Friday, August 21st, 2020
What a wonderful day today. I took the afternoon of and EM picked me up at 13:30, after spending the morning with her friends, to go for our daily swim. Admittedly I was in a bit of a huff as she did not rock up until 13:28 and I was really worried about missing my lap time. I let her know as much, which resulted in a melt-down.
Seems one of her friends had wanted to go further afield and she had no idea how long it would take her to get home. One thing led to another and she was claiming to be super busy, failing her college essay, failing school, not making it to college and me yelling at her was the last thing she needed. We made up quickly as I offered to review her essay and help if she would think it useful.
We had a great 45 minute swim with her excelling as coach and telling me how to improve my style. I was asked to hurry up as she had asked her friend, who is a boy, over to our house for 15:30 as he wanted to meet me and she wanted to be ready. I changed outfits three times as I wanted to be sure not to embarrass her in front of her friend.
On a normal sailing day, I would have worn a white tie-up blouse and my skimpy silk skirt. This attire was deemed weird. I tried said blouse with shorts, which was also rejected and finally settled on my beach dress (which was okay, but probably not adult enough). J. came on the dot of 15:30 – impressive for a young man – introduced himself, shook hands and asked for a tour of the house. Good on him to bridge an awkward moment. I grabbed my stuff and left to the marina giving them some space. What is more awkward than mum hanging around the house?
What a beautiful day to be out on the water! A lovely breeze and a little overcast, so not ho. My friend Maureen, whom I have not seen since this whole thing started many moons ago, joined me. We cruised leisurely across the water in the company of some Rose bubbly. Once back on shore we enjoyed some cocktails Maureen had prepared, before I left to buy milk and other essentials at Trader Joes. Now I am sitting in my garden; the youngsters have gone for a drive somewhere. Good on them. I am so happy EM has met someone who is special to her and I have all the trust in the world, because I know she is my daughter and responsible.
As the DNC wrapped up last night here is a view to how differently it had to be organized, courtesy of the virus. I ended up watching the last hour or so of it in its entirety and must say I was impressed. I am not sure I could have spend four days, two to three hours a day watching this, but the testimonials under the theme “ We the People...” were very strong and touching. Personal stories and most of Biden’s competitors for the nomination in one panel explaining why they support Biden/ Harris. It was most impressive and touching. And despite all fears of Biden maybe stuttering or stumbling, he gave a powerful speech reaching out to Americans with the promise to unite not divide. After so many Republicans speaking at the convention and endorsing him, a very credible statement. He focused on the theme of “Who we are as a nation, what we stand for, and who we want to be — that's on the ballot this November.”
I feel he would make a great president, but alas, I fear the people in this country will end up with the moron in chief yet again. There is too much stupidity in this country I find.
Meanwhile the Virus spreads. 5.79 million cases of 22.8 million worldwide are reported in the USA today. Funnily I had intuitively expected that children may be viral spreaders (calling them ”Virenschleudern”) and a recent study seems to confirm this. While they may not expose symptoms children carry a potentially high viral load in the breath. In the absence of authorities doing so a school teacher has kept track of all COVID-19 cases in US schools since March. Turns out news reports have covered some 958 schools with over 3000 cases in total, and that is with schools being closed for about half of the period in question. The teacher being overwhelmed with the interest and response in her work is now transferring the spreadsheet to a professional organization. What is shocking, is that there is no Federal agency monitoring this data to inform school reopenings. Then again, why am I shocked about anything related to the current administration? I should not be given the incompetence they have demonstrated in managing the pandemic and the effort that has been put in to destroy functional systems across board.
It is starting to rain, so I need to cover the furniture. Calling it a night.