the church and complain. Tell the church our broadcast people are stupid and don’t know what we are doing.
I have found that really does not work on a TV broadcast. May work for a stream, but not on TV in my opinion. I like to have a face visible at all times and will overlay information in the lower part of the screen.
I also like this guy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JECLVAwGs3M
Por Old Chap and the linked video shows how to plant and grow potatoes without building a “potato tower”, but just using a plastic bag. Brilliant. I’m doing it.
n
Doubling every 3 days.
Just to play devil’s advocate, just exactly what is doubling every 3 days?
Reported cases? How are they determined?
Deaths? How are they classified? Does anyone over 70 who died of sepsis attributed to Chinese flu?
Infected cases? Are those presumed infected or verified by an antibody test? Which test? What is the test identifying?
I had to go into the office today to reboot my company laptop for various upgrades ordered by the IT department. The process usually doesn’t go well at home, and I didn’t want to take the chance of it going badly and having it down for a week.
Stopped at Sam’s on the way home to check the fresh meat situation. They had a fairly decent selection of chicken and beef, but forget about any pork products right now. I also grabbed a 12 pack of green beans which have been absent for a couple of weeks.
Canned chicken, a six pack of the small cans or one 50 oz can, was one to a membership.
People still bonkers about toilet paper.
Driving home, I heard Limbaugh, dialed into his show for 30 minutes from God knows where, talking about his bad reaction to experimental chemo which sidelined him last week. He said he was at home today, but the quality of the audio was really lousy.
Does it really matter to the states seeking a chunk of federal funds? One person dies in Kentucky, 90+ years old, underlying health issues, boom KungFlu related. Kentucky declares a state of emergency which now qualifies the state for federal funds. Even Knoxville is looking to get funds from the state. I really don’t know what the city is doing beyond normal. Actually probably less as a lot of people are staying. But the city has to chase that dollar.
Don’t you know, Ray? The person who does the last piece before the user sees it is responsible for all problems, down to and including the monitor’s power switch breaking.
I got fired one time because I was writing the user interface to a library being written by the guy who sat next to me. That guy kept changing the signature of the functions and the UI tool inflicted on me by management — VB3 — didn’t provide exception handling or a way to check the DLL for the signature of functions it was calling. The result was that the front end crashed several times when the boss wanted a progress demo and the end result was I got fired. The coworker was sitting right there and didn’t volunteer that he’d changed the DLL without telling me.
But that’s ok. The job sucked and I kept it only because I had a pregnant wife who couldn’t keep a job. And a couple years later Scott Shithead used me for a professional reference — apparently thinking that I hadn’t realized what he’d done or that I wouldn’t hold a grudge — and I gave him a very poor reference.
@~jim, yes. Any and all of those things.
n
Death rate in the US for COVID-19 is roughly 1.5% right now (1380 deaths divided by 92932 confirmed cases). Keep in mind, that’s calculated using CONFIRMED cases and, celebrities/politicians/pro athletes aside, the only cases they’ve been bothering to confirm are the symptomatic cases. Since they said 80% of cases are asymptomatic or very mildly symptomatic and likely are never tested and “confirmed” (plus the ones that are fully symptomatic but are self-quarantining and never reporting to a hospital for testing) then that 1.5% is probably closer to 0.3%. So, we effectively shut the country down for a virus that is turning out to be 0.3% lethal? That’s not going to land well when the dust from all of this settles.
Watched ST:Picard finale last night. I guess they wanted an out if ratings tanked. I guess they didn’t. So long, Data. And Jeri Ryan is gorgeous! 52 is the new 32.
After “Star Wars” tanked and “Doctor Who” blew up 57 years of back story, I believe “Picard” was tweaked to avoid p*ssing off the fans, but the bulk of the filming was complete a year ago, before “Discovery” got very lucky with Anson Mount establishing instant credibility as Captain Pike.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7d503vjuOZw
@chad, I can’t remember where the 80% value came from, can you?
I know that Cuomo and others were using it, but I can’t remember where they got it.
n
Eschenbach updated his Covid-19 plots again today – apparently Johns Hopkins changed the data format that he was scraping, which delayed him a day or so.
Essentially we are on track to get a years worth of deaths in one month, in about two weeks for the country as a whole, this coming week for NY and LA.
Graphs are semi-log, and have (1)totals, (2)deaths per 10M, (3)deaths as a % of population, (4)Normal Flu death range.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/daily-coronavirus-covid-19-data-graph-page/
Eschenbach himself thinks the shutdown is overkill, btw, personally I just don’t feel I know enough to second guess those that should (presidents, governors, etc).
The clutch has no power assist like a modern car, so you can really tell when it engages the flywheel.
Never even heard of power assist. What does it do? I can imagine, so what’s it like? I’m a stick shift guy 101%.
I had a hydraulic assist clutch in the 1987 VW Jetta GLI. I think our 2005 Honda Civic EX has one too. You have no idea where the clutch engagement is since it is so smooth. After a while you get it by the position of the clutch though.
ADD: BTW, when the hydraulic assist gets a leak, you cannot use the clutch to shift anymore. I know this for a fact on my son’s 2003 Ford F-150 with a V6 and 5 speed manual.
And now for a break from all that KungFlu stuff 🙂
Let’s set aside hydraulically actuated clutches for a bit…
Actually, there have been clutch assist springs for decades. My first encounter was with a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, but many high performance cars of the 1950s and later had them. I think they are still used today. The principle is simple: there is a spring in the linkage, arranged so it is under tension when the clutch pedal is released (clutch engaged.) As the pedal is pushed down, the over-center linkage design allows the spring to add to the force applied to the pedal. The maximum spring contribution occurs when the pedal is at the floor. The spring makes the action feel lighter. The Harley-Davidson design was adjustable, but the ones on cars are not. Many bikers mis-adjusted theirs, and the “mousetrap,” as it was called, got a bad reputation. Imagine operating a clutch with a release force of a thousand pounds with your hand! Later designs eliminated the need for the assist spring.
I might add that one effect is to make it easier to hold the clutch disengaged, but this isn’t the only effect. A well designed linkage makes the operation easier and smoother, with better “feel” of the engagement point. Historically, the mechanical linkage on car clutches was arranged to approach some over-center effect, and there was no need for an assist spring. How? Typically, the clutch pedal pivots, there is a link to another pivot shaft, and a link to the clutch release bearing. So, there were three bellcranks used. By arranging the angles, it was possible to get the force-travel relationship desired, even though the pressure plate was linear.
Also, there are commonly two types of clutches; those whose clamping force is supplied by coil springs, and those with diaphragm springs. Both are in common use. The ones with coil springs are reasonably linear: the force increases proportional to the travel. Diaphragm springs typically are nonlinear, and require less force as the pressure plate travels toward full release. One advantage of the diaphragm spring is that it produces increased clamp force as the clutch engages, and it can compensate for wear. As it turns out, both types have their advantages and disadvantages, but important here is their travel-force curve.
Enter hydraulic actuation. With no series of bellcranks, hydraulic release mechanisms are somewhat limited to nearly linear action. They do have the advantage of low friction, important with the typical one ton or more forces involved. I don’t know, but would bet most hydraulically actuated clutches are of the diaphragm design.
All clutch actuation mechanisms are compromises. One important characteristic is the “feel” I mentioned. Some cars have very good feel, and some do not. There are many factors that contribute.
Over The Hedge: Diaper Duck
https://www.gocomics.com/overthehedge/2020/03/27
Diaper Duck is not oppressed.
Hey, that’s what hams do best. Bravo!
Lunch meetings. Anyone here remember “Lunch with Soupy”?
The wife is going through baseball withdrawal so yesterday I turned on the TV (it has been off for about 2-weeks). Useless error message on the screen and the cable box alternates between “hunt” and the cable channel. I went through all of the Charter/Spectrum trouble-shooting.
So as the website tells me I unplug, wait, plug in, reset via their website, rinse and repeat and repeat and repeat as I wait in chat for over 3-hours (forget trying the phone it gets nowhere). Gave up.
So this morning I had a “face-palm” moment, I hadn’t tried the Google. Sure enough, the first Google search item has the fix, (face-palm again) tighten all the cable connections. Sure enough, one was loose and I have no idea how that connection could have come loose as I always use a wrench to tighten them, so a quarter of a turn and voila TV picture.
So the wife is happily watching a 1994 New York Mets at Chicago Cubs game on MLBHD as she sews and crochets facemasks for her nurse and doctor friends. There will be other old classic games for the rest of today and the foreseeable future.
All is well and happy.
BTW my son’s company IT in Sweden actually listened to my idea on how to speed things up; basically/simply, allow downloading all the files related to/required for a specific wheelchair to the engineers’ workstations instead of having their computers read and write every fricken thing up to the servers in Sweden and then wait for it to come back. They must have been desperate because they tried it yesterday and productivity went up 400%. I doubt I’ll get any Atta-Boys, but my son has a new respect for his old man.
The ashes for our cat, Sunny, are now back home and he has joined the urns of our other cats that have passed on. The house is whole again.
“Sling TV Will be Free For Two Weeks to Help You Stay Informed on Coronavirus”
https://www.pcmag.com/news/sling-tv-will-be-free-for-two-weeks-to-help-you-stay-informed-on-coronavirus
I sense a marketing ploy. I will investigate this.
@Nick
Any and all of those things.
Unless the premises are clearly and explicitly defined, any conclusions drawn from them might as well be pulled out of a hat. That’s the way science works.
@Chad
CONFIRMED cases
Same standards apply. How are you defining confirmed?
*****
Is a hydraulically assisted clutch the same as a regular hydraulic clutch? Except for my BMW 1800, I think most or all of my cars have had hydraulic clutches. The Hondas had a good feel, the Volvo less so, the Chevy (a brand new Monza with a baby’s arm holding an apple!) was shite.
Death rate in the US for COVID-19 is roughly 1.5% right now (1380 deaths divided by 92932 confirmed cases). Keep in mind, that’s calculated using CONFIRMED cases and, celebrities/politicians/pro athletes aside, the only cases they’ve been bothering to confirm are the symptomatic cases. Since they said 80% of cases are asymptomatic or very mildly symptomatic and likely are never tested and “confirmed” (plus the ones that are fully symptomatic but are self-quarantining and never reporting to a hospital for testing) then that 1.5% is probably closer to 0.3%. So, we effectively shut the country down for a virus that is turning out to be 0.3% lethal? That’s not going to land well when the dust from all of this settles.
Actually, they are shutting down the country since 14% of the confirmed cases will need a ventilator at some point for 2 to 3 weeks. There were / are not enough ventilators in the country to handle 80 million infected over a six month period. This has not peaked yet.
BTW, there will not be a vaccine. I finally figured out Wednesday night that COVID-19 is actually SARS 2. We do not have a vaccine for SARS 1 (there are some claims that Obama canceled the work). Somebody is claiming that they could have created a SARS 1 vaccine but there was no money. I wonder that since the test that we are using was developed for SARS 1, would a vaccine developed by SARS 1 work for SARS 2 ?
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-care/scientists-were-close-coronavirus-vaccine-years-ago-then-money-dried-n1150091
Whatever they’re reporting, it’s doubling every three days on average. There is enough variation in the numbers to have them look ‘real’, unlike the china numbers that were within a couple 10ths of percent of a math function…
When china changed their reporting criteria, there was a noticeable discontinuity in the graph.
Doesn’t seem to matter who is reporting or what local criteria they use, they’re all getting exponential rates (once it takes off).
n
Had to take wife into urgent care for a UTI (she gets them a lot). Got there (not busy) and parked in front of the door. Tech came out to the car with paperwork needed. Another CNA came out a few minutes later to take temp/oxy/heart rate readings.
She had done a self-test at home, and has had them before. CNA did a quick lung listen, then gave her prescription. All done in the parking lot. All staff had gloves, masks, face guards.
Took script to local WalMart. Person at the door providing wipes on carts. Social distancing marks on the floor at the walkup window at the pharmacy. Had to wait 20 minutes to get the drugs, so got my basket and wandered around the store.
Shelves well-stocked, maybe at 90% level. Only outages was rice/flour/noodles and paper goods. All other areas, which were at 10% levels, were well-stocked: meat, dairy, deli, produce, canned goods, cereal, etc. Much more normal looking.
Store was not crowded. A few older folks with masks/gloves. I did the self-checkout thing. Hand sanitizer before and after. Drive-through at Wendy’s. Cashier had gloves.
Other than the social distancing, and the empty shelves as noted, almost normal experience at my local WalMart. YMMV.
Shelves well-stocked, maybe at 90% level. Only outages was rice/flour/noodles and paper goods. All other areas, which were at 10% levels, were well-stocked: meat, dairy, deli, produce, canned goods, cereal, etc. Much more normal looking.
Rice is the other mystery hoarding item to me beyond toilet paper. We have a big bin we keep full at the house to feed the rice pot, but we’ve done that for 25+ years. We always seemed to be outliers on that one among our friends.
No paper products at the local HEB. Got some meats. They restocked my favorite snack: Corn Nuts. I’ll need paper towels in a month. Maybe hit Sam’s tomorrow.
For the third day in a row, trucks from a landscaping company are parked in front of my house, working on scraping all the plants out of one neighbor’s front yard and replacing them with brand new plants. Everything but the trees.
So much for the end of the world. If the apocalypse is nigh, at least it will have … a shrubbery!
I planned to get some groceries this weekend; nothing we really need but I figured to get some milk and produce and anything Grandma needed. Mentioned it to my wife to get the mother-in-law’s shopping list and to see if any of the other retirees were running low; as long as I was going out I was willing to get extra and drop it off for oldsters who can’t (or shouldn’t) drive.
Well. My wife started bitching at me, escalating to screaming when I didn’t concede that she was right. She and especially her mother are terrified that I’ll bring germs in and kill them both, and we have food to last a long while so we don’t need anything and there’s no need for me to go out and risk them. I mentioned that she bitched at me the last several times I went out to get groceries, for them, as they had no food, and that they didn’t seem to have any problem eating that food for the past couple weeks. That point was ignored.
My current plan is to stay home this weekend, as there’s nothing my daughter and I need. And they can get their own damned groceries when they realize they’ve run out. And, if I get screamed at again, I’ll move the hundred pounds of rice and the paper products and all the rest to someplace they can’t get to, as I got bitched at for buying those, too.
A week or two back I mentioned the importance of a supportive spouse when prepping. It’s even more important in times of trouble.
Greg, as a test, go up to your neighbors and say “it”.
I think you are talking about a mechanical clutch with a hydraulic operating mechanism. These started appearing about 1970.
To me, a “regular hydraulic clutch” is similar to a torque converter, but with only two elements. They were used just before the advent of automatic transmissions, in the late 1940s and very early 50s, and in a few early automatic transmissions before torque converters took over. Another name is a fluid coupling. I have read that they are coming back in modern automatic transmissions. Those apparently use the fluid coupling to get started, and then transition to mechanical connections. Fluid couplings are much cheaper than torque converters, but they don’t multiply torque.
Added: Fluid couplings are also used extensively in heavy equipment.
Hope this helps.
Greg, as a test, go up to your neighbors and say “it”.
They were the “Knights Who Say ‘Nik'”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYSMPjMVnAU
The neighbors aren’t around, and I don’t think the landscaping crew speaks English.
Mexico is about where Texas is last week in terms of cases, but I doubt their cities are shut down this weekend. The guys working across the street don’t seem concerned about social distancing.
“The guys working across the street don’t seem concerned about social distancing.”
–or germ theory, or the scientific method, or indoor plumbing for that matter…
n
OK, the learned scientists are all over the place on the number of dead from SARS 2, COVID-19, in the USA.
1. Three weeks ago, it was one million dead
2. Two weeks ago, it was ten million dead
3. Last week it was back to one million dead
4. Now it is predicted that 80,000 will die
https://gulfnews.com/world/americas/coronavirus-us-covid-19-deaths-may-top-80000-despite-confinement-study-1.1585242429831
5. I wonder what next weeks prediction will be ? 5,000 ?
The number of dead in the USA due to SARS 2 is now 1,559.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
I wonder what next weeks prediction will be ? 5,000 ?
My wife said H1N1 had 60 million infections, 300,000 serious cases, 16,000 dead.
If we’re doing a pool, I’ll take about the same number dead.
“A Win for Gun Rights in Texas”
https://gunownersofamerica.cmail20.com/t/ViewEmail/i/803FF775B76E80CD2540EF23F30FEDED/
“Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton just released his official opinion on the issue of cities and counties failing to exempt firearms stores from closure.”
“Paxton stated that municipal and county officials may not use their emergency powers under section 418.108 of the Government Code to regulate or restrict the sale of firearms.”
“Thank you, Attorney General Paxton, for upholding Texas law and ensuring that Texans have the continued ability to purchase guns and ammo.”
I wonder what next weeks prediction will be ? 5,000 ?
My wife said H1N1 had 60 million infections, 300,000 serious cases, 16,000 dead.
If we’re doing a pool, I’ll take about the same number dead.
I think that would be a little callous at this or any point.
My point is that we are destroying the economy of the USA, built on millions of small businesses, for a pandemic that is not a pandemic. I was just at my clothes cleaners, a husband and wife that I have known for 40 years. They cut back all their people to two days a week last week. Now they may lay off everyone next week. Just five people but multiply that five by millions of small businesses.
“POLL-Almost one in four Americans lost job or furloughed because of coronavirus -Reuters/Ipsos poll”
https://news.trust.org/item/20200327204817-8hr18
My current plan is to stay home this weekend, as there’s nothing my daughter and I need. And they can get their own damned groceries when they realize they’ve run out. And, if I get screamed at again, I’ll move the hundred pounds of rice and the paper products and all the rest to someplace they can’t get to, as I got bitched at for buying those, too.
Does the wife still work ? If not, then will your alimony be based on the amount of time you spent together ?
I think that would be a little callous at this or any point.
I was kidding about the pool. And 16,000 is probably high.
No one talks about H1N1 because that was Doh-bama’s first Spring in office, and he was going to fix healthcare. The President was finally cool … like Fonzie cool — just snap his fingers.
My point is that we are destroying the economy of the USA, built on millions of small businesses, for a pandemic that is not a pandemic. I was just at my clothes cleaners, a husband and wife that I have know for 40 years. They cut back all their people to two days a week last week. Now they may lay off everyone next week. Just five people but multiply that five by millions of small businesses.
The I35 corridor and Houston are locked down but a lot of Texas isn’t.
Abbott is under huge pressure for a state-wide lockdown, but he knows what will happen in two years when the Dems use it against him. It is the same story with DeSantis in Florida when the ditzy Ag Commissioner makes a run at moving up to Governor.
That reminds me — I saw Wendy Davis running for Congress somewhere around here. IIRC, it was every county in TX voted against her except Travis so the district must include Metro Austin.
The VA is looking for volunteers among its staff to go to NYC. Something tells me that it won’t be too long before that changes to a mandatory situation. Fortunately, unlike most of the other doctors, my wife has a TX license and can quit if it comes to that.
Tennessee’s governor has sent state troopers to select towns for “remote assessment” and to see if people are complying with not gathering. Seems like Gestapo tactics to me. The governor thinks he has more power than he should be allowed.
The other day I heard that 99.9% of the business in the US are “small.” Seems impressive, but another way to look at it is here:
https://advocacy.sba.gov/2019/01/30/small-businesses-generate-44-percent-of-u-s-economic-activity/
“U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) is the market value of the goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States. Across the 16 years from 1998 to 2014, the small business share of GDP has fallen from 48.0 percent to 43.5 percent. Over the same period, the amount of small business GDP has grown by about 25 percent in real terms, or 1.4 percent annually. However, real GDP for large businesses has grown faster, at 2.5 percent annually.”
Still impressive.
I wondered if the price gouging laws applied to merchants physically based in Texas and Florida. I guess we are going to find out.
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/article/Texas-AG-files-suit-for-price-gouging-against-15160038.php
Every time I go into Sam’s, I seem to be the only one not leaving with a case of TP. I wonder how much of it will end up on Craigslist.
If we take the first incidence of infection on the 31st of December 2020†, today would mark the 85th day of the second person getting infected.
If we exponentially double that rate we get 2^84.
That’s a fairly large number and I will hazard to guess no matter how many fudge factors you apply to it, you, like Maxwell Smart, will miss it by “that much”.
I’m going to put the baby to bed unless you have a unimpeachable ‘Yes, but…’
†
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%9320_coronavirus_pandemic
You forgot to account for people who get it more than once.
— Your friendly neighborhood peer reviewer
If we exponentially double that rate we get 2^84.
You forgot to account for people who get it more than once.
— Your friendly neighborhood peer reviewer
2^84 = 19,342,813,113,834,066,795,298,816
according to Windows Calc.
I guess that we are all going to have to get it a few million times each.
https://advocacy.sba.gov/2019/01/30/small-businesses-generate-44-percent-of-u-s-economic-activity/
“U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) is the market value of the goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States. Across the 16 years from 1998 to 2014, the small business share of GDP has fallen from 48.0 percent to 43.5 percent. Over the same period, the amount of small business GDP has grown by about 25 percent in real terms, or 1.4 percent annually. However, real GDP for large businesses has grown faster, at 2.5 percent annually.”
That sounds like “Too big to fail.”
Well, that can’t possibly be good for the economy…just sayin’….
Every time I go into Sam’s, I seem to be the only one not leaving with a case of TP. I wonder how much of it will end up on Craigslist.
I haven’t seen TP in Sams Club in a month !
Our Riverpark HEB had four pallets of Ozarka and a pallet of Dasani going today with no limits marked. No TP or Bounty or Kleenex though. The other shelves were about 90% full with lots of bread and buns. No specialty bread meaning no sourdough bread !
16,000? Italy has over 9000 SO FAR, with a tiny population compared to ours, and almost 1000 LAST NIGHT.
Italy
Coronavirus Cases:
86,498
Deaths:
9,134
Recovered:
10,950
There’s another 30K if half the remaining cases resolve to recovery. If fewer do, because of degrading care (see above- 4 MORE Drs dead) or lack of equipment, it will be MORE than 30K. and that’s if new infections STOP TODAY.
Spain, france, Germany, Switzerland are all headed that way too, then UK, Netherlands, and all the rest following on…
Texas alone is number 24 on the list and we’re just getting started.
n
“If we exponentially double that rate we get 2^84.”
in the real world, we didn’t all start on the same date, and we all have different lengths of time before it goes exponential. It’s easy to find some absurdity that is comforting.
n
16,000? Italy has over 9000 SO FAR, with a tiny population compared to ours, and almost 1000 LAST NIGHT.
The PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain) have been in deep trouble for over a decade.
Something stinks in Italy, but the priority is getting the epidemic under control. On a per-million basis, the death count is much higher than the US, which is actually on a par with Germany by that metric.
The stimulus check is to be $1,200 (but the wife and I wont see one because we made good money in 2018 unlike 2020).
Cost to build a guillotine, $1,200.
Coincidence ?
https://westernrifleshooters.wordpress.com/2020/03/26/open-thread-0615e-26mar2020/
Something stinks in Italy, but the priority is getting the epidemic under control. On a per-million basis, the death count is much higher than the US, which is actually on a par with Germany by that metric.
New York is heading that direction. Turns out they had the federal grant money to buy ventilators five years ago. So they used the money to build a solar panel plant. Which promptly went bankrupt.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/03/18/new_yorks_ventilator_rationing_plan_142685.html
BTW, the median age in Italy is 45. The median age in New York is 38 which is also the median age in the USA. Probably gonna be less deaths in New York.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/median-age-by-state/
@Nick
It’s easy to find some absurdity that is comforting.
True, but in the real world I wonder how easy it is to find comfort in absurdity.
” how easy it is to find comfort in absurdity.”
–easier when you don’t have dependents, based on my own experiences.
n
Aesop runs some numbers, one more time….
https://raconteurreport.blogspot.com/
n
Aesop runs some numbers, one more time….
I was on a ventilator for 4 or 5 hours back in 2018 when I had heart surgery. The 10 seconds that I remember of it was terrifying. But, it saved my life when they managed to accidentally cut my uvula and I bled a pint or two of blood into my windpipe. The head of anesthesiology at Methodist in the Houston Med Center came to recovery, sat down with me, and personally apologized to me.
I cannot imagine being on a ventilator for weeks and conscious for any of that time period. BTW, if you do get SARS 2, COVID-19, and have to go onto a ventilator, your chances of survival apparently are 33%. Not good. And the resulting lung damage is not good for the long term either.
@Nick
I hope you are teaching your dependents the comfort of numeracy.
“the comfort of numeracy.”
yep, although 8 yo pushed back a bit tonight, saying I made everything into school. She was shocked when I explained that you don’t stop learning when you finish school, and in fact that’s when you really get started. She was indignant! Insisted that SHE’D know everything when she graduated (despite everyone else being a slacker.) It was funny as hell.
n
New York is heading that direction. Turns out they had the federal grant money to buy ventilators five years ago. So they used the money to build a solar panel plant. Which promptly went bankrupt.
Like where Tesla is headed soon.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/03/26/tesla-make-ventilators-buffalo-plant-got-750-m-ny-subsidy/2914638001/
BTW, the median age in Italy is 45. The median age in New York is 38 which is also the median age in the USA. Probably gonna be less deaths in New York.
NY and Italy are probably similar in terms of cronyism. Our state agency customer in NY doesn’t pay us without constant threats of lawsuits.
Which reminds me — work announced today that we aren’t getting raises, bonuses, or promotions this year. Even before the virus, we were headed that way, but now they have an excuse.
Ok. Fine. Loyalty is a two way street.
I won’t go along with cuts to money without a corresponding cut to the numbers of people in the office who seem to do nothing but drive spreadsheets. I absolutely won’t play the deferred paycheck game like the small tech companies and bottom feeder defense contractors around Tampa used to do in the early 90s.
“Ol’ Remus Woodpile Report”
http://www.woodpilereport.com/html/index-620.htm
“These are your choices. They always were and they always will be.
Prepare when no one else is preparing.
Panic when everyone else is panicking.”
Eloquently and succinctly said.
“Guns and ammo are selling at a record rate. Dealers say even anti-gun leftists are buying ’em. No one will say it, but it won’t take much scarcity for the perpetual EBT Diversity to go where the food and supplies are. It’s just there they’ll meet real resistance for the first time in their lives. The suburbs have learned their family freezers are worth more than social posing. Unlike the stock market, price discovery will be utterly reliable when it comes to fried chicken and a six pack.”
Very sobering. And scary.
“The CDC had one job. Virology. Other countries had reliable test kits ready to go, in sufficient quantity to be useful. The technology is decades old yet the “renowned” CDC managed to botch it. The CDC distributed excuses and promises. N95 masks? Ventilators? Um, no. Maybe eventually, their Top Men are working on it. Somehow they always have plenty of everything to “fight the epidemic of obesity and racism” but not enough to perform their mandate. The CDC is useless and incompetent, an 11 billion dollar scam, benefiting no one except otherwise unemployable social activists.”
The CDC had one job. Actually not, according to the conspiracy theorist son. They are primarily a bioweapons lab according to him.
And speaking of deadbeats, I have to find my youngest brother again tomorrow. It appears that they got thrown out of their apartment. They live day to day off his wife’s pitiful salary as a temp. Temps have not been working for a month now.
My late BIL was on a ventilator for a week. He made it through that surgery, but without it he would have passed in an hour. A modern medical miracle of a device.
The CDC? Bureaucratic incompetence. It’s the usual problem: how do you weed out inefficiency in governmental organizations? They have no incentive to be efficient. Pournelle’s Iron Law.
It’s worse in agencies like the CDC that are mostly a sort of insurance policy. They don’t really expect the fecal matter to hit the rotary air impeller, so their leadership has even less incentive to focus on their mission. Pournelle’s Iron Law in spades.