Monday, June 22, 2020

Self-isolation Day 97.

Today is another holiday, Sagrado Corazón (Sacred Heart). It is a day of devotion to God’s love for humanity, as symbolized by a representation of the physical heart of Jesus.

Last night I played 5 games on Chess.com, winning 1, losing 3, and drawing 1.

There was some doubt as to whether our next day out was today or tomorrow. I checked with Glenn who told me it was today. Teresa seconded that after she talked to the doorman.

Teresa left at 10:30 to visit her mother.

I called Go Wings for lunch but they were closed so I used Rappi to order a medium pizza from Papa John’s. They told me exactly how much it costs, allowed me to add an additional 5mil tip and kept me apprised as to the progress of the order and its delivery. It arrived 1-hour later at the tail end of their time estimate. It wasn’t restaurant hot but it was still warm. I ate 5 pieces skipping the outer crust and kept 3 pieces for dinner.

Teresa called me at 4:30 and I met her at Exito in the mall at 5pm. She talked to a salesman about hooking up the water supply to the refrigerator, we bought some groceries and were back at the apt by 6pm. (I bought a new facemask, the surgery type, which should be more comfortable than my N95.)

Today Teresa and I drew at parcheesi 1 to 1.

 

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) said at a press conference on Monday that he is concerned the coronavirus is spreading at an "unacceptable rate" following the state's reopening, but that he would only support a second shutdown as a last resort.

Texas is well into its "phase 3" of reopening, allowing businesses to host up to 50% capacity. But the state outbreak is one of several that has seen a surge in infections in recent weeks, averaging more than 3,500 daily new cases and a positivity rate higher than 9%.

 

White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett is set to leave the administration, and he had some parting words in a Washington Post interview on Monday. "I think everyone should be worried about how this is going to turn out in the end, because it's a shock unlike anything we've ever seen," he said.

Hassett helped connect the administration's economic and health teams and coordinate their data analysis. He was also criticized for publishing a chart that showed coronavirus deaths dropping to zero by mid-May.

 

The Economist: In absolute terms, America has been the country worst affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Nearly 1.7m of its inhabitants have been infected, a number which is still growing by around 20,000 every day. On May 27th the country passed its 100,000th confirmed death. Such official death tolls do not necessarily capture all of the loss, and the real tolls in some other countries may be much higher than they seem. But America’s official figure is more than 20 times that, say, of China, the country where the disease originated. China is unlikely to have managed to hush up 95% of its deaths.

 

During a live public briefing on Facebook last month, "someone very casually suggested" the Los Angeles County's public health director should be shot, the director said.

"I didn't immediately see the message, but my husband did, my children did, and so did my colleagues," Dr. Barbara Ferrer said Monday in a statement.

It's just one of the many threats of violence public health workers are facing across the nation "on a regular basis" as the Covid-19 pandemic rages on, Ferrer said.

Across the US, many people have taken issue with guidance from health officials -- as the act of wearing a mask to protect others during a pandemic has become a political and cultural flashpoint.

 

South Carolina racial justice activists said they would postpone future demonstrations or move them online after at least 13 people who took part in previous protests tested positive for the coronavirus.

 

After months of lockdown in which outbreaks of the coronavirus often centered in nursing homes, prisons and meatpacking plants, the nation is entering a new and uncertain phase of the pandemic. New Covid-19 clusters have been found in a Pentecostal church in Oregon, a strip club in Wisconsin and in every imaginable place in between. 

In Baton Rouge, La., at least 100 people tested positive for the virus after visiting bars in the Tigerland nightlife district, popular among Louisiana State University students. 

At a Christian summer camp near Colorado Springs, at least 11 employees fell ill just before the season’s opening, leading the camp to cancel overnight stays for the first time in 63 years.

And in Las Vegas, just weeks after casinos reopened, a handful of employees from casinos, restaurants and hotels have tested positive, and frightened workers on Monday begged guests to wear masks in a news conference conducted over video. 

 

Former CIA director and defense secretary Robert Gates said Monday that the U.S. government is paralyzed by political polarization and careerism, which has allowed China, Russia and other rivals to make inroads internationally to America's detriment.

 

The US Secret Service on Monday evening told members of the White House press corps to immediately leave the White House grounds, a highly unusual decision that did not immediately come with an explanation.

The decision came during an ongoing demonstration in Lafayette Square, across the street from the White House where protesters were trying to bring down a statue of former President Andrew Jackson that stands in the middle of the park. Those protesters were eventually pushed back out of the park by police.

 

The latest Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll finds that 61 percent of voters say Biden would be better at solving issues of race and policing, compared to 39 percent who said Trump.

 

A Trump replay from March 26^th: Reuters revealed that the Trump administration cut CDC staff in Beijing by more than two-thirds over the past two years.

The US has 2,264,931  ð 2,291,237  ð 2,304,256 coronavirus cases with 119,701 ð 119,979 ð 120,128 deaths.

Per Medellin Guru, as of this afternoon Colombia has a total of 65,633   ð 68,652 ð 71,183 cases with 2,310 deaths.  Medellin has 1,181  ð 1,238 ð 1,278 cases, an increase of 40 from June 21^st to June 22^nd. Colombia’s rolling 6-day average of new cases is still on the increase, Medellin included. Envigado has a total of 65 cases, an increase of 2 from June 21^st to June 22^nd. As of June 22, Bogotá was the city in Colombia impacted most in Colombia by coronavirus with 21,541 cases, which was 30.3% of the total cases in Colombia.

Joke of the day

ALBERT EINSTEIN'S JEWISH MOTHER:
"But it's your senior photograph! Couldn't you have done something with your hair?"