Sunflowers 78

 Gee, now it looks like mid-week we'll have some serious cold stuff. Why does anyone even bother with "long term forecasts"? Anything more than a day or two in advance is worthless. OK today, and OK tomorrow, but after that, so say the forecasts, it gets rough. So they say. I'm as prepared as I can be. Surely it won't be as bad as the stuff that hit us last year around this time. But who knows? You might as well flip a coin. 

The sunflowers are reminders of happier times. There really WERE happier times. 

Sunflowers 77

 Looks like today and tomorrow will be pretty nice days. After that, a nasty shot of cold stuff. Just winter crap. 

Odds are, it won't be as bad as the stuff hitting the Northeast. Not by a long shot. Maybe not bad enough to make ERCOT collapse. I'd like to see some hard evidence that improvements have actually been made, that the money appropriated for that purpose didn't simply line pockets. For that matter, was ANY money actually appropriated?? Was it all talk? 

I've added some new SCIENCE links to my list of favorites sites, at the bottom of this blog. 

I've been waiting for Vlad the Impaler's Russia to be hit by the Omicron surge. It's happened. This could be spectacular, with less than 50% of that backward country's population vaccinated. 

Sunflowers 76

 We've got a few nice days coming up with a couple of days of bitter cold forecast for midweek next week. I hope that turns out to be a bust. They've taken wintery precipitation out of that forecast, but it changes every day. Forecasts are largely worthless, I've noticed. There are reports now of a new Omicron variant spreading in "North Texas". There are cases in Dallas and Houston, and in Denmark it is now the dominant strain. It only took a couple of weeks for infections to explode there, as the new strain appears to be significantly more infectious than the last dominant Omicron variant. Not clear how much protection vaccination provides (but surely it's better to be vaccinated), and the severity of this variant is not clear. And what does "North Texas" mean, precisely? I would say Amarillo, as a guess. And the US is now over 880,000 Covid deaths, with almost 60,000 in the last 28 days. And there are still people who won't get vaccinated. Amazing! The depth of ignorance in this country, and in the human population at large, is really stunning. Ignorance and superstition that would do a Neanderthal proud. Oh well. Nothing I can do about any of this. Just sit back and see what happens next.

The illusion of control is insidious. Best to abandon that one.

Sunflowers 75

 I'm enjoying the milder weather and taking advantage of it to get things done, in anticipation of more cold stuff next week. 

Sunflowers 74

 Our two day winter bumblast is over and it wasn't as bad as forecast. Middle of next week another winter bumblast is forecast but there is no precip associated with this one-- just rather cold. We will see. I'm more than ready for winter to be over but I realize we have a long way to go. I'm quite sure that ERCOT is not prepared to deal with anything serious. Money appropriated for upgrades has probably lined the pockets of Asshole Abbot's buddies, and his own pocket as well. Just my uninformed opinion here, but in Texas I habitually suspect corruption in high places. Besides, I despise Abbot, Paxton, and that other half-wit. A veritable trinity of twits. I think I'm still free to dislike and mistrust anyone I choose to dislike and mistrust, for whatever reason... and say so, in a public forum. Not that this blog is very public. To hell with all that anyway.

I need to be more positive, so let me say that Texas is not as bad as some other deep red states, so things here could be much worse. I don't think we've gone so far as to have an official index of prohibited books, for instance. Not yet, anyway. And the food is great! And if you ignore the legislature, Austin rocks! Nothing wrong with the music! We have not yet outlawed everything  but "praise music". And the food is great! Nice scenery! Although there is not as much nice scenery as there used to be, since developers are wrecking things, but that's what developers do. They wreck everything good. The oil industry will probably ultimately foul and pollute every aquifer in the state but that hasn't happened yet. The oil men will take the money and run and the rest of us can slurp brine. Killing and destroying for profit is as American as apple pie and strange fruit. Traditional values still rule in Texas. So we can rest easy. We still have a First Amendment, even though, if you scrawled it on toilet paper, it wouldn't be worth the paper you wrote it on. Toilet paper is expensive these days!

Sunflowers 73

 Cold and cloudy, but no snow or ice on the ground this morning. The later it gets the less likely an accumulation becomes. All sorts of warnings yesterday about the morning commute, but so far not looking that bad. I'll have to check for an updated forecast later. Covid deaths in the US now over 870,000 but the weekly cases seem to be declining from a peak near 6,000,000. Maybe the Omicron wave is passing. And maybe the death rate will decline as well. 

I sure am glad I had my dental checkup yesterday, rather than today! I'll be out to tend to the animals as needed, and that's it. 

Sunflowers 72

 It's above freezing to start the day, and that's not bad, although the local forecast is still for a decidedly wintery turn tomorrow. Yesterday, doing necessary things, driving here and there, I had no problems. Traffic, yes, but generally sane. Maybe the 20 to 30 somethings were hiding in their parent's basements. Who knows? I neither know nor care. What thrills me, is that the Webb telescope has reached its L2 point with minimum fuel expenditure. It should be good for 20 years of amazing discoveries. I'm old (and my feet are cold-- I wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled) but I suppose I'll live long enough to learn at least a little. Also interesting to find that string theory is finding a bit of validation, although it's a stretch (ha ha)-- more of a logical consistency thing but better than nothing. If someone could find a way to drag it out of AdS space and into our actual geometry, that would be significant. Failing that, it would be remarkable to discover that we actually do inhabit an AdS geometry!! Could an infinitesimal region within an infinite AdS geometry look and act like the spacetime we know and love? The whole thing is way beyond my pay grade, but it's still fascinating. And in a day or two the US will have exceeded 870,000 Covid deaths. Eric Clapton should have a brain that works as well as his fingers...

I continue to hunker down. I like hunkering down; living with the animals, and all that. 

Sunflowers 71

 Well, well, well, this is set to be an even nicer day than yesterday, although it starts to go a bit downhill tomorrow. So today I'll do what I need to do and prepare to be shut in for a couple of days. As usual I will need to take extreme care driving. 

Of course, even today, it won't be warm enough to suit me, but that's winter for you. And our drought continues!

Sunflowers 70

 I took my usual Sunday morning drive and thought I would not see any hurrying half-wits, no pod people behind the wheel, but no, there were quite a number, actually. On a Sunday morning?? What's to hurry for? What is there to hurry to?? Are the pod people incapable of relaxing? Do the pod people have no concept of leisure? It seems they do not. And I feel sorry for them. When I have a destination with a scheduled appointment time, I leave EARLY, and I find that I arrive in plenty of time, despite the fact that I've never exceeded a posted speed limit at any point, and have not run any lights. It could be that the pod people are chronically severely disorganized or distracted. I would recommend tossing the "smart" phone, but many feel they must have such a device and are in fact addicted to their devices. And I feel sorry for them. Of course, some people really do need such a device but I would reckon that they are smart enough to manage their time and do not have addictive personalities. I think most people are NOT smart enough to manage their time, prioritize, place things in perspective. And most people do seem to be easily addicted to this and that. How did that come about? I can't explain it. I can only deplore this state of affairs, and try my best to avoid the various traps people fall into.

Life has become very strange, because people seem to be getting strange. Stranger and stranger.

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