Friday, June 5th, 2020
The plants I ordered three (!) months ago have arrive. It is nothing but roots! Nothing pre-grown, just seeds and roots. I would not need to order from a nursery for that. I could have just gone to Giant or American Plants or Strosnider and bought a few packets of seeds. I am extremely miffed. I have a mind to just send them back. The only thing from preventing me is that I feel sorry for the poor things which have been stuck in plastic bags now for ten days. I will decide tomorrow whether or not I shall adopt them, but what a disappointment!
The bipolar weather continues. After a beautiful day the forecast predicted rain for the afternoon. I am finding that even the weatherman lies as it did not started raining until 18:00, when we would have been done with our excursion. Preempting this the Marina closed and cancelled my boat reservation. Moved it to Sunday seeing there is so much going on tomorrow. I do hope we will be back in time for the neighborhood vigil!
I have of course tripped myself up. Just this morning I looked for a National Park with a swimmable lake (and found one near Baltimore!) with plans to go there on Sunday. Unless we first do one and then the other, though that may well interfere with EM’s schoolwork plans. She is trying to get ahead on her essays due next school year. She wants them finished in the next two weeks. Let’s see how that goes. If it goes well, it would give her time to use the Theory of Knowledge (TOK!) class to prepare for the written French exam which has been postponed from May to November. Brilliant idea to have kids do exams on a subject they have not studied for six months! The wisdom of the IB board, what can we do?
The Listserv has been exploding with discussions around the flyers put up by college students to draw attention to the ongoing injustice after they politely asked for neighbors not to tear them down. There is a complete lack of clarity whether officials or neighbors are the culprits. Nonetheless, it led to a very lively discussion about living in affluent privileged neighborhoods, and what may or may not be within the law. The discussion more or less concluded with this very thoughtful post:
“You and your friends have had an impact that goes far beyond the signs you hung up. The simple fact that someone pulled them down demonstrates that. Someone had to make a conscious choice to take that action. In doing so they had to think about their own opinions in response to the views that sign was supporting. 'Do I agree or disagree? Why?" Whether they pulled the signs down because they disagreed with the sentiment or simply because they didn't think it should be hung there, they had to think about it. How many people saw you hanging the signs up, and thought about it. How many people walked by one of the signs, and thought about it. How many people saw someone take a sign down, and thought about it. And now the issue is bouncing back and forth on our listserv. People who didn't even see the signs now know about them and are thinking about the issues you and your friends raised. Whether they agree or disagree, they're thinking about it. Don't let anyone tell you that your activism counts for less because you're white or live in an affluent neighborhood or because you printed the flyers from a website or on no-recycled paper (although how someone would know that, I have no idea). Certainly things like that were true for suburban kids in my generation or in my parents. I grew up in a very sheltered neighborhood and went to school where everyone was truly just like me. Thankfully, I see a much greater exposure to diversity in my own children - in their friends, their awareness, and in their experiences. Perhaps the internet and social media gets some of the credit for exposing our kids to issues beyond their smaller circles. I'm sure your college years have given you a much greater awareness of social issues beyond our little "hood" as well. Some have mentioned guidelines for signs and where they can or cannot be posted. I would argue that there are times when a message and a purpose is greater than the countless regulations that help us all inhabit the same area without irritating each other too much. We often measure the impact of bending the rules for a greater good. If the Lost Puppy flyer illegally hung on the telephone pole helps find the puppy and keep it from harm, we'd likely all agree bending the rules was worth it. Considering the issues we're dealing with now, enforcing a sign regulation seems a little petty at this time. But I'm all for following the rules, so I'd be happy to help find a way to display the signs within county guidelines. It sounds like displaying on private property is acceptable. I have a shed full of scrap wood that I would be happy to turn into stakes that could be used for posting signs in yards (with the property owner's permission of course). Again, thank you to you and your friends for your activism and efforts.”
It has prompted me to start a communal order of double sided lawn signs “Black Lives Matter” on one and “Silence = Violence” printed on the other side and the response has been quite overwhelming. I now need to figure out how to pick them up once they are done, given the “Floh” is just that, a tiny 500C Lounge Fiat convertible with virtually no boot.
Many of the discussion on “Black Lives Matter” have turned to highlighting the persistent economic inequalities and these charts powerfully illustrate the underlying issue in the USA, the persistent wealth gap.
I am so with the protestors, but also understand the concerns of medical professionals. Now that we have barely managed to flatten the curve, there is a risk of a new spike caused by closeness and teargas. And during the protests police brutality continues to be very visible. It is also hitting journalists, more than 300 have been physically attack while covering the protests
The NYT today had a great piece on the Corona Virus: The number of new cases has virtually stopped falling, hovering around 20,000 new cases per day over the past 10 days. But the actual trend may be more encouraging. The number of tests being conducted has been rising rapidly in recent weeks — which means more virus cases are being uncovered than otherwise would have been. Taken together, the various measures suggest that the virus’s spread continues to slow — but only modestly and not as rapidly as in some other countries
In this context it would be interesting to take a closer look at where exactly increases currently are occuring, so far growth has been in rural America (!) where there have been fewer protests. So if infections increase as a result of protests, we should see a renewed spike in New York, Washington DC and other urban areas in about a week or two from now.
The world today has 6.7 million reported cases with a death toll nearing the 400k mark; almost 2 million of which are in the USA (1.93 million and 110k dead).
On the positive side AstraZeneca is getting ready to produce potential vaccine investing in production capacities amongst others with financial support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to ensure that poor and middle income countries will also have access. AstraZeneca is banking on the research conducted by Oxford University.
With all the Virus news and police brutality Brexit is all but forgotten and it is not really going anywhere it seems.