Shutdown Diary
The latest statistics from Washpo:
In the last week, an average of 949.9k doses per day were administered, a 4% decrease over the week before. From the CDC below:
As readers of my journal posts probably know, I have a viewing interest in WWE (pro wrestling) and it just struck me watching NXT Tuesday on USA network, that it looked like they had a full crowd in attendance. They have been phasing in crowds since Wrestlemania, but the flagship RAW and Smackdown shows are about 2 weeks away from live/taped audiences.
Nobody has given me any crap, at least directly, over demasking at work or shopping. I'm still astonished that a large plurality, if not a majority, of people I've seen are masked. It's possible a lot of people wearing masks are vaccinated but are masking out of habit, fears about the Delta variant or "feel safer".. Why would you choose to pass on getting vaccinated and possibly end up in the hospital or put up with inconvenient masking? Me, I never believed masking did much good with bioaerosols, and masking makes breathing more difficult when you do something with modest breathing difficulty (e.g., reaching for an item on the bottom shelf). I've always gone to the beat of my own drummer; I remember being one of 2-3 people maskless one Saturday at Lidl (grocery store). I didn't wear my mask to fit in with the crowd; I knew Lidl had announced their mask mandate had been relaxed in an email I got (but no signs at the front of the store). I did worry about some mask Nazi challenging me. I also worried about being stopped by government installation security and asked to show my vaccination card, but no, I haven't been carrying my card around.
At work, we entered HPCON Alpha this week. I don't know when we'll transition to full-time on site, but technically I don't have my own cubicle on site; I'm currently sharing a colleague's cubicle on a complementary basis during his telework days.
Finally, some good news that the mRNA vaccines may be effective for a longer period of time. I haven't ruled out a booster shot in the months ahead
Good News About the mRNA Vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna)
Reader Statistics
I think in June I barely met an informal goal of 2000 pageviews a month for I think about the fourth month in a row and 5 of the last 6 months. I remember in past months, I had a mini-streak of 150+ pageview days in past months that made it comfortable to hit the target, nothing comparable in June, just a steady trend of readers. I will say I've had a recent 20 post streak of double-digit viewers, although a number of those hit that target after the post day period. My social media digest posts used to be my most popular ones, but my readership has tailed off there also. It used to be I was averaging over 1K impressions a day and there was a time when all my monthly top tweets had attracted over 1K views. I think more recently a 1K impression day is more of an exception than the rule and it's been weeks since my last "viral" tweet. Returning to the blog, many of my occasional essays do well relatively speaking (maybe up to triple the daily posts), but it's been a while since I've had a post exceeding 40 or more readers (I think maybe a handful over the past year).
My Greatest Hits Over the Past Month (May 2021)
- Post #5205 Commentary: Youtube Temporarily Suspended the GML Guys on COVID-19 "Misinformation"
- Post #5175 Rant of the Day: In Defense of Amash From the Guys of GML
- Post #5202 Commentary: Some Thoughts After the Latest SCOTUS ObamaCare Decision
- Post #5179 Rant of the Day: Does the Economy Really Do Better Under the Dems?
- Post #5183 J
Entertainment
I mentioned in recent journal posts that Hallmark cable was starting its Christmas [Movies] in July, starting with Movies & Mysteries; I mentioned descriptions of some cable movies I like. This post I'll give more specific personal recommendations. The schedule can be found here. (You click on the day to get a pulldown of the schedule.. Note that some selections of my recommendations may be past by the time I post, but the titles are on rotation and may be available during the upcoming week at different times: (Note I may not be able to watch at some times for work/sleep schedules, etc.; this has more to do with identifying movies. Some promos for the films may be on the website.)
6/28
6/29
2 PM "Family For Christmas"
6/30
10 AM "Finding Christmas"
7/2
