The dry summer weather continues here in the city (79 °F/ 26 °C today).
There were clouds and a chance of drizzle on Saturday morning, but it stayed dry.
Sunday/ wild blackberries
Saturday/ more help needed, right away
It’s going awfully bad for many millions of people here in the United States.
With 153, 000 lives lost, there is no end in sight for the pandemic.
There is no national strategy to contain it.
The country’s GDP had declined by 9.5% in the second quarter, wiping out 5 years of economic growth.
Unemployment benefits for tens of millions of workers have expired at the end of July.
Mitch McConnell & his Senate Republicans have let legislation languish for months— proposed by the House for additional help from the government to people in dire need.
Friday/ decoding street art
I walked down to the former Capitol Hill Organized Protest zone by the East Precinct police station today.
All was quiet with not much traffic on the streets – but right then three police patrol vans erupted out of the police station garage, piercing sirens going and headlights flashing. There was an emergency somewhere that they were rushing to.
At the back, left to right: Barney Rubble from The Flintstones (first appearance 1959), Luigi from Super Mario Bros., Inspector Gadget from the namesake animated TV series (1983), Ned Flanders from The Simpsons (1989), and The Kool-Aid Man, primary mascot for Kool-Aid (1975).
In front, left to right: Rocko the wallaby from Rocko’s Modern Life (1993), Nibbler from the cartoon series Futurama (1999), Underdog from the animated movie (2007).
*Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, as well as strong regimentation of society and of the economy which came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe [Wikipedia].
Thursday/ John Lewis laid to rest
Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and stand up for what you truly believe. In my life I have done all I can to demonstrate that the way of peace, the way of love and nonviolence is the more excellent way. Now it is your turn to let freedom ring.
– John Lewis (80), in an essay he wrote shortly before his death on July 17.
Civil rights icon and former congressman John Lewis was laid to rest today after three former presidents (Clinton, Bush, Obama) had delivered eulogies for him at a service in Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.
Minutes later, with white onlookers cheering them on, Alabama State troopers in riot gear brutalized and trampled unarmed men, women and children, beating them with clubs and unleashing tear gas. Lewis was hit on the head and fell to the ground and when he tried to get up, was struck again, leaving him unconscious.
Wednesday/ a slice of Irish
My Tintin book in Irish landed on my porch today.
Irish (written Gaeilge in Ireland and pronounced ‘gail-gyuh’) is spoken by some 2 million* people in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
It has been the dominant language of the Irish people for most of their recorded history, with inscriptions in primitive Irish of the names of people going back to at least the 4th century.
*These are level 2 speakers with some knowledge of the language. There are fewer than 100,000 daily speakers (outside the education system).
The clumsy detectives Thomson & Thompson are called Mac Grianma & O’Grianma in the Irish translation. (Mac means ‘son of’ and so does O’).
Tintin’s dog Snowy is Báinín, which is the Irish word for a collarless reverseless unlined man’s jacket made of white close-woven wool.
Tuesday/ the frenzy of the VP sweepstakes
Who will Joe Biden pick as 2020 Vice-Presidential running mate?
Well, we know it’s going to be a woman: Biden said it will be, some time ago.
Some political experts say that he has taken care of the ‘heavy lifting’ already, in terms of commiting to picking a woman. That would build on the success of female Democratic candidates in the 2018 midterm elections, and be a nod to empowering women in politics (and a thorn in Trump’s side). So it does not matter too much which woman he chooses.
So how does this site work? Well, you can buy shares at the price listed, and if the event turns out in your favor, you get $1 per share (minus a fee). If your candidate loses, you lose all your money!
Monday/ toasty
There was nary a cloud in the blue sky today, and at Seattle-Tacoma Airport a high of 94°F (34.5 °C) was recorded.
Sunday/ waiting for a little rain
The white stuff on my garage roof will kill the moss that had taken hold on it, but it needs a little rain to dissolve in.
The crew that had put it on (it’s environmentally friendly, they assured me), will be back in 4 to 6 weeks to brush off the moss and clean out the gutters.
I will have to be patient: July and August are the driest months in Seattle, each with about 1 in. of total rainfall, on average.
Saturday/ more rioting & vandalism
Some 45 people were arrested here in Seattle today, and several police officers were injured in scuffles with the protestors.
We could hear the helicopters hovering, sirens that were wailing at times, and loud flash-bang explosions, a dozen times or so.
A handful of people vandalized a Starbucks on 12th Ave and set fire to construction trailers at the site of the new juvenile detention center nearby. It seems to me that the vandals are doing serious damage to the Black Lives Matter message of the peaceful protestors, as well.
Friday/ Tintin, in Scots
Some of the Adventures of Tintin tales have now been translated into Scots*.
So of course, I had to add one of these books to my collection.
I ordered it on AbeBooks.com.
*Scots is spoken in Scotland and parts of Ulster in Ireland. It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Goidelic Celtic language that was historically restricted to most of the Highlands, the Hebrides and Galloway after the 16th century. [Source: Wikipedia]
The King Ottokar’s Sceptre adventure is the 8th in the series. It was published in French in 1939, and first translated into English in 1958.
Thursday/ it’s the Seattle Kraken
It’s offical: the name for Seattle’s National Hockey League team is The Kraken (rumors had been swirling for months). The kraken is a legendary cephalopod-like sea monster of gigantic proportions in Scandinavian folklore (per Wikipedia).
Fans will have to wait until next year’s NHL season to cheer for the team in the remade Key Arena, which will be called the Climate Pledge Arena (the world’s first certified net-zero carbon arena).
Wednesday/ squaring off over squares
There is a case before the Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Court of Justice) in Karlsruhe in Germany, over the right to exclusively use a 4×4 square design for chocolate slabs. German chocolatier Ritter Sport introduced it way back in 1932. In 2010 Swiss company Milka started using it as well.
Now Ritter Sport alleges that Milka violates its patent that had been registered in 1993.
Update Thu 7/23: A ruling in favor of Ritter Sport came down from the Bundesgerichtshof. Milka will no longer be allowed to copy the square design of the Ritter chocolate slabs.
Tuesday/ my primary vote is in
I mailed in my ballot for the Washington State primary election today. Washington uses a top-two primary system, in which all candidates appear on the same ballot, for congressional and state-level elections.
So the top two vote-getters move on to the general election in November, regardless of their party affiliation.
To any candidate that dares having ‘Prefers Republican Party’ behind his or her your name on my ballot: You are automatically disqualified.
Your party is a disgrace — as is that ‘President’ that you had foisted on us in 2016.
Monday/ three is just right
‘Een in die was, een aan die bas, en een in die kas!’
– Afrikaans for ‘One to wash, one to wear, and one to spare!’
I picked up my new tennis racquet from the tennis shop today. My social club has started playing super-safe and social-distanced tennis*, and I needed one more, as a spare.
*We play on outside courts only. Each player has his/ her own set of numbered tennis balls (to handle, and to serve with). Other players pick up & pass the server’s balls to him/ her with the racquet only, so without touching them.
Higher string tension gives more control (for volleys at the net, say), but less power.
Lower string tension gives more power, but less control.
Sunday/ a flower, aflame
It’s going to be warm (for Seattle, that is) this week — 87 °F (30.5 °C) on Monday, and slightly cooler on Tuesday.
Saturday/ a glimpse of the comet
I went out after sunset tonight to find a spot here in my neighborhood that would enable me to look over the trees for Comet C/2020 F3 (Neowise*).
I found it with the help of my binoculars, and got a somewhat decent look at it. The sky is definitely not an inky black here in the city!
*Neowise stands for Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the space telescope from NASA that had discovered it in March.
The comet is on its way back to 715 astronomical units, or AU, from the Sun. (For comparison, Earth orbits at 1 AU, Jupiter at 5 AU, and Neptune at 30 AU.) The comet takes about 6,800 years to make one lap around its long, stretched-out orbit .. so it won’t visit our inner solar system again for many thousands of years.
[Source: NASA Skywatching tips ]
Friday night stroll
I walked down 19th Ave after dinner.
A few people were lined up, socially distant, for ice cream at Hello Robin.
Zeeks Pizza had a smattering of diners inside, as did Monsoon, the Vietnamese restaurant.
No Friday night music and dance at the Russian Community Center; its doors were shut.
The No 12 bus rolled by. Its scrolling letters now say ‘Masks Required’— an upgrade from ‘Essential Trips Only’, I guess.
Thursday/ the Trump White House: dishonest, disgusting, deranged
Dr Anthony Fauci, via blurry webcam, on the White House’s efforts to undermine him: ‘You know, it is a little bizarre; I don’t fully understand it’.
Jake Tapper (CNN): ‘That’s Dr Fauci characteristically being diplomatic.
Let me not be diplomatic.
The White House campaign to undermine Dr. Fauci is dishonest, it’s disgusting, it’s deranged, and at a time of a deadly pandemic, it is the ultimate in irresponsibility.
Literally more than 136,000 Americans are dead because of this virus and instead of an aggressive national testing and contact-tracing program, the White House is instead launching a smear campaign against the guy trying to save our lives’.
Wednesday/ Rancho Mirage, 30 yrs ago
I discovered this bird’s eye view picture of the Pete Dye Challenge golf course (north of Rancho Mirage, in the greater Palm Springs area), in my scanned archives.
I took it from my seat in a propeller plane, during my very first visit to the United States, in March 1990.
My brother lived in nearby Palm Desert at the time. ‘Just so you know‘, he said, ‘Palm Springs and its golf courses are not what the real America looks like’.
March 1990: The Pete Dye Challenge golf course at Mission Hills Country Club north of Rancho Mirage, was completed in 1988.
The curved road at the bottom of picture is Dinah Shore Drive.
At the very top edge of the picture runs highway Interstate 10, going to Phoenix, AZ, and all the way east across the country to Jacksonville, FL.
The tracks of real estate in between the greens of the golf course would be developed soon enough ..
July 2020: Fast forward 30 years later to today, and we find the Pete Dye Challenge golf course temporarily closed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Mission Hills North/ Gary Player Signature golf course was added in 1992.
The tracks of land have been filled up with houses/ golf course condominiums.
Rancho Mirage High School at the top left of the picture was founded in 2013.
Tuesday/ landed: CD from North Carolina
My CD from a warehouse in North Carolina landed in the mailbox today (from a bare-bones website called MovieMars).
None of the CD was available on Amazon, none on Discogs.com, none on Ebay. Amazon Netherlands does not ship to the United States, and I could order one from Amazon UK, but that would have cost $36 with the shipping cost. Yikes.
