Shutdown Diary
The latest stats from Washpo:
According to CDC:
There is no good news about all statistics up dramatically with principally the Delta variant since my last post. In fact, Friday saw the return of daily 6-figure cases for I believe the first time in 6 months; overall about 78K/daily. Yet the vaccination rates are barely up, maybe the equivalent of up to 1.5% of the population getting a single dose. It does look, like others projected, we're close to Biden's goal of 70% of adults being at least partially vaccinated but it'll happen in August versus July 4.
A couple of personal notes: I noticed that my grocery store Lidl, which didn't post a sign when they announced they had relaxed masking policies pointedly had a sign recommending masking. I think most customers are probably maskless by now... At work as a contractor, I may be affected by a government mandate requiring employees to vaccinate or test (weekly). It's all a matter of time because the command won't allow a double standard between employees and contractors. My contractor boss is worried about HIPAA violations of imposing the standards; me, I publicly announced my vaccine shots in my blog (the only reason I haven't published my vaccine card is it contains PII). Plus, there is already buzz about extending the mask mandate to the vaccinated.
A lot of discussion this past week over vaccine breakthroughs. The first was a study reported by CDC based on a July 4 weekend COVID-19 breakout in Provincetown, MA, of nearly 900 people, 75% of whom were fully vaccinated. Supposedly about 35K/week from more than 162 M vaccinated Americans are breakthrough cases. When you take into account that's less than a half day of a week's count from nearly 70% of vaccinated Americans, you have compelling evidence that vaccines work--not to mention very low hospitalizations and virtually no deaths from the group (and the bulk of those are from a tiny percentage of those with compromised immune systems. Now why did CDC flip its mask guidance? Because it found infected vaccinated had comparable virus loads in the mouth and nose. They are worried about infected people spreading virus-laden splatter (coughs, sneezes ,etc.), and the idea is that masks mitigate the risks of splatter.
The second comes from Israel. where a large segment of the population was vaccinated by January, and they've found that effectiveness diminishes to as low at 16% among the elderly after 6 months, so Israel is in the process of administering a third/booster dose of the Pfizer vaccine.
My nuclear family has an older female relative in a memory care facility. I believe she was vaccinated back in January. The Texas facility recently retightened masking rules. But my RN sister (14 months younger) and I are disagreeing I couldn't believe it when I discovered the vaccine isn't mandated for the staff and residents. I'm pushing for a booster shot for our relative, and my sister is sticking with the early CDC skepticism when Pfizer started pushing for approval of a booster shot. I think CDC is starting to reconsider its original response, at least for immunocompromised individuals.
Finally, I'm ticked off by libertarian comedian Dave Smith in comments made during a recent Reason interview. Smith has no intention of having himself or his daughter vaccinated; I don't want to caricature his position, but loosely paraphrased he sees this as a corrupt crony capitalism scam by greedy vaccine makers. Let me be clear: these vaccines do work at great savings to the economy and the heath of millions of Americans. It's based on real evidence, not media hype. Now I have been a critic of government distribution and monopoly, but on the cost standpoint, consider these statistics:
These vaccines are free to all patients, thanks to funding by the U.S. government which negotiated contracts with the Covid-19 vaccine makers that will supply enough vaccines to cover our entire population. Of course, these contracts came at a cost to the government, from $39 for Pfizer’s two dose regimen, $32 for Moderna’s regimen, and $10 for J&J’s single shot. For perspective, the price of one’s annual quadrivalent flu shot ranges from $35 - $41, with the more potent shot being almost twice as high.
Miscellaneous Notes
Well, I had resigned myself to the lowest reader pageviews in 6 months; over the last 2.5 weeks or so I had barely trended over half the regular rate. I was looking at maybe 1950 pageviews for July--when all of a sudden on the last two days of the month (officially the Blogger dates start 8 PM EDT), I got an unexpected burst of 400+ pageviews each. So I probably went from the worst to the best monthly number in 6 months. I'm sort of a stats junkie; I noticed for some odd reason a significant number of hits came from Sweden (I haven't noticed any significant traffic from there in the past, although I haven't reviewed numbers on a regular bases.) I don't know what motivated the burst, but I'm grateful to anyone who takes the time to read my blogs. I wouldn't say these bursts are typical; I'll often have a couple of good days a month. As I write, it looks like the burst came to an end around 6 AM Saturday. It looks like my slower trend has resumed since then. On a more positive note, most of my posts have been drawing double-digits, including consistently over the last third of the month. I also published an all-time record 53 posts for the month; the previous record was 51. I really wasn't publishing for the sake of publishing; I just had a hot stretch of one-off posting starting early in the month. I'm already over 300 posts on the year.
I resumed Twitter after the expiration of my suspension and have my first 1K+ day since then with a couple of 500+ impression tweets on Babbitt and Giuliani. I don't really have a formula on which tweets are more popular although I knew I was stirring the pot a bit on the former (and I'll probably release a related post on that topic, probably by tomorrow).
From the Life's Little Problems category: online orders and shipping addresses. As a professional DBA, I have a thing for external hard drives (and cloud drives) for my PC's. So I noticed an online vendor I've purchased from in the past (not in several months) was having a special on external drives, including a 12 TB model I had been eyeing in the past. I was wary of using any obsolete credit card (all my cards had new/updated expiration dates and/or verification codes. So I used a new card option with my specified (current) billing address. I'm fairly sure that I didn't see an old shipping address during the checkout process (and now I'm kicking myself for not checking the address in my vendor profile account). The first thing I noticed--with alarm--is that UPS sent me a shipping confirmation to my 5-year-old South Carolina address. I then double-checked my emailed vendor receipt, and it showed my correct billing address but my old shipping address. Maybe I'm more used to Amazon's verification process, which explicitly references shipping address. I frantically looked for the vendor 800 number--and couldn't find it on the website. Thank God for Google. So I call up (I needed the order ID to enter the voice messaging system, so I had to go pull that up). The customer agent eventually found the transaction but said that he couldn't reset the shipping address but needed me to go change my shipping address in my profile. I'm dogged by Chrome caching issues and start up my desktop computer. I have to get my password manager working and eventually get my vendor profile address book open. I quickly add my current address, set it default, but the agent still can't see it. What is wrong with their system? I try to add the address again, and this time he sees it. He assures me the drive hasn't shipped yet, and it will use the newly updated shipping address (I haven't seen a new UPS confirmation as I write). I'm not really worried in the sense I can challenge the charge to my card if I don't receive the drive; I'm certain glad I noticed the error before they had shipped the item; I just hope the agent is correct about the shipping address being fixed.
I think in terms of the Olympics, I've nearly watched it nonstop while at home (switching between NBC and USA Network). I mentioned in a prior post I had a soft spot for underdogs, and one of the first events I watched, the men's bike road race, was ideal; for much of the home stretch athletes from Ecuador and the US (which I don't think has placed in recent memory) were going head to head, trading leads; the US biker eventually fades down the stretch and the Ecuadorian takes the race going away. Unfortunately the US rider didn't medal, but I think he is the first top 10 finisher in recent memory.
The most intriguing new event to me was the 3-on-3 basketball tournament. It is faster paced, especially on switching possessions after buckets (you have to take it outside the circle to initiate your scoring drive), both sides using the same goal, each bucket or foul shot goes for a point, although there is a bonus 2-point circle, and you play for 10 minutes or the winner scores 21 points. The American women took the inaugural tournament with a win over ROC (at first I wondered about the abbreviation: Republic of China? Nope. Russian Olympic Committee; it has to do with a prior Russian doping scandal), and the key to the US victory was Russia quickly getting into foul trouble which meant some key foul shots/bonuses down the home stretch.
What happens in the post-Phelps era? Dressel is the new male superstar with 5 golds, missing a sixth in a mixed gender relay where one of the female members (Jacoby) had a face goggle mishap on her swim.
The men's basketball team got upset by France in pool play but made it to the championship round.
I have mixed feelings over the mental health issues of US lead gymnast Simone Biles and Japanese tennis player Naomi Osaka. I know Phelps, who battled his own issues before he retired after the last Olympics, has expressed support for Biles. I've never been a stellar athlete, and I don't doubt there's a lot of pressure. I myself am a perfectionist of sorts with nearly impossible personal standards. Biles, however, is a veteran US/international champion. Personally, I think if you can't compete at your standard, you should retire. I always thought it was a mistake for Michael Jordan to come out of retirement to play for the Washington Wizards after his storybook finish with yet another NBA championship streak with the Chicago Bulls. It wasn't his will or fault that age had taken a toll on his performance; his stats were across the board below his career average, with his point production about a third off his Bulls' average. I think the jump the shark moment was when he blew his signature dunk shot and fans started jeering him.
It's hard to say Biles at 24 is "over the hill", but she is older than any female Olympic gymnast champion since 1968. I'm sure she was terrified of losing as the defending world champion which would be a tragic ending to her storied career. It's not her fault that her body is starting to betray her, but I'm sure as much training as she has been doing, she must have seen it coming. She did the right thing in withdrawing; that's why alternates qualify in the first place. But having a meltdown during the Olympics is a sad way to end one's career. I wish her success in her future endeavors.
Entertainment
It does seem my interpretation of the previous Smackdown of Finn Balor's challenge to Roman Reigns at Summerslam was correct. Some of the others on the web had speculated that Balor's challenge was meant for an interim match which would still keep Summerslam open for an eventual Cena challenge. I thought it was totally stupid for Cena to be in a bait-and-switch for Balor. Now, in one sense, Balor is a logical contender, a past WWE champion and a babyface. But Balor has been off main brand programming for more than a year (on NXT), so there's not been any kind of a storyline build since his recent callback. What are they going to do, find some old Balor/Reigns' match before Reigns' interim heel turn to motivate the challenge? Cena's opening for last Friday's Smackdown also muddied the water, as WWE was now promoting a Summerslam contract signing between Reigns and Balor. Were they trying to suggest a 3-way? Why? What's the feud between babyfaces Cena and Balor? Having Cena attack Reigns would be an unlikely heel move for the perennial babyface Cena.
WWE pulled a typical storyline scenario for them, although they scripted it in a confusing manner. They had Sad Sack Baron Corbin panhandling Hollywood Cena for a handout, and eventually Corbin eats a Cena finisher. So I don't see the logic in Corbin doing Cena any favors. But in WWE storyland, contracts aren't drawn up with a signature block for contender Balor; they are open where anyone possessing the contract can sign it. Why Reigns signs an open contract first is unclear (I wouldn't have in his position), but how does Cena get possession of the contract? Why, of course, Corbin comes on the scene to take out Balor before he can sign the contract. Of course, that sets up a Corbin/Balor feud, but why is Corbin doing Cena a favor? Perhaps you can argue Sad Sack Corbin desperately wanted/needed the contract for himself.
Finally, we see the return of Sasha Banks, who never got a return match with Bianca Belair, who had jobbed to Belair in an unlikely babyface/babyface match at Wrestlemania (motivated by Belair's winning the right to a championship match at the Royal Rumble). Now to motivate a rematch WWE needs one of the wrestlers to turn heel. But how do they do that? One of the oldest heel turn scripts in the wrestling storybook: a tag team split.
They start up the scenario with Carmella, who Belair had already just defeated in a championship match, issuing yet another challenge for the belt. Recently returning heel Zelina Vega joins the scene, and quickly they turn their attention to Belair and take her out. That prompts the long-anticipated returning babyface Sasha Banks on the side of Belair. That sets up a tag match between faces and heels. I swear the whole match I'm saying, "Sasha is going to turn on Belair..." It was only how they were going to script it--during the match, after the match....
Late-breaking news: Bray Wyatt was dropped by WWE. This is disappointing, but not totally unexpected since WWE had kept him off programming since jobbing to Randy Orton at Wrestlemania. In a manner of speaking Bray had an interesting fusion of the Undertaker's dark gimmick with Mick Foley's multiple wrestling personas. I have mixed feelings; from a technical view, he had a limited arsenal as a wrestler, probably best known for his Sister Abigail finisher. He was good on the mike and very creative. To be honest, I was never fan of supernatural gimmicks, like the zombie gimmick several weeks back, or the puppet shows. Wrestling really comes down to a conflict in the ring, and Wyatt's character was unusual, not really fitting in traditional babyface/heel roles. But his segments were probably the most entertaining on WWE television; he'll be missed.
