Jan 19 2022 - Status Quo or Quo Vadis

 

Would you ever have associated status quo with COVID-19?  How strange to consider this might continue to be the "current state of things".  Typically there are those who want to disrupt the status quo and those who want to maintain the status quo because it benefits them.   Will we or can we "exit the pandemic"? As though we can turn right or take an off-ramp and leave it behind on the highway? The experts are ahead of us and are weighing in on what's to come.  One of them is Seema Yasmin,  a journalist and doctor interviewed HERE on what needs to change. Her first item was supporting the mental health of health care workers.  The second is the need to improve scientific literacy among the public. "Something we’ve had to do is get people up to speed on the evolving — rapidly evolving — science as we are learning it,” Yasmin said. “We’re building bridges and we cross it. And we’re sharing that information with the public, realizing it’s not hitting home. We’re not communicating it well.   And that shows how difficult it is in a crisis to get the public up to speed when you haven’t had investment in education,” she added. “I think so many of these things are not quick fixes that we want to hear about, but they are paradigm shifts and they are generational issues that will take time to fix.” America's  "dreaded mask issue" was on the table:  On Monday, American immunologist Anthony S Fauci said while it was difficult to predict as yet what could be the new normal, he does not think that people will roam around with their masks on forever.  I wonder if that is a quote or the journalist used the verb "roam". The Endemic transition is being debated. Six medical experts close to the White House published three op-eds in the Journal of the American Medical Association, arguing that the time had come for a new approach to the pandemic—one that sets aside the campaign for eradication in favor of living with the disease.  Covid-19, one op-ed argued, should no longer even be tracked on its own but monitored together with other respiratory viruses, such as the flu. Something that we've lived in is the State of Emergency,  Here's the latest on this: “A ‘new normal with COVID’ in January 2022 is not living without COVID-19,” Ezekiel Emanuel, of the University of Pennsylvania, Celine Gounder, of N.Y.U., and Michael Osterholm, of the University of Minnesota, wrote. But they believed that the long era of emergency—the one defined by a wartime feeling and frequent briefings from Anthony Fauci—should draw to a close.   Just last week, a cat was returned home after nearly 12 years of going missing. Vaughan Animal Services picked her up and scanned the microchip to find the owner who now lives in Kitchener.   This cat very much owned the street in Niagara-on-the-Lake a few years ago during a garden tour.

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Oct 9 2021 - Singing like Sweet Adelines

 

Choirs are returning to practice.  There are special masks for singing. The website choralcanada.org has information on them.  There is a mask on the Broadway relief project website and it is available there.  The Singer’s Mask was developed by singers FOR singers by Broadway professionals to help contain droplets while allowing space around the mouth to sing comfortably. There's information on the mask HERE. You can buy music and masks from the same sites now - JWpepper.com has lots of masks.  There are also masks for various wind instrument players.   So this seems extremely encouraging - as though choir singing can begin again this Fall.  But that doesn't seem to be the case - there's a very cautious set of guidelines in Ontario. The Region of Halton published this update of Ontario COVID guidelines/requirements on September 17th: Adapt or suspend singing, choirs, and the playing of wind or brass instruments. Consider audio or video recordings instead of live singing or wind or brass instrumental music.  Group singing is strongly discouraged. The number of persons singing should be limited to the fewest possible. Anyone singing or playing wind or brass instruments should be separated from others by a barrier and should maintain two metres (six feet) distance from others. The conclusion seems to be that safe masks for singers will be for professionals, and us amateurs have a while to wait. The important key indicator of when singing would be safer is having fully vaccinated singers.  Canada has over 80% of the eligible population fully vaccinated, but that isn't the case in the US at all.  So websites that are dominantly US are negative on singing. Our image today is titled "Bubble Up".

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Aug 13 2020 - Mingling on Friday the 13th

 

There are only two Friday the 13ths in 2020 - the first one happened in March just before lockdown and the next one is November.  That may or may not be a problem for Port Dover. It is the destination town for its  motorcycle gatherings on Friday the 13th occurrences.  There were 100,000 bikers in September 2019.  The next summer gathering will be August 2021.  They might expect the same numbers - and we might expect to still be expected to wear masks and social distance.   Will they be wearing mingle masks?  Here's the latest in COVID-19 masks. It is Canadian-made, clear face covering.  This is expected to help in a few ways:  the sound is better, it is better for reading lips for the hard of hearing, smiles and other expressions will be seen, and less fogging of glasses.     This could be a nice step forward for our social interaction.  It makes me wonder why countries already wearing masks aren't using this type - but then all the articles say they are wearing surgical masks.  I guess that question is for another time. I thought I would catch up on the latest COVID-19 jokes: When you work at a bank and 2 guys with masks come in ... but they're just robbing the place Day 1:  I have stocked up on enough non-perishable food and supplies to last me for months, maybe years, so that I can remain in isolation for as long as it takes to see out this pandemic Day 2: I am in the supermarket because I wanted a Twix The owner of my gym just emailed a more thorough, detailed, thoughtful plan for dealing with the coronavirus than the President of the United States Doctor: Your Covid-19 test came back positive Patient: That can't be correct.  I have more than 300 rolls of toilet paper Corona beer changes name to avoid association with the Coronavirus outbreak Ebola Extra I washed my hands so much due to Covid-19 that my exam notes from 1995 resurfaced Friend in California unsuccessfully trying to get a test for coronavirus: Q "Have you been to any countries experiencing an outbreak of coronavirus in the past two weeks?" A "Yes, the USA" Here's the entrance bridge to the conifer garden at Whistling Gardens.

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