100 24 26018 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/584ddaf016f92aef70dcb247cc910057.pdf 18855e2ea2afe68d0df8e33f1a5bdad5 PDF Text Text Day 395. Saturday April 10. by windoworks These are the daffodils (or jonquils) in Craig’s meadow. I thought this was a cheery way to begin this morning. ClickonDeetroit: MDHHS is currently tracking 991 outbreaks in counties across the state. Between January and March, there were 291 outbreaks associated with youth sports teams. Whitmer called on Michigan high schools to voluntarily return to remote learning for the next two weeks -- past spring break -- to bring down rising cases. She also called on youth sports to voluntarily suspend games and practices for two weeks. “I’m strongly encouraging Michiganders to avoid dining indoors and avoid gathering with friends indoors for two weeks,” Whitmer said. She asked Michiganders to get carryout, eat outdoors and wear masks even during small gatherings. “These are very tough things to do, and we do not make these recommendations lightly. But everyone needs to understand that if we can just pause some of these activities temporarily, it will go a long way to prevent the spread of the virus and save lives.” �Yesterday Michigan had 8,724 new cases. And as Dr Khaldun said: those are the cases we know about. The true number is closer to 3x that - 26,172. What does this all mean? As Eddie Murphy said in the movie “Bowfinger”: keep it together, keep it together, keep it together. In looking back at the last year I realized that I became comfortable with our daily routine, the highlight of which was a daily walk. But 2 weeks after our vaccinations, when we were fully vaccinated, I wanted more. I wanted to toss aside the comfortable, boring routine and get out there and do more!. I wasn’t scared anymore. Now it is so dire out there that I feel as though we are right back in the heart of it again. How could this happen? Who’s to blame? Because I need to blame someone. I’ve done everything I was asked to do and 2 months ago everything looked so hopeful. But unlike other Michiganders, we are leaving. Yesterday my daughter posted a photo of 11 family members, all seated at a long table in a restaurant, eating breakfast together. Not one of them has been vaccinated. They were not wearing masks. They were inside a restaurant. It is such an extraordinary photo. They shop in malls and grocery stores and gather on beaches. They attend indoor events where they do wear masks but they sit next to each other. Everyone (as far as I know) has an App on their phone for contact tracing. They get tested if they even suspect they might have Covid. I hold that image up in front of myself like the proverbial carrot and mutter: keep it together, keep it together, keep it together. The news around the world is mostly negative. President Biden continues to work hard on our behalf. Yesterday a truly dreadful story emerged about the Trump administration altering CDC coronavirus reports to make the virus seem much less of a threat and then celebrating their efforts. I can’t even. Remember I told you yesterday that they had been evacuating people from Bequia and other islands due to the imminent eruption of La Soufriere volcano? Washington Post The 4,049-foot La Soufrière volcano erupted on St. Vincent early Friday, sending a more than two-mile high cloud of ash billowing above the tropical Caribbean island just hours after surrounding communities were ordered to evacuate. Low visibility caused by volcanic debris was hampering the effort to transport residents to safety, officials said. Satellite images and photos shared on social media images captured a thick column rising from the active volcano that began erupting at 8:41 a.m. Plumes of brown ash and smoke drifted higher as they moved northeast, reaching at least 38,500 feet into the atmosphere, nearing the altitude at which many commercial aircraft fly. “The ash column is starting to fall back down around the volcano,” Erouscilla Joseph, director of the Seismic Research Centre at the University of the West Indies, told The Washington Post “It is possible that there will be some property damage. This could go on for days, weeks, or even months.” �So to finish up our day in Grenada. The United States invasion of Grenada began at dawn on 25 October 1983. The U.S. and a coalition of six Caribbean nations invaded the island nation of Grenada, 100 miles (160 km) north of Venezuela. Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury by the U.S. military, it resulted in military occupation within a few days. It was triggered by the strife within the People's Revolutionary Government which resulted in the house arrest and execution of the previous leader and second Prime Minister of Grenada Maurice Bishop, and the establishment of the Revolutionary Military Council with Hudson Austin as Chairman. The invasion resulted in the appointment of an interim government, followed by democratic elections in 1984. The country has remained under the USA's sphere of influence since then. Wikipedia ��This church was damaged during Hurricane Ivan in 2004, and the clock froze at the moment the hurricane hit. �Connecting the east and west side of St George's, Sendall Tunnel runs through volcanic rock and stands out as an engineering milestone for its time. Engineers began constructing the tunnel during the 19th century, in commemoration of the island’s governor, Sir Walter Sendall. The tunnel is approximately 106 m (350 ft) and roughly 2.7 m (9 ft) high. And no, we didn’t go through it. �Walking back to the ship through the rain. �St George at night �The large cruise ship sailing before our ship. Oliver �His �daycare formal photo shoot. Walking through the woods at Kirk Park. And this last photo is for all the family members who loved The Bean in Chicago: �I’ll leave it there, shall I? � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-10_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-395 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-10 Title A name given to the resource Day 395 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/621a0e338fa8770158c947ed37cecc37.pdf a472ab7cd4920fae0d50e58300a003b7 PDF Text Text Day 396. by windoworks This could be a doomsday edition of the blog. Its all about the virus. Virus Fatigue is the latest catchphrase. I understand this condition but just because we’re tired and want our lives back, doesn’t mean the virus is gone or even under control. To scare the pants off you, here is a comprehensive list of variants currently raging through the globe and the US. Washington Post 1. The New York variant (B.1.526) Where and when was it discovered? This variant, which was found in samples obtained as early as November, probably emerged in the Washington Heights section of New York, Fauci told reporters in March. By the middle of that month, this variant made up nearly half of the city’s new infections. Where is it? Officials have reported this variant in at least 14 other states, including Texas, Wyoming and Maryland, Bloomberg reported. 2. The South Africa variant (B.1.351) Where and when was it discovered? This mutation, also referred to as 501Y.V2, was found in South Africa in early October and announced in December, when the country’s health minister said the strain seemed to affect young people more than previous strains. This variant may have contributed to a surge of infections and hospitalizations across South Africa. Where is it? This mutation has been identified in at least four dozen countries. On Jan. 28, South Carolina officials announced that this variant had affected two people there with no travel history — the first instances of this strain identified in the United States. It has since been found in more than two dozen other states. 3. U.K. variant (B.1.1.7) Where and when was it discovered? This variant was first found in the United Kingdom, specifically in London and the nearby county of Kent, in September. It is sometimes referred to as the “Kent” variant. It has been spreading rapidly in Britain, Denmark and Ireland since December. Where is it? Dozens of countries, including the United States, have seen infections from this variant of the virus. It is by far the most prevalent variant of concern in the United States, with thousands of cases across the country. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a model forecast in early January that indicated �the variant could become the dominant strain in the United States by some point in March. A recent study showed this variant was spreading rapidly in the United States by early February. 4. The ‘Eeek’ mutation (E484K) Where and when was it discovered? This might best be described as a mutation within a mutation. It’s called E484K — or “Eeek,” as epidemiologists refer to it — and it’s appearing on some of the variants we describe below. It’s not brand new; it has appeared many times since the start of the pandemic, but experts have been concerned about it. It gained mainstream attention when it started to coincide with other variants that are more contagious. Where is it? Eeek has been seen in the variants first discovered in the U.K., South Africa and Brazil. It has also been detected in more than 200 samples of the virus sequenced in the United States since May. 5. The Denmark/California mutation (L452R) Where and when was it discovered? This mutation was detected in Denmark in March. Where is it? A variant with this mutation was found in California this winter and became dominant there over five months, eventually making up more than half of infections in 44 of the state’s 58 counties. This mutation has also been confirmed in several other states. 6. Brazil variant (P. 1) Where and when was it discovered? Sequencing studies found the variant in Brazil, mainly in Rio de Janeiro, as early as July. Researchers in Japan discovered it in travelers from Brazil in January. Where is it? It has been confirmed in more than two dozen countries, including Japan, Spain and New Zealand. On Jan. 25, Minnesota health officials confirmed the first U.S. case of this variant in a resident with recent travel history to Brazil. It has since been found in at least 18 states. 7. The original variant (D614G) Where and when was it discovered? This mutation, known to scientists simply as “G,” was discovered in China in January 2020. It soon spread through New York City and Europe. Where is it? The “G” mutation has become ubiquitous. By July, about 70 percent of the 50,000 genomes of the coronavirus uploaded by researchers worldwide to a shared database carried the variant. �Seven variants of concern. As everyone raced down to Florida or South Carolina or any of the southern states, many of them threw caution to the wind. They didn’t think about being asymptomatic and spreading the virus or a variant and they certainly didn’t consider hospitals being overwhelmed. Before the next concerning piece, here’s an item that will twist your brain; Okay. To rest your brain from that thought, here’s this from my home state, Michigan: The Guardian In Michigan, hospitalisations have soared and intensive care beds are being rapidly filled. An average of 7,226 cases a day were confirmed in the state last week, according to Johns Hopkins University data, �approaching record highs seen in November. Michigan’s public health system “is overwhelmed”, warned the state’s top medical official, Joneigh Khaldun. The surge has prompted Governor Gretchen Whitmer to urge people to restrict activities and wear masks and for schools to halt in-person learning. “A year in, we all know what works and this has to be a team effort,” the Democrat said. “We have to do this together. Lives depend on it.” Public health experts have blamed the rise in cases on on the spread of the highly infectious coronavirus variant B117, first identified in the UK, along with the relaxation of restrictions in the wake of dropping cases and the uptake of vaccines. Of course all Governor Whitmer can do is advise, caution, ask nicely and when that fails plead or beg. This is what happens when a group of Republicans successfully overturn the Governors powers. All she was doing was keeping us safe. I understand business owners going under and closing, but if all restrictions are lifted and most of the population fall ill, including your staff, you won’t be able to keep operating anyway. My favorite gluten free bakery recently closed for 4 days to refurbish their premises. Then they reopened to in house dining with great excitement and fanfare. And a week later they have closed inhouse dining and now operate with take out or outside dining only. Why? To keep themselves and us safe. The owner and his family had the virus late last year and the staff had to keep the curbside pick up going while the family isolated. So, in the meantime, we’re back to Craig as the shopper and we’re not socializing just yet. The exercise bike has gone to a good home and all the houseplants have been relocated. �Three of my African Violets settling in, in their new home. The remaining 3 collage windows have been taken down and stored for packing. The piano is leaving on Wednesday and in a flurry of excitement, we bought a new mattress for our bed, which is traveling to Australia with us. And no, we haven’t been reduced to sitting on deck chairs in the living room - but its coming. Yesterday Craig walked to Reeds Lake and took this gorgeous photo: �Next stop in the Caribbean: Terre-de-Haut. Terre-de-Haut is a commune in the French overseas department of Guadeloupe, including Terre-de-Haut Island and a few other small uninhabited islands of the archipelago (les Roches Percées; Îlet à Cabrit; Grand-Îlet; la Redonde). It is the most populous island of the archipelago of the les Saintes. The Fort Napoléon is located in this commune.Wikipedia �First, Craig explored the island a little bit. �The view from Fort Napoleon. �Exploring the fort ruins ��The view back to the town �Our ship. �A beautiful group of islands. More adventures tomorrow. Oliver. �Planting seeds at daycare. Today’s clothing theme is dinosaurs �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-11_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-396 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-11 Title A name given to the resource Day 396 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4a35a4bf58b9a63daf4c1faf3af34398.pdf fd9e5fe24dc061f1bd877d3fa4e02dfb PDF Text Text Day 397. 12 weeks exactly. by windoworks ��This was posted yesterday by my neighbor and although it had a different meaning for her, for me it represented the journey through the pandemic. Kent County’s positivity rate is 15.4% - that is, of all people tested 15.4% are positive. Ideally the positivity rate should be 5% or lower before reopening stores, schools etc. So no good news yet. This is a short post today. I have my 6 month check up for my eyes after the cataract surgery, and it always involves dilating my pupils, and then it takes hours for the dilation to wear off. Yesterday we drove up to Silver Lake. In the summer it is overrun with vacationers, but yesterday it was still quiet with most shops and restaurants closed. Once again, I had made our lunch and we ate it looking at the play of light on the sand dunes across the lake. ��After lunch we drove south a little along the lakeshore and stopped to walk through the dunes to Lake Michigan itself. The lake has been seriously undermining the dunes beneath the houses built close to the shore all up and down the coast and in the next photo you can see some attempts to shore up the house �foundations. On our way home we decided this was our last visit to this far north. Time is beginning to slip by and each day there are more items to be ticked off the list. Also yesterday we booked our airport hotel in Chicago because we will be there over the July 4 weekend and rooms were filling fast. Over the weekend, this happened: Washington Post; More than 100 chief executives and corporate leaders gathered online Saturday to discuss taking new action to combat the controversial state voting bills being considered across the country, including the one recently signed into law in Georgia. Executives from major airlines, retailers and manufacturers — plus at least one NFL owner — talked about potential ways to show they opposed the controversial legislation, including by halting donations to politicians who support the bills and even delaying investments in states that pass the restrictive measures, according to four people who were on the call, including one of the organizers, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a Yale management professor. While no final steps were agreed on, the meeting represents an aggressive dialing up of Corporate America’s advocacy against controversial voting measures nationwide, a sign that their opposition to the laws didn’t end with the fight against the measure passed last month in Georgia. �The online call between corporate executives on Saturday “shows they are not intimidated by the flack. They are not going to be cowed,” Sonnenfeld said. “They felt very strongly that these voting restrictions are based on a flawed premise and are dangerous.” Leaders from dozens of companies such as Delta, American, United, Starbucks, Target, LinkedIn, Levi Strauss and Boston Consulting Group, along with Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank, were included on the weekend’s Zoom call. This is a very interesting development. Along with the splintering of the Republicans into the Trump supporters and the rest, there is the unfolding scandal of Senator Matt Gaetz who appears to have indulged in sex trafficking, and the tone of the prosecution in the Derek Chauvin case. Many things seem to be unraveling. Out in the countryside around Grand Rapids there are still some Trump flags - on poles high out of reach in trees. Sad. No Caribbean cruise today, I’ll resume the cruise tomorrow. But here’s Oliver, of course. Threading this cord through the holes is very tricky. �I’m better at glueing stuff. (Look at the wild hair). �See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-12_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-397 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-12 Title A name given to the resource Day 397 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4ab772eb9df24a84d3798dc911bf932c.pdf ddbc2478f378800b7abc634f5f65c9bc PDF Text Text Day 398 by windoworks I’m happy to report that my eyes passed all tests and it will be another year before I have to have my eyes dilated again. My eye doctor was very surprised to hear that we weren’t allowed to visit Australia or New Zealand and that when we go, we will have to stay. I realize that because I read so much online news, I am more up to date on developments both here and overseas. Here’s the latest on the rising virus numbers: (CNN) As the US races to vaccinate more Americans, Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations are rising, predominantly among younger people who haven't yet gotten a shot. Some experts worry this might only be the start of what's to come in the next weeks. Michigan is already in the middle of a violent surge, and one epidemiologist says other states should be paying close attention. Michigan is really the bellwether for what it looks like when the B.1.1.7 variant … spreads in the United States," Dr. Celine Gounder told CNN on Sunday. "It's causing a surge in cases and it's causing more severe disease, which means that even younger people, people in their 30s, 40s and 50s are getting very sick and being hospitalized from this." The B.1.1.7 variant, first spotted in the UK, is now the dominant strain of the virus in the US. Experts say it's more contagious, may cause more severe disease and may potentially be more deadly. And it's rapidly spreading across the country. My friend Paul Lee, who owns The Winchester, Royals, Donkey and Hancocks has weathered the pandemic storm better than others. He is insistent on careful virus safety protocols at all 4 restaurants and was one of the first people to successfully set up take out options. During this 2 week period he has taken Governor Whitmer’s request to heart and has closed all indoor dining at his 4 restaurants. All 4 have outside dining alternatives which are carefully sanitized and then rested between customers. He is just one of local restaurant owners who also adhere carefully to all Covid recommendations and I am appreciative of their efforts on our behalf. We are still hesitant about dining outdoors at restaurants, but we will still try takeout from time to time. Here’s what Dr Fauci says about fully vaccinated people: Well, I can’t find the article again, but he said that fully vaccinated people must decide for themselves, but now is not the time to throw away your masks and try to recreate the Before Times lifestyle. �Speaking of cicadas, here’s another event expected in early to mid May. �Parts of the eastern and southern United States are about to witness a remarkable sight: billions of cicadas emerging from underground for the first time since 2004 to swarm outdoor spaces and share their loud collective mating calls. Periodical cicadas, as they're known, spend almost their whole lives a foot or two underground, living on sap from tree roots. Then, in the spring of their 13th or 17th year, mature cicada nymphs burrow out from the ground for a short adult stage, synchronously and in huge numbers. Really huge numbers. The insects climb up the nearest vertical surface, often the tree whose roots sustained them. They shed their exoskeletons and inflate their wings. Then, after a few days resting, recovering and waiting for their shells to harden, the mating begins. The frenzy is impossible to miss once the males start emitting their high-pitched mating song. That happens via sound-producing structures called tymbals on either side of their abdomen. "They may amass … in parks, woods, neighborhoods and can seemingly be everywhere," Michigan State University entomologist Gary Parsons explained in an MSU question and answer session on the phenomenon. "When they are this abundant, they fly, land and crawl everywhere, including occasionally landing on humans." The insects are harmless. They don't sting, bite or carry diseases, and they typically �don't come indoors, though they do gather on outside walls. "The only way they could get inside is accidentally flying in through an open door or window, or because they had landed on a person who then carried them inside unnoticed," Parsons says. Wow! And at that same time we are approaching bat season. In almost 19 years, we have had 2 incidents of bats inside our house. Here’s a myth busting piece about bats. ��After 5 years of discussion and dilly dallying, Brexit became official in Britain and 100 days in, things aren’t going so well. The Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol of the Brexit withdrawal agreement commits the UK and the EU to maintaining an open border in Ireland, so that (in many respects) the de facto frontier is the Irish Sea border between the two islands. Wikipedia. But unrest is beginning in Belfast, the capital of Northern Ireland. Here’s a look at Brexit so far: CNN: It’s been just over 100 days since Brexit began in earnest, and British exporters aren’t happy with how things are going. Trade with Europe has taken a major hit, with exports of goods to the European Union plummeting by more than 41% in January and recovering only modestly after that. The situation is especially dire for food exporters, who have seen exports all but wiped out by new trade restrictions. Now, businesses are asking the UK and the European Union to amend their trade agreement to reduce barriers. Some lawmakers, business leaders and economists have also announced an independent commission to scrutinize Britain's trade deals with Europe and the rest of the world. Well, back to the Caribbean. On his walk Craig saw a hen and chickens �And a goat with a baby goat (kid) �The church �The altar inside the church �The Mayor’s office �While he was exploring, I sat inside this cafe on the waterfront and read my book and drank tea �The beach by the wharf. Our next adventure in Terre-de-Haut tomorrow. Oliver. ��Tomorrow then. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-13_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-398 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-13 Title A name given to the resource Day 398 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/41ed689ab9889d96833da637dd16c58b.pdf a6e8dc148f58ccf5bec03bd45999b37f PDF Text Text Day 399. by windoworks This morning the piano will be taken away, so last night when Zoe and Oliver FaceTimed, Craig played one of Oliver’s favorite songs on the piano. It was hard to tell if he liked it or not. But then he ran and got his toy piano with attached book and played sounds that Craig mimicked on our piano. It was an interesting thing to watch. Oliver plays atonal music, sometimes almost melodic. Craig has high hopes of him being a wind instrument musician, but I think Oliver might be a pianist or a percussionist or maybe both. Who knows? We are almost halfway through the month, and the temptation to pack more things is looming. We seem to be waiting for the next development while trying to stay isolated. Its not that we think we’ll catch the virus, but its better to be safe. One concern I keep thinking about is how will it be in Australia with us fully vaccinated, and only Craig’s mother having received the first dose? This morning, among other issues of the day, people are worrying about the one shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine. To explain: What kind of vaccine is the Johnson and Johnson COVID 19 vaccine? The Johnson and Johnson vaccine is made by taking a piece of DNA from the COVID-19 spike protein and combining it with an adenovirus, a type of virus typically involved in a common cold. (source-CDC) This adenovirus is just a way to carry instructions to your immune system – it is genetically modified so that it cannot give you a cold. The piece of COVID-19 DNA also does not give you an infection. This vaccine helps your immune system recognize the COVID-19 virus, and develop antibodies to protect you from future infection. The blood clots that everyone is talking about are exceedingly rare. (CNN) Six people out of an estimated 6.8 million who got the shot have developed a rare and severe type of blood clot, leading the CDC and the FDA to recommend a pause of the single-shot vaccine. All six cases were among women between the ages of 18 and 48. Pfizer and Moderna vaccines work in a new way: MRNA vaccines teach our cells how to make a protein— or even just a piece of a protein—that triggers an immune response inside our bodies. The benefit of mRNA vaccines, is those vaccinated gain protection without ever having to risk the serious consequences of getting sick with COVID-19. CDC So here’s how I understand it: Pfizer and Moderna teach our cells how to recognize Covid and fight against it, while other vaccines such as J&J, use a tiny piece of the virus to trigger an immune response, which is the same theory as the annual flu vaccine. For some reason which I don’t understand, Pfizer seems to be developing into the gold standard and although Moderna has been used almost as much as �Pfizer and has the equivalent protection rate, no one seems to be discussing it. I have read recently that Moderna gives at least 6 months protection from the virus. Here’s today’s statistics: First up, the world. 137M recorded cases yesterday. Deaths: 2.96M. In the US, 77,312 new cases yesterday and 987 deaths. In Michigan where the Governor is relying on people to do the right thing, we had 10,083 new cases yesterday. This was the second day in a row of just over 10,000 new cases. I don’t think some people are doing the right thing. Seen on FB: Republicans scream 'Governor, trust us to do the right thing…!' Yeah, right, 400% increase in COVID cases in Michigan. From NPR: So, take a look around — at your walls, your bed, maybe even your desk, if you've been working remotely. Does your space stress you out? If so, you have company. It's why lots of people have been making their homes cozier, calmer and more efficient since the pandemic began. There's even a name for it: "comfort decorating." We definitely indulged in this. Now all those wonderful new things will be enjoyed by the new owners. Oh well. And a little good news: Crooked Media: Tribes across the country are racing to preserve more than 150 indigenous languages that became even more endangered when the pandemic hit, and are counting on funding in the latest coronavirus relief package to do it. Coronavirus has killed Native Americans at more than twice the rate of white Americans, and the loss of elders means the loss of first-language speakers with irreplaceable stores of cultural knowledge. Tribes and nonprofits that support language-preservation efforts now need to accelerate what was already a race against time. The American Rescue Plan includes resources to make that possible (over vehement GOP objections), with $20 million in federal grants to fund projects like creating dictionaries, digitizing language resources, training teachers, and developing online courses. Earlier relief programs for tribes were plagued with delays, but the new grants are structured in a way that'll hopefully get money out the door faster. So to finish our day on Terre-de-Haute, we signed up for a chocolate and rum class. We tried young rum, older rum, rum aged in a whiskey barrel. We learned that we had all been eating chocolate the wrong way all our lives. You don’t chew, you put in on the roof of your mouth and let it dissolve slowly. If you then breathe in slowly through your mouth and out through your nose, you get a more intense chocolate taste and smell. In tasting rum, we learnt to smell it, roll it around in the glass, tip the glass on its side to check its viscosity and then hold a sip in your mouth to savor the flavor, followed by a second sip to notice the �difference. We had one member of our party who drank everything straight down and then ate all his chocolates. �����We bought some chocolate and we wobbled back to the jetty to wait for the next tender back to the ship. Next stop St Lucia. Oliver �I’ll leave you with this: �Workers load an All-Star Game sign onto a trailer after it was removed from Truist Park in Atlanta last week. Major League Baseball plans to relocate the game to Coors Field in Denver. (John Spink/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/AP) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-14_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-399 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-14 Title A name given to the resource Day 399 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5ca56b1132e92b3b3c14e5f35fd3f057.pdf b50f6639d9e6c93561db6ef918f47c0e PDF Text Text Day 400. Excuse me while I just lie down for a moment. by windoworks What am I saying? I’m already lying down - well sitting down in bed, with my IPad on my lap, just exactly as I have for the past 399 days. I wake up, eat my same breakfast every day and then set up the iPad and think about what I want to write. And what I write almost never bears any relation to what I decided to write. No, I can’t explain that except to say its a process. Well yesterday the piano went to its next safe home. Here’s some photos: First, get the trolley underneath - much harder than they thought �Down the front stairs �Over the last step on to the sidewalk �And after 2 tries the 3rd was the charm at getting it up the ramp and into the truck. �Arriving at Vinecroft �Maneuvering it into its new home �Look Ma, no piano! �Here’s a long article with a lot of questions answered about the vaccines: Washington Post: Knox: Some of my readers have expressed concerns about news reporting that the vaccines are effective for six months — they have interpreted that to mean only six months. What should they know? Jha: They should know that six months is a floor not a ceiling. They’re effective for at least six months — and that’s because we only have six months of data. More realistically, these vaccines are going to be effective for at least a year and maybe multiple years. Knox: Anecdotally, there seems to be a lot of concern and confusion about whether getting vaccinated protects you from getting infected vs. getting sick, and whether a fully vaccinated person can still spread the virus. What do we know? Jha: It’s frustrating. Here’s what people need to know. Our vaccines, all three of them, provide a high degree of protection against all the variants that we have so far — not perfect, and some variants will cause some breakthrough infections, but they’re going to be infrequent. All the vaccines protect people from getting sick and hospitalized, to a very high degree, 98 percent, 99 percent. Nothing in life is 100 percent, I suppose, except for taxes and death. And all the evidence so far says that these vaccines are terrific at reducing transmission. Again, probably not 100 percent, but they probably cut transmission 80 to 90 percent, and possibly more than that. So: Great protection against all the variants, near-perfect protection against severe illness and death, and very high degree of protection against transmission. Knox: A few Trump voters have told me they don’t want anything to do with “an experimental vaccine.” Is there an argument, especially for healthy younger people, to hold off until we know more about longterm effects? Jha: No. And here’s why: These vaccines have been tested now in hundreds of thousands of people. The truth is that, with all the vaccines we’ve ever created, any significant side effects, health consequences of vaccines, tend to show up in the days to weeks that follow. One of the reasons [the Food and Drug Administration] asks for two months of follow-up before they would authorize [is] they knew millions of people would get it. I have no real concerns about long-term effects. That’s not how vaccines work. If they’re going to have a negative effect, you’ll see it in the weeks that follow at the most, maybe out to two months, but not much later than that. We’ve literally had tens of millions of people around the world who’ve been vaccinated for longer than that [and] we’ve not seen significant issues. I don’t think there’s any concern for young people. And then the other thing I would say is we know young people can have long-term consequences of covid, including long-covid, neurological and psychiatric complications. To me this is a no-brainer. Knox: You’ve long been an advocate for carefully reopening schools —since last summer, I think. Has anything about the coronavirus variants made you rethink that? �Jha: No, at this point, we know so much about how to do it safely that as long as schools are implementing those safety precautions — including universal masking, ventilation — and now that teachers and staff are all vaccinated, I really do think we can open schools safely this spring. Knox: I feel like the first time you and I talked about this, we were still debating mask-wearing and wiping down groceries. What would you tell readers about the evolving messages from public health officials? Jha: I think the key point is that, with a novel virus, we’re going to learn and we’re going to change recommendations based on what we learn. In fact, science has been learning more and more about how this virus spreads — it doesn’t spread through surfaces, it spreads through the air. And therefore, all the focus on wiping and deep-cleaning was largely misguided. So apparently we can stop wiping down surfaces and groceries (Phew!) but keep masking, distancing and washing hands. Now here’s something that happened on Monday night: NPR: It wasn't a bird or a plane that gave Floridians a shock late Monday night. It wasn't even Superman. A meteor shot across the sky around 10 p.m. Monday. Residents along the state's Atlantic coast from West Palm Beach south to Miami shared videos of the surprising sight on social media. Dashcam footage and security videos showed a still, dark night suddenly lit up by what appeared to be a large fireball streaking diagonally across the sky. In just a few seconds, it was over. According to NASA, an asteroid is a small, rocky object that orbits the sun. A meteor is what happens when a meteoroid — a small piece of an asteroid or comet — burns up upon entering Earth's atmosphere, �creating a streak of light in the sky. There's disagreement online over whether the Monday night visitor was the asteroid 2021 GW4 that was expected to make a close shave with Earth's surface Monday evening. Zach Covey, a meteorologist for a local CBS affiliate in Florida, wrote on Twitter that if the meteor seen Monday was indeed 2021 GW4, it likely flew much closer to Earth's surface than what was originally expected. Covey said the asteroid made its closest approach of roughly 9,300 miles. He tweeted, "To put this in perspective, most close approach asteroids are between 1 and 3 millions miles from earth." Did you see the footage? I did. Too close for my liking. I’m beginning to regret watching all those comets hitting the earth movies. I already regret watching the movie Contagion and also I really regret watching The Day After Tomorrow - that movie where politicians ignore scientists and the earth snap freezes. And can I just say - why do politicians seem to almost always ignore the scientists and then scream for help from those same ignored scientists? I think if someone can imagine something it becomes possible. Automatic sliding doors came about (I think) through the TV series Star Trek. I’m still waiting for teleportation - imagine not having to spend hours and hours in an airplane to reach the other side of the world. Okay. Next day in the Caribbean. Saint Lucia is an Eastern Caribbean island nation with a pair of dramatically tapered mountains, the Pitons, on its west coast. Its coast is home to volcanic beaches, reefdiving sites, luxury resorts and fishing villages. Trails in the interior rainforest lead to waterfalls like the 15m-high Toraille, which pours over a cliff into a garden. The capital, Castries, is a popular cruise port. ― Google �The Queen Mary 2 �Craig signed up for a hiking excursion �Among the �trees Climbing up �At the top! �Castries below �It was harder climbing �down Holding on to ropes to get down safely. Tomorrow we’ll have my St Lucia excursion. Oliver �The piano leaving the house marks the beginning of, ‘we’re really doing this, aren’t we?’ �Today I’ll leave you with this: � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-15_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-400 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-15 Title A name given to the resource Day 400 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2f31daa0544b652f6084384dffbda409.pdf 5a5f10a47a94866113b56f2be0d93151 PDF Text Text Day 401. (she, her, hers) by windoworks Just to make you laugh; Crooked Media: It’s been another brutal week of anti-trans bills advancing in state legislatures: Alabama and North Dakota lawmakers have approved trans sports bans, the Florida House has passed a bill that would subject student athletes to genital inspections, and the Texas Senate is considering a bill that would take children away from their parents if parents provided them with gender-affirming health care. A friend of mine just posted a story about their child who has decided that they want to be a boy. For the family it has been a life affirming journey filled with love and understanding. For some reason, some �Republicans think that transsexuals are making a choice. There is no choice here. We are talking about a decision that is difficult and painful and lays the person open to ridicule. There is (shock, horror!) actual scientific evidence which explains trans sexuality. When I say explains, I actually mean to another scientist or geneticist because although I read it thoroughly, I didn’t really understand it, but I could see it was scientific and logical. Years ago, my hairdresser, who was a gay man, gave me the clearest explanation of being gay. He said: its the same as eye color. You may want to be a brown eyed person and even if you wear brown contacts, underneath you will always be blue eyed. And thats the most profound thought: underneath, you will always be exactly who you are. What these bills are doing is forcing people to regard others true sexuality as a crime. I think that’s despicable. Last night we attended a 2 hour zoom retirement celebration for Craig. It was wonderful and sad and exhausting. Zoe, Asher and Oliver joined in, and Craig’s brother Drew was online also. It marked a major step in our journey. One of the most surprising items was a current student of Craig’s playing Craig’s fathers saxophone - and sounding spookily like him. To explain: after Gordon died, Craig inherited his tenor saxophone. He didn’t really play it because he has his own tenor sax. So after some discussion with the family, he sold it to his student who absolutely loves it. I feel as though we are leaving little bits of ourselves behind, here in the US, and I hope that’s a good thing. First something uplifting: Crooked Media: The Illinois House has passed a bill that would require public schools to teach AsianAmerican history. But I am including this next tidbit to demonstrate what a depth we have fallen to. In my entire life I could not imagine living in a society where this discussion took place (and in all seriousness). In the end, they built a gallows. Washington Post: In the weeks before supporters of then-President Donald Trump assaulted the U.S. Capitol, TheDonald.win forum commenters debated how best to build a gallows for hanging — or simply terrifying — members of Congress deemed disloyal. What kind of lumber? What kind of rope? And how many nooses? A user named “Camarokirk” had a different suggestion: “I think you should build a guillotine,” he wrote Dec. 30. “A guillotine is more scary.” User AsaNisiMAGA countered with a practical concern: “It’s better symbolism in every way. But it might prove more difficult to get that big blade into town.” Such conversations flowed freely and visibly on TheDonald.win for weeks, underscoring the openly violent intent of some of the thousands of Trump enthusiasts who thronged the Capitol on Jan. 6, as well as the intelligence failures of the authorities charged with preparing for that day. The clashes left five people dead, including a Capitol Police officer. �Michigan continues to be the leader in catastrophic numbers of virus cases. Access to vaccinations is open to all 16+ and there is even a new do-it-yourself online appointment app. It makes no difference to Craig and I if the state is locked down or not. We continue to practice the same safety protocols and we live mostly isolated. No one is asking to see our vaccination cards although I imagine that is coming. And so we come to the end of our last day of the Caribbean cruise:. While Craig was hiking, I went to the Castries Waterworks Reserve where I boarded an Aerial Tram for a ride through the tropical canopy. �At this moment I was a bit �nervous. �Cameras clicking everywhere �Up through the tree �canopy And out at the top before turning and descending again. An incredibly beautiful, calming and quiet experience. I loved it. �Afterwards we walked through the gardens and this hummingbird drank from the feeder as I watched. �Our cruise was over and it was time to head home. Oliver ��� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-16_BenjaminPamela_Pd-Day-401 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-16 Title A name given to the resource Day 401 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e4ea99bf3247032b472120277f6bd86c.pdf 28d19b173b1fe999879cb7739b6225dc PDF Text Text Day 402. Saturday April 17 (she, her, hers). by windoworks Just sayin’. Everyone seems worried about variants, how long the vaccination will last and what to do here in Michigan where the numbers keep increasing. Kent County has a positivity rate of over 17%. There is an argument about whether Michigan should be locked down again or whether we should give up and let everyone decide for themselves. I read the above post from the Kent County Health Department and I wonder: who is going to follow those rules? Everyone is worrying about breakthrough infections (infections of the fully vaccinated). The number is tiny - less than 1%. Here’s this to reassure you: NPR: Once we reach herd immunity and circulation levels drop, breakthrough infections will become even rarer. When was the last time you worried about getting diphtheria or pertussis? The vaccines that prevent them have similar efficacy rates — 97% for diphtheria, and a range between 71 and 98% for pertussis — as the COVID vaccines. Here’s some other news items: Crooked Media: A 19-year-old gunman shot and killed eight people at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis on Thursday night, and wounded several others before taking his own life. The gunman was a former employee of the facility, �and his mother warned law enforcement officials last year that he might try to commit “suicide by cop.” The authorities put him on an “immediate detention mental health temporary hold,” according to the FBI, and confiscated a shotgun that was not returned. It’s not yet clear when or how he got his hands on a rifle, but Indiana doesn’t require a background check, training, or a permit to carry one, so not too much mystery there. Thursday marked the third mass shooting in Indianapolis this year, and at least the 45th mass shooting for the U.S. in the last month. President Biden has renewed his calls for Congress to pass gun-control legislation, which will not happen until Senate Democrats end the filibuster. The 45th mass shooting for the US in the last month. A week or so ago, Oliver’s daycare had a safety drill. This time they told the children there was a tiger outside trying to get in. Oliver’s 20 months old - and now he knows what do to for an active shooter lockdown. I found that disturbing. Washington Post U.S. sanctions to be announced against six Russian companies that supported cyberattacks on federal agencies, companies. The measures, which also include the expulsion of 10 Russian diplomats, are an effort to make good on President Biden’s vow to hold Moscow accountable for malign actions, including the hacking operation commonly known as SolarWinds, which compromised nine federal agencies and about 100 private firms. Yesterday in retaliation, Putin expelled 10 US diplomats. I see the name calling has already begun. The Chinese government, having taken over Hong Kong and enforcing restrictive laws there, is now eyeing Taiwan.Its hard to say what the legal position of Taiwan actually is, except that there is push for independence. Meanwhile, this happened just over 3 months after January 6. Washington Post Founding member of Oath Keepers becomes first defendant to plead guilty in Capitol riot cases. Jon Schaffer, 53, of Indiana has agreed to cooperate against others in the domestic terrorism investigation that has led to charges against more than 400 people, according to court filings. He pleaded guilty to two felony charges: obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress and trespassing on restricted grounds of the Capitol while armed with a deadly or dangerous weapon. There was also the meeting of an inaugural group of Republicans whose ideology seems to echo White Supremacy and the Ku Klux Klan. A white supremacist is a person who believes that the white race is inherently superior to other races and that white people should have control over people of other races. Miriam-Webster. And if you were wondering: �The Ku Klux Klan was (and still is) a viciously racist white supremacist organization that first arose in the South after the end of the Civil War. Its members opposed the dismantling of slavery and sought to keep African Americans in a permanent state of subjugation to whites. The reason behind this was that this allowed the whites to make an enormous amount of money. If you had slaves, you didn’t have to pay them, because you owned them. They were your property just the same as a dining table or bed. As well as money, it gave the slave owners power. Two extremely addictive items. I always wonder why my skin color is referred to as ‘white’? I think I’m closer to pink, but I guess pink people doesn’t hold the authority of white people. Humans come in an enormous range of colors, but we are all exactly the same inside. I could give you sound scientific reasons for differing skin colors, eye shapes, hair colors etc - but you can look that up for yourself. I think the important thing is that we are all the same inside. Oh, and I read this and I thought this was something we should consider carefully: a group of scientists have cloned a human/monkey fetus. They say they are doing this for spare parts. I think I read a fiction book about this. Beings bred for spare parts. I hope the Scientific Ethics Board will struggle with this. No flashback today. I need to organize my photos first. Oliver ��I’ll leave you with this: � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-17_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-402 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-17 Title A name given to the resource Day 402 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/aebcb949a01a48162604dd2d792cf224.pdf 5d3921abc075b2906ef59afc4a6acd99 PDF Text Text Day 403 First up: by windoworks ��Queen Elizabeth sits in strict Covid isolation during the funeral. New York Times: A somber farewell to Prince Philip. Queen Elizabeth II said goodbye to her husband of more than 73 years, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, at his funeral on Saturday at St. George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle. The Rev. David Conner, the dean of Windsor, noted Philip’s life of service and “his unwavering loyalty to our queen.” The ceremony was a subdued affair, with only 30 royal family members in attendance. All eyes were on Prince William and his brother, Prince Harry, looking for a slight easing in the family rift; the two walked out of the chapel together. Philip’s coffin, transported in a Land Rover Defender, custom-made to his specifications, was lowered into the vault beneath the chapel. The funeral marked a poignant dress rehearsal for the far more consequential passing of the queen. She turns 95 on Wednesday. Craig and I watched most of the ceremony yesterday. It was a perfectly coordinated affair, as only the British monarchy can do. In Before Times it would have been a massively orchestrated, daylong event. People would have lined the route of the coffin, standing in silence. The service would have been broadcast live as well as a jumbo TV in nearby Kensington Gardens. Everything would have been draped in black. The entire Royal Family would have walked behind the coffin, but probably not the Queen. It brought to mind Diana’s funeral. Who can forget the wail of sorrow as the coffin carried on a gun carriage came out from Kensington Palace? �Yesterday’s funeral was very quiet and respectful. 4 singers (3 men and one women) sang beautiful songs, 4 buglers played the Last Post and 4 Fanfare trumpeters played a funeral fanfare. One of the most emotional moments for me was the lone piper near the end of the service who played a lament. Such a talented piper. Like all Royals, Phillip was entombed in a lead lined coffin. This preserves the body better. I’m not sure why you would want to preserve Phillip’s body - but it certainly explains the strain on the coffin bearers faces. Prince Charles, the heir to the throne, is 72 years old. He is now assuming his father’s position of helper to the Queen. There is endless discussion if she will abdicate in favor of Charles. I would be surprised. The Queen views her role as a lifelong one and Charles will only become King on her death. For years now, there has been discussion about the role of the Monarchy and the drain on the economy. The British Monarchy is known as a constitutional monarchy. This means that, while The Sovereign is Head of State, the ability to make and pass legislation resides with an elected Parliament. Although The Sovereign no longer has a political or executive role, he or she continues to play an important part in the life of the nation. Here’s a brief explanation of the role: As Head of State, The Monarch undertakes constitutional and representational duties which have developed over one thousand years of history. In addition to these State duties, The Monarch has a less formal role as 'Head of Nation'. The Sovereign acts as a focus for national identity, unity and pride; gives a sense of stability and continuity; officially recognises success and excellence; and supports the ideal of voluntary service. The pandemic is far from over anywhere in the world. Michigan continues to be an appalling hot spot, red zone, call it what you will. Last week in nearby Hudsonville, the Education Board held a meeting where they had to lock the doors because they couldn’t fit any more of the 50 parent protesters in the room. The parents were protesting the school mask requirement. They protested because their children, who are attending face to face classes, have to wear a mask inside the school buildings. I can’t even. The Guardian: The US state of Michigan saw 8,955 new Covid-19 cases as of Friday, marking “the second highest single-day case total in Michigan since the start of the pandemic”, ClickOnDetroit reports. Michigan has now seen 779,777 confirmed Covid-19 cases, with 16,771 deaths, and leads the US in new infections. In an article in the Wall Street Journal, there is a discussion about being honest about our pandemic feelings. The author wrote: I think it’s OK to talk about this. We should feel comfortable acknowledging vulnerability, conceding our doubts. Admitting struggle doesn’t make you a whiner; it’s quite the opposite, it’s a ferocious display of �strength. I’m hopeful that a year sequestered will turn us into more empathetic listeners, overpowering the judgment economy, which is still in full, cruel bore. How hard is it to listen? And then they went on to talk about how we will all be as the end of the pandemic nears. Still: it’s not going to be instant. It’s not going to feel like flipping a switch. Hidden traumas abound. I presume we’re all a little different now. How can we not be? This past year has challenged everyone in unforeseen ways, and a lot of us are just coming to terms with it. There are probably changes still imperceptible. Hopefully, some of the change is for good. How lovely would it be if we all got a little more forgiving of each other, and of ourselves, too? How beautiful would it be if we all became better neighbors? Patience remains important. So does grace. The road may be opening up, but the road remains long. Who knows when the pandemic will end? When herd immunity is reached? When the whole world is vaccinated? When you try to consider those questions, you quickly realize there isn’t an answer. In the end, there is only hope. BY EMILY DICKINSON “Hope” is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops - at all And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard And sore must be the storm That could abash the little Bird That kept so many warm I’ve heard it in the chillest land And on the strangest Sea Yet - never - in Extremity, It asked a crumb - of me. Oliver �See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-18_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-403 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-18 Title A name given to the resource Day 403 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/182b252708606eba86af1e76b4501b40.pdf 7a8e958a17ada0d7f1c8ea08d33aebf5 PDF Text Text Day 404. 11 weeks left. (she, her, hers) by windoworks Its been an emotional morning. Zar (my son who works at Stuff.co.NZ) sent a link about the trans Tasman Bubble opening between Australia and New Zealand with no quarantining. There were videos which I sobbed through. A koala and a kiwi hugging. There were drag queens. There was interpretive dancing. And there was a whole lot of Dave Dobbyn. After more than a year apart, Kiwis and Australians were eager to roll out their welcome mats to those crossing the ditch on the first day of the trans-Tasman bubble. Airlines and airports on both sides of the ditch celebrated the occasion with gusto, with Air New Zealand serving up 24,000 bottles of bubbly, and Wellington Airport painting “welcome whānau” in enormous letters at the end of the runway. �Whanau means family, but family in the widest sense of the word. Melbourne Airport decided to share its excitement for the quarantine-free travel arrangement through the medium of interpretive dance, with a troupe of masked dancers using clear balloons to symbolise the bubble. Travellers arriving into Sydney Airport were also in for a visual spectacle, as they were greeted by a group of drag queens. �A traveler posing with the drag queens. Meanwhile in Auckland, those waiting in the arrivals hall for their loved ones on the first flight into New Zealand were treated to a marathon performance of Dave Dobbyn’s Welcome Home/Nau Mai Rā. Jetstar had its own tribute on display at Auckland Airport – a table draped in both the Australian and New Zealand flags, with a pavlova placed on top. Following the arrival of the plane, airport and airline bosses came together for a ceremonial cutting of the cake. Passengers arriving into Wellington on Air New Zealand’s first flight from Sydney were immediately greeted by the faces of their loved ones, on a giant screen that showed people waiting in the arrivals hall. �In other news, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter successfully flew on Mars. The first time an aircraft has flown on another planet. Think about that. In the clamor of other news, the significance of this is enormous. What will we do next? I am presenting this next piece because it gives me so much hope. New York Times: A vaccinated person’s chances of getting Covid are about one in 11,000. The chances of a getting a version any worse than a common cold are even more remote. But they are not zero. And they will not be zero anytime in the foreseeable future. Victory over Covid will not involve its elimination. Victory will instead mean turning it into the sort of danger that plane crashes or shark attacks present — too small to be worth reordering our lives. That is what the vaccines do. If you’re vaccinated, Covid presents a minuscule risk to you, and you present a minuscule Covid risk to anyone else. A car trip is a bigger threat, to you and others. About 100 Americans are likely to die in car crashes today. The new federal data suggests that either zero or one vaccinated person will die today from Covid. It’s true that experts believe vaccinated people should still sometimes wear a mask, partly because it’s a modest inconvenience that further reduces a tiny risk — and mostly because it contributes to a culture of mask wearing. It is the decent thing to do when most people still aren’t vaccinated. If you’re vaccinated, a mask is more of a symbol of solidarity than anything else. Coming to grips with the comforting realities of post-vaccination life is going to take some time for most of us. It’s only natural that so many vaccinated people continue to harbor irrational fears. Yet slowly recognizing that irrationality will be a vital part of overcoming Covid. “We’re not going to get to a place of zero risk,” Jennifer Nuzzo, a Johns Hopkins epidemiologist, told me �during a virtual Times event last week. “I don’t think that’s the right metric for feeling like things are normal.” After Nuzzo made that point, Dr. Ashish Jha of Brown University told us about his own struggle to return to normal. He has been fully vaccinated for almost two months, he said, and only recently decided to meet a vaccinated friend for a drink, unmasked. “It was hard — psychologically hard — for me,” Jha said. “There are going to be some challenges to re-acclimating and re-entering,” he added. “But we’ve got to do it.” And how did it feel in the end, I asked, to get together with his friend? “It was awesome,” Jha said. �The US has gone mad. Here’s evidence: CNN: Shootings across the US made for a harrowing, heartbreaking weekend of gun violence. Three people were killed and three injured in a shooting at a Kenosha, Wisconsin, tavern. A person of interest has been located and is facing a charge. In Austin, Texas, three people were killed after an apparent “domestic situation,” and the suspect -- an ex-sheriff's detective -- is still on the run. In Columbus, Ohio, one person was killed and five wounded in a drive-by shooting at vigil for a gun violence victim. The US has recorded at least 50 mass shootings since the Atlanta-area spa shootings on March 16, which left eight �people dead. We’re also learning more about last week’s Indianapolis shooting, in which police say a 19year-old killed eight people at a FedEx facility. The suspect legally bought the two assault rifles used in the attack after he'd been investigated by the FBI due to his potential for violence. ��The jury is now deliberating in the Derek Chauvin trial. The country is holding its breath, waiting. On December 27, 2019, we boarded a cruise ship in Fort Lauderdale. We sailed into the edge of a storm and it was rough sailing for all the next day. On the morning of the 29th we docked at Grand Turk. Grand Turk Island is the capital island of the Turks and Caicos archipelago, in the Atlantic Ocean. It’s dotted with the remains of salt ponds and windmills from the island’s sea salt industry, prevalent from the 17th to 20th century. The 19th-century Grand Turk Lighthouse is perched on a rocky bluff in the north. Beaches with clear water ring the island, which is home to wild horses and donkeys. ― Google �Carefully docking the �ship Ready for the day �Yes, I did have to walk all that way to our �bus Thank goodness for no windows. It was so hot! �This is a replica of Friendship 7 flown by John Glenn. Friendship 7 made it's water landing �close to this island and the flight was tracked from this island. Look at that gorgeous water and those golden sands. More Grand Turk tomorrow. We have booked our hotel in Chicago and in Grand Rapids. This weekend we cleared out the garage and the basement and most things went to a new happy home. Best moment: the little boy who got the desk chair on wheels and rode it down the road to his house. This morning our new mattress arrives. We’ve reached the ‘there’s something to do every day’ stage and the more that leaves the house, the emptier it is and the more it echoes. Oliver �Watering the seeds. �Stay safe. Its crazy out there. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-19_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-404 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-19 Title A name given to the resource Day 404 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/cfa41a590a48524beeb4a53450465e0c.pdf 712ca294687206ca5aee4b7fd37f49bf PDF Text Text Day 405. (she, her, hers) by windoworks Its amazing what a difference a new mattress makes! This first piece is alarming: CNN: India has reported six consecutive days of more than 200,000 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total over the last week to a staggering 1.5 million. The country now has the second highest number of coronavirus cases in the world, ahead of Brazil, which reported over 13.9 million cases (the US has 31.7 �million cases). However, nonstop cremations in India -- the grim consequence of coronavirus deaths -have led some to believe India’s official Covid-19 data is understating the crisis. Meanwhile, the US State Department announced it will update its travel guidelines to more closely align with CDC recommendations. That means approximately 80% of countries worldwide will now fall under the highest travel advisory level, Level 4: Do Not Travel Perhaps it is time to look at the history of plagues/pandemics. Craig has given the following summary to both his classes and asked them to think about the consequences of our present pandemic. I am reprinting this with permission from Dr. Craig Benjamin: How Pandemics Change the World. Historians who study epidemics realize that these events always lead to great changes. Here are some historical examples to help you think about some of the possible longterm impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. Antonine Plague – Rome and China (165-180) 15 years altogether. • Smallpox; brought back to Rome by soldiers campaigning in Iraq • Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus died from the virus (hence the name of the plague) • Two distinct outbreaks over 15 years, with a ‘plague-free’ period between • Greco-Roman physician Galen wrote first ever ‘scientific’ description of symptoms • Helped push Roman Empire into the chaotic crisis of the early third century • Same plague hit Han China – contributed to the collapse of the Han Empire Plague of Cyprian – Roman Empire (250-270) 20 years altogether. • Yellow fever or Ebola; broke out in Ethiopia and spread to Rome via Egypt • Devastated city of Rome and the empire for two decades • At its peak 5000 people were dying each day in Rome; depleted Roman army and caused massive labor shortages • Cyprian, Christian Bishop of Carthage, wrote a detailed description of symptoms • Christians were scapegoated, but impact on pagan society was worse • Christians responded in a more thoughtful way in how they buried their dead • Pagans feared that this plague marked the end of their world • Half a century later Christianity was officially recognized in the Roman Empire, so this plague had a dramatic impact on the entire ideological framework of the ancient world Plague of Justinian – Byzantine Empire (541-549) 8 years altogether. • Bubonic plague; developed in Africa, traveled to Constantinople via Egypt • Named after Byzantine Emperor Justinian who contracted the plague but survived • Historian Procopius recorded that at its peak the plague was killing 10,000 people per day in Constantinople �• Killed 25-60% of population of Europe • Agriculture sector collapsed and prices of grain soared • Byzantine government’s response was to increasingly rely on monastic infrastructure • Huge impact on Christian ideology; monasteries developed hospitals, and Christianity quickly became a religion of philanthropy, which it has been ever since Black Death – Europe and Middle East (1347-1351) 4 years altogether. • Bubonic plague; spread from Eastern to Western Eurasia via Mongol Silk Roads • Carried by fleas that traveled on rats • Mongol siege of Genoese colony of Kaffa in Crimea helped spread plague to Europe • Once in Europe virus aerosolized and spread rapidly • Killed 75-200 million; Florence and Northern Italy particularly hard hit • So many laborers died this led to end of feudalism and transition to a wage labor system • Italian intellectuals turned away from Medieval obsession with death and religion, focused instead on the values of liberal humanism; led directly to the Renaissance • E.G. Petrarch and Boccaccio; both survived the plague and used this to create the first great works of Renaissance literature; artists followed their lead Influenza Pandemic – Global (1918-1920) 2 years altogether. • Mutation of influenza virus; started in trenches of Western Front and spread globally • First global pandemic; affected everywhere on earth (including Arctic, Pacific Islands) • Killed 50-100 million people; my grandfather contracted the virus in the trenches but survived • High infection rate and severe symptoms; mortality rate of 10-20% of those infected • Came in a series of waves • Killed a huge percentage of heathy 18-40-year-olds (e.g. in one day in 1918, 80 out of 400 workers in one US textile factory died) • Led to huge labor shortage; so surviving workers demanded better wages and working conditions; forced governments to enact labor welfare policies like workers comp • Also changed gender composition of the workforce; contributed to 19th amendment giving women the vote • Culturally led to the Roaring 20s – economic boom, movies, radio, jazz age, urbanization, Charleston, endless parties, Gatsby, flapper fashions, sexual revolution Covid 19 Pandemic – Global (2019-20..??) who knows? • Ongoing global pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome) • First detected in Wuhan China in December 2019; spread rapidly around the world • As of late-April 2021 has killed 3+ million people • Led to massive global social and economic dislocation; but also to remarkable breakthroughs in vaccine science �• Also led to a plague of misinformation, fake news and conspiracy theories • Revealed massive racial and geographic inequalities in access to health care • Massive impact on cultural performances (drama, music etc); and on religious services • Largest interruption to sporting events and education (at all levels) since WWII • Longer term impact? How will this current pandemic change the world? I am reminded of the saying - the more things change, the more they stay the same. And just in case you thought things were getting better: (CNN) The Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta says its Asian small-clawed otters tested positive for the virus that causes Covid-19. The aquarium announced on Sunday that it tested the otters after they showed "mild respiratory symptoms including sneezing, runny noses, mild lethargy, and coughing." The seven creatures are being cared for off-exhibit. Despite being geriatric, they are improving and expected to make a full recovery, the aquarium said. "Our Asian small-clawed otters are under very close monitoring by veterinarians and animal care team members," Dr. Tonya Clauss, vice president of animal and environmental health at Georgia Aquarium, said. "We are providing supportive care as needed so they can eat, rest and recover." It turns out that cleaning surfaces is nowhere near as important as good ventilation. In Australia, a family of 3 in quarantine caught the virus. After lightning speed investigation, it appears (however unlikely this seems) that they caught the virus through the shared ventilation system with the infected people in the �adjacent hotel room. So, new, safer quarantine quarters are being sought - with (I hope) independent ventilation systems. Excuse the language, but a fair point. I misspoke yesterday about the Derek Chauvin trial. Yesterday the court heard closing arguments before the jury retired to deliberate. They were asked to bring a suitcase of clothes as they will be sequestered until they reach a verdict. Personally, I thought what the defense presented was weak. Grand Turk. We were talking about this excursion yesterday and Craig asked me why I was wearing a backpack. Then we remembered that I had volunteered to be an attendant on the excursion, so I had a backpack with emergency supplies in it. Because they were working on the main road, we had to travel over small side roads which were in an appalling condition. �Wild horses were everywhere and they are protected. �The deep blue line on the horizon is where the shelf stops and the deep ocean trench begins. This trench is the Turks Islands Passage. The trench is 30 miles wide and over 7000 feet deep. �Wild donkeys - also protected. �A chance to stretch our legs and unkind our �backs. The Grand Turk Lighthouse More Grand Turk tomorrow. Oliver. �Today, I’ll leave you with this. Stay safe out there. �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-20_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-405 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-20 Title A name given to the resource Day 405 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/429c8a2830437b991d3f18b74ddfc80d.pdf 13f9f9a4ccc97a83e87ae2ddf36aa208 PDF Text Text Day 406. (she, her, hers) by windoworks Yesterday I watched the judge in the Derek Chauvin trial open a manila envelope and read the jury’s verdict. They found Chauvin guilty on all 3 counts. The judge then polled each juror and asked is this your decision? We couldn’t see the jury but we could hear each ‘yes’ response. Then to confirm it, the judge asked the jury to confirm their judgement as a whole - to which all said yes. Chauvin looked curiously blank throughout this. Of course he was wearing a mask, but his eyes showed no emotion. He was handcuffed and taken to jail to await sentencing. There is much more I could say about this and the resulting Black Lives Matter movement which echoed around the world, but it has all been said by so many others. Here’s an interesting piece from the New York Times: The murder conviction of a police officer is an exceedingly rare event. There have been only seven murder convictions of officers for fatal police shootings since 2005, according to Philip Stinson of Bowling Green State University. That suggests the chances of a killing by the police leading to a murder conviction are about one in 2,000. Yet a jury in Minneapolis yesterday convicted Derek Chauvin of second-degree murder (as well as two other charges) for killing George Floyd last May. A typical sentence for that felony in Minneapolis is 12½ years in prison, although prosecutors have asked for more and the maximum is 40 years. A judge will sentence Chauvin in about eight weeks. Chauvin’s conviction does not automatically signal a new era of police accountability. The Floyd case was the exception of all exceptions. A video, watched around the world, showed Chauvin pressing his knee onto Floyd for more than nine minutes. That footage led to weeks of protests that were among the largest in U.S. history. And at the trial, the so-called blue wall of silence — that is, many officers’ willingness to protect colleagues, regardless of their misbehavior — crumbled. “For so many, it feels like it took all of that for the judicial system to deliver just basic accountability,” President Biden said late yesterday. There were 3 other officers present at George Floyd’s arrest and deadly restraint and not one of them said or did anything to stop Chauvin. For their complicity, they are awaiting trial in August - and I don’t think its looking good for them. And here’s the final word from Crooked Media: Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison neatly summed up the significance and limitations of Chauvin’s conviction: “I would not call today's verdict justice, however, because justice implies true restoration. But it is accountability, which is the first step toward justice.” George Floyd is still gone, and police officers across the country continue to inflict violence on Black Americans while shielded from consequences. Today’s verdict brought a measure of accountability; we’ll stay on the streets for justice. And from Stephen Colbert: “Today is one stop on a journey that began last May and led to protests calling for that accountability in every town and every city in America. But this is just one stop. There is more work to be done, and it’s �work that all of us should be committed to, because as Ben Crump, the Floyd family lawyer, reminded us today, justice for Black America is justice for all America.” Last night I watched President Biden talking about the conviction and I felt he was talking from the heart and he was talking to me. Of course, Biden sometimes misspeaks and he is nowhere near perfect, but I don’t think that is what you want in a leader. I think you want a person who shoulders responsibility, tries to do their best every day, and cares about the people under their sphere. To my mind, so far, Joe Biden fits that description. He is working to turn things around, and here are two important steps: CNN: The largest coal miners union in America is backing President Joe Biden’s $2 trillion green energy plan. It may seem like a case of strange bedfellows. But the coal industry would benefit from the Biden proposals to rebuild bridges, ports and airports -- likely boosting demand for steel, which typically uses coal as a key ingredient. The infrastructure plan also calls for expanding access to broadband in rural areas where many coal mining communities are located. The president of the United Mine Workers of America also said the plan would create lots of new job opportunities. In a completely different infrastructure realm, the Biden administration kicked off a 100-day effort to beef up cybersecurity in the nation's power grid, calling for industry leaders to install technologies that could thwart attacks on the electricity supply. This comes after a cyberattack in Florida that sought to compromise a water treatment plant. I was going to post the statistics for yesterday, but at some point the numbers become meaningless. For Michigan and Kent County, there seems to be a slight easing of numbers of new cases (average cases per day down to 6,000+, rather than 7,000+). Are we over the hump? I don’t know. Now the authorities are battling vaccine reluctance in young people. CDC: Since COVID-19 vaccine distribution began in the United States on Dec. 14, more than 211 million doses have been administered, fully vaccinating over 85.3 million people or 25.7% of the total U.S. population. However on a global scale, things are not so good. Washington Post: Global coronavirus cases have reached their highest levels yet, and the consequences of this surge are especially dire in India, which accounts for a third of new infections worldwide. Hospitals there are overwhelmed. A cremator in the Indian city of Surat told The Post his facility receives 100 bodies a day, five times more than typical, and the round-the-clock use has melted steel pipes in two of the crematorium's six chimneys. It's possible the 250,000 daily cases in India could double within a month, one biostatistician said. Melted the steel pipes. Wow! And from Crooked Media’s Light At The End Of The Email:New Jersey will join 19 other states and Washington, DC, in offering an “X” gender identifier on driver’s licenses. Okay, so Grand Turk: �There was a church service going on inside. Everyone was dressed in their best clothes and �the singing was wonderful. We could have gone in, but all of us just peeked through the door. I took this photo mostly for the Pianist parking sign. When your church services involve fabulous singing, you need to treat your pianist well. �Craig went swimming. I think I might have �waded. This cactus closely resembles the red fez worn on a Turkish man’s head - and is the reason for the island being named Grand Turk. My mind just wandered off and thought about Grand Beret or Grand Bonnet or Grand Helmet or ..... �As you can see, I didn’t cross the yellow line on my way back to the ship. �Craig lecturing onboard. �Oliver �Walking with Great Aunt Bernie. �Its freezing out there. No, I mean literally freezing. Wear a mask. Get vaccinated. Stay safe. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-21_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-406 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-21 Title A name given to the resource Day 406 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6145ee64694f79dcbe2620602c282e45.pdf b548d4ad82ad723a809d505b77459c59 PDF Text Text Day 407 by windoworks I’m writing later today because I had to have a medical appointment this morning. We are back to no visitors allowed as the Covid variant is causing a surge in Michigan. It is funny how you get used to having your temperature taken with that thermometer gun which doesn’t actually touch your forehead. And then you sit in a carefully spaced out seat in the waiting room. But the big news of the day is that this is Craig’s last day of teaching at Grand Valley State University. He is giving a zoom keynote address in a week or so, and he has to buy himself a new Mac laptop and then return the college one to GVSU. I think his students have come to terms with him leaving and most of his colleagues are have accepted his retirement. It will be odd, but in some ways it allows us to concentrate on all the tasks going forward. Its still all about the virus. India is not doing well: Washington Post: India on Thursday recorded the world’s highest number of new coronavirus infections in a 24-hour period since the beginning of the pandemic, reporting a staggering 314,835 cases, as a surge tears through communities and inundates the nation’s hospital infrastructure. The single-day case count surpasses a previous record set by the United States, when more than 313,000 infections were reported on Jan. 8, according to data compiled by The Washington Post. The massive outbreak in India has been blamed on more contagious variants of the virus, as well as an early relaxation of restrictions and a slow-moving vaccination campaign. It seems to me that Michigan may have crested the peak and is beginning to descend the other side. Of course we have July 4 looming before us, but hopefully more people will be fully vaccinated by then. The new big concern is children aged 6 months to 16 years. Pfizer has asked for FDA clearance for their vaccine for 12 -15 year olds. Moderna has asked for permission to conduct the following trial: Moderna announced that the first participants have been dosed in the Phase 2/3 study, called the KidCOVE study, of mRNA-1273, the Company’s vaccine candidate against COVID-19, in children ages 6 months to less than 12 years. Each participant ages two years to less than 12 years may receive one of two dose levels (50 μg or 100 μg). Also in Part 1, each participant ages six months to less than 2 years may receive one of three dose levels (25 μg, 50 μg and 100 μg). An interim analysis will be conducted to determine which dose will be used in Part 2, the placebo-controlled expansion portion of the study. Participants will be followed through 12 months after the second vaccination. Vaccine effectiveness will either be inferred through achieving a correlate of protection, if established, or through immunobridging �to the young adult (ages 18-25) population. Evaluation of vaccine safety and reactogenicity is also a primary endpoint of the study. Their plan is to begin vaccinating all children 6 months to under 12 years by early 2022. Now the biggest problem is anti-vaxxers. President Biden has begun calling it ‘your patriotic duty’ to be vaccinated. What the diehard Republican holdouts doesn’t understand is that Trump is already fully vaccinated. He received his first shot before he left the White House. So here’s my question: if he kept insisting that the virus was nothing - why did he get vaccinated? There is information surfacing that Trump was much sicker with Covid than anyone realized. His lungs showed some lung infiltrates (associated with pneumonia) and his oxygen level went down to the 80s. Those are 2 indicators of severe Covid. He was given the best medication available and some oxygen. There was some talk of putting him on a ventilator. Will we ever know if this is the truth? Probably not. Crooked Media: A Nebraska study on asymptomatic coronavirus infections in schools suggests that school infection rates may be higher than we thought. In the first phase of a pilot program that screened students and staff without symptoms weekly, participating schools had infection rates that were two and a half times higher for staff and nearly six times higher for students at schools using conventional, limited testing. The program also found school infection rates that were 10 times higher than reported within the surrounding counties. The study didn’t look at whether those infections were contracted at school or brought in from outside, but the findings make pretty clear that ramping up proactive testing at schools should be a priority either way. Meanwhile, in other news: CNN: President Biden kicks off a two-day virtual climate summit today with 40 of his foreign counterparts to discuss ways to combat the climate crisis. The White House is hoping the event will reassert America’s climate credibility, which was fractured in recent years. Biden will back up the efforts by revealing an aggressive new pledge to halve US carbon emissions, hoping other countries will follow. Meanwhile, the Senate confirmed Vanita Gupta as associate attorney general after Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski broke ranks to join Democrats in the 51-49 vote. And Vice President Kamala Harris cast her first tie-breaking vote related to a Biden administration nominee, voting to advance the nomination of Colin Kahl as the Pentagon's undersecretary for policy. And: WASHINGTON, D.C. – Senator Debbie Stabenow was selected to receive the prestigious Bryce Harlow Award, which honors an elected official whose career is built on championing the principles of integrity, dedication and professionalism — echoing the work and life of the late Bryce Harlow. In their announcement, the Bryce Harlow Foundation details Senator Stabenow’s work as a leader in creating jobs, supporting American workers and lowering the cost of health care. �The new big thing is vertical forests. Verticale in Milan. I’m guessing that is vertical wood or forest in Italian. This is the Bosca �In China The benefits of vertical forests are already well understood, and include sequestering carbon, producing oxygen, reducing the heat island effect, providing sound deadening, improving the building's energy efficiency, and adding protection to the envelope. The Bosca Veritcale in Milan is tended by full time gardeners who are lowered down the buildings on ropes. Is this our future? And on this note, I am so pleased to report the Gardeners World has resumed on TV and we have watched the first few episodes. One of the most telling segments was about a female TV presenter, whose husband fell so ill last year with Covid, that he was put into an induced coma by the medical staff. Meanwhile, she was isolated at home with her children, and to keep their spirits up, they began transforming their backyard into a garden. They grew flowers, herbs and vegetables, all with the hope that Daddy would be home soon - and how excited he would be to see their garden. In last week’s episode, Gardeners World returned to see how the family were doing. The garden was just starting to wake up after winter, but the husband was still in hospital in an induced coma - a year later. I felt so bad for her, but she was managing to smile and to keep going. Such grit. Our next stop in the Caribbean was Samana, in the Dominican Republic. Samaná (Santa Bárbara de Samaná) is a town on the Samaná Peninsula, in the Dominican Republic. It overlooks Samaná Bay, which �plays host to thousands of humpback whales during winter’s mating season. Nearby, the Whale Museum's prime attraction is a huge whale skeleton. The town's waterfront promenade, the Malecón, has restaurants and bars. In the bay, Cayo Levantado is a tiny island known for its palm-lined beaches. ― Google First up, Craig’s expedition. It took an hour in a fast speedboat to cross the bay from the port to the Samana National Park. Samana Bay in a national park at the eastern edge of the Dominican Republic. These are limestone outcrops that rise out of the bay. �The outcrops have been colonized by rainforest and a huge variety of �birds. Rainforest and seabirds everywhere �Extensive mango swamps which are tidal. �There is a cave complex in which early indigenous peoples created cave art. These are �wading birds images drawn by the Taino People - more than 1,000 years ago. �Exploring the caves with our �guide �An image of a face carved into the soft limestone by pre-Columbian peoples. On the way back in the speedboat there was a torrential downpour and Craig and his companions got soaked. More tomorrow. Oliver �Oliver peeping into the worm habitat. He said ‘There’s the worm! Hi �wormy’ �See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-22_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-407 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-22 Title A name given to the resource Day 407 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b3b48c76dce4ebf3df58f67db0caf86d.pdf 6402522ec2e01045898933ed06dd90d2 PDF Text Text Day 408. (she, her, hers) by windoworks To begin today, here is a photo of Auckland, New Zealand on a beautiful fall morning. Auckland is built on 53 dormant volcanoes and this photo was taken from the top of one of them. You can see the island of Rangitoto in the distance - another dormant volcano. I always thought most volcanoes were extinct (and some are) but more are just dormant. Rangitoto is Māori for 'Bloody Sky'. New Zealand really is a beautiful country and if they ever open their borders again to tourists - its more than worth the flight time. And that’s the big question starting to occur to everyone. The CDC posted a 4 page summary of countries, most of which were tagged Level 4: do not visit. A scattering of countries were tagged Level 3: use caution, Australia being one of them. But this is academic - nobody can visit Australia or New Zealand as a tourist at this time, or a number of other countries such as Japan. The US is currently leading the world in vaccinations with 40% of all Americans having received at least one dose. And speaking of vaccinations yesterday when I had my mammogram, the woman asked me which arm I had the vaccine in. I answered the left arm and asked why. She said the doctor wanted to know. The answer is in the next item, but my results came back as normal by lunchtime - a record of efficiency. I know this piece is long, but its worth reading. AARP If it has been at least two weeks since you received your last dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, �congratulations! You are now considered “fully vaccinated.” You are armed with our best weapon against a virus that has killed more than 2.6 million people worldwide and upended our lives in unimaginable ways. 1. You still need to wear a mask Even though COVID-19 cases are down from their peak in January, the coronavirus is still circulating in the U.S., and new and more contagious variants have emerged. So wearing masks and social distancing are still important in helping slow its spread until we can reach herd immunity — when an estimated 70 to 85 percent of the population is vaccinated. 2. You could still catch COVID-19 This is the other reason experts don't want you to put aside your mask just yet. Although all three vaccines authorized for emergency use in the U.S. were found to be highly effective against severe disease and death from COVID-19, there's still a chance you could get infected with the virus. The whole point of a vaccine is that it prevents you from dying or ending up in the hospital. But you may still get sick. 3. You could infect someone else There's also a small chance that you could get infected with the virus and not even realize it, and then you could transmit it to someone who is not vaccinated. 4. You can visit friends and family Fully vaccinated people can gather indoors with others who are also fully vaccinated, without wearing masks or physical distancing if you choose, the CDC says, because the chance of anyone getting infected would be remote. You can also spend time inside with unvaccinated people from a single household without wearing masks or physical distancing if you choose, the CDC says, as long as no one is at increased risk for severe COVID-19 disease and no one lives with somebody who's at increased risk as well. That means you can visit (and hug!) your unvaccinated children and grandchildren 5. You don't have to quarantine after exposure You do not have to quarantine or get tested after an exposure to someone with the coronavirus, as long as you aren't experiencing any symptoms, the CDC says. If you develop a cough, fever, shortness of breath, diarrhea or other symptoms of COVID-19, however, you should get tested. 6. You should keep your vaccine record card handy In the future, you may need proof of vaccination to travel, work in certain industries or attend large events. Several other countries already have a validation system in the works, and a number of private companies in the U.S. are working on creating a digital passport that would include your vaccination status. Obviously, your vaccine card is your main proof right now. �7. Travel is still discouraged Even though the number of airline passengers has been rising, the CDC continues to recommend against travel, even for those who are vaccinated. In explaining the decision on March 8, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said: "In terms of travel, here's what we know: Every time that there's a surge in travel, we have a surge in cases in this country. We know that many of our variants have emerged from international places, and we know that the travel corridor is a place where people are mixing a lot. We are really trying to restrain travel at this current period of time, and we're hopeful that our next set of guidance will have more science around what vaccinated people can do, perhaps travel being among them." 8. It's a good time to go to the doctor or dentist Countless Americans put their health care on hold due to the pandemic. Now that you're vaccinated, it's time to schedule that colonoscopy, dental cleaning or elective surgery you've been putting off. Being vaccinated, now is the safest it has been to have surgery in well over a year. The only screening you may want to hold off getting right away is your mammogram. Many women develop swelling in the lymph nodes in their underarm after vaccination, the CDC says. Although the swelling is a normal sign that your body is building protection to the coronavirus, it could cause a false mammogram reading. For that reason, some experts recommend waiting four to six weeks after you are fully vaccinated to get a mammogram. 9. You may need a booster shot There are two reasons we might need a booster shot: If our immunity wears off naturally or if the virus changes so much that the immunity we have from the current vaccines proves inadequate. Chances are that we will have to get some kind of COVID-19 shot on a regular basis, perhaps once every three years or every year, like the flu shot. 10. A return to normal hinges on herd immunity Before life can get totally back to normal, experts say that first we need to reach herd immunity — when enough Americans are vaccinated to significantly slow the spread of the virus. Estimates of when we will reach that point range from this summer to early 2022. Factors that will affect that timeline include the percentage of Americans willing to get the vaccine, how quickly a vaccine for children is authorized and how well the vaccines work against more contagious variants of the virus. And speaking of vaccinations: Washington Post Except for a lull during winter storms, vaccination rates had climbed steadily in the United States. Until now. The seven-day average of daily coronavirus vaccinations dropped by 11 percent when compared with the previous week. Half of all eligible Americans have had at least one dose, and demand may be �easing despite the millions who are not yet vaccinated. Health experts say the next phase of vaccinations will be more tailored, such as door-to-door administration and targeted outreach to communities. Sadly, after an entire year of almost normal living, Perth in Western Australia is locked down for at least 3 days due to a small number of virus cases but with possible larger community spread. Now, for something different: Feadship's new superyacht Project 817 is guided through the canals of Holland while en route to the North Sea. Courtesy Tom van Oossanen Imagine living in one of those houses that border that canal! So, the next morning we sailed into Jost Van Dyke in the British Virgin Islands. Jost Van Dyke is one of the main islands in the British Virgin Islands, which are part of a volcanic archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. The island is known for its yacht anchorages, like the sheltered bay at Great Harbour. Casual bars and restaurants dot the sandy beaches here and at nearby White Bay. Bubbly Pool, a naturally foaming sea pool, is in the island’s northeast. ― Google. It seemed to be mostly a party island to me. �Sailing into the harbor �We drove up over the winding hilly road to the far beach �Everyone was partying �We walked to the far end to wade in the water �Looking down at another beach on our way back to the ship. Oliver ��Last night we had take out dinner from a local Japanese restaurant. We toasted the end of Craig’s teaching career here in the US with a bottle of sparkling wine. The end of an era. See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-23_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-408 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-23 Title A name given to the resource Day 408 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/34b6d3ce45a23212c9c402f09e4d446c.pdf 4db1504e5d2b58ab068fa94b54f205d6 PDF Text Text Day 409. Saturday April 24. (she, her, hers) by windoworks Remember that piece from Craig which described the history of pandemics? It was actually written for both his classes, and this week, they gave home their answers. To remind you, here’s his questions: Longer term impact? How will this pandemic change the world? I have cherry picked the answers. And remember, these answers are from 1st year Honors students, who see the world significantly differently to many of us. The responses are divided into headings. Health and Science We will increasingly apply mRNA vaccine science to other illnesses. We have a greater understanding of how illness affects others. We used to praise kids and workers for going to school/work when they were sick – soldiering on! Now we understand how dangerous this was. Telehealth will become the norm. So much more awareness of personal space! Mental Health Increased self-reflection has led people to think about meaning of life for the first time in a long time. In the future there will be a greater appreciation of what is really important in life. For so many people being alone has revealed mental health problems they never realized they had. More people will need therapy in the future. People will struggle with interpersonal relationships in the aftermath of the pandemic. Human Activities/Culture The benefits of the ‘Anthropause’ will lead to great environmental awareness. More people have developed hobbies, become more creative. We have found so many work arounds for education and entertainment. But we have also realized how precious human interaction is. Many symbolic milestones are no longer important (graduating high school/college etc) We might also see a turn to religion. People will want to spend money on concerts etc. as soon as they are available, because who knows how long this will last! We will be better prepared for the next pandemic (authors note: will we?) We will become more dependent on technology for interpersonal communication in future. Politics/Cultural Divide Racial/cultural divide revealed by the pandemic will only widen. Spread of conspiracy theories because of isolation has exacerbated cultural divide. Because of the pandemic, GenZ has realized that it is important who you vote for at all levels. Presidents �matter, governors matter, city mayors matter. Remote voting must expand because of pandemic; we need an election month, not a day! Education Technology has saved education during the pandemic. Online learning will only become more important in the future. Plus there will be no more snow days! How will lack of social interaction impact children’s social skills in the long term. Will they lose the ability to talk face to face? Because of expansion of online learning many school buildings and infrastructure will become redundant. More education will be online, but not feasible for elementary school – this must be F2F. Pandemic will further widen the educational/economic divide. Robots will be programmed as teachers. Economy/Work Pandemic could lead to weakening of US economy and influence, and the rise of Chinese influence. Developing world will be further set back by the pandemic. Remote work has allowed for a reset of work/life balance. Companies will have to take this balance more into account in the future; provide better facilities at work; perhaps 4-day work week. Businesses will become more efficient, will cut unnecessary expenses (e.g. business trips will be greatly reduced). Many businesses have realized that various departments and workers are redundant in their search for increased efficiency More work will be outsourced; more will work from home. Workers will be increasingly replaced by disease-resistant AI. Office buildings will be emptied. Pandemic will speed up the death of malls and retail stores. Many new industries have developed because of the pandemic (Zoom etc). Many people have worked out how to make good money out of social media (influencers, Tik Tok etc.); plus there are many more private investors in the stock market. Astonishing increase in marketing through social media influencers and TikTok stars. Paid time off if sick must increase; US must adopt European practices for sick days. The whole world will become more digitalized. Crypto currency will expand, leading to a cashless society. Most shopping will be online in the future. Increased respect for essential workers, including grocery workers, who will be paid appropriately. Technology Social media was sometimes ridiculed by older generation; now everyone realizes its value. �Increasing reliance on social media for inter-personal communication. But at the same time, we have come to realize the importance of genuine inter-personal contact. Responses collected from my first year Honors students April 21/22 2021 Its interesting that the most responses was to the Economy/Work section. One of the students who works in a mall at a clothing store, said she spends hours cleaning the store and steam cleaning the clothes that people have tried on. In another example outside of these classes, a friend of mine who owns 4 restaurants has igloos for diners. Each igloo is cleaned thoroughly after the diners have left, and then left for an hour before new diners sit in it. What a huge new workload on retail and the food industry! I cannot imagine trying on clothes or shoes inside a store - and the thing about online shopping is that if it doesn’t fit, you can send it back and have your money refunded. (I learnt that in this last year). Here’s an update from Washington Post: During the 2020 campaign, Trump repeatedly claimed electing President Biden would trigger a depression. That hasn't happened. Republicans warned of a stock market collapse under Biden — instead, the Dow Jones rose more after Biden's election win than it did after Trump's. And Republican attacks on the $1.9 trillion pandemic stimulus package have resonated little beyond the GOP base. And a quick news roundup: just days before his hunger strike would have killed him, Alexey Navalny, the Opposition leader, has ended the strike. He was able to see a doctor from outside the prison where he is being held. The Perseverance rover converted carbon dioxide into oxygen on Mars, marking the first time breathable air has been made on another planet, NASA announced Wednesday. Debris from an Indonesian Navy submarine that disappeared this past week with 53 people aboard has been found deep in the Bali Sea, confirming fears that the vessel sank and cracked. And finally, Russian troops began pulling back to their permanent bases Friday after a massive buildup that caused Ukrainian and Western concerns. Yesterday I listened to a panel on NPR talking about the length of the pandemic. The biggest problem continues to be vaccinations. It is fantastic that the US is actively planning ways to vaccinate everyone, including the most reluctant. Yesterday Dr Adam London, Kent County’s Chief Medical Officer, encouraged us all to talk to friends, neighbors and relatives and convince them to be vaccinated. He asked us to post on social media once we were vaccinated under the heading: #sleevesup. It is more than 6 weeks since Craig’s and my second dose. The panelists said, the problem was that many countries are unable to secure enough vaccine doses to significantly vaccinate their population. Its a problem because Covid-19 loves a fresh unvaccinated population to infect, multiply and mutate. They had no answers just the stark evidence of the problem. And this is where the answer to the question how much longer will this pandemic lastresides - as long as it takes to vaccinate at least 75% of the world’s population, before a more serious mutation appears. To me, the answer to the question: will we wear masks in social situations for the rest of our lives? Is probably yes, here in the US. �Caribbean cruise: We sailed away from Jost Van Dyke and spent the next day sailing to St Lucia. It was New Years Eve and to enjoy our sumptuous dinner, we had to wear these party hats. �I liked �mine. �Craig wasn’t so sure. There was music and dancing after dinner on the pool deck. �And then it was midnight with champagne. A new year begins. Castries tomorrow. Oliver �Nearly always smiling. �Today I’ll leave you with this from Carl Sagan. Worth thinking about. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-24_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-409 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-24 Title A name given to the resource Day 409 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/764dbef8c5220067d7fed8badd4167ec.pdf 8bdfce87fda396073a7af3183f34087c PDF Text Text Day 410 by windoworks Oh, I can really relate to this. In 9 weeks today we move into a nearby hotel, while we pack up the house and our furniture etc., is packed into container and shipped back to Australia. We are still not confident that our flights will go, but we are moving forward anyway. �In Michigan virus news, the positivity rate has dropped to 6.8%. This is still high but nowhere near as high as it was. The graph of new cases shows a steady decline and the weekly average of new cases has dropped to 5,000+. I am cautiously optimistic, but we have been here before. We’ll see. Yesterday we put out assorted electricals such as lamps, fans, a rice cooker etc. Everything went except a bedside table and an extraordinarily large and heavy window I was once given from another artist. It had resided in the basement and I think Craig struggled to move it anywhere. We have empty bookcases all over the house and rooms are getting so empty of bric a brac that the whole house echoes. I have begun emptying out drawers and making ruthless decisions. Of course, some items have been packed long ago and they are just too hard to find again, so although I know I own them, I’m learning to do without them. Here’s some news from the outside world: New York Times: India now accounts for nearly half of all new Covid cases in a global surge. But experts say the number is just a fraction of the virus’s real reach in the country. As Indian officials reported nearly 350,000 new infections on Saturday, a world record, hospitals are unbearably full, oxygen supplies are dangerously low and people are dying in line waiting to see doctors. The sudden surge in recent weeks has cast doubt on India’s official Covid-19 death toll of nearly 200,000. Reports from cremation grounds, above, suggest a far greater number. India’s crisis is wreaking havoc on �the global vaccination effort, especially in Africa, after the government in Delhi restricted exports of doses to deal with its own outbreak. Now the U.S. is under pressure to release vaccine supplies that Indian vaccine makers say they need to expand production. And tucked away was this gem: Crooked Media Some amazing vaccine news that’s gotten lost in the shuffle of all the amazing vaccine news: A new malaria vaccine looks like a breakthrough. The vaccine, developed by Oxford University's Jenner Institute (of AstraZeneca vaccine fame), showed up to 77 percent efficacy in a trial of 450 children in Burkina Faso over 12 months. It’s the first shot to reach the WHO’s goal of a malaria vaccine with at least 75 percent efficacy. If it’s proven to be safe and effective in a Phase III trial, it could save a whole lot of lives: Malaria sickens around 230 million people a year and kills around 400,000, the majority of whom are children under age five. For over a year now, we have been coping with the global pandemic. But other concerns are now being addressed, such as the climate crisis. During Trump’s presidency he refused to acknowledge the climate crisis and he removed the US from the Paris Accord. President Biden has worked extraordinarily hard to address the problems left behind by the Trump Administration. Here’s a piece about addressing the climate crisis from the New York Times: President Biden’s climate goals carry a big risk — or a big potential payoff. Scientists say that his pledge to cut America’s climate warming emissions in half by 2030 is technologically feasible and ecologically imperative. The speed of the economic transition away from fossil fuels, however, risks exposing vulnerabilities in the nation’s electricity system and unsettling its transportation sector. But the rewards could be high: lower risk of catastrophic climate change, new jobs and renewed global leadership for American companies. Separately, a major U.N. report to be released next month will declare that slashing emissions of methane, the main component of natural gas, is far more vital than previously thought to ward off the worst effects of climate change. We are wondering if the conviction of Derek Chauvin was a one off or was this the tipping point? (noun) the point at which a series of small changes or incidents becomes significant enough to cause a larger, more important change. For generations, the American criminal justice system has operated by an old playbook in cases of police violence. The case of George Floyd upended that. Instead of dissecting his background, Floyd was presented as a full person.Derek Chauvin, who declined to take the stand and was convicted in Floyd’s murder, remained an aloof figure, shown on video kneeling on Floyd’s neck for nine and a half minutes. Some prosecutors saw Chauvin’s trial as a turning point in how Black victims are portrayed. Others found �it to be an exception. We’re also watching developments out of Elizabeth City, N.C., where seven sheriff’s deputies were put on leave after they shot and killed Andrew Brown Jr., a Black man, on Wednesday. The governor called for the release of body-camera footage. On our last excursion in Castries on our first Caribbean cruise, I had gone on the aerial tramway and Craig had gone on a trekking and climbing excursion. For this visit I chose a chocolate making course. Castries was a popular destination as you can see by the 4 cruise ships docked �A governors house? Someone important anyway �The gorgeous view from the chocolate factory �All ready with our aprons �on �Our table helper grinding my cocoa beans for me. It was a long and tedious business. The other table - no one is looking at the view �My chocolate bar after resting in the fridge. �There was a wonderful gift shop which we wandered around while waiting for our chocolate to set. We drank some strong Rum Punch - although the ladies from South Carolina needed some extra rum in their drinks. I really enjoyed this excursion, we had so much fun. I often wonder how such tourist spots have been doing over the past year? We don’t hear much from the Caribbean. Here’s the latest from the CDC - Level 4: COVID-19 Very High Travelers should avoid all travel to these destinations. I couldn’t copy and paste the map but here’s the link: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/travelers/map-and-travel-notices.html#print Oliver. Oliver visited Mick who lives upstairs and met his pet snake Pearl. He then sat at Mick’s electric piano and tried to play something but ended up dancing to some recorded music. �Look! He’s even got his hands right! �If you haven’t already, go and get vaccinated. That’s all. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-25_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-410 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Day 410 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/95afd3e132c4399c4c02568d92b9b645.pdf 0fd955225b76424f0077474022cc2578 PDF Text Text Day 411. 10 weeks left. by windoworks Some mornings I feel just like this. When I was 13 my mother died after a long battle with cancer. Two weeks after the funeral, my father sent me to boarding school, about 3 hours drive away. For someone who had never had to share a bedroom, to be in a dormitory with 30 other girls and sharing a cubicle with a stranger, was very difficult. My father had promised my mother on her deathbed, so what else could he do? I am telling you this because I am reminded now of how those first weeks dragged. Finally, the matron in charge (a large, overbearing woman in a white nurses uniform and cap), looked at me sympathetically and told me to buy the biggest calendar I could find and to cross off the days. Did it help? I don’t remember. But last week I made Craig find the biggest calendar (which turned out to be a really small one), so I could cross off the days. But I have reached that awkward place. I am trying to keep going until we safely leave and I am also becoming sadder each day at leaving our friends. Yesterday, Craig put a couple more things outside and they have all gone except the wooden high chair that a house plant sat on. Craig did try to break it up, but it turns out that it was very sturdily made. My neighbor commented to his wife that we must have nothing much left in our house, as he watched all the furniture etc come out. He’s right and I never realized how depressing empty bookcases and built in shelves can look. �We also realized that in 9 weeks time we will become nomads. Eventually we will have a new house, but from early July to perhaps September or October, we will be living with relatives. Craig is deep in discussion regarding a mortgage with an Australian bank while trying to sort out retirement details here. I have found myself looking at things and thinking: I must fix that - and then I remember, this isn’t my house any more. Here’s some news from India: CNN: Countries are pledging aid to India as it fights a deadly pandemic wave. India today reported 352,991 new cases and 2,812 virus-related deaths, marking the world's highest daily caseload for the fifth straight day. Covid-19 cases have risen astronomically in India since March. In response, the US will deploy supplies and support, including ventilators, PPE and rapid diagnostic test kits. The UK, Germany and neighbor Pakistan, as well as tech giants Microsoft and Google, have also pledged supplies and relief. And here’s one of the reasons why India is faring so badly, from New York Times: Confident they had beaten Covid, government officials relaxed restrictions on virtually all activities, including weddings, political rallies and religious gatherings. The northern town of Haridwar held one of the world’s biggest gatherings this month, with millions of people celebrating the Hindu festival Kumbh Mela. Meanwhile in Michigan: New York Times: The vaccinations of older people do not explain rising hospitalizations among people younger than 60, including those in their 20s and 30s. Public health experts say the outbreak — driven by the B.1.1.7 variant of the virus, which is more contagious and more severe — is spreading rapidly in younger age groups. And across the state, doctors and nurses are increasingly reporting a concerning trend: Younger patients are coming in more often with serious cases of Covid-19. “I am putting more patients in their 20s and 30s and 40s on oxygen and on life support than at any other time in this pandemic,” said Dr. Erin Brennan, an emergency room physician in Detroit. Dr. Olusola Ogundipe, an infectious-disease fellow, said he noticed that some of his younger patients also had a tougher time emotionally with their condition. “They have a feeling of immortality,” he said, “and so I think it does take younger people by surprise.” And I really don’t understand why people don’t get this: New York Times:“The restrictions were our pause button,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “As soon as you press play, you are going to see the virus race back as quickly as it can.” �And moving off the virus topic, here’s an interesting piece from CNN: A North Carolina sheriff says he wants body camera footage of Andrew Brown Jr.'s fatal shooting to be made public and will file a motion for it as early as today. Brown, a 42-year-old Black man, was shot and killed Wednesday by sheriff's deputies as they tried to serve him with an arrest warrant. Meantime, body camera footage of a police shooting last week in Virginia has been released. An unarmed man named Isaiah Brown was shot by a sheriff's deputy about an hour after the same deputy gave the man a ride home. These incidents, along with last week’s police shooting of 16-year-old Ma'Khia Bryant in Columbus, Ohio, are casting even more scrutiny on police practices at a time when calls for police reform are ringing through the country. Capitol lawmakers are expressing optimism that bipartisan cooperation on a police reform bill may lead to real results. This better be the tipping point! During my chocolate class, Craig did some hiking: Beautiful beaches to swim at. �At Fort Rodney looking out at the Martinique Passage many naval battles were fought in this passage in the 18th and 19th centuries. ��This sailing ship followed us around the Caribbean. Saint Kitts and Nevis tomorrow. Oliver. Yesterday when we FaceTimed, Oliver was very upset. Zoe had been cutting his fingernails and she accidentally nicked the skin on one. He wouldn’t let her put a bandaid on it, so Craig pretended he had an owie and put a bandaid on his finger. Zoe got one on Oliver’s finger but eventually after shouting ‘off’ he got it off himself. By that time it had almost stopped bleeding. So we were able to cheer him up by singing some of his favorite songs and he forgot about his finger. �The speed demon. Thats it for today. I’ll leave you with this: �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-26_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-411 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-26 Title A name given to the resource Day 411 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2d48a2b556bf393a408fdaf0823b5c0c.pdf d9b14f2f0d0c1dd7a95887a8f1e1c18d PDF Text Text Day 7,459. 0h all right – day 412. by windoworks My mother-in-law shares some funny emails with me, most days. Yesterday one of the emails had a series of memes and this one made me laugh and say ‘exactly!’ at the same time. �First up, The Atlantic: COVID-19 cases have reached a terrifying new global peak, with India experiencing the bulk of the surge. “What is taking place in India isn’t so much a wave as it is a wall,” our staff writer Yasmeen Serhan reports. “Charts showing the country’s infection rate and death toll … depict curves that have shot up into vertical lines.” In the U.S., case rates have lulled, in part thanks to mass vaccination. But as Yasmeen writes, “Uncontrolled outbreaks anywhere pose a threat everywhere, including vaccine-rich countries such as the United States.” That could explain why the Biden administration announced today that it plans to share 60 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine with other countries. • Vaccine nationalism is doomed to fail. As Yasmeen warned last year: “Without equal vaccine distribution, public-health experts warn, the pandemic could continue to live on residually for years, bringing with it even more death and further economic collapse.” • Officials in India are raising alarms about another mutation of the virus. That wouldn’t be a problem if we had a universal coronavirus vaccine that could protect against all variants—and the race to make one is on, James Hamblin reports. (Short break while I lie on the floor and scream - aaaahhhh!) And this is followed by: Crooked Media: The White House announced on Monday that the U.S. will share up to 60 million AstraZeneca doses with other countries, once the vaccine clears federal safety reviews. That’s great news both for poorer countries battling horrific outbreaks and for everyone around the globe who would be affected by the emergence of more dangerous variants, but spare a thought for the Fox News producers currently trying to fit “Why Is Sleepy Joe Sending All Of America’s Life-Saving But Also Deadly And Freedom-Violating Vaccines To Foreign Terrorists?” on a chyron. No, I didn’t know what a chyron is either. I had to look it up: an electronically generated caption superimposed on a television or movie screen. �Hmm. Now where did I put that teapot? Okay, so some 13 months in and people have begun to let their hand washing routine slide. One expert suggests that we need to make it a routine item - like taking off your shoes when you enter the house. CNN: "If you show up at my house, the first thing I say is, 'Hey, take your shoes off and would you mind washing your hands?' Our house rules are we wash our hands before we eat, we wash our hands after �going to the bathroom, and we wash our hands when we come inside from an activity, such as going into work or returning home." That seems reasonable. Now, here’s cheery note from Crooked Media: Some 92 percent of Americans who received a first dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines have come back for the second shot—a very solid rate of follow-through for a two-dose vaccine, by historical standards. And just to remind you of what you can and can’t do: �Two nights ago Craig took this photo of the moon over our house. �I think this is my favorite. �What else is happening in the world? From Washington Post: Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Monday that the Justice Department will open an investigation into the Louisville Police Department, after the shooting death of Breonna Taylor, whose killing was among the flashpoints that sparked mass protests across the nation last summer. Garland’s announcement comes days after he announced a similar investigation into the Minneapolis Police Department following the death of George Floyd. Also from Washington Post: EPA moves to give Calif. permission to set own tailpipe climate emissions limits, giving state leverage over U.S. mileage standards The step, coming days after the Transportation Department withdrew Trump-era restrictions of state tailpipe emission rules, could help pave the way for a broader climate deal. The administration’s actions will give the populous state with big climate ambitions more leverage in discussions between car company executives, autoworkers and federal officials over national mileage and greenhouse gas emission standards for new passenger vehicles. Today will be warm for this time of the year. So Craig and I are going to go out to Grand Haven to look at the lake, eat a take out lunch from Morningstar Cafe and then walk through the forest at Kirk Park. We are becoming more adventurous, but we are still washing our hands. St Kitts and Nevis. Saint Kitts and Nevis is a dual-island nation situated between the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea. It's known for cloud-shrouded mountains and beaches. Many of its former sugar plantations are now inns or atmospheric ruins. The larger of the 2 islands, Saint Kitts, is dominated by the dormant Mount Liamuiga volcano, home to a crater lake, green vervet monkeys and rainforest crisscrossed with hiking trails. ― Google �Nevis Peak is a potentially active volcano which is located in the centre of the island of Nevis of the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis in the West Indies. The stratovolcano rises to a height of 985 metres (3,232 ft) and is the highest point on the island. There have been no eruptions since prehistory, but there are active fumaroles and hot springs on the coastal slopes of the island, and these represent low-level volcanic activity. Wikipedia �In the museum which featured Alexander Hamilton. The music from Hamilton was the �soundtrack inside the museum. �Alexander Hamilton was born on January 11, in either 1755 or 1757, on the island of Nevis �in the British West Indies. (There is a dispute among historians about his actual birth year.) Today, Nevis and St. Kitts are one country, known as the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis. His father was from Scotland; his mother from Nevis. Hamilton left the region as a teenager to live in North America. Hamilton’s skills as a writer let him leave the Caribbean In August 1772, Hamilton’s letter to his father about a hurricane that struck Saint Croix was reprinted in a newspaper, the Royal Danish American Gazette. The locals were so impressed that they took up a collection to send Hamilton to a college in the British North American colonies. Princeton rejected Hamilton, but King’s College (later known as Columbia) accepted him. Hamilton wrote roughly 51 of the 85 essays of the Federalist Papers, which are still consulted today by scholars and the Supreme Court. Hamilton’s authorship wasn’t made public until after his death in 1804. Next a scenic drive ��I literally can’t remember why this church and graveyard were important - perhaps the first established �church? �While I went on this excursion, Craig went on a hiking excursion in the rain forest on the slopes of the volcanic mountain. Their guide in the rain forest. The last of Caribbean Two tomorrow. Oliver. In a new development, Oliver now says ‘bye bye Gandad, bye bye Mimi’ at the end of our FaceTime. He hasn’t quite mastered l or r yet. He calls himself Owwie. �And this made me laugh: �Tomorrow then. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-27_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-412 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-27 Title A name given to the resource Day 412 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/36c57434f54a783687e3924da1e3005a.pdf a0c893c3cb9f76ad25a8dfe25e21f63f PDF Text Text Day 413 by windoworks On this day last year from my blogpost: the CDC posted an amended list with 6 new symptoms of Covid19. Doctors in the ER or ICU noticed a new problem: the virus was able to cross the blood brain barrier. More and more evidence is coming out that people with COVID-19 are suffering from cognitive effects, such as brain fog and fatigue. And researchers are discovering why. The SARS-CoV-2 virus, like many viruses before it, is bad news for the brain. In a study published Dec.16 in Nature Neuroscience, researchers found that the spike protein, often depicted as the red arms of the virus, can cross the bloodbrain barrier in mice. This strongly suggests that SARS-CoV-2, the cause of COVID-19, can enter the brain. The study could explain many of the complications from COVID-19. When you have the COVID infection you have trouble breathing and that's because there's infection in your lung, but an additional explanation is that the virus enters the respiratory centers of the brain and causes problems there as well. Now, one year later, to recap, here are the symptoms of COVID-19: COVID-19 affects different people in different ways. Infected people have had a wide range of symptoms reported – from mild symptoms to severe illness. Symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure to the virus. People with these symptoms may have COVID-19: Fever or chills Cough Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing Fatigue Muscle or body aches Headache New loss of taste or smell Sore throat Congestion or runny nose Nausea or vomiting Diarrhea Look for emergency warning signs for COVID-19. If someone is showing any of these signs, seek emergency medical care immediately: Trouble breathing Persistent pain or pressure in the chest New confusion �Inability to wake or stay awake Pale, gray, or blue-colored skin, lips, or nail beds, depending on skin tone It is concerning that some people refuse to be vaccinated. In the US, we have 231M doses given (as of 2 days ago), 95.9M fully vaccinated which translates to 29.2% of the population. The number that are refusing to be vaccinated is close to 25% of all citizens. Now if that number remains static and the other 75% get fully vaccinated, then the US will be close to herd immunity. It is galling to see people refuse the vaccine when places like India are desperate for enough doses to help to get the crisis under control. From a correspondent of the New York Times: NEW DELHI — Crematories are so full of bodies, it’s as if a war just happened. Fires burn around the clock. Many places are holding mass cremations, dozens at a time, and at night, in certain areas of New Delhi, the sky glows. Sickness and death are everywhere. Dozens of houses in my neighborhood have sick people. One of my colleagues is sick. One of my son’s teachers is sick. The neighbor two doors down, to the right of us: sick. Two doors to the left: sick. “I have no idea how I got it,” said a good friend who is now in the hospital. “You catch just a whiff of this…..” and then his voice trailed off, too sick to finish. He barely got a bed. And the medicine his doctors say he needs is nowhere to be found in India. What we’re witnessing is so different from last year, during India’s first wave. Then, it was the fear of the unknown. Now we know. We know the totality of the disease, the scale, the speed. We know the terrifying force of this second wave, hitting everyone at the same time. What we had been fearing during last year’s first wave, and which never really materialized, is now happening in front of our eyes: a breakdown, a collapse, a realization that so many people will die. I’m sitting in my apartment waiting to catch the disease. That’s what it feels like right now in New Delhi with the world’s worst coronavirus crisis advancing around us. It is out there, I am in here, and I feel like it’s only a matter of time before I, too, get sick. �A crematorium ground for Covid-19 victims in East Delhi, on Friday. The only way forward out of this global pandemic is to vaccinate everyone in the world. Everyone. Men, women and children. As fast as humanly possible. Here, in Michigan, vaccinations are available everywhere. Yesterday in the pharmacy section of Meijer, I walked past a young man who had just reached the pharmacists window. She asked him: how can I help you today? And he replied: I’d like a Covid vaccination please. As I walked away, I heard her reply: certainly sir. There is no wait, no need for appointments. You can look up the nearest vaccination center and just go there. Across the States, they are using convention centers, football grounds, fairgrounds, empty buildings anywhere they can find to set up a clinic. And each large site is run with military precision. The site we attended ran like clockwork and I have heard nothing but praise for the convention center clinic downtown. But apart from the virus, America seems to be displaying elements of the Wild West. From NPR: First-time gun owners, young and old from across the country, are helping to push record levels of gun sales for what looks like the second year in a row. "My gun store has had a run like I've never seen before," said Todd Cotta, the owner of Kings Gun Center in Hanford, Calif., in the state's agriculturally rich Central Valley. "It was just an avalanche of new gun buyers for the first time." These buyers are white, Black, Asian and Latino and come from all political beliefs. And they're being driven by uncertainty, fear and a need to feel safe. Gun sellers across the country said the pandemic and civil unrest over the past year �have pushed customers to feel they must take control of their families' protection. Fears of Congress passing new gun control legislation in the wake of a rash of mass shootings since March are also adding fuel to the buying craze, industry insiders said. People lining up to purchase a gun. Okay. ��Yesterday we drove out to Grand Haven. We bought take out sandwiches form Morningstar Cafe and ate them watching the waves on Lake Michigan. Then we drove to Kirk Park and walked to the lakeshore. Craig had some of his father’s ashes left and he put most of them in the lake. Then we drove to Grand Valley and he delivered some posters he discovered cleaning out his study and then he walked into the ravine and put the rest of the ashes on a log, to be blown away by the wind. After some more errands we came home. We are comfortable with socializing in a small group outside and eating take out food, but not eating inside a restaurant or cafe. We are cautious. Caribbean: The next morning we docked at Road Town in the British Virgin Islands. Road Town, located on Tortola, is the capital of the British Virgin Islands. It is situated on the horseshoe-shaped Road Harbour in the centre of the island's south coast. Wikipedia �Anchoring off Road Town �On the dock, waiting to board our boat for the first part of Tortola by sea and land �This whole area was a favorite haunt for pirates, including Blackbeard. �While we looked at the islands and the sea, we drank Rum punch, of course. �Back to the dock for Part 2: Tortola by land �Tortola is a beautiful island but very steep in places �Craig and I were sitting next to our friends from the South who screamed with fear at the steep drop offs, or squeezed their eyes shut. I spent a lot of time saying, we’re all right, you’re okay. I’ve never met such nervous women. What are they like when they fly? �The steep road down Oliver. He has discovered what a satisfying tune he can play on his toy piano with his tummy. Craig is ecstatic - an avant garde musician in the family! ��To end today I’ve included this: Now there’s a thought. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-28_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-413 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-28 Title A name given to the resource Day 413 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/0edac43361d6c457fdea6c3631f9e79a.pdf 7663a553ae346cfa8564a2d99f612304 PDF Text Text Day 414 by windoworks Last night President Biden delivered his first national speech, marking his first 100 days in the White House. This is an historic photograph- for the first time both the Vice President and the Speaker of the House are women and all three are Democrats. From CNN: President Biden delivered his first address to Congress last night, on the eve of his 100th day in office. The President focused his speech on what his ambitious and sometimes politically divisive policy changes can do for Americans. He made no apology for passing the massive coronavirus relief bill without Republican support and called on legislators to swiftly act on other top-line issues, like police reform and infrastructure spending. While his biggest priorities have been domestic, Biden also said by addressing issues like green energy production, the US is staying competitive with the rest of the world. As the President spoke, Vice President Kamala Harris and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi completed a historic tableau behind him, marking the first time two women have occupied both those positions. Here is a roundup of virus news from ClickonDetroit: DETROIT – The number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) in Michigan has risen to 833,891 as of Wednesday, including 17,467 deaths, state officials report. Overall, new cases have slowed over the last 10 days. The state’s 7-day moving average for daily cases was 4,167 on Wednesday -- lower than one week ago. The 7-day death average was 60 on Wednesday, slightly higher than the last two �weeks. The state’s fatality rate is 2.1%. The state also reports “active cases,” which were listed at 189,000 on Wednesday. More than 626,000 have recovered from the virus in Michigan. Michigan has reported more than 6.6 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine administered as of Wednesday, with more than 48% of residents having received at least one dose. According to Johns Hopkins University, more than 32 million cases have been reported in the U.S., with more than 574,000 deaths reported from the virus. Worldwide, more than 149 million people have been confirmed infected and more than 3.1 million have died. More than 84 million have recovered, according to Johns Hopkins University. The true numbers are certainly much higher, because of limited testing, different ways nations count the dead and deliberate under-reporting by some governments. There seems to be some discussion over wearing masks. The CDC says that wearing them outside is not necessary unless it is a crowded situation. I remember Dr Fauci’s advice from some time ago, saying that the rule for masking outside was: if you were close enough to a stranger who could blow out the candle on the cake you were holding - then wear a mask. Otherwise no mask outside. Craig and I try to walk every day and usually we have a mask in our jacket pockets. We hardly ever put them on. We do still move over to the far side of the path and walk single file as people pass by going the other way. I sometimes wait in the car while Craig goes into the grocery store and I watch the automatic masking routine of every customer. Some put their mask on in their cars and some wait until they are almost at the door to the store. In the beginning, people would rip the mask off their face as soon as they exited the store. Now shoppers often wear them until they have unloaded their cart, returned the cart to the cart bay and then gotten in their car - then they take their mask off! Masks hang from the rear view mirror, are pushed down onto the neck, dangle off one ear and peep out of pockets. Stores that used to have notices which read: you must wear a mask unless you have a medical condition that prevents it, now read ‘all customers must wear a mask to enter this store’. I guess too many people tried the medical condition ploy. And have you noticed that the ‘Karen’ phenomena has mostly disappeared? Those angry women screaming about their rights and deliberately coughing on innocent staff members and other customers? Perhaps they caught the virus. As you know, we have been avid cruise fans because of Craig’s lecturing. The cruise ship industry has been hammered. Cruise lines keep setting new start up schedules, only to push them back, further and further. I can see how all crew must be fully vaccinated, all passengers fully vaccinated and all ships adapted for safe cleaning procedures. But what to do about shore excursions? Most destinations won’t allow tourists yet and vaccination rates in a lot of countries are low. But two new things have happened. First are ghost ship cruises. �Many cruise ships have anchored in the British Channel. They have a skeleton crew of about 100 onboard and every few weeks they have to sail to port to refuel. Anchoring in the British channel is far cheaper than being tied up in port. So an enterprising passenger ferry captain has begun ghost ship cruises. He takes passengers out for a 2 and half hour cruise around all the nearby anchored cruise ships. The captain of one of the cruise ships parked off the Dorset coast has even started to wave back at his tours using what he describes as a six-foot-long hand made of plywood. �What an extraordinary sight! The second thing is cruising around the British Isles without ever getting off the ship. The idea is a resort type vacation with fabulous food, entertainment etc, but only views rather than excursions ashore. Evidently these cruises sold out quickly. �Its a remarkable thing to think about the crew on these ships - just the same as a lockdown or quarantine, except at sea. I believe there are cruise ships docked or anchored offshore all over the world, and I wonder - is that part of our life now firmly in the Before Times? In other news, in the section “it always catches up with you” there are these two stories. First: NBC Three men accused in a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer have been indicted on charges of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. The new charges against Adam Fox, Barry Croft Jr., and Daniel Joseph Harris center on an alleged plan to blow up a bridge near Whitmer's vacation home in order to hinder police, according to a superseding indictment. Fox and Croft allegedly inspected the underside of the bridge for a place to put explosives in September while they were on their way to conduct "nighttime surveillance" of that home, the indictment alleges. Croft and Harris also allegedly blew up or tried to blow up improvised explosive devices, including a test of how well shrapnel would work against people. Fox is accused of ordering $4,000 worth of explosives from an undercover FBI agent. Ahh, Michigan. And second: CNN:Federal agents executed search warrants yesterday at the apartment and office of Rudy Giuliani, former President Trump’s personal lawyer. Giuliani has been the focus of a long-running criminal investigation concerning his activities in Ukraine, including whether he conducted illegal lobbying for Ukrainian officials during Trump’s presidency to try to damage the reputation of then-rival Biden. A search warrant for a lawyer like Giuliani would require a sign-off by the highest levels of the Justice Department, and generally, it is unusual for prosecutors to execute a search warrant on a lawyer at all. But they’ve done so before -- most notably, in this case, against another former lawyer for Trump, Michael Cohen. Giuliani hasn't been charged and has denied wrongdoing. Its never good when federal agents search your home. Our second Caribbean cruise ended in San Juan, Puerto Rico - and I have no photos from the day. I look at these photos and wonder if I will ever see some of these places again. I am glad that I have been to so many places in the world and I have the photos to remember them by. I have one last cruise to share with you, but not today. Oliver. ���Have you been vaccinated yet? See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-29_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-414 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-29 Title A name given to the resource Day 414 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3cdedd09d2cc92f860301f402d555499.pdf 98b19f9704e73dfa0a8c36af75a64689 PDF Text Text Day 415 by windoworks It took me a moment too. Smile - because you’re allowed to keep your mask off outside. India continues to struggle. Craig was listening to NPR this morning and their Mumbai correspondent Lauren Frayer, said she had been isolated inside her apartment for at least 30 days. The restrictions will be �looked at today, but no one knows what will happen. There are photos of empty streets, a truly unsettling sight in India. I’ve been here in Mumbai - I’ve never seen it without hundreds of people. My counselor was listening to a podcast and the podcaster was saying that any final return to ‘normal’ life wouldn’t happen until 2024. He said that this summer could be better but there would probably be another surge in winter, later this year. Also, on NPR this morning, there was the view expressed that many countries will take years to vaccinate most of their population. But what about new variants, I hear you asking. Well, Pfizer and Moderna are already hard at work on booster tweaks. �Because I am angry. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. Its that blameless anger which is even harder to cope with. We’ve all had our normal lives and freedom taken away. It has gone on for so long that I struggle to remember my Before Times life. Yesterday at 11:30am Craig said to me: normally you would have been at a Women’s City Club lunch and speaker at this time, chatting to all your friends. It brought me up sharp. I had forgotten about that. My life has closed down to the same routine every day. I could get angry or upset - and for the longest time I did, regularly. But now time moves in a blur of one day following the next. Long ago, Craig would say as we went to bed: another day we survived, but he hardly ever says that anymore. I think about plagues that happened hundreds of years ago, and how wealthy people stayed locked inside their estates with no visitors in case they carried the infection. Of course being fully vaccinated we have more options than before. We can carefully visit art museums, we can eat take out and we can see small numbers of fully vaccinated friends. I thought about going to the Annual meeting of the Women’s City Club, not to stay, just to say goodbye, but there’s zero socializing. You walk in and sit at a table with 3 others - and there you stay until the meeting and lunch are over. I tried thinking of alternatives until Craig said: you’re not comfortable with this, are you? And so I gave up. I think about Oliver and what he will think when he first sees us as big people and not the little people on Mummy’s iPhone screen. I think about sitting in a restaurant or cafe with family and friends, and �truthfully, I just can’t imagine it. I have lived and am still living such a cautious, careful life here in the US that I can’t imagine anything else. And here’s the thing: when we leave the US and hopefully make it to Sydney Australia without trauma, there we will be . By that I mean, no one else but returning Australians will be allowed in. There is a Trans Tasman bubble in place between Australia and New Zealand but nowhere else. And until most people in all countries are vaccinated and given booster shots, there will be no tourism. Many countries depend on tourism financially. Apparently Disneyland is opening today as is New York City. The stores have all been open here in Michigan for some time, but there is not a lot of face to face shopping going on. We went to Kohl’s last week to buy a suitcase. It was the first big box store we had been in for over a year. You could have fired a cannon down some of the aisles and not hit a soul. Their inventory looked sparse and overpriced and we went home and I ordered my suitcase online from the company. It is arriving today and it was much cheaper than in the stores. That, in a nutshell, spells the probable end of malls and big box stores. In another long lasting change, we get our 3 pounds of coffee beans delivered to the door every two weeks. I am reminded by email each time. We leave the check in the basket by the front door and Dan leaves the bags of coffee in the basket. There are a myriad of food delivery services as well as people who will shop for your groceries for you. At the end of our block there is a group of lockers called Cubi. You contact the providers on the Cubi list, order and pay for what you want and they will text you when you order is complete and locked inside your locker, waiting for you to retrieve it. Yesterday there was a long thread on FB about unmasked people in stores, particularly grocery stores. In our area, this is almost never a problem - we all seem to follow the rules without squabbling. But the one universal place to shop and feel safe was Trader Joe’s where they still only let 25 into the store at one time, where you must wear a mask and where you still stand back behind the blue line while they pass your groceries through the checkout. And best of all, they have 2 truck deliveries every day and they restock the shelves constantly. In other news, Biden gave an address to the nation. Here’s a piece from Crooked Media: The address steered clear of any partisan language or culture war fuel, so Republicans have gone ahead and reacted to a different, imaginary speech. GOP Race Spokesman Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) ran through a litany of grievances in his rebuttal, and argued that while Biden “seems like a good man,” the country feels pretty divided, and who else’s fault could that be? In a Fox News interview on Wednesday night, House Leader Kevin McCarthy repeated the thoroughly debunked lie that Biden is out to abolish red meat, with no pushback from Sean Hannity. �There have been suggestions that in order to stop the nonsensical idea that President Biden is going to take away your hamburgers, Jen Psaki, the White House Press Secretary should begin each press briefing by eating a hamburger. And in other news from Crooked Media: Texas’s energy market wasn’t the only deregulation nightmare that contributed to the catastrophe in February: The state is one of just six in the country with no statewide requirement for carbon monoxide alarms in homes. During Texas’s historic freeze, thousands of Texans unwittingly released poisonous gas into their homes as they improvised to stay warm, and at least 11 people died. Many of them didn’t have alarms in their homes or apartments, because none were required in their jurisdiction. Black, Hispanic, and Asian Texans accounted for 72 percent of the poisonings. In spite of a decade's worth of warnings, and recent proof that those warnings were right, Texas lawmakers have not leapt into action to fix this. They happen to be considering a broader overhaul of state building codes which would require carbon monoxide alarms in some new homes, but not in anything built before 2022, and local governments would still be able to opt out. Hmmm. Some years ago, the Grand Rapids Fire Department began a scheme funded in part by the city, to install smoke detectors and carbon monoxide alarms in any household as requested. We have them all over our house and each one is in the proper designated place. The chief fire officer also told me off for drying my tea towel on the oven door handle - it leads to more house fires than you can imagine. I have never done it since. New York Times: More than 100 colleges across the United States have said they will require students to receive coronavirus vaccines in order to attend in-person classes in the fall, according to a New York Times survey. Those requirements come as coronavirus cases have continued to climb steadily this spring at U.S. colleges and universities. More than 660,000 cases have been linked to the institutions since the start of the pandemic, with one-third of those since Jan. 1. Major outbreaks continue on some campuses, even as students have become eligible for vaccines. Salve Regina University in Rhode Island canceled all in-person events for at least a week after more than 30 students tested positive in seven days. Wayne State University in Detroit, a city that has been one of the worst U.S. coronavirus hot spots, suspended inperson classes and on-campus activities in early April. Of course some students object that it is an invasion of their personal freedom. I think the answer is easy: face to face classes for the vaccinated and online classes for those wishing to protect their personal freedom. I could begin a rant about others preserving their personal freedom at my expense - but I’ll leave that there. �Oliver ��See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-04-30_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-415 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-30 Title A name given to the resource Day 415 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/bd3694a79d57e7957dad904477cd3304.pdf 214ef58bac6797d65ab41e06fc9571d9 PDF Text Text Day 416. Saturday May 1. by windoworks Another month has gone. Some days it is painfully slow and some days fly by fast. More and more of my friends are fully vaccinated. As our departure approaches, we are planning to get together safely outside in small fully vaccinated groups to say goodbye. Of course in a small group (8 at most, counting Craig and I), we would be safe inside too, but in order to make everyone comfortable, we will be outside. We are taking baby steps forward. It is hard to explain to friends and family in other countries just how profound the change to our everyday behavior is. We have been living as safely as possible for over 12 months. I cannot adequately describe the fear at the onset of the pandemic and the Michigan lockdown. Every normal activity outside the house was seen as life threatening. We waited to fall ill, as did many of our friends. That fear went on for 11 months, until we were vaccinated. Every email or text ended with the words: stay safe and stay well. Every cough or sneeze might be the onset of Covid. Craig and I talked about what we would do if one of us caught the virus and ended up in hospital alone and perhaps on a ventilator. We made Worst Case Scenario plans. We did this because it was irresponsible not to do it. I’m telling you this because if you live far away in a low virus risk area, it can be hard to understand the constant worry and apprehension from living in a recurring surge state. The vaccine is literally a lifesaver and a sanity restorer and a door opening device. The more people vaccinated all around the world, the more life comes back to something resembling the Before Times. Here’s a piece from CNN: The real-world data on the Covid-19 vaccines is clear: they are stunningly effective. The vaccines essentially take death and severe disease off the table. They dramatically reduce the risks of getting Covid and transmitting the virus to other people. They are powerful weapons against all of the circulating variants. In short, they are the clear ticket to normality. Yet that message isn't getting through. Vaccine hesitancy continues to be an enormous problem in this country. Now that all adults ages 16 and over are eligible for the vaccine in the US and approximately 42% of Americans who want the vaccine have gotten at least one dose, the biggest hurdle to achieving herd immunity -- and to resuming normal life -- is the ground game of encouraging vaccine uptake among unvaccinated people. Of course, risk mitigation -- masks, distancing, and ventilation -- is still critical for unvaccinated people, and for vaccinated people in public indoor spaces, until everyone who wants the vaccine has been offered one. Moreover, no two people's risk or risk tolerance is exactly alike. But most people understand that health is more than the absence of disease. We need a hard right turn on the narrative about vaccines. People need incentives to take one. We must empower people with facts about vaccine efficacy and shift the media's bad news bias to one of evidence- �based optimism about post-vaccination life. We need visible public confidence in the vaccines' stunning efficacy and trusted messengers to deliver nuanced advice to vaccine-hesitant folks. But meanwhile in India, the unimaginable is happening. These are cremation fires and these sites are used again and again, all day long. First up, from Washington Post: The devastation in India is fueling growing anger at Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Modi has overruled health experts to hold election rallies, and he did not cancel a religious festival attended by millions. Daily infections there have risen to record highs, recently to 379,000 new cases. The White House announced Friday afternoon that it would ban travel from India, beginning Tuesday, for those who are not U.S. citizens or residents. And more form NPR: Some scientists have been sounding the alarm about India's virus uptick since late February. Bhramar Mukherjee is one of them. She's a biostatistician at the University of Michigan who's designed models that show India's reported infections will peak in late May. She predicts India could be confirming as many as 1 million new cases a day and 4,500 daily deaths by then. "There has been tremendous data denial. People didn't want to believe, and the government didn't want to �believe, that this was actually going to explode," Mukherjee told NPR. "There was also a sense of premature celebration and exceptionalism." Another model of India's current COVID-19 wave has been conducted by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington. The institute's director, Chris Murray, told NPR that India may be detecting only 3% or 4% of its daily infections. So when India confirms about 386,000 infections, as it did Friday, that may really mean it's seeing about 10 million infections, according to the institute's modeling. But here is some good news for the US. Washington Post; A spring wave of infections has crested in the U.S. Forty-two states and D.C. reported declining caseloads for the past two weeks, and the national rate of new infections dropped to where it was in October. Deaths and hospitalizations, too, are waning, though those lag behind new cases. Some hotspots remain — in the Pacific Northwest, for example — but public health specialists have given their wary approval to the overall trend. “There could be smaller, local flare-ups, but in general, things are looking really good as we move into the summer,” University of Florida biostatistician Natalie E. Dean told The Post. The White House said Friday that 100 million U.S. adults, nearly a third of the population, are fully vaccinated. Overseas, though, outbreaks continue to be dire. Yesterday Michigan recorded 3,804 new cases and the 7 day average is 4,249 - half of what it was 2 weeks ago. The state’s positivity rate has dropped to 5.8%. While that is still too high, it has dropped out of the truly alarming level of at least 15%, 2 weeks ago. Our red state is gradually fading to nearer pink. Our next (and last) cruise was to Costa Rica and beyond. Our friend and colleague Neil, contacted Craig in a state of agitation, saying one of his lecturers for the Costa Rica cruise had pulled out at the last moment. Could we join the cruise in Costa Rica please? Because it was Neil we said yes. We did wonder about this new virus that seemed to be spreading out of China, but we went anyway. The cruise had begun in Miami and had sailed through the Panama Canal and on to Costa Rica. Costa Rica is a rugged, rainforested Central American country with coastlines on the Caribbean and Pacific. Though its capital, San Jose, is home to cultural institutions like the Pre-Columbian Gold Museum, Costa Rica is known for its beaches, volcanoes, and biodiversity. Roughly a quarter of its area is made up of protected jungle, teeming with wildlife including spider monkeys and quetzal birds. ― Google �We arrived in San Jose in the late afternoon and found our beautiful hotel. Here I am, sound �asleep the next morning and Craig took this sneaky photo through the sliding glass doors. �The hotel grounds were �gorgeous. And I did walk around the grounds with Craig after breakfast �Our Uber car was tiny and the air conditioning was on the fritz so we drove the hour and a half to the coast with all the windows down and the pollen laden air howling through the car. �And here we are at our ship. More tomorrow. Oliver �Get vaccinated. Wear your mask inside stores etc. Summer is coming. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-05-01_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-416 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-05-01 Title A name given to the resource Day 416 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5116a92c092aaa99abbde43d50825261.pdf 402c3e3f5854023f35efe8c43d852984 PDF Text Text Day 417 by windoworks And really, that’s all I have to say about the subject. Today seems to be all about swings and roundabouts. Its a useful phrase because - If you say that a situation is swings and roundabouts, you mean that there are as many gains as there are losses. What do I mean? Well here in the US the scientists are concluding that when you add those who have had Covid and have antibodies and those who have had at least one vaccination shot, we are almost reaching herd immunity. All the signs are there: declining numbers; smaller outbreaks with rigid containment; �people continuing to be vaccinated; places relaxing restrictions and slowly opening up in a controlled way. But there is a disturbing new trend - NPR After spending much of the past year tending to elderly patients, doctors are seeing a clear demographic shift: young and middle-aged adults make up a growing share of the patients in COVID-19 hospital wards. It's both a sign of the country's success in protecting the elderly through vaccination and an urgent reminder that younger generations will pay a heavy price if the outbreak is allowed to simmer in communities across the country. "We're now seeing people in their 30s, 40s and 50s — young people who are really sick," says Dr. Vishnu Chundi, an infectious disease physician and chair of the Chicago Medical Society's COVID-19 task force. "Most of them make it, but some do not. … I just lost a 32-year-old with two children, so it's heartbreaking." Nationally, adults under 50 now account for the most hospitalized COVID-19 patients in the country — about 35% of all hospital admissions. Those age 50 to 64 account for the second-highest number of hospitalizations, or about 31%. Meanwhile, hospitalizations among adults over 65 have fallen significantly. More than 30% of the U.S. population is now fully vaccinated, but the vast majority are people older than 65 – a group that was prioritized in the initial phase of the vaccine rollout. The only way to stop this is for everyone to be vaccinated. Here’s what’s happening overseas, from the New York Times: Global coronavirus cases are surging, driven by India and South America. The number of new daily cases has exceeded 800,000 for more than a week. The spike is largely driven by the outbreak in India, which now accounts for more than 40 percent of the world’s new cases. The U.S. plans to halt travel for non-U.S. citizens from India starting Tuesday. Vaccines in India are running short, hospitals are swamped and cremation grounds are burning thousands of bodies every day. Health experts and political analysts say that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s overconfidence and domineering leadership style bear a huge share of the responsibility for the crisis. Meanwhile, Indians living abroad are frantically seeking to help sick relatives. Much of South America is also faring poorly. Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil, Peru, Argentina and Colombia all rank among the 20 nations with the highest number of Covid deaths per capita. Yesterday I read a devastating piece about India, and although it looks long, I did cut it down. Please read it all. Washington Post Avani Singh hops on Zoom around 11 p.m. every night with her mother in New Jersey and uncle in India, strategizing how to keep her coronavirus-stricken grandfather alive. They already managed to get K.S. Walia, 94, out of a New Delhi emergency room where Singh said a worker demanded an $8 bribe to keep �oxygen running. A different hospital where her grandfather is now admitted said the family would need to find oxygen and remdesivir, a drug that reduces recovery time, themselves, Singh said. Before starting a new search last weekend, Singh, a 28-year-old consultant, walked her dog in her Arlington, Va., neighborhood where people lined up to get inside a rooftop tiki bar and a group pedaled by on a party bike, drinking beer. She returned to her apartment and stayed up until 2 a.m. scouring Instagram for phone numbers of Indians who might have oxygen and getting no replies to a flurry of messages. Singh is among thousands of Americans struggling to help Indian relatives survive a catastrophic coronavirus surge that has caused the health-care system to collapse. The desperation of families in India has spread across time zones and borders as families fend for themselves in search of hospital beds, oxygen canisters and basic medication. “There was a huge disconnect where I felt very angry that the world isn’t paying attention, and would it be different if it was White bodies piling up on the streets?” Singh recalled. “How am I supposed to go about my normal day?” This is the split-screen pandemic in the U.S., where vaccine selfies flood social media feeds and newly vaccinated families are reuniting as many are struggling to help loved ones with coronavirus around the world access medical care. The ongoing crisis in India and the fallout in the United States illustrates how the global pandemic will continue to inflict misery even if infections plunge inside American borders. A nation of immigrants, and one so interconnected to the world through family, trade and culture, America still reels from lives lost as coronavirus ravages a mostly unvaccinated world, including in South America, where a variant-driven surge in Brazil has rapidly spread to other countries. “It’s almost like you’re living in two realities: one where things are getting better in the United States, and one abroad, where the situation is terrible,” said Sadaf Jaffer, the former mayor of heavily South Asian Montgomery Township, N.J. “It’s an extra burden that people who have connections on the other part of the world bear because they know how bad things are there.” Because India is so global, any strain of virus that gains set advantage — more contagious, more deadly or able to spread more efficiently — will not only become dominant there, but quickly become global. And thats my fear - that countries struggling to contain the virus will keep reinfecting the rest of the world. The only answer is a global coalition to address COVID-19. It just won’t work if some countries recover, some countries shut down their borders, and some countries are led by politicians who refuse to believe the virus exists. Under these circumstances the pandemic will continue to rage, on and off, for years. In this common goal of ending the worst pandemic in a century, no-one is safe until everyone is safe. Here’s today’s statistics: total world cases recorded, 152M. Deaths, 3.19M. I’m sure that’s an undercount, especially in places such as India. �Here’s a meme to make us all laugh: Costa Rica: �The ship was docked at Puntarenas instead of another closer port because of a large fire which was blowing smoke out into the bay. If you look at the top of this photo, you can see some light smoke. ��It was hot so I paddled at the water’s edge �A sightseeing trip? ��The lovely beach - see the smoke above? �Watching Puntareanas disappear from our cabin balcony. More cruise tomorrow. Oliver �I think Oliver tries to make everything a scooter. �About a month ago, I gifted Dan our coffee deliverer, one of my windows which he had admired for some time. He has hung it on the fence in his garden. ��See you tomorrow � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-05-02_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-417 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-05-02 Title A name given to the resource Day 417 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/ff3dd73d06fbb0afaa92fe47d80d432e.pdf d9305e43d30621f3e0a8e5f2694fd86b PDF Text Text Day 418. 9 weeks left. by windoworks CNN: People rest, at right, after getting Covid-19 vaccinations under the 94-foot-long, 21,000pound model of a blue whale at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. So here we are. This week we are driving to Holland to see the Tulip Time Festival; giving away some of the furniture we will not be taking with us; having continuing conversations with banks in Australia and I’ll be getting my hair cut again. Yesterday Craig dismantled the closet cupboard bequeathed to us by the house’s former owners. It was in my study and years ago I asked Craig to take the doors off so I could use it to store art supplies in. Some months ago he tried to put the doors back on, but time in the basement had led to them being warped and although Craig spent the best part of an afternoon trying - they just wouldn’t go back on. The dismantled closet is out the front of our house as free wood - but no takers so far. The basement is now eerily empty, and we do tend to rattle around our house. I found an interesting article in the Washington Post. Its an opinion piece and is called:The Habits We’ll Keep - the pandemic made us change our lives. Here are 11 ways we won’t change back again. Its a long piece so I’ll present it over the next few posts. When we speak of the end of the pandemic, we tend to imagine it as a “return to normal.” And by “normal,” we mean we will slip back into the blithe ways of being we once took for granted: We will slouch into movie theater seats, invite co-workers over for dinner, hug our parents and shout to be heard �in loud bars. Much as we crave that familiar safety and ease, though, many of the habits that we acquired over the past year — some in the service of survival, some in the name of comfort, others in simple pursuit of pleasure — will remain with us. These are the things we’ll keep, not because the pandemic forced them on us but because they are improvements on our pre-pandemic ways. — Jacob Brogan 1. Wearing masks when we’re sick By Daniela Lamas Like many doctors, I was uncertain about the benefit of masks at the start of the pandemic. But as the data began to accumulate, so too did the masks in my home. Now, a year after this pandemic began, there are masks everywhere — on door handles and in drawers, at the bottom of my bag and in the pockets of my jackets. I’ll be excited, eventually, to live without them — to read facial expressions again, sense the wind on my lips and feel that particular freedom that comes from being able to enter a room without covering my face. And yet. We now know that these politicized little pieces of material actually save lives — including other people’s. Cases of the flu and other respiratory illnesses are at a striking low this year, and while that is probably a result of multiple factors, including physical distancing and hand hygiene, wearing masks is undoubtedly one component. Which is why I am going to continue to wear a mask in my daily life to protect others, long after this pandemic is over. Not all the time. Definitely not in open, outdoor areas. But in many offices in America, coming to work sick was expected, even a norm. Now, if I have a cough or a cold and am entering a crowded indoor area, like a movie theater or a mall or an airplane, or coming to work at the hospital, I will make sure to put on that mask. If we have learned anything from this past year, it is the extent to which we are all interconnected. So I will keep those masks around. I will see them not just as a reminder of this devastating pandemic but also as a promise that we can be better. Daniela Lamas is a pulmonary and critical-care doctor at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. @danielalamasmd 2. Streaming theater By Diep Tran I used to see about 150 live theater performances a year. When Broadway shut down on March 12, 2020, it felt like the curtain had closed on an important part of my life. And not just mine: overnight, the entire performing arts industry shuttered; nationwide, around 1.4 million people lost their jobs. Then the theater community did something astonishing: It went digital. Michael Urie performed the one-man show “Buyer & Cellar” in his living room; Oscar Isaac pretended to spank Marisa Tomei in a Zoom live reading of “Beirut.” Eventually, original productions started popping up, such as “Ratatouille: The TikTok Musical,” a creation that I’m still convinced was a fever dream, and “Circle Jerk,” which had me cackling alone in my room as �the cast pilloried Internet meme culture. These projects showed that you don’t need high production values to make great theater — just committed performers and a riveting script. It was theater at its very essence. Theater has always been restricted by place. But now that even “Hamilton” has a streamable version, you no longer have to be in the room where it happens. Theater companies, large and small, have been investing in camera equipment; D.C.-based Woolly Mammoth, for example, is staging an entire virtual season. When in-person performances come back, $200 and a plane ticket should not, once again, become the prerequisite for seeing a Broadway show. The theater world should retain its pandemic strategies for making its work affordable and accessible, no matter the viewer’s location or economic bracket. Let’s retire the shaky bootlegs: Give us the show in HD, and we’ll live-tweet the hell out of it. Diep Tran, the former features editor of Broadway.com, is the industry news writer for Backstage and the managing editor of Viet Fact Check. @diepthought More tomorrow. How is India doing? I hear you ask. Not well. CNN: India is on the brink of recording 20 million coronavirus cases as it continues to buckle under its worst outbreak yet. Authorities also reported more than 400,000 daily cases for the first time on Saturday and a record-high number of deaths yesterday. Multiple states in the country are preparing to go into “complete lockdown” in the coming days. Many have accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of not properly preparing India for the crisis, and he has often painted a rosy view of the nation's pandemic response when numbers were saying otherwise. In an election in a key battleground state, Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party just suffered a defeat, with the results seen as a test of whether the second wave of Covid-19 has impacted support for Modi. I decided to look at other hotspot countries. Here’s what’s happening in South America, from The Guardian: South America produced some of the most horrific episodes of the pandemic last year, with mass graves dug in the Brazilian Amazon and bodies dumped on pavements in the Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil. But at the end of 2020 there was some hope that with the onset of vaccination the worst might have passed. Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, even claimed the crisis had reached its “tail-end” in December. Such predictions have proved grotesquely misguided. Brazil’s death toll has since more than doubled to more than 400,000, after an explosion of infections caused a catastrophic healthcare collapse. At least 100,000 Brazilians have died in the last 36 days and 100,000 more are expected to lose their lives before July. Many of Brazil’s neighbours are also in dire straits, including Uruguay, which was once heralded as a regional success story but in April suffered its deadliest month. On Thursday Argentina, Paraguay and �Colombia all registered their highest daily death tolls with 561, 505 and 106 fatalities respectively. The mayor of Colombia’s capital, Bogotá, urged residents to stay at home, warning they faced “the most difficult two weeks – not of the pandemic, but of our lives”. The situation in authoritarian Venezuela is harder to gauge, but also appears to be deteriorating.Last week South America, home to 5.5% of the world’s population, suffered nearly 32% of all reported Covid deaths. “What’s happening is a catastrophe,” Argentina’s health minister, Carla Vizzotti, admitted as her country’s Covid restrictions were extended until late May. A man cycles past shuttered businesses during the strict lockdown in Bogotá, Colombia. Photograph: Fernando Vergara/AP Many specialists suspect South America’s current collapse is largely the work of the more contagious P1 variant that emerged late last year in the Brazilian city of Manaus and has spent 2021 rampaging across the continent, from Lima to Buenos Aires.The vaccination of older age groups offered some hope that future waves would be less deadly – but even that was not assured if new variants appeared. The coronavirus cannot be underestimated. If it was capable of doing this in 2021, it could easily do it again in 2022. Oliver. It was mask day at Daycare. ��See you tomorrow. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COVID-19 Journals Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. University Libraries Description An account of the resource This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled. The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2020 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Subject The topic of the resource Epidemics Grand Valley State University College students Personal narratives COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context COVID-19_2021-05-03_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-418 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Benjamin, Pamela Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-05-03 Title A name given to the resource Day 418 Description An account of the resource Daily journal entry of Pamela Benjamin, spouse of GVSU history professor, Craig Benjamin, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally self-published on WordPress. Subject The topic of the resource COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 Epidemics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids (Mich.) Personal narratives Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng