Monday, July 6th, 2020
What a happy day. It was our first outing to the Bethesda Pool. We managed to book a two hour slot and got there a little ahead of time. There was a line of 7 people in front of us and a few people behind who were rather anxious about the fact that I joined EM in the queue. . However we had one permit for the two of us.
The entry process was smooth – they just wanted a piece of paper with the permit number. If one does not have a printer, like us, it suffices to write the number on a piece of paper. Showing the number on the phone did get us in, but we were politely requested to write it down for our next visit. Luckily the weather held. The thunderstorms predicted for 15:00 did not start until 18:30 tonight.
Now it is positively pouring and it looks as if the world wants to drown and this includes my den/ office as I neglected to close the window. As a result, I have dry all the external drives and note books scattered across my desk.
Once in the pool premises there was a bit of a scramble with eight people wanting the six lanes. Family members are sadly not allowed to share so we took up two lanes. Most of the lanes freed up after 20-30 minutes as a result I did not feel about just continuing my laps. After 60 minutes I was the only one still swimming. I made it last and spend 90 minutes doing laps! It was so nice. And when I left there was no one in the pool. I have never seen this place so empty.
As the diving well was open I also did a few back flips. By the time I was done most of my two-hour slot had been put to good use. I am in a very happy place tonight and looking forward to my Sunday booking 12:00 - 14:00
The Aikidoka decided to have an in-person weapons class in a park tomorrow night (masks required), which is excellent news. We are starting with an hour, but I am hopeful we can ramp it up to several times a week and maybe even two hours each time. Also, the Gaithersburg dojo seems to have weapons practice on Friday nights, I may just drive up there!
As far as the virus is concerned it is more of the same, a perpetual shitshow. How hard is it to learn, reflect and act? It is like Groundhog Day. Media (Guardian, NYT, BBC, ....) all report the same: the USA is the worst performing country when it comes to fighting the virus. Over the past 24 hours 44k new cases were added to the tally and the death toll is close to 130k, which we will reach by tomorrow, I am certain. Infections worldwide are at 11.56 million.
Even as numbers are rising reopening continues with federal workers due to return to offices in Washington DC next week. At the same time officials across sunbelt states are admitting they reopened too quickly. No shit Sherlock? Who could have known? Oh right, every single health expert knew and told you so. This is just so frustrating. In addition to opening early contact tracing is not in place, no wonder numbers are exploding all over the country.
There is mounting evidence of a correlation between color and infection, indicating how systemic racism in the USA is. Poorer people are less healthy so the virus in those communities is far more lethal than in white communities which as a rule are economically better off, people have better jobs, health insurance and so on. This of course is the result of almost two centuries of discrimination where people of color were denied the ability to build wealth. Even in the North of the country, while not by law, people of color have been discriminated against by limiting access to jobs, housing and schooling. In addition, people of color typically had to pay more for the same services than white people. And even mild cases of COVID-19 seem to be very unpleasant, so best not to get this damn virus at all, which calls for vaccine! Finally there appears to be no end of crazies in this country. Destroying face mask displays at target, really?
Completely unrelated to the virus, there is a mysterious death befalling elephants in the Okavango delta. This is incredibly sad news. Elephants are such wonderful animals. It reminds me of a book I read a while back, which unlike my usual reads was more of a scifi story, except it does nto seem so fictinal anymore given it was set in a world where most of the animlas we know today were extinct and China controlled the world.
Continuing yesterday’s thought exercise on a potential cabinet: While reports on Biden leading are encouraging it is too early to claim victory. The Teflon president may well end up surprising all which would be a disaster for the world and most certainly for the land of the free. Ideally the Democrats get their act together and develop sweeping bills with senators and house representatives now all to be passed on January 23rd 2021. Voter rights, police reform and health care come to mind first and foremost and vote them through on partisan lines. Get a list of judges now to appoint 200 in the first six months! The same for all other politically appointed positions. In other words, get your act together so any potential majorities can be put to good use. Of course this requires a concerted effort of all democrats in the House and the Senate, which I doubt they can pull off.