89 24 26018 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b032d9f75d720380f04ac0888883b43c.pdf 6eac304fd056172ba754c96d41eab9a4 PDF Text Text Day 131 by windoworks Its Monday, the beginning of another week. On Wednesday we will have been staying at home for 19 weeks. This morning I am sitting on my bed with the curtains closed while a hive of painting activity goes on around the house. Craig is continuing to finish the last section of red on the north side of the house, while a college painting team paint the 4 dormer attic windows - because I wouldn’t allow Craig to be up that high on the roof. (Possible photos tomorrow). Soon just the white lower walls on either side of the house will be all thats left to do. TJ has installed half the wooden fence in the back garden and when it is finished, Craig will stain it. As you walk or drive around Grand Rapids, it is obvious that most residents are taking this time to plant flowers, paint houses, grow vegetables and try to make the houses they are mostly confined to, comfortable and beautiful. Gov Whitmer continues to reinforce her order for masks and most people seem to be complying. Michigan continues to have cases - more than anyone would like. Some are due to very foolish behavior on the weekend of July 4. But we are doing better than Florida. That state has not slowed the spread or the death count. Yesterday there were 12,000+ new cases. Thats the 5th consecutive day of over 10,000 new cases a day. Gov Ron De Santis complained that the headlines about the surge was unduly worrying Floridians. Really? They’re unduly worried? In California the new cases have gone up by 45% in recent days, and deaths increased by 20%. Gov Andy Beshear in Kentucky has said the rise in new cases means the state will have to take more action and the residents have to do better. In Texas, they’ve had to rent refrigerated trucks to store the bodies as the death toll rises. In Georgia chaos reigns as Gov Brian Kemp is suing cities and mayors for mandating mask wearing and closing down restaurants etc. We are standing in the middle of a maelstrom. It is very hard not to feel sorry for yourself. I could burst into tears (and I often do) but what does it achieve? A red nose, sore eyes and a thumping headache. I cannot even begin to list the number of safeguards and well thought out policies and regulations that chump and his minions have overturned. For example, if you don’t like the increasing numbers of virus cases that the CDC is recording - well, easy peasy, make a new rule that all state hospital numbers come to the White House (where we can hide them from you, the unsuspecting public). In Florida, the governor didn’t like the fact that the chief medical officer wouldn’t change the numbers to look better, so she was forced to resign. In some states, people are having COVID parties. I’m not sure what the rationale is behind this, but there seems to be the huge misconception that if they get the virus, they’ll get over it quick and then they’ll be immune. Tom Hanks and his wife Rita who both had the virus in March while in Australia, has said that �their immunity to the virus appears to be dwindling over time and they could possibly catch it again. Wait, what? So, we live in Michigan where the big three: Gratechen Whitmer, Dana Nessel and Jocelyn Benson, along with Lieutenant-Governor Garland Gilchrist and Chief Medical Executive Dr Joneigh Khaldun do their very best (among Republican opposition) to keep us safe and operational. �It is now 105 days until the presidential election. In August, Democratic nominee Joe Biden will announce his running mate. All we know is that he has promised it will be a woman. We voted already in the August primary for our state. And not trusting the mail service, we deposited our voting envelopes in the box on Ottawa. �Speaking of Joe, here are the other 2 campaign ideas: ��And here are 2 new billboards. ���Two more billboards tomorrow. Now I know the polls are showing Biden leading and chump falling behind - but these are polls. You can skew statistics any way you want (the one thing I do remember from my two agonizing terms of stats classes at college). And honestly, are they trying to show you that you don’t need to vote because Biden has it in the bag? I have one answer for this: remember 2016. Vote by mail, vote on the day even if you have to wait in line for hours, vote, vote, vote. And not just for Biden but for every Democrat up and down the ballot. Its up to all of us to effect a change for the better. This year, the pandemic will be an accelerant of preexisting trends: There will be a surge of early and mail voting. So, an unambiguous decision by midnight Eastern time Nov. 3 will require (in addition to state requirements that mailed ballots be postmarked, say, no later than Oct. 31) a popular-vote tsunami so large against the president that there will be a continentwide guffaw when he makes charges, as surely he will, akin to those he made in 2016. Then, he said he lost the popular vote by 2.9 million because “millions” of undocumented immigrants voted against him. Making a preemptive strike against civic confidence, Trump has announced that the 2020 election will be the “most corrupt” in U.S. history. The hard truth is that there has been a rising tide of voter suppression in recent U.S. elections. These actions — such as overeager purging of electoral registers and reducing early voting — have the appearance of enforcing abstract principles of electoral integrity but the clear effect (and apparent intent) of disproportionately disenfranchising racial minorities. One example was the decision of Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State (now Governor) Brian Kemp to suspend 53,000 predominantly AfricanAmerican voter registration applications in 2018 because the names did not produce an ‘exact match’ with other records.” This nation built the Empire State Building, groundbreaking to official opening, in 410 days during the Depression, and the Pentagon in 16 months during wartime. Today’s less serious nation is unable to competently combat a pandemic, or even reliably conduct elections. This is what national decline looks like. George F Will Washington Post Again: vote as if you life and your family’s lives depend on it. And now Oliver. �So grown up! �Last Orkney excursion. Firstly the Ring of Brodgar. It is thought to be erected between 2500 - 2000BCE. There were originally 60 stones and only 27 remained standing at the end of the 20the century. It was a bitter, rainy cold day and to be honest, I stayed in the car while Craig and Asher explored it . ���You can look up this site on Wikipedia for a lot of very interesting information. Then, we packed up and caught the ferry back to Scrabster ���Fro the top: leaving Stromness behind; Craig outside in the rainy weather and lastly, the Old Man of Hoy: The Old Man of Hoy is a 449-foot sea stack on Hoy, part of the Orkney archipelago off the north coast of Scotland. Formed from Old Red Sandstone, it is one of the tallest stacks in the United Kingdom. The Old Man is popular with climbers, and was first climbed in 1966. Created by the erosion of a cliff through hydraulic action some time after 1750, the stack is no more than a few hundred years old, but may soon collapse into the sea. Wikipedia I just knew Craig was itching to climb it - but no time (and no way to reach it). Tomorrow we begin our journey south in Scotland. ��Me in my happy place - the green. � 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_2020-07-20_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-131 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 2020-07-20 Title A name given to the resource Day 131 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/4f8874474766e267f6c7828d2ca1dfb9.pdf 9a9c934ca9afbd6a22d507e40d5fbf4d PDF Text Text Day 132 by windoworks A note of explanation: yesterday afternoon I posted on FB that it had been a difficult day. I received an amazing outpouring of care and love from many.many people. One comment said: I don’t know what happened but I hope you feel better. What happened was complete inertia. I felt as though I couldn’t move, I was frozen in place. Sometimes I think we just soldier on, day after day, just doing our best to manage - and then suddenly, it all climbs on top of you and your body and your mind just say: stop. But I read all the comments and I looked at all those emojis of hugging hearts and I thought: you can do this Pamela. Pull up your big girl pants and carry on. Knowing that green helps me to feel better, Craig took me for a drive and on our way home we stopped at the Fulton Heights Community Garden. Its a huge place, some plots are neglected and forgotten and some have been established for years and years. It was peaceful and calming - and we only walked around half of it. ��The other night chump was interviewed by Chris Wallace on Fox (and surprisingly, Wallace is a true hard hitting journalist). Here’s a follow up piece. There has been speculation that Donald Trump might not voluntarily leave the White House if he loses the election in November. He confirmed this possibility during his interview on Fox News Sunday. When Chris Wallace asked whether he would accept the results, Trump answered, “Look … I have to see… I’m not going to just say yes. I’m not going to say no.” Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi was asked about this during an interview with MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski. Pelosi replied: “Whether he knows it yet or not, he will be leaving.” Here’s the full exchange: Mika Brzezinski: In the interview with Chris Wallace, he did not confirm whether he would leave – whether he would accept the results of the election if he lost. What do you make of that? Nancy Pelosi: .....but the fact is, whether he knows it yet or not, he will be leaving. Just because he might not want to move out of the White House doesn’t mean we won’t have an inauguration ceremony to inaugurate a duly-elected President of the United States and the – I just – you know, I’m second in line to the Presidency. Just last week I had my regular continuation of government briefing. This might interest �you because I say to them, ‘This is never going to happen. God-willing it never will.’ But there is a process. It has nothing to do with the certain occupant of the White House doesn’t feel like moving and has to be fumigated out of there because the presidency is the presidency. It’s not geography or location. So, so much for him. I wouldn’t spend so much time on it. So Nancy’s on the job! Now this makes it easy to understand: And this is priceless: �And to prove children are watching: �Here’s some of the latest news: Many scientists have come to believe that “superspreaders” — extraordinarily infectious people who may not even know they are sick — are driving the pandemic, spreading “bursts” of the coronavirus to dozens of people in a matter of hours. A single person may have infected nearly 200 others at a college bar in �Michigan in the past month, among other incidents around the world that could have huge implications for how we combat the virus. “If you could stop these events, you could stop the pandemic,” one professor of environmental health told our health desk. The U.S. outbreak continued to worsen over the weekend, as average death rates hit new highs in Alabama, Arizona, Florida, South Carolina and Texas, and at least 18 states set records for average weekly infections, according to statistics tracked by The Washington Post. America now stands almost alone among wealthy nations for its failure to contain the disease. Infection rates have tapered off or flatlined in Europe, Canada and Japan — where many people have watched in shock as the United States gets sicker and sicker. “The fumbling of the virus was not a fluke,” our health desk wrote in an analysis of the political polarization, weak leadership, fragmented government, decrepit public health infrastructure and persistent social inequalities that led to this fiasco. “If there was a mistake to be made in this pandemic, America has made it.” The Trump administration is also trying to block Congress from passing billions of dollars in funding for testing and contact-tracing programs, which were key to driving down infections rates in other countries. “Some White House officials believe they have already approved billions of dollars in assistance for testing and that some of that money remains unspent,” our political desk reported. In an hour-long interview on Fox News on Sunday, Trump was visibly rattled and occasionally hostile as he struggled to answer questions about the U.S. outbreak. He falsely claimed the spiking infection rate was an illusion, said that most new covid-19 patients would “heal in a day,” and blamed China for letting the virus “escape.” “I will be right eventually,” Trump said at one point. “It’s going to disappear, and I’ll be right . . . You know why? Because I’ve been right probably more than anybody else.” In the absence of advice from federal health officials, many people have decided they are on their own and are crowd-sourcing how to live safely. News & Guts So you can see why yesterday was a difficult day. We’re okay here in Michigan because of our governor and her team, but other states don’t have the same support. Michigan has 82,486 cases in total but by comparison Florida now has 360K cases and California, 400K confirmed cases. You know, I’m nervous living here, I can’t imagine how nervous I would be living in Florida or Georgia. I’d be crowd sourcing how to live safely. But here’s what’s happening at our house - �Painting the dormer window surrounds. That’s a very long ladder the boys are standing on. You can’t see it but one person is sitting on the bottom rung to stop the ladder slipping. Meanwhile, in the back garden, the new fence is half installed and already stained, TJ is installing, Craig is staining. �When this is finished, we can take out the chain link gates, and drive straight in and out of the garage. A slight break in the proceedings today while I kept a doctors appointment for my sinus headaches. Remember I told you that a big piece of tree fell on our neighbors house down the road? Well, 3 silver linings: 1. The car was old and needed replacing. 2. The tree limb missed their house and 3. The tree is on their neighbors property so it was their responsibility to clean it up. It was cleaned up that afternoon and this morning (2 days later) the car left, positioned royally on the top of a truck. Here’s a photo of the damage. �Oliver in his painting smock at daycare. ��Coming to the end of our Scottish adventure. After we left Scrabster, we drove down the east coast. ����A wild fishing village on the coast. �A really hoity toity house and estate - completely closed for the winter but we walked all around it anyway. And then we detoured through the highlands. �����The second photo is of Doris, our car. An atmospheric graveyard; and yes, that is the gate to Balmoral Castle. I’m not sure if the Queen was in residence or not. Of course its not open to the public. And so lastly, dinner in Aberdeen. It was the end of our wonderful adventure with Asher. The next morning we took him to Aberdeen airport where he began his journey home to Australia. I’m always sad when the children leave. Tomorrow we begin our journey south to Wales and Cornwall. �� 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_2020-07-21_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-132 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 2020-07-21 Title A name given to the resource Day 132 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/3d06ad97127503c0fe685012fb5f5ae0.pdf 9974e5701c6560c743cd84a75356074c PDF Text Text Day 133 by windoworks Its Wednesday July 22 and today marks the 19th week of staying safe at home. 19 weeks since Grand Valley State University closed down and sent all students, staff and faculty home. True to disaster movie form, where no politician or person in authority listens to the scientists in the first half hour of the movie, and then begs them for guidance, advice and facts by the end - yesterday chump said ‘its going to get worse before it gets better ‘ and ‘wear a mask - its patriotic’. Oh, so we must be near the end of the disaster movie, or at least chump is hoping so. I do not have the energy to tell you what a monumental difference it would have made if he had just said these words at the �beginning of March. Too little, too late. I watched a video of a man who tested positive for the virus and spent all of March in hospital. He got better and came home, but the most telling thing he said was ‘When I got home on March 31 - the whole world had changed’. It has indeed. Telling it like it was: TULSA — John Jolley never thought he'd be sleeping in his car awaiting unemployment benefits. But there he was, the owner of a once-successful advertising agency, taking a sweaty nap in a Subaru wagon in a convention center parking lot at 1:45 a.m. on a Wednesday. The pandemic sent his business into a free fall, and now Jolley wanted to be first in line for an unemployment claims event beginning in five hours. He barely dozed, afraid that if he fell into a deep sleep, he would miss the early-morning handout of tickets for appointments with state agents. There would be just 400 tickets handed out for that day’s event. When those ran out, there would be 400 more for appointments the following day. “I just didn’t want to be number 803,” Jolley said. Washington Post. I’ve seen this post before but yesterday Senator Debbie Stabenow (D,MI) posted it and I just had to share ��The third and final podcast recommendation from Zoe: This Land. Patrick Murphy was convicted of murder by the state of Oklahoma in 2000. But defense attorneys soon discovered that his conviction may have been based on a lie. Hosted by Rebecca Nagle, an Oklahoma journalist and citizen of the Cherokee Nation, this podcast will provide an in depth look at how a cut and dry murder case opened an investigation into half the land in Oklahoma and the treaty rights of five tribes. Follow along to find out what’s at stake, the Trump administration’s involvement, the larger right wing attack on tribal sovereignty and how one unique case could result in the largest restoration of tribal land in US history. A quick update: SCOTUS ruled that more than half of Oklahoma is considered tribal land. The implications of this ruling are huge, and will take a long time to work out. Joe Biden threatened on Monday to retaliate against Russia by imposing sanctions, freezing assets, deploying cyberweapons and exposing "corruption” if Vladimir Putin interferes again in this year’s U.S. presidential election. “I am putting the Kremlin and other foreign governments on notice,” the former vice president said in a 653-word statement. “A range of other actions could also be taken, depending on the nature of the attack. … I will not hesitate to respond as president to impose substantial and lasting costs.” During a virtual fundraiser that evening, Biden noted that he recently began receiving classified briefings again as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee and suggested such meddling is underway. “We saw it in ‘16, we saw it in ‘18, and we’re seeing it now,” Biden told donors. “Russia, China, Iran and other foreign actors are working to interfere in our democracy and undermine our faith in our electoral process. We can't let that happen.” President Trump has never thrown down the gauntlet this way. He has equivocated about whether he accepts the U.S. intelligence community’s consensus that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election. He said during his Helsinki summit with Putin in 2018 that he believes the Russian president's denials. Washington Post While this whole piece is heartening, here’s what I think is the interesting thing to note: Biden is receiving classified briefings as the presumptive Democratic nominee. So I assume Hillary received the briefings too - and I suspect chump did also, as the Republican nominee. Quick pop quiz: who do you think actually absorbed them? And, from yesterday’s post: Nancy Pelosi receives briefing on becoming President if something should happen to chump and pence. Also, when the President gives his State of the Union address, there really is a junior congress person who is housed offsite as the ‘designated survivor’ just in case something catastrophe happens. And now for something completely different: �When humpback whales migrated to Glacier Bay in Alaska this year to spend the long summer days feeding, they arrived to something unusual: quieter waters. As the COVID-19 pandemic slows international shipping and keeps cruise ships docked, scientists are finding measurably less noise in the ocean. That could provide momentary relief for whales and other marine mammals that are highly sensitive to noise. Through networks of underwater hydrophones, scientists are hoping to learn how the mammals' communication changes when the drone of ships is turned down, potentially informing new policies to protect them. NPR One last billboard. ��More than 1,100 Americans died of the coronavirus yesterday, the highest daily total since late May. The C.D.C. said the number of cases in the U.S. could be anywhere from two to 13 times higher than the official count. The findings suggest that large numbers of people without symptoms have kept the virus circulating in their communities. Still, virtually no places are near achieving herd immunity, the level of exposure at which the virus would stop spreading Oliver has either 6,7 or possibly 8 teeth - who is willing to put their finger in his mouth? He ‘talks’ incessantly and apparently he snores in his sleep. In 9 days he’ll be one. What a first year of life this turned out to be. He’s not entirely sure about bubbles. ��Yesterday I misspoke. When we left Asher at Aberdeen airport he was flying east to begin a Scandanavian adventure. In any case, we wouldn’t see him again for sometime. So we drove south to Whitby. Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Cliff is home to the ruins of Whitby Abbey, where Cædmon, the earliest recognised English poet, lived. The fishing port emerged during the Middle Ages, supporting important herring and whaling fleets,and was where Captain Cook learned seamanship. Tourism started in Whitby during the Georgian period and developed with the arrival of the railway in 1839. Its attraction as a tourist destination is enhanced by the proximity of the high ground of the North York Moors national park and the heritage coastline and by association with the horror novel Dracula. Jet and alum were mined locally, and Whitby Jet, which was mined by the Romans and Victorians, became fashionable during the 19th century. Wikipedia �����Whitby from the cliff; Whitby Abbey ruins; and two more of Craig looking down on Whitby as the sun set. On into Wales tomorrow. I’ll leave you with this. Two men from differing political ideologies travelled across America talking to each other and all the people they met along the way. While their party affiliations remained largely intact, they grew closer together in understanding and respect. The result is a book called ‘Union’. Here is an excerpt from the interview: Allsides. What's the main message you would like to give Americans who are feeling scared or disheartened by the division in the U.S. right now? Chris: Two things: First, Jordan and I heard the same desires—the same values—almost everywhere we went. Americans aren’t as far apart as we may seem on TV. Second is all the evidence out there is that this won’t last. What we’ve take place on in the streets this spring—whether they were empty or full of protesters—was a deep expression of hope. We largely banded together to fight a pandemic, condemn police brutality, and otherwise keep trying. We opted in, not out. That expression in the preamble of the U.S. Constitution— “form a more perfect union”—gets thrown around a lot, but we’re living up to it even if we’re not quite yet accomplishing the lofty goals that follow that phrase—justice, domestic tranquility, and so on. Things can change and often do—especially when we actively work on them. Jordan: They're not alone. The overwhelming majority of people we met on the road felt the same way. One message I would want to give is that there are so many great people and organizations working on this issue. Groups like AllSides and Braver Angels and Civil Politics are doing terrific work, and so too are countless individuals in large and small ways. We all have the ability to do something to make this country better, to perfect our union. We all get to participate in this great experiment. Whether getting out on the road or hosting civil dialogues, everyone can do something to heal our divisions, even if that's just making a new friend across the aisle. That's the story of America. � 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_2020-07-22_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-133 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 2020-07-22 Title A name given to the resource Day 133 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/03d7999a16232b1eb4a05f4047d90fce.pdf 56ca5a8f0b554ced5a2165697698b68c PDF Text Text Day 134 by windoworks My grandmother once gave me a tip: In difficult times, you move forward in small steps. Do what you have to do, but little by little. Don't think about the future, or what may happen tomorrow. Wash the dishes. Remove the dust. Write a letter. Make a soup. You see? You are advancing step by step. Take a step and stop. Rest a little. Praise yourself. Take another step. Then another. You won't notice, but your steps will grow more and more. And the time will come when you can think about the future without crying. Elena Mikhalkova (from my neighbor Lauren). Good morning. Perhaps a word of explanation. I find many items online, in new feeds, and in social posts. I save them to my Fat Fact File or My Photographs and then I revise both these files each day. The situation changes every day, sometimes more than once a day. Some items I thought important become �out of date before I can use them. I expect you, as the reader, to follow up for yourself if something I have published in an abbreviated form, interests you. It’s exactly the same as when I ran my travel company. For example, when leading a bus tour across Europe, we would provide a short visit to as many well known tourist spots as possible. If you wanted to see and do more, you had to return on your own time. I hope that analogy makes sense. To begin: this morning I watched a press conference being given by the Australian Deputy Health Minister. He was in Canberra at the nation’s capital. I watched for the 5 minutes or so while he outlined the sharp increase in positive cases overnight in Victoria, and I kept thinking: what is so different about this? And then it came to me - just the facts, followed by what the federal government is doing to help Australians, followed by careful reminders on how to keep yourself safe and then another reminder about getting tested if you thought you might be sick. There was nothing political, no pleading, no justifying, just one adult talking to a bunch of other adults, saying ‘here’s what the experts think will help. I’ve watched 4 different Australian state and federal COVID press conferences now, and they’re all the same. Just the facts, reminders, advice on testing. Imagine. Remember I talked about parents grouping their children in bubbles and hiring a teacher? Here’s more: The coronavirus is so widespread in the U.S. that many schools are unlikely to reopen anytime soon. Already, some large school districts — in Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, Phoenix, suburban Washington and elsewhere — have indicated they will start the school year entirely with remote classes. Yet many parents and children are despondent about enduring online-only learning for the foreseeable future. So it makes sense that the topic of home schooling is suddenly hot. Parents who never before considered home schooling have begun looking into it — especially in combination with a small number of other families, to share the teaching load and let their children interact with others. Some are trying to hire private tutors. One example is a popular new Facebook group called Pandemic Pods and Microschools, created by Lian Chang, a mother in San Francisco. New York Times This backs up parents concerns: The study of nearly 65,000 people found that children younger than 10 transmit to others much less often than adults do, but the risk is not zero. And those between the ages of 10 and 19 can spread the virus at least as well as adults. Experts cautioned that the findings could mean clusters of infection in children of all ages. The director of the Harvard Global Health Institute called the study “one of the best” to date on the issue .New York Times. �The following is from an Emergency Physician in the area I live in: Dr. Rob Davidson, As an ER doctor, I feel compelled to correct a dangerous and upsetting new talking point from Donald Trump. Lately Trump has been boasting that while COVID-19 rates are soaring, deaths are not as high. This is extremely disturbing for a few reasons. First, it may not even be true. Death is a lagging indicator of COVID-19 cases, meaning we won't know how many people are dying as part of this current surge until 3-4 weeks later. Plus, if deaths are down, it's partly because we know how to treat it better now. But here's the real point: COVID-19 is causing an immense amount of real suffering and despair, even when there isn't death. We cannot discount that. Donald Trump hasn’t just failed to rise to the occasion and fight this crisis — he’s actively undermined our nation’s efforts to fight COVID-19 by sidelining science and slandering public health experts. At this point, our only chance to beat this virus is to continue elevating the voices of doctors and public health experts who will sound the alarm on Trump’s failed COVID-19 response and advocate for a sciencebacked approach to ending this crisis. ��Talk about coming back to bite you on the bum! Meanwhile in the alternate universe I would like to be living in, after November: ��Oh! Words! Sentences that are coherent. Reassurance, Capability. I could go on..... (two more tomorrow) PORTLAND, Ore. — In a response to federal tactics used against peaceful protesters in Portland, a group of mothers has formed a group focused on protecting demonstrators. Wearing bicycle helmets and yellow shirts, at least 30 mothers in Portland, Oregon, created a human barricade Saturday evening to protect the hundreds of peaceful protesters from federal officers who have recently deployed to the city, according to Buzzfeed News. “Wall of Moms” organizer Bev Barnum posted a Facebook event asking mothers to join the first protest Saturday evening. �Well done Moms! But why were they there? And now he seems to have decided that sending — or threatening to send — federal troops to Chicago and other cities is his best hope for turning around a struggling re-election campaign. Meeting with reporters in the Oval Office yesterday, Trump said that he planned to deploy federal law enforcement agents to Chicago, after already having done so in Portland, Ore., last week. He suggested he might also do so in New York, Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore and Oakland. He was vague about the reasons, saying all of the cities were run by “radical left” Democrats. But the politics of the move are fairly clear. Trump is trailing Joe Biden in the polls, and the move lets him try to shift the nation’s attention away from the coronavirus crisis. Instead, he can run against two of his favorite bogeymen: “the radical left” and big-city crime. In recent weeks, he has frequently tried to portray Black Lives Matter protesters as out-of-control radicals, even though millions of Americans have participated and the protests have typically been peaceful. He has also made numerous racial appeals to white Americans, such as defending the Confederate battle flag. Threatening to send troops into cities — most of which have large Black populations — unites the two themes and lets him cast himself as a defender of a fading America. “If Biden got in,” Trump said yesterday, “the whole country would go to hell. And we’re not going to let it go to hell.” In response, Democrats vowed to pursue legislation or lawsuits to stop him. “We won’t let these authoritarian tactics stand,” Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon said. “It’s an American crisis.” New York Times So I think we need a lighter moment. Here are some businesses attempts to catch shoppers attention: ����Oh is Chad a thing now? And I might have more of these for tomorrow. Its time for Oliver. The red cheeks are because he’s still teething. Look Merrilyn. He’s reading your Bear Hunt book! ��After overnight in Whitby, we drove over the York Moors to Leeds to meet with our great niece (?) Alice who was studying at the university there. Leeds was incredibly confusing and we got lost twice trying to find the restaurant we were meeting her at. ���After a lovely (gluten free) lunch we dropped Alice back at her rooms and then navigated out of Leeds and on through Snowdonia into Wales. As a boy Craig had hiked, climbed and camped in Snowdonia, and it is a beautiful wild national park. ��When I look at these photos now, I am struck by how red my hair was! It was certainly a statement. Caernarfon tomorrow. I’ll leave you with this 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_2020-07-23_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-134 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 2020-07-23 Title A name given to the resource Day 134 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/af2b455deea2c972be198558e6d5bf5e.pdf b20c5dc3b39debefc66d6e70d4e64877 PDF Text Text Day 135. by windoworks This morning my news feed was dire. Yesterday the US passed a major milestone: 4.11M confirmed cases. As the experts say - this is an inaccurate count, the true numbers could be anywhere from 2x - 13x that number. Before breakfast I watched a Town Hall with Anderson Cooper and Dr Sanjay Gupta. Sanjay gave the clearest analogy of this virus. Remember how it began with 19 cases? He said its like a large cruise ship. When it leaves the dock it moves slowly, but then once in open water, it begins to increase speed and then it takes a great strength to stop it. In the last few weeks our coronavirus cruise ship has begun picking up speed. I was discussing this with Craig this morning. One of the significant factors is that the virus itself mutated at some point. It doesn’t necessarily make you sicker but one small change in its composition has made it so much more contagious. Remember when the symptoms you had to look out for were: fever, cough and shortness of breath? Ah the good old days. Now the symptoms are: fever or chills; cough; shortness of breath; fatigue; muscle or body aches; headache; loss of smell or taste; sore throat; congestion or runny nose; nausea or vomiting, or diarrhea. And, rush to the ER if you are: having trouble breathing; persistent pain or pressure in the chest; new confusion; inability to wake or stay awake, or bluish lips or face. Hands up all of us who have had at least 3 of the first list of symptoms over the past few weeks. Mmmhmmm. One of the biggest problems we’re facing here in the US is the ridiculous lag time for test results. There’s little point in being tested and then waiting 8 days to 3 weeks to get the results. By that time the results are meaningless. Lately I have watched far too many videos from inside hot spot ICUs, where medical staff are trying everything to keep people alive and best scenario: recovering. In one video, the medical staff had labels on their chest: doctor, or nurse, so patients knew who was working with them. I watched a video of a young man in Italy who was very ill and they were able to turn him around. Later, as he was lying in a regular hospital bed in a regular ward, recovering before he was allowed to go home, the middle aged man in the next bed (with an oxygen tube) said; ‘for the rest of your life you will never be scared of anything now, because you have looked at death’. I thought: how true. So while this continues unabated, chump has canceled part of the Republican convention in Jacksonville Florida - which is a moot point because lots of Republicans had decided not to show up anyway. But here’s the thing - they had spent millions on the convention already and now its wasted. Think what a difference that money would have made used wisely somewhere else. Chump is also sending troops into big cities (all with Democratic mayors) to quell non existent violence. Here’s a FB piece from a young man called Jason in Portland, Oregon. I’ve edited it as it was quite long. �My city is a wall of moms and a Navy veteran unflinching while he’s beaten by batons and pepper sprayed at point blank range. My city is Black community leaders and white allies and state leaders that are trying to figure out what comes next. My city is a mystery yoga Athena, daring border troops to rubber bullet her naked body. My city is still showing up to fight fascism, even as the Proud Boys from nearby Washington have arrived with their lovely mullets and AR-15’s in tow. And look, this is not a gun post, but we’ve been patiently waiting to see if those wise fb libertarians will show up soon—you know—those true Jeffersonian’s who have been warning us about just such government overreach for years. I’m sure they’re stuck in traffic. Maybe they got stuck behind a truck full of clever memes. But if you think Portland is some sort of lawless badlands...naw...we’re just waiting for the rest of you. We’re also the testing ground for Trump to see how much he can get away with. And when he does a Fox interview and talks about not accepting the election results, everything starts to become a bit more clear. You see, he looks at how Putin has installed himself permanently (and you know how much he envies that type of power), and he dips a few more toes into the deep end of using military power to remain installed where he is. Because all this civil unrest could very well be the precursor to something much bigger. This is what a righteous populace looks like. So when you look at us and think...man..stuff there is crazy. It’s not. It’s the bellwether of a movement. RISE UP. And to back Jason up: President Trump on Wednesday placed much of the blame for the swell in coronavirus cases on recent demonstrations against racism and police brutality, ignoring in large part his own large-scale rallies and his administration's push to reopen the national economy before the virus had been fully contained. NPR Some memes: ����This morning on the CNN Covid Town Hall, Sanjay Gupta said he looked at photos of Anderson Cooper’s baby son Wyatt, to cheer himself up. In moments of sadness I watch videos of Oliver which always make me smile. ��Look at his hair. What famous baby character does he remind me of? The house is almost finished being painted - just the white on the north and south sides. Look how handsome it is! On to Caernarfon. The history of Caernarfon as an example where the rise and fall of different civilizations can be seen from one hilltop, are discussed in John Michael Greer's book The Long Descent. He writes of Caernarfon: Spread out below us in an unexpected glory of sunlight was the whole recorded history of that little corner of the world. The ground beneath us still rippled with earthworks from the Celtic hill fort that guarded the Menai Strait more than two and a half millennia ago. The Roman fort that replaced it was now the dim brown mark of an old archeological site on low hills off to the left. Edward I’s great gray castle rose up in the middle foreground, and the high contrails of RAF jets on a training exercise out over the Irish Sea showed that the town’s current overlords still maintained the old watch. Houses and shops from more than half a dozen centuries spread eastward as they rose through the waters of time, from the �cramped medieval buildings of the old castle town straight ahead to the gaudy sign and sprawling parking lot of the supermarket back behind us. Wikipedia. �������From the top: walking through the town to the castle; inside the castle walls with the poppy display - Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red was a public art installation created to commemorate the centenary of the outbreak of World War I. It consisted of 888,246 ceramic red poppies, each intended to represent one British or Colonial serviceman killed in the War. The ceramic artist was Paul Cummins, with conceptual design by the stage designer Tom Piper.The work's title was taken from the first line of a poem by an unknown soldier in World War I. Wikipedia. The poopy display began in the Tower of London in 2014 and then traveled around Britain. The next photo is of the town from the battlements; then me walking around the battlements and lastly two of Caernarfon Castle in the early morning. I’ll leave you with this thought: when you are feeling overwhelmed and you can’t go on - insert one word to make it this: I’m almost overwhelmed. 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_2020-07-24_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-135 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 2020-07-24 Title A name given to the resource Day 135 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/70b2af11a5cbc15643130e4cbeddf410.pdf ac7e11a97d54da10b736cd3632608c57 PDF Text Text Day 136. by windoworks In Melbourne, Victoria where the state is locked down and mask wearing non compliance comes with a $100 fine, masks have become the new thing and have supplanted designer coffee drinks in the must have category. They must be custom made and the fabric should be a recognizable high fashion brand. Here is the youngest in his ‘everyday’ mask. ��A tasteful zucchini green shade (with a color coordinated cap) which led to an online discussion with the oldest child who lives in New Zealand - and I quote: One strange effect of the coronavirus international border closures of late is that the country has lost its source of imported zucchinis - and the cost of the locally produced crop, under pressure from local zucchini aficionados, has shot up to $38/kilo - up to $7 for a decent one. It’s actually become a thing with people abandoning their pricy zucchinis at the checkout. Is this an example of price gouging? So yesterday the US confirmed cases jumped by 74,360 which brings us to the case total of 4.19M. At this point the statistics are so staggering that they almost become meaningless. Florida tops everyone in new cases daily - yesterday they had 12,000+ in one day. In bothNew Zealand and Australia, the cases in March/April were all from overseas contagion, that is, someone entered the country while asymptomatic. In recent weeks, the cases are predominantly community spread in Australia which is confusing to the authorities. Although I have to say, both countries have superb contact tracing programs and testing procedures that give results in a maximum time period of 2 days. Here in the US we are once again running out of essential testing supplies and all laboratory facilities are hugely overwhelmed. Is it just me or have we declined from a highly developed country to a developing one? Craig and I used to discuss the US and its knife edge balance between success and infrastructure failure. Its no longer a theory. From Coronavirus Community Resource Michigan Although it’s too early to know all the long term effects from COVID-19, there is emerging research that shows many serious complications that result from the virus, even if you survive. The White House has been pointing to the death toll, which has remained relatively low due to the lag between infection, hospitalization and death, as evidence that the virus isn’t as serious as public health experts and the media have been making it out to be. But the lingering complications effect all ages and even those that are asymptomatic. Dr. Aileen Marty, an infectious disease specialist at Florida International University says that many young people who report being asymptomatic actually have scar tissue in their lungs. �What are the potential longer term effects? They include reduced lung capacity, neurological disease, blots clots, inflammation, heart damage, kidney damage, and severe psychological issues. “Evidence strongly suggests that patients surviving COVID-19 are at high risk for subsequent development of neurological disease and in particular Alzheimer’s disease,” wrote researchers from the University of Bonn in Germany. And here’s the other idea that keeps circulating: herd immunity NPR The idea of herd immunity has been around for decades. In the past, it has been used to describe an effect seen with vaccination — if vaccination rates for measles are high, for example, a single case cannot spread far into a community. The "herd" of people is protected even when not everyone has received the vaccine. But with the outbreak of the coronavirus, the idea of natural herd immunity took hold in some circles. The theory, broadly speaking, is that should enough people become ill and then immune, the entire population will be protected. Estimates vary widely, but it's generally thought that somewhere between 50% and 80% of a given population would need to have been infected by the coronavirus before such natural herd immunity could be achieved. Well those figures seem way too high and In Sweden, where they practiced herd immunity without naming it, the statistics show that it just led to more deaths than any other Scandanavian country. So when people tout the herd immunity theory, remember: 50 - 80% of the population to achieve it. It is now 100 days and counting to the election. Here’s a meme: �And here’s a new worry that’s circulating. It’s long and I have left it almost intact as w all need to read and absorb this: �President Trump’s relentless efforts to sow doubts about the legitimacy of this year’s election are forcing both parties to reckon with the possibility that he may dispute the result in November if he loses — leading to an unprecedented test of American democracy. With less than four months before the election, Trump’s escalating attacks on the security of mail-in ballots and his refusal again this week to reassure the country that he would abide by the voters’ will have added urgency to long-simmering concerns among scholars and his critics about the lengths he could go to hold on to power. “What the president is doing is willfully and wantonly undermining confidence in the most basic democratic process we have,” said William A. Galston, chair of the Brookings Institution’s Governance Studies Program. “Words almost fail me — it’s so deeply irresponsible. He’s arousing his core supporters for a truly damaging crisis in the days and weeks after the November election.” Most legal experts said it is hard to envision that Trump would actually try to remain in office after a clear defeat by former vice president Joe Biden, considering the uproar that would follow such a challenge to U.S. democratic norms. Trump has previously said he offers up inflammatory ideas to provoke the media and his critics. But his unwillingness to commit to a smooth transition of power has forced academics and political leaders — including, privately, some GOP lawmakers — to contemplate possible scenarios. The resulting turmoil could surpass the contention over the outcome of the 2000 presidential election, confounding the legal system, Congress and the public’s faith in how the country picks its leaders. Such a crisis could also have long-lasting consequences for a nation that has already been rocked this year by the coronavirus pandemic, an economic collapse and a reckoning over racial injustice. Among the possibilities: Trump could claim victory before the vote in key states is fully counted — a process that could take days or even weeks this year because of the expected avalanche of absentee ballots. He could also spend weeks refusing to concede amid a legal war over which votes are valid and should be included in the tally, according to legal and constitutional experts who are tracking Trump’s statements. Or he could simply refuse to leave on Jan. 20 — a possibility Biden has discussed publicly. Anxiety about Trump’s intentions has grown as he seizes on the shift to absentee voting during the coronavirus pandemic as a sign that the election’s outcome will be rigged, claiming without evidence that this year’s race will be “the most corrupt election in the history of our country,” as he put it last month. Top Democrats and Biden supporters are now bracing for what former Ohio governor Ted Strickland said could be “dark days going forward.” “I fear this election could lead to civil unrest in this country because Trump would happily be a cheerleader for that kind of response,” said Strickland, a Democrat. “We are facing circumstances in this country we have probably never faced in our history, because we have a president who has no regard for our constitutional system of government. . . . He is fully capable of putting his own ego and perceived selfinterest above what’s right for the country.” Dan Baer, senior fellow in the Europe program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a �former Democratic Senate candidate in Colorado, compared the thought experiments to insurance. “It is unlikely that our house is going to burn down this year, but we still buy insurance against that,” said Baer, who recently wrote a piece titled “How Trump could refuse to go” for the website UnHerd. “One of the lessons of this presidency is that we should think about the most insidious opportunities, the most egotistical course of action and make sure we’ve thought through what could follow from that,” he said. “If we haven’t done that at this point, shame on us.” Washington Post So, vote. Encourage all friends and neighbors to vote and to vote blue. Vote absentee but make sure to get your vote in early. Stand in line, ignore suppression, just stand fast and vote. Each day from now on I will remind you to vote. Oliver: today a family shot. Zoe, Christian and Oliver with friends. �Flashback: years ago, when Zoe was living in London, Craig and I and Asher flew in for Christmas in London and then a family trip around England and Wales. Until I was looking at yesterday’s photos, I had forgotten that when we visited Caernarfon in the dead of winter, the other 3 went off somewhere exploring and I walked up to the shuttered door of the castle and knocked. The guard answered and said ‘you can’t come in, the castle is shut due to ice’ . I explained I had come from far away and could I just peek inside. So he let me penguin walk across the icy ground to take a photo or two. When I related this to the family they were annoyed and had no good excuse to ‘where were you?’ ���Harlech Castle. UNESCO considers Harlech to be one of "the finest examples of late 13th century and early 14th century military architecture in Europe", and it is classed as a World Heritage site. The fortification is built of local stone and concentric in design, featuring a massive gatehouse that probably once provided high-status accommodation for the castle constable and visiting dignitaries. The sea originally came much closer to Harlech than in modern times, and a water-gate and a long flight of steps leads down from the castle to the former shore, which allowed the castle to be resupplied by sea during sieges. Wikipedia Just an authors note here: when I look up each of these destinations to find more information for my blog, each one says (no matter what country) Temporarily closed. I think there was a lovely cafe attached to this castle and we ate lunch there. More Wales tomorrow. Yesterday I made a packed lunch and we drove out to Caledonia Lakeside Park. It was sunny with a light breeze and the park was quiet and green and calming. ��� 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_2020-07-25_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-136 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 2020-07-25 Title A name given to the resource Day 136 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/77be6e08ca8bf8425fc077044a78fe3c.pdf f4155e8bc883d8766637e274c74ddfd1 PDF Text Text Day 137 by windoworks It Sunday and a late start this morning because, once again, we drove out to Kirk Park to try the water. There were a few more people with dogs, this morning. Since the collapse (and the continuing collapse) of the dunes, the beach is now open along the whole length for dogs. There’s still nowhere to sit and the waves are still pounding in, but I managed to go in to waist height and Craig submerged to his neck. So at least I have been in the lake twice this year. Craig is back up the ladder, painting the lower half of the south side of the house, and I am on the front porch, enjoying the slight breeze and shade before the real heat of the day begins. Looking towards Big Blue, our neighbors house. Tomorrow it is 5 weeks until the start of college opening. I think it is about the same for all schools K-12 across America. Everyone seems nervous - parents, teachers, ancillary staff and students. From my high school teacher friend, Angela: �(FYI: a Hunger Games reference). �And speaking of Betsy DeVos and education From Washington Post’s Pinocchio files. Remember how Pinocchio’s nose grew longer every time he told a lie? • DeVos says ‘kids are actually stoppers of the disease’ • Could children actually be “stoppers” of covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus? • Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who is pressing the Trump administration’s case for sending kids back to school in the fall, made the claim during a radio interview: “More and more studies show that kids are actually stoppers of the disease and they don’t get it and transmit it themselves.” • The Education Department sent us four sources in support of DeVos’s claim, emphasizing a German study that found no evidence that schoolchildren play a role in spreading the virus, with a researcher quoted in a news report as saying that “children may even act as a brake on infection.” �• Well, there’s a problem with that. The German study has not been peer-reviewed; it is still in preprint review by the Lancet, meaning it should not be used to guide clinical practice. • It’s easy to find studies and news reports that contradict DeVos’s assertion. In South Korea, a large study using contact tracing found that children ages 10 to 19 can spread the virus at least as much as adults do; children younger than 10 were half as likely to transmit the virus, but there was still a risk. In Israel, at least 1,335 students and 691 staff members contracted the coronavirus after the country reopened its entire school system without restrictions on May 17, believing it had beaten the virus. The spike in infections among the children spread to the general population, according to epidemiological surveys by Israel’s Health Ministry. • We gave Four Pinocchios to DeVos. From Washington Post. This morning I am posting the first 3 of 10 key takeaways from a schools reopening Town Hall Roundtable: 1. Schools cannot be opened safely for in-person instruction if the virus is not contained in the local community. Ideally, local communities are following mitigation strategies including masks, social distancing, hand washing and ventilation protocols. Examples of schools opening safely in Denmark and Finland are drawn from societies in which the virus was under control. 2. The decision to open schools has to be a local decision based on the latest available, local scientific data. The fact is individual communities don’t know where the virus will be in September. Everyone wants all students back in school in traditional brick-and-mortar settings, but that has to happen safely based on local science and data. Some argue that a local daily infection rate of less than 5 percent is an indicator that the community has the virus in check. However even with small numbers the disease could be rising. It would be preferable to see a downward trend of at least a few weeks. (CDC guidance calls for a downward trend for 14 days.) 3. Infection rates for children aged 10 to 19 are similar to infection rates for adults 20 to 49. Although it is often said that children are less likely to contract the coronavirus than adults, the finding breaks down when children are disaggregated by age. Children from 5 to 9 are less likely to be infected, but that is not true of children of 10 or older. 3 more points tomorrow. Nearly 5 months into the pandemic, all hopes of extinguishing COVID-19 are riding on a stillhypothetical vaccine. And so a refrain has caught on: We might have to stay home—until we have a vaccine. Close schools—until we have a vaccine. Wear masks—but only until we have a vaccine. During these months of misery, this mantra has offered a small glimmer of hope. Normal life is on the other side, and we just have to wait—until we have a vaccine. Feeding these hopes are the Trump administration’s exceedingly rosy projections of a vaccine as early as October, as well as the media’s blow-by-blow coverage of vaccine trials. Each week brings news of “early success,” “promising initial results,” and stocks �rising because of “vaccine optimism.” But a COVID-19 vaccine is unlikely to meet all of these high expectations. The vaccine probably won’t make the disease disappear. It certainly will not immediately return life to normal. This is the beginning of a very long article on vaccines from The Atlantic. The article explains how vaccines work - an important point is that vaccines such as flu shots are put into the muscle in your arm. But COVID-19 doesn’t reside in muscles, it attacks the respiratory system and so the vaccine manufacturers have to be aware of this. The article ends: For all the uncertainties that remain ahead for a COVID-19 vaccine, several experts were willing to make one prediction. “I think the question that is easy to answer is, ‘Is this virus going to go away?’ And the answer to that is, ‘No,’” says Karron, the vaccine expert at Johns Hopkins. The virus is already too widespread. A vaccine could still mitigate severe cases; it could make COVID-19 easier to live with. The virus is likely here to stay, but eventually, the pandemic will end. So I wonder, will we be wearing masks and social distancing for years? Will any sort of group gatherings became acceptable and will we always think hard before going to well attended public events? Two days ago I went back to Trader Joe’s for the second time. Although the wait was short, the staff were helpful and the aisles were sparsely populated, some people shopped as they always used to. They parked their carts in front of the shelves, and some stood and considered what they wanted. And some people think its okay if their mask just covers their mouth and leaves their nose exposed. While I do enjoy being able to get the products I want, I do find shopping stressful. �A very early morning shot of the Auckland Sky Tower in New Zealand. �And in the strong women everywhere category: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Thursday morning speech, delivered from the House floor and directed to a fellow member of Congress, but really to us all. “You can be a powerful man and accost women,” said the New York Democrat. “You can have daughters and accost women, without remorse. You can be married and accost women. You can take photos, and project an image to the world of being a family man, and accost women, without remorse, and with a sense of impunity. It happens every day in this country.” And from Portland Oregon: Here is the Wall of Moms, now joined by the Wall of Vets. Both groups aim to protect peaceful protesters. The federal troops sent there by chump to protect federal property, have stepped outside those bounds and begun acting as unofficial riot police and are arresting protesters for ‘federal’ crimes. Moms and vets all over the US are watching closely and getting ready to mobilize. This is all part of chump’s frantic attempt to regain electability. His refrain is that Joe Biden will destroy America. Actually, chump, I think you already began that. I think 4 more years of your destruction will leave nothing recognizable. ��There are 2 things I love about this photo. Firstly, as Zoe pointed out, he’s got a room full of toys and yet he chooses to chew his socks, and secondly, he’s standing on his toes! Oh Oliver, you do make me laugh! Still in Wales. We drove to Milford Haven for the night. (Welsh: Aberdaugleddau, meaning "mouth of the two Rivers Cleddau") is a town and community in Pembrokeshire, Wales. It is situated on the north side of the Milford Haven Waterway, an estuary forming a natural harbour that has been used as a port since the Middle Ages. The natural harbour of the Haven was known as a safe port and was exploited for several historical military operations throughout the second millennium. Campaigns conducted from the Haven included part of the invasion of Ireland in 1171 by Henry II and by Cromwell in 1649. Forces which have disembarked at the point include Jean II de Rieux's 1405 reinforcement of the Glyndŵr Rising. In 1485, the future Henry VII landed close to his birthplace in Mill Bay before marching on to England. Wikipedia. We were staying in a bed and breakfast for the night. It was a gorgeous old house and our room had a carpeted bathroom with a bath and no shower. I don’t want to talk about the bath experience, I’ll just say baths are not my thing. However, the breakfast was spectacular. ���From the top: looking at the Waterway; the view from our room; and breakfast - it turned out to be the full Welsh, yum! Tomorrow we leave Wales. �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_2020-07-26_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-137 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 2020-07-26 Title A name given to the resource Day 137 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/72bfb301be82a9ec9c818636011e93a2.pdf 8e07504fd539b55f92c2dccac9992635 PDF Text Text Day 138 by windoworks Yesterday was hot. It felt like 98F in the late afternoon. Murphy does not do well with the heat and we discovered that if unsupervised in our back garden, she eats sticks and twigs and stuff. Usually it causes no problem but yesterday she threw up her breakfast and then spent some time dry heaving. So after a quick consultation by phone with our vet, Craig took her to the Urgent Care vet on the other side of the city. They had a desk set up outside and they came out and took her inside while Craig gave her details to the assistant outside. Then he came home. Eight hours later he drove back and picked her up, after she had a thorough examination, a nausea shot and X-rays to make sure she hadn’t eaten anything like a pebble. It cost $524. Dogs are expensive. Things continue apace in Portland, Oregon. Over the last couple of nights, men with leaf blowers have joined the Moms and the Vets. Apparently the tear gas they are using (which I read is banned in war due to its possibly toxic nature) hangs in the air and gloms onto clothing, hair, masks, shoes etc. Men using leaf blowers can blow that cloud away or even back towards the federal troops. Then the troops brought their own leaf blowers and it has become a leaf blower competition. A group of self-identified Portland dads, inspired by the “Wall of Moms” that forms a protective human shield at the front of nightly protests near the Mark O. Hatfield Courthouse, set out to help clear the air at protests by arming themselves with leaf blowers. They are known collectively as “DadBloc” and “LeafBlower Dads” and turn up to the protests wearing orange shirts to compliment the moms’ yellow ones. Each night, their numbers have swelled. On Friday, they were joined by other burgeoning groups — the veteran-led Wall of Vets, green-shirted Teachers Against Tyrants, the pizza-box carrying ChefBloc, health-care workers in scrubs and Lawyers for Black Lives, who turned up at the protest in suits and ties. President Trump sent dozens of federal law enforcement officers to Portland — a move that Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler (D), who was tear-gassed with the crowd earlier this week, and Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D) have likened to a hostile occupation.Washington Post But all joking aside, this has become a much darker thing. My friend Gladysin sent me an article written by a woman who was shot with a rubber bullet. Here’s some of what she said: Professor Maureen Healy is the chair of the history department at Lewis & Clark College in Portland. She teaches Modern European History, with a specialization in the history of Germany and Eastern Europe (and the rise of fascism). I wanted to, and will continue to, exercise my First Amendment right to speak. Federal troops have been sent to my city to extinguish these peaceful protests. I was not damaging federal property. I was in a crowd with at least a thousand other ordinary people. I was standing in a public space. By professional training �and long years of teaching, I am knowledgeable about the historical slide by which seemingly vibrant democracies succumbed to authoritarian rule. Militarized federal troops are shooting indiscriminately into crowds of ordinary people in our country. We are on that slide. It dawned on me when I was in the ER, and had a chance to catch my breath (post tear gas): my government did this to me. My own government. I was not shot by a random person in the street. A federal law enforcement officer pulled a trigger that sent an impact munition into my head. From FaceBook. I’m just going to let you think about that for a minute. This is where we are - in the middle of an uncontrollable, global pandemic with an executive branch of our government who are using that pandemic to sow distrust while lining their own pockets. You know, words failed me months ago. Consider this: �And this next one is extremely confronting. ��The next 3 take always about schools reopening. 4. Schools need well-developed protocols for reopening and for steps to follow if the virus appears in a school. Schools need to be transparent about their procedures for taking students in each day — temperature checks, hand washing, sanitation procedures and the like — as well as procedures to be followed in the event the virus strikes a student or staff member. Protocols for both intake and treatment need to be agreed on in advance, not invented amid a crisis. 5. Schools should consider strategies that encourage cocooning, staggered drop-off and pickup times, social distancing on buses and making best use of ventilation. If children can be “cocooned” during the school day into small groups of 6 to 10 students, it is easier to quarantine the “cocooned” group than the entire �school if an infection appears. Staggered times of arrival and departure and staggered days for students in different grades might make sense. Everyone on school buses must wear a mask while students are socially distanced.Ventilation is another important consideration. Improving HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) filtering, opening windows if needed and even holding classes outside (in playgrounds inside tents) are all sensible precautions, if possible. 6. Is a vaccine likely to bail us out? The issue of a vaccine needs to be off the table right now. There is no possibility of a vaccine appearing in the next 6-8 weeks. The last takeaways tomorrow. Statistics from yesterday: US new cases - 58,631. Michigan - 1,041 new cases and Kent County - 134 new cases. For the US this is about a 10,000 drop but for Michigan and Kent County, this is a sudden rise. In Australia they had 549 new cases yesterday and 532 of those were in the state of Victoria. Most of the new cases in Australia are from community transmission. And its time for an Oliver photograph. I think we all need one. ��He does love a tambourine. I look at his face and think - what does he know of pandemics, and climate change and racism? Mostly, all he knows is pure joy in the simple things. We left Wales and drove across the Severn Bridge to England. We then drove all the way down to Truro, Cornwall to visit our niece Elle and her partner Terry. Terry had just had hernia surgery, so Elle was our tour guide for our stay. ����From the top: crossing the bridge to England; with Elle on her favorite beach and walking the cliffs. We had arrived in Poldark country. More Cornwall tomorrow. So thats it. The start of another week. 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_2020-07-27_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-138 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 2020-07-27 Title A name given to the resource Day 138 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/5f98e68c989285161fdb73189aa003aa.pdf ce7e69a1f6c13be3c42ea2f8334816eb PDF Text Text Day 139 by windoworks So here we are. Yesterday a very significant thing happened. Grand Rapids Public Schools announced that classes would be online for the first 9 weeks of the semester. That’s 26 schools. Some background: when the Women’s City Club was housed at the Sweet House, they used GRPS as an indication of how dangerous a winter snowstorm was going to be. If GRPS closed all schools for the day, the WCC closed. In fact this was written in the general handout for WCC members. In some ways, GRPS is a bellwether indicator. (Bellwether: an indicator or predictor. The word originally described the lead sheep in a flock �that wears a bell around its neck - now you know). So, my question is - if GRPS has decided its too dangerous to teach face to face, what will the local colleges and nearby school districts decide? Here’s some points from the WoodTV8 interview with GRPS Superintendent Leadriane Roby: • We said that the health, safety and the well-being of our students and staff would be our top priority in our decision-making,” Roby said. “I believe starting with distance learning is practicing what we preach and is by far our safest approach to the start of the 2020-21 school year.” • The first nine weeks of school accounts for the first marking period, which ends Oct 21. During the first period, Roby said the district will “continuously assess our decision” and will work out plans for shifting to hybrid or in-person learning. • GRPS said each student will get the devices they need to take classes and the district will ensure kids can get online, including the distribution of hot spots. The district is preparing “digital literacy training” for parents so they can help their kids through the start of school. A Family Helpdesk will be available to provide technical support and troubleshoot connection problems. • Programs to feed kids will also still be in place. And while we’re all digesting that, here’s a piece from Jean Molot who is teaching a summer program in New Haven, Conn. To explain to people the reality of being in a classroom all day, I ask them to imagine that they work in an office building with 900 other people, most of whom work in groups of about 20, in spaces the size of a very large conference room. Most office workers remember to stay in their designated seats six feet apart, but sometimes they get up and move about the room, or move their chairs closer to each other so that they can hear better or share their work. Most people remember that they must keep their masks on all day, but some forget. Some remove their masks to rub their noses or drink from their water bottle and then forget to put their mask back on. Some of the younger office workers refuse to wear one at all. I ask these people, would you be comfortable working in that conference room with 20 other people for over six hours a day, five days a week? If not, how can we expect teachers to do the same? Washington Post. �As a former teacher - YES! And while still on the topic of schools reopening, here are the last 3 takeaways: 7. Teachers in schools need protection but so do nonteaching staff. All adults in the school need to focus on masks, hand washing and social distancing. Cafeteria workers, counselors and administrative staff might not have extended interactions with students, but they require protection, perhaps in the form of face guards and Plexiglass barriers. Break rooms, where teachers and staff remove masks and perhaps eat together in confined spaces, need attention. 8. Extracurricular activities are going to be an extremely challenging area for school safety. We have already seen community outbreaks in choral groups and choirs, activities involving expelling a lot of air. We may need to put a hold on them. Band and orchestra don’t present the same problem, but frequently instruments are exchanged, so that may be a challenge. A golf team doesn’t have the same risks as basketball, football or soccer, where players are exerting themselves in close proximity to each other. These teams will be major concerns. 9. The costs of attending to all this are astronomical, at a time when state and local revenues will decline due to the crippling unemployment and recession accompanying the pandemic. The Council of Chief State School Officers has estimated that schools will need between $150 billion and $250 billion to ensure that schools can do what is required to open safely. Congress and the federal government need to step up. Fully �98 percent of those following the town hall agreed that Congress should provide additional emergency covid-19 relief funding for K-12 public schools. The maelstrom of the virus continues to swirl around us unchecked and while that’s happening, political mayhem abounds. �Much of the world is now coping with a coronavirus resurgence. The number of new daily cases has risen more than 20 percent in both Europe and Canada over the past week. It’s up about 40 percent in Australia and Japan. Hong Kong reported 145 cases yesterday, its highest one-day count yet and the sixth straight day of more than 100 new cases. All of these increases are �worrisome reminders that crushing the virus is not a one-time event, at least not until a vaccine is available. It involves constant vigilance. New York Times Here is our house with the painting almost finished. Craig is beginning work on the lower white section of the north side of the house. The fence in our back garden just needs the gate attached. I will post a photo of the completed fence in a day or so. And here’s the vegetable garden before Craig harvested the lettuce crop and I shared it out to our neighbors. Very yummy. The tomatoes are beginning to ripen. �This was timely and was sent to me from my daughter Zoe. I have edited it for length, With all our lives changing because of coronavirus, you could be experiencing disenfranchised grief When you ask someone how they are at the moment, you might get a stoic response in which they compare their feelings to people who are really struggling. "Things are hard, but they are worse for others," is the way it often goes. In the face of an extraordinary crisis that shows no sign of easing soon, I suspect many of us are getting good at minimising our own experiences of the pandemic. But what if somebody asked you: What are you missing most right now? What has COVID-19 and its many consequences taken away from you? Chances are, you can name at least one loss that has caused you pain. Some of these losses may not be so obvious or easily discussed such as: a trip to visit a friend or relative, or the deferral of medical treatment for an ailment that's been problematic. Perhaps you miss the way people used to greet each other casually without fear of breaching a 1.5-metre barrier, or the feeling of your mum or dad's embrace. If you are feeling a sense of loss, but haven't found the words or the moment to acknowledge it, you may be experiencing disenfranchised grief. Disenfranchised grief refers to experiences of loss which might not �be recognised, either by the person or by others. As with recognised grief when somebody dies, disenfranchised grief is accompanied by disbelief and shock, yearning for reality to be different or as it was before the loss, and then uncertainty and sadness as reality grows. The process can be more difficult because unrecognised losses tend not to attract increased social support or public ceremonies or rituals. These experiences can be isolating and induce powerlessness, rather than the problem-solving that is needed to reduce the psychological pain. Just as knowing the signs of anxiety and depression can help people recognise and begin to manage these emotions, appreciating the impact of disenfranchised grief might help us understand our experience. Abc.net.au So I want all you readers to ask yourself now, what is it I miss the most?Any answer will be correct. Oliver! ��Wait, what? Cornwall. ����Our first stop of the day was St Ives. As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives, Each wife had seven sacks, Each sack had seven cats, Each cat had seven kits: Kits, cats, sacks, and wives, How many were there going to St. Ives? Sorry, I just had to put that in there. It was a wild stormy day and we comforted ourselves by having the proper cream tea. So 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_2020-07-28_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-139 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 2020-07-28 Title A name given to the resource Day 139 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/d27a9d741bc8adbd31693d9ec081eeb1.pdf 44ac4e60552650a7317fa4418621538c PDF Text Text Day 140! 20 weeks! 20 weeks by windoworks I’ve been writing this post so long that there are a huge number of new emojis and Gmail has introduced Google Meet. Two houses on our block have been repainted with two more starting soon. Two houses have new hot water systems installed, people are refurbishing their front porches and rethinking their backyard space. Several houses have made the lawn strip by the road into gardens - the list goes on. Ten years ago in November, Craig and I became American citizens. To become a citizen, you must first apply for a green card. We had help from a legal team recommended by GVSU. Once you get your green card, you must wait for 4 years before beginning your citizenship application. Again, we used a legal team (you can do it yourself, but sometimes Immigration has tricky questions). We were fingerprinted, tested for AIDS, photographed and investigated. We had to read the Constitution and be ready for questions. In the interview (in Detroit at 7:30am) I was asked to read aloud, and then write a sentence that was dictated to me. I had to answer 3 questions from the Constitution and I had to answer (in the affirmative) if I was prepared to bear arms for the United States. And renounce all allegiance to the country of my birth. In the confirmation ceremony we all stood and took the oath of allegiance. I look at this country - my country - today and think: all that study and work and how happy I was to become an American citizen. And I wonder - how many politicians have read (and understood) the Constitution and the Amendments? How many use this as rules not only to live by, but to rule by? When chump was elected, Craig said to me: don’t worry, there are many checks and balances on his power. Apparently, checks and balances are minor irritations to be ignored and the Constitution is easily set aside. But I love my city and my state and especially all my dear friends and neighbors and I worry for all of us. What more could possibly happen if chump wins another 4 years? Thats too awful to contemplate. �From Portland, Oregon. Lets look at this photo for a minute. Here is a young woman in light clothing, she has a sign under her arm, her phone in her hand and a mask (not properly worn). The person facing her is in full battle dress, helmet, face shield and industrial gas mask and is pointing a weapon IN HER FACE. Ask yourself: what threat is this young woman posing? What weapon is she carrying? Words fail me. Pay attention. This may be coming to a city near you. New York Times: Attorney General William Barr clashed with House Democrats in a hostile five-hour hearing. Barr defended the deployment of federal agents in Portland, Ore., saying that “rioters and anarchists” had “hijacked” peaceful demonstrations. And he denied improperly interfering in criminal cases against Roger Stone and Michael Flynn, two allies of President Trump. Democrats portrayed him as a dangerous political enforcer for the president. In the ‘do you think they will pay attention? Category: PORTLAND, Ore.— U.S. District Judge Michael Simon today blocked federal agents in Portland from dispersing, arresting, threatening to arrest, or targeting force against journalists or legal observers at protests. The court’s order, which comes in response to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon, adds the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Marshals Service to an existing �injunction barring Portland police from arresting or attacking journalists and legal observers at Portland protests. Under the court order, federal agents also cannot unlawfully seize any photographic equipment, audio- or video-recording equipment, or press passes from journalists and legal observers, or order journalists or legal observers to stop photographing, recording, or observing a protest. ACLU �Good question. In Michigan, the Republican Senate have decided to withhold essential funding to school districts in Lansing, East Lansing, Ann Arbor and Grand Rapids because all these districts have decided to �teach online this semester. Because, as Betsy said: children don’t get the virus and they don’t transmit it. And this leads to another topic: rampant misinformation and conspiracy theories. New York Times: Why is the U.S. enduring a far more severe virus outbreak than any other rich country? There are multiple causes, but one of them is the size and strength of right-wing media organizations that frequently broadcast falsehoods. The result is confusion among many Americans about scientific facts that are widely accepted, across the political spectrum, in other countries. Canada, Japan and much of Europe have no equivalent to Sinclair — whose local newscasts reach about 40 percent of Americans — or Fox News. Germany and France have widely read blogs that promote conspiracy theories. “But none of them have the reach and the funding of Fox or Sinclair,” Monika Pronczuk, a Times reporter based in Europe, told me. Fox is particularly important, because it has also influenced President Trump’s response to the virus, which has been slower and less consistent than that of many other world leaders. “Trump repeatedly failed to act to tame the spread, even though that would have helped him politically,” The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent has written. The headline on Sargent’s opinion column is: “How Fox News may be destroying Trump’s re-election hopes.” Oh, I sincerely hope that headline remains true. In COVID news; the numbers in Michigan and Kent County seem to keep slowly climbing and yesterday Governor Whitmer said we all need to do even more to help slow the spread down. She has extended the State of Emergency to August 31 and she has been asking for federal funding assistance. Of course, chump won’t authorize it because a) she’s a woman and b) she’s a Democrat. Our chief financial officer then laid out that facts that our state economy is in shambles and with no help from the federal government there is no money for anything, like road repairs etc. And here we are: The Post examined the decision-making of two U.S. leaders who saw covid-19 rage out of control on their watch: President Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R). DeSantis bragged about his state’s early success against the virus, sidelined scientists and prioritized a political alliance with Trump over his own public health officials — only to see Florida become the pandemic’s global epicenter. As for Trump, even some of his defenders are baffled by his refusal to even attempt to control the national crisis. Several people close to the president told The Post he is hobbled by a penchant for magical thinking and an “almost pathological unwillingness to admit error.” Washington Post. I can hear you all saying: Oliver! Give us some Oliver, please! ��In Cornwall we were staying in a little rabbit warren of a hotel in Truro. Truro is Cornwall’s only city and I didn’t explore it as much as Craig did. ��The streets and the Truro River on a wet weekday morning. ���Bosigran. This is part of a National Park Walk past ruins of tin mines and along cliffs. In the top photo, Craig is standing next to a popular climbing spot - and he would have tried climbing down the cliffs if I hadn’t been there to stop him. The next two photos show ruins of tin mines. Mining in Cornwall and Devon, in the southwest of England, began in the early Bronze Age, around 2150 BCE, and ended (at least temporarily) with the closure of South Crofty tin mine in Cornwall in 1998. Tin, and later copper, were the most commonly extracted metals. Some tin mining continued long after the mining of other metals had become unprofitable. Wikipedia. Tin mining is the thread running through all the Poldark novels and many of the ruins we saw were used in the recent tv series. Cornwall’s coast is wild and exciting and a great place for hikers. More Cornwall tomorrow. I’ll leave you with this, from my brother-in-law: �� 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_2020-07-29_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-140 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 2020-07-29 Title A name given to the resource Day 140! 20 weeks! 20 weeks 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/a2825c9cb5005e7dccd5783d49459019.pdf 0752e64e96eef24cc610eb4f047bd0fe PDF Text Text Day 141 by windoworks ��So this is where we are. It’s no surprise really. The weather has been spectacular, everything is growing, fruit and vegetables abound, the lake is sparkling clear and warm - and isn’t everything right with the world? Here’s some thoughts about this: COVID-19 has now killed more than 148,000 in the US.. On a typical day in the past week, more than 1,000 people died. But the deluge of grim statistics can dull our collective sense of outrage. And part of that has to do with how humans are built to perceive the world. "With any kind of consistent danger, people get used to situations like that," says Elke Weber, a professor of psychology and of energy and the environment at Princeton University. "When you live in a war zone, after a while, everyday risk becomes just baseline. Our neurons are wired in such a way that we only respond to change. And any state that's constant basically sort of gets washed out. She says that's what's happening now with the coronavirus pandemic. "People have just gotten used to being in this new state of danger, adapting to it, and therefore have not taken enough precaution anymore.” “People are not very good with large numbers. We don't discriminate between 150,000 or 300,000 or 3 million. And so to put it into a context where people can imagine what it means — like to have the probability of dying of COVID — can be very helpful. One way would be to say, well, what towns and cities in the U.S. has COVID wiped out at this point? And an example is Paterson, N.J., it’s gone. It has a population of 145,000.” NPR Stats: US - 63,255 new cases yesterday and 153K deaths in total. Michigan - 996 new cases yesterday and 6,426 deaths in total. Kent County - new cases swing between 45 and 100+ daily. 150 deaths in total. On a side note - I am seeing an ENT specialist next Tuesday and tomorrow I have to have a COVID test beforehand. Then on August 28 I am scheduled for my first cataract surgey and I have to have another COVID test prior to that. Oh well. And here’s this: Right now we are experiencing a national forest fire of COVID that is readily consuming any human wood that's available to burn," says Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. When you have something like this happening, there's no way that traditional testing and tracing is going to have any meaningful impact," Osterholm says. "I liken it to trying to plant your petunias in the middle of a Category 5 hurricane." Others agree. At this point, there are just too many new infections occurring too quickly for underfunded, understaffed public health departments to effectively use testing and contact tracing. So if testing, contact tracing, isolation and quarantine won't work, what will? Given our basic failure to fix the gaps in testing �and the bottlenecks, that really puts us on a path where there is no viable alternative beyond shutdowns. Washington Post �A statue of Roger B Chaffee in downtown Grand Rapids. Roger Bruce Chaffee was an American naval officer and aviator, aeronautical engineer, and NASA astronaut in the Apollo program. Chaffee was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he became an Eagle Scout. He graduated from Central High School in 1953, and accepted a Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps scholarship. Wikipedia And look - he’s wearing a mask! I haven’t written about it but 13 days ago, Former United States Representative John Lewis died. He was a civil rights leader of great note and well respected by all - except chump. John Lewis’s body was given the great honor of lying in state in the US Capitol. His funeral today will be attended by George W Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. The eulogy will be delivered by Barack Obama. And all the president of the United States had to say was, "No, no, I won't be going" as he turned and walked off. No recognition , no sympathy, not even a RIP for John Lewis, a brave patriot and incredible human being. It would have taken him about 30 seconds to be kind. He failed. This is a prime example of low-life partisanship. That is not what we need. Here’s what Joe Biden’s tribute to John Lewis after he and his wife Jill attended the lying in: "To John’s son, John Miles, and to his family, friends, staff, and constituents, we send you our love and prayers. Thank you for sharing him with the nation and the world. And to John, march on, dear friend. May God bless you. May you reunite with your beloved Lillian. And may you continue to inspire righteous good trouble down from the Heavens." From a FB post on Michigan Women for Biden From a nearby yard. This made Craig, the Big Historian, very happy. �In The Who knew? Category: The "lipstick index" has been the go-to way for experts to measure how women spend money during hard times. When the economy is up, lipstick sells like hotcakes because it's a relatively inexpensive way for women to treat themselves. But the coronavirus has turned the lipstick index on its head. Why? You guessed it: masks. The two just don’t mix — or they do mix and it’s messy. Maybe it's time for the mani-pedi index since people are buying nail polish and nail care tools for DIY self-care. NPR If you look online there is an amazing video clip of many people, standing in the dark with lights above their heads, chanting Black Lives Matter and waving the lights in unison in Portland Oregon. I can’t post it here but its worth finding and watching. And here is a post from Oregon’s governor, Kate Brown: After my repeated requests, the federal government has agreed to a phased withdrawal of federal officers that have been deployed to the Mark Hatfield United States Courthouse over recent weeks,” Brown said in a statement. “These federal officers have acted as an occupying force, refused accountability, and brought violence and strife to our community.” Washington Post. And just to remind you: �And on a lighter note: As if 2020 wasn’t feeling a little old school already (baking homemade bread, summers with nothing to do) now outdoor movies are popular again. Actor Michael B. Jordan and Amazon Studios are running a drive- �in movie series in 20 cities this summer. And next month, 160 Walmart parking lots will become temporary drive-in movie theaters. At one time, this country had more than 4,000 drive-in movie theaters. Where did they all go? NPR When our children were small we lived very close to a drive in movie site. Unfortunately the nearest drive in movie site is about an hours drive from our house - and the movie doesn’t start until 9:30pm after the sun sets. Maybe they’ll set one up in the Walmart parking lot here. Tomorrow is Oliver’s first birthday. Yesterday he missed daycare because he had a cold and was unhappy. Look carefully at this photo. He’s ‘resting’ while mummy works. (He’s under the end of the coffee table). ��Flashback: remember we visited John o’ Groats at the top of mainland Scotland? Well, we also visited Land’s End at the bottommost tip of England. If you went straight south from here you would end up in Spain. ���And finally, we visited St Michaels Mount. The island is a civil parish and is linked to the town of Marazion by a man-made causeway of granite setts, passable between mid-tide and low water. It is managed by the National Trust, and the castle and chapel have been the home of the St Aubyn family since approximately 1650. Wikipedia. ��And that was the end of our Cornwall adventures. I liked Cornwall a lot. I’ll leave you with this photo of the Auckland, New Zealand, sky. �� 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_2020-07-30_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-141 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 2020-07-30 Title A name given to the resource Day 141 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/a8084db946112de585c98bfc32a6a550.pdf 9e5ca7c7bf166bb78532f6412bb6a430 PDF Text Text Day 142 by windoworks President Trump drew immediate rebukes from Republicans and Democrats alike on Thursday after floating the prospect of delaying the November election and claiming without evidence that widespread mail balloting would be a “catastrophic disaster” leading to fraudulent results. The U.S. Constitution gives the power to regulate the “time, place and manner” of general elections to Congress, while states control the dates of primary elections. Nowhere is the president granted such �power. In addition, the Constitution spells out a hard end to a president’s and vice president’s terms on Jan. 20 in the year following a presidential election, whether an election is held or not. Even if Congress voted to delay the general election, the electoral college is still required to elect a president under federal law. If lawmakers changed that too, Trump and Vice President Pence would still be required to leave office by noon on Jan. 20. With no successor, the speaker of the House of Representatives, currently Pelosi, would be next in line. Washington Post It’s 94 days until November 3. In Michigan we have a primary election Tuesday August 4. Craig and I have already voted by mail in ballot and then we put our ballots in the official mail box on Ottawa. We will do the same with our ballots for November 3, because that way there’s no delay in the office receiving them. You can look online to see if and when your ballot was received. I’ve checked that mine was received. I am happy to share this next post from the Ingham County Clark. And here are some of the plans being put in place if Joe Biden wins the presidency �Executive orders would be signed, thick pieces of proposed legislation sent to Congress, phone calls placed to foreign leaders, international agreements reentered. New ethics guidelines would be instituted for the White House and new inspectors general would take up oversight positions. As former vice president Joe Biden hones his list of what to tackle on his first day were he to win the White House, he has pledged a portfolio of actions that would impact a wide and diverse array of American life. Biden representatives already have held preliminary discussions with top House and Senate Democrats about what to prioritize, according to campaign and congressional aides. Washington Post. Yesterday the funeral for John Lewis was held. This morning Craig and I watched Barack Obama give the eulogy. He spoke for 40 minutes. Honestly, I cried through most of it. He used words and sentences and whole paragraphs. He never once talked about how great he (Obama) was. My feelings were mixed: on the one hand we lived in the US for 8 amazing years under his measured guidance and on the other hand we’ve lived for 3 1/2 years under his unfortunate successor. It’s like the very best and then the very worst. If you are an American citizen and you are reading this - get out and vote for the BLUE WAVE - from the bottom all the way to the top. And remember: we the people elect our representatives to work for us - not the other way around. Lets do something to support the younger people coming behind us. They don’t deserve to have to fix our mistakes. If you have time today, find Obama’s eulogy on YouTube. You won’t be sorry. Here’s a piece about a vaccine: The development of a coronavirus vaccine won’t end this pandemic overnight. Instead, it’ll merely mark “the beginning of the end.” 1. A vaccine won’t make life go back to normal instantly. A vaccine, when it is available, will mark only the beginning of a long, slow ramp down. And how long that ramp down takes will depend on the efficacy of a vaccine, the success in delivering hundreds of millions of doses, and the willingness of people to get it at all. 2. The rollout of a treatment would likely be complex … Logistically, manufacturers will have to make hundreds of millions of doses while relying, perhaps, on technology never before used in vaccines and competing for basic supplies such as glass vials. Then the federal government will have to allocate doses, perhaps through a patchwork of state and local health departments with no existing infrastructure for vaccinating adults at scale. 3. … and political. If the pandemic so far is any indication, a vaccination program is likely to take place against a backdrop of partisanship and misinformation. The Atlantic And I heard yesterday that there will have to be 2 doses for efficacy. Here is a piece from NPR: �On January 30, the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus — then unnamed — to be a "Public Health Emergency of International Concern." The virus, first reported in China in late 2019, had started to spread beyond its borders, causing 98 cases in 18 countries in addition to some 7,700 cases in China at the time. Six months later, the tiny coronavirus has spread around the world, infecting more than 16 million people worldwide and killing more than 650,000. It is one of the leading causes of death in the U.S. in 2020. What was it about this coronavirus — later named SARS-CoV-2 — that made it the one to spark a global pandemic? It's a super-fast spreader … One of the novel coronavirus's biggest advantages is how easily it spreads from human to human, The coronavirus causes COVID-19, a respiratory disease that infects the sinuses, throat, lungs — all parts of the body involved with breathing. As a result, the virus can be readily passed onward through breath and spittle expelled from the nose and mouth. All it takes to introduce the illness to a new continent is a single person who travels there while infectious. It's transmittable even with no symptoms Even before symptoms develop, infected people can spread this virus by speaking, singing, coughing and breathing out virus-laden droplets in close proximity to others. A lot of the transmission is from asymptomatic, [presymptomatic]or mildly symptomatic people. The severity of symptoms puts a strain on health systems Even though some people who are infected have no symptoms or mild symptoms, the novel coronavirus can inflict serious damage. This coronavirus has the capacity to cause really debilitating respiratory disease and even death for a higher proportion of infected people compared with the flu. The world has never dealt with a pandemic caused by a highly dangerous coronavirus before. This means everyone in the world is likely susceptible to it. And that lack of knowledge about treatments and control has contributed to the virus's ability to spread. Unlike flu, which has been known to researchers for centuries, this novel coronavirus has required researchers to figure out everything from scratch — how it spreads, who's most likely to get sick from it and how to combat it with drugs and vaccines. NPR From my son, who is locked down in Melbourne Australia, where the daily cases continue to increase - a Halo Moon. ��Yesterday was Oliver’s first birthday. Oliver, Zoe and Oliver’s dad, Christian, went to Taronga Zoo. Craig and I were sad not to be there but he loved the bongo drums we sent him. I think he was confused by everyone singing that same song to him all day long. ��On to Langport, Somerset. Years ago Jill and her first husband lived next door to us in Sydney. When we are visiting the UK we always try to fit in a visit to Jill. ����From Craig’s early morning walk - the bridge over the river Parrett and geese. Lastly, Jill and I at the bottom of her gorgeous garden. Our adventures at Highclere Castle tomorrow. Today I’ll leave you with an impressive sign for our governor: We love you, Big Gretch! � 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_2020-07-31_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-142 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 2020-07-31 Title A name given to the resource Day 142 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/422f45402921981fe7fbce663ab0fa65.pdf 9f3f1bb1cd1e87af5b2280a50feb8254 PDF Text Text Day 143 and August 1. by windoworks We were talking to Zar, our oldest, who lives in Auckland New Zealand with his wife Alva. We were discussing our hope to visit New Zealand and Australia next year during our summer, to catch up with all the family. Zar pointed out that unless things improve dramatically , we might have to quarantine for 14 days in Auckland. The NZ government has rented at least one hotel and installed security guards and 2 6 foot fences around it. You are tested on Day 3 and again on Day 12. If you test positive, they move you to a special isolation premises until the virus is over. This is for incoming relatives or New Zealanders returning home. You have to pay $3000NZ for one person (or $4000 total for 2), for the hotel costs which include 3 meals a day. You might be allowed to spend some time in an exercise room but otherwise, you are confined to your hotel room. And then after a 2 week visit with our NZ family (post quarantine), we would fly on to Australia and repeat the exact same thing there. Think about this: to the best of my knowledge, people returning to the States are asked to self isolate at home. There’s no facility for quarantine and its strictly an honor system. At the same time, the US government has realized that they can’t afford the cost of repatriation that they paid out for thousands of Americans to fly home at the onset of the virus, and now they’re billing people $10,000 each. Perhaps by May next year there will be a readily available vaccine and this will all change. In the meantime, here’s this: The United States reported just over 1,400 fatalities in 24 hours. That’s about one per minute. It’s our highest daily death toll in two months. California, North Carolina and Idaho also broke their single-day coronavirus fatality records. Over 150,000 Americans have died since February because of the novel coronavirus, according to our tracker. Daily new cases over the past few days are more than double what they were during the previous peak from April. Washington Post �Said no scientist, ever. The coronavirus is spreading inside American homes. New evidence suggests that covid-19 is following younger people home from work or social outings, then infecting older and more vulnerable members of the household. “Front-line caregivers, elected officials and experts in Houston, South Florida and elsewhere say they are seeing patterns of hospitalization and death that confirm fears this would happen,” our health desk wrote. Much of the country could soon see case surges like those already devastating the South, the White House's top infectious disease expert Anthony S. Fauci warned Wednesday. “Ohio, Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana … are starting to show that very subtle increase in percent positives among the total tested, �Fauci told ABC News. “Which is a surefire hint that you may be getting into the same sort of trouble with those states that the Southern states got into trouble with.” The dire situation in the United States is often blamed on premature attempts to reopen the economy, but many experts think it has as much to do with public aversion to masks. “Faulty guidance from health authorities, a cultural aversion to masks and a deeply polarized politics have all contributed. So has a president who resisted role modeling the benefits of face coverings, and who belittled those who did,” our health and politics desks wrote. “The result, experts say, is a country that squandered one of its best opportunities to beat back the coronavirus pandemic this spring and summer.”Washington Post. You know some mornings the news divides itself into dire, more dire and direst of all. When John Lewis was days from death, he wrote a piece that he asked to be published after he died. Here’s a paragraph from it. Like so many young people today, I was searching for a way out, or some might say a way in, and then I heard the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on an old radio. He was talking about the philosophy and discipline of nonviolence. He said we are all complicit when we tolerate injustice. He said it is not enough to say it will get better by and by. He said each of us has a moral obligation to stand up, speak up and speak out. When you see something that is not right, you must say something. You must do something. Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself. Yesterday was Oliver’s birthday party. To be safe, Zoe and Christian held it in a nearby park. Here are 3 photos to lighten your day. �One of his favorite toys is a box of blocks - so thats his cake! It’s all edible. �And these two made me laugh ���In other news: The coronavirus pandemic prompted Saudi Arabia to limit access to Mecca, where many Muslims take a pilgrimage this time of year known as the hajj. So Mona Eldadah created a miniature version of the hajj in Sandy Spring, Maryland, done by car to keep people safe from COVID-19. Eldadah likens it to a drive to see Christmas lights to help you "get in the festivities of the season." This innovation is part of a trend across religions of looking for new ways of keeping the faith. One Los Angeles cantor presided over a "Car Mitzvah" celebration in a parking lot. And many churches have been hosting drive-in services. NPR And speaking of schools opening again: Kids and the coronavirus A new study suggests that children can carry at least as much of the coronavirus in their noses and throats as adults — suggesting they are likely to spread the virus, as well. As schools and universities plan for the new academic year, and administrators grapple with complex questions about how to keep young people safe, a new report about a coronavirus outbreak at a sleepaway camp in Georgia provides fresh reasons for concern. The camp implemented several precautionary measures against the virus, but stopped short of requiring campers to wear masks. The virus blazed through the community of about 600 campers and counselors, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Friday. The staff and counselors gathered at the overnight camp in late June. Within a week of the camp orientation, a teenage counselor developed chills and went home. The camp, which the C.D.C. did not name, started sending campers home the next day, and shut down a few days later. By then, 76 percent of the 344 campers and staffers whose test results were available to C.D.C. researchers had been infected with the virus — nearly half the camp. New York Times. Well thats certainly not reassuring. Yesterday with the wooden fence finished, Craig removed the chain link gates from our driveway. He then spent ages trying to remove the 2 poles and wood support (and broke his hammer in the process). Then TJ came home and removed the metal poles with his angle grinder and the wooden post with his electric saw. It looks wonderful! ��We walked in a local cemetery and met a woman who was looking for a wild turkey that lives there. She said she feeds it every day and it comes when it hears her car! ��I’m standing in front of Herpolsheimer’s Obelisk. He owned a department store in downtown Grand Rapids starting in the late 1800s. Herpolsheimer's was also featured in the 2004 film, The Polar Express. The film's "Hero Boy" has a picture from Herpolsheimer's of himself ripping the fake beard off the store's Santa Claus. Later, as the boy is riding the train to the North Pole, the "Know-It-All kid" exclaims "Hey, Herpolsheimer's! Herpolsheimer's!" as the train passes the store in what is presumably downtown Grand Rapids. The children aboard the train admire the store's window displays as they pass, with the hero boy scoffing at an obviously animatronic Santa placing presents in one display. Wikipedia. I must be honest and say, I don’t know if this grave is for THE Herpolsheimer, but I thought I’d include the reference to the Polar Express. I had organized for us to visit Highclere Castle before we left home in June. It was expensive, but I bought tickets for a ‘private’ tour with gift bags and high teas (with 48 other people). It was a gorgeous, cold day and one that will live in my memory. �������Highclere Castle is the house used to portray Downton Abbey in the TV series and the recent film. We toured the first and second floors before adjourning to the converted stables for high tea (gluten free of course, Madam). After that we were free to wander some of the extensive grounds. No photos inside the house but Craig took one of a poster of them shooting a scene. It was amazing to wander around the house from a TV series that I had watched. The final photo was taken from our hotel room in Heathrow and marked our last night in the UK. Tomorrow we resume our adventure in France. Today I’ll leave you with this. It seems appropriate. �� 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_2020-08-01_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-143-and-August 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 2020-08-01 Title A name given to the resource Day 143 and August 1 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/94103ec2ecb857edddfb7c5d51c98e82.pdf 40a425c6793bd324abc5c3524983bbeb PDF Text Text Day 144 by windoworks My son Zar sent me an update regarding New Zealand and the quarantine restrictions. I quote: the government has 32 hotels, in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Christchurch - and one dedicated quarantine facility. When they’re full, the flights stop (this is what you’ve seen recently) - when people finish their isolation and more rooms open up, flights are able to resume. Also the charges for isolation ($3000NZ per person) require a law change so will come in after the election. It’s a contentious issue - the charges will probably only bring in $10m, a drop in the bucket against the total cost (so far) of $487m Also, the $10,000 repatriation fee for US citizens returning earlier in the year is for a family not per individual. In Victoria where they reported 671 new cases overnight and 7 new deaths, the state has declared a state of disaster and imposed new lockdown measures immediately. Melbourne has a nighttime curfew from 8pm to 5am. Residents will only be allowed to shop and exercise within 3 miles of their home. Exercise outside the home will only be for 1 hour at a time and only one person from each household will be allowed to shop for essentials at a time. And masks outside the home are mandatory. This lockdown is scheduled until at least September 13. Here’s what Asher did yesterday: �He was going for first prize in the locked down, staving off boredom cake decorating competition. So here’s how creative we can all be. Some more tomorrow : From the New York Times Arts & Recreation • The She Jazz Project in South Florida — which tries to address gender disparity in jazz — is holding auditions for musicians between the ages of 14 and 20. Each musician will rehearse in a separate tent, nestled in a botanical garden in a park, Alana Perez wrote. • The public library in Morton, Ill., is hosting outdoor browsing sessions in its garden while the library building remains closed. “With mobile devices, patrons can check out items and enjoy browsing, something they miss with only placing holds and doing curbside pick up,” Alissa Williams wrote. • TJ Clark is a volunteer actor at a local community theater’s “driveway cabaret” in Grand Rapids, Mich. Teams of performers drive to patrons’ homes and put on 45 minute cabaret performances in their driveways and yards. A flagged off area keeps the performers at least 10 feet away from their audience. Performances include songs, tap dancing, and even seven family members all performing together. There’s now a waiting list with over 200 houses for a potential second run in August. �Work • Adrianne Mathiowetz, a portrait photographer, has found a way to keep doing sessions with newborns: “The parents stay in their homes with the windows closed. I walk around their house for different angles and shout instructions to them through the glass about where to be for the best light,” she said. “I like that I can’t pose anyone too much. We do a lot of pointing and gesturing, and then they just exist in that space with their new person. I like these images more than any previous newborn photos I’d taken.” • “I’m an attorney in Milwaukee,” wrote Alexander “Sandie” Pendleton. “When in-person meetings have to be held, often there is no reason why staff meetings, client meetings and witness interviews have to be conducted indoors. We’ve held several of these outdoors. Find a shady spot, or open-sided shelter, with a picnic table. Two people can sit at the picnic table in a socially distanced way, and if there needs to be other people involved in the meeting, have lawn chairs for them.” • Estelle Frankel, a psychotherapist in Berkeley, Calif., is holding sessions with clients in a forest, with chairs eight feet apart. “In addition to the benefits of intimate, deep conversation, we are enjoying the calming effects of nature — what the Japanese call forest bathing,” Frankel said. “For winter I plan to buy a see-through tent I can use to continue working this way.” • Marti Macon, a massage therapist in Winston-Salem, N.C., created a treatment space for clients on her screened porch. “There are obvious drawbacks such as summer heat and intermittent suburban neighborhood sounds,” Marti wrote, but “all things considered, it has been a great solution and I am already trying to figure out how to continue it into the fall and winter!” • Kathleen Kaloudis, a mental health counselor in Salt Lake City, has started doing sessions outdoors as well. “I have a handful of clients, mostly teens, that are not comfortable and resistant to the video option,” she said. “We meet outdoors at a large park, in a remote corner, in the shade with folding chairs for our sessions. This has worked remarkably well.” • Rebekah Richards, a piano teacher in Saint Paul, Minn., has created a studio in her garage, with two digital pianos 10 feet apart. The pianos and benches are sanitized after each student leaves and the teacher uses a laser pointer to maintain distance. Everyone wears a mask, and the chirping of cardinals adds background music. A large chalk-drawn music staff adorns the driveway for students to explore music notation. The argument over schools opening continues. A school reopened in Indiana, and then closed for quarantine within hours. I read a long article yesterday about colleges promising to open at least in a hybrid form, waiting until all fees are paid and then reverting to online classes only. I think what bothers me about face to face teaching is that the burden is on all teachers, professors and ancillary staff to constantly police the students re social distancing, hand washing and all day mask wearing. And lets consider mask wearing. If we are inundated with ‘Karens’ and ‘Chads’ across the world - that is coherent, seemly intelligent people who can string a sentence together - and they won’t wear a mask no matter what, how do we expect children and young adults to comply. Here’s an interesting thing. A sometime intern of mine from years ago, is a friend on FaceBook. This person posts photos about once a week of �group gatherings in which faces are pressed side by side for the photos - no social distancing and never a mask in sight. There is never an explanation (we’ve all been tested and are virus free, for example) I find these photos worrying and unnerving. Remember I told you about the summer camp in Georgia? This morning I watched one of the dads interviewed and he said the camp sent them videos of preparations and every person attending the camp (staff and children) had to be tested for the virus first. His son was in a pod for sleeping, well apart from other pods. The only thing they didn’t do was have the children wear masks. All staff members did. Over half of the 600 children and staff tested positive. It just takes one infected person. ��What if indeed. Oliver’s other grandmother, Mimi in the mountains (I’m Mimi in the States), sent Zoe this and she forwarded on to me for the blogpost: ��Our son and daughter in Australia are working from home. They both think this could continue for some months. Zoe can go into the office one day every 2 weeks if she likes - but this may change as the virus seems to be increasing in Sydney. In New Zealand Zar and Alva are back in the workplace but Zar has the option of working from home some days. Here’s this thought: Could working from home become a permanent thing? Maybe, if you work in the tech world. Google announced on Monday that their employees can work from home for at least another year — a sign that the technology industry is expecting disruption from the pandemic to linger for a long time. Facebook, Twitter and Square have all said that some employees will be able to work remotely on a permanent basis. Pajamas and/or sweatpants are optional. NPR Oliver’s first birthday turned into a 3 day marathon that exhausted both Zoe and Oliver. I have an embarrassment of photos, so I will dole them out over the next few days. ��This is Nick, my nephew, reading a book with Oliver. Oliver has many books (you can see a few around them) and he loves reading. Books are for exploring - turning pages, opening and closing, touching and talking to. I hope he will have a lifelong love of reading. We arrived in France! We leased a car (Georges) and drove slowly for 3 days to the south of France to our house we had rented for November and December. ���Our first night was in Chaumont. Chaumont is about a 4 hour drive from Paris heading south east. From the top: the Hotel de Ville (Town Hall); the Chaumont railway viaduct built in 1855 (it is 2000 feet long and 160 feet high); and the parking lot with our silver car, Georges. Georges was the GPS navigator. �Well that says it all really - and before you all worry, I’m just a bit fed up - thats an F word, isn’t it? � 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_2020-08-02_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-144 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 2020-08-02 Title A name given to the resource Day 144 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/6acec9ed989fc22a0acffd580f7986d9.pdf 7ec7410e5a11f3653ed7ced0d207cf7f PDF Text Text Day 145 by windoworks Today its all about schools. Last week Craig was asked to record a video for GVSU, telling prospective students what a marvelous experience it is to attend college. Now, don’t get me wrong - in any normal (remember that word?) year, it can be a marvelous experience. But not this year. Here’s what’s happening elsewhere (Authors note: I did edit this piece a little but even though its long, its worth reading) Jeff Gregorich, superintendent of schools at Hayden Winkelman Unified School District in Arizona. This is my choice, but I’m starting to wish that it wasn’t. I don’t feel qualified. I’ve been a superintendent for 20 years, so I guess I should be used to making decisions, but I keep getting lost in my head. I’ll be in my office looking at a blank computer screen, and then all of the sudden I realize a whole hour’s gone by. I’m worried. I’m worried about everything. Each possibility I come up with is a bad one. The governor has told us we have to open our schools to students on August 17th, or else we miss out on five percent of our funding. I run a high-needs district in middle-of-nowhere Arizona. We’re 90 percent Hispanic and more than 90 percent free-and-reduced lunch. These kids need every dollar we can get. But covid is spreading all over this area and hitting my staff, and now it feels like there’s a gun to my head. I already lost one teacher to this virus. Do I risk opening back up even if it’s going to cost us more lives? Or do we run school remotely and end up depriving these kids? This is your classic one-horse town. Picture John Wayne riding through cactuses and all that. I’m superintendent, high school principal and sometimes the basketball referee during recess. This is a skeleton staff, and we pay an average salary of about 40 thousand a year. I’ve got nothing to cut. We’re buying new programs for virtual learning and trying to get hotspots and iPads for all our kids. Five percent of our budget is hundreds of thousands of dollars. Where’s that going to come from? I might lose teaching positions or basic curriculum unless we somehow get up and running. I’ve been in the building every day, sanitizing doors and measuring out space in classrooms. We still haven’t received our order of Plexiglas barriers, so we’re cutting up shower curtains and trying to make do with that. It’s one obstacle after the next. Just last week I found out we had another staff member who tested positive, so I went through the guidance from OSHA and the CDC and tried to figure out the protocols. I’m not an expert at any of this, but I did my best with the contact tracing. I called 10 people on staff and told them they’d had a possible exposure. I arranged separate cars and got us all to the testing site. Some of my staff members were crying. They’ve seen what can happen, and they’re coming to me with questions I can’t always answer. “Does my whole family need to get tested?” “How long do I have to quarantine?” “What if this virus hits me like it did Mrs. Byrd?” A bunch of our teachers have told me they will put in for retirement if we open up this month. They’re saying: “Please don’t make us go back. This is crazy. We’re putting the whole community at risk.” They’re right. I agree with them 100 percent. Teachers don’t feel safe. Most parents said in a survey that they’re “very concerned” about sending their kids back to school. So why are we getting bullied into �opening? This district isn’t ready to open. I can’t have more people getting sick. Why are they threatening our funding? I keep waiting for someone higher up to take this decision out of my hands and come to their senses. I’m waiting for real leadership, but maybe it’s not going to happen. Washington Post And here’s another perspective: College promised a fresh start. Many of the approximately 17 million undergraduate students across the country this summer who are uncertain when or if their schools will be able to reopen safely are caught in a waiting game. Some schools announced they would begin the year with in-person classroom cleaning. Others, including Harvard, Rutgers and the University of Southern California, pushed almost all classes online for the fall. Many more schools proposed a mix of online and in-person options. As the dates approach for students to arrive on campuses and begin classes, colleges and universities are still figuring out the best way to make that happen. They have issued plans and then changed them in response to a multitude of factors. Residents of college towns fret that the influx of thousands of young adults will further spread the novel coronavirus. Professors worry about teaching large classes in stuffy classrooms. Administrators ask themselves whether they will have all the cleaning, testing and tracing capability to keep everyone safe. And even if everyone does everything right, it could still all go wrong. As the schools refine their plans, students wait and wonder. Should they take a gap year? Should they find different schools? Should they stay or should they go? Washington Post Here’s one solution to home schooling while working from home : From my sister-in-law: In Melbourne Australia there is still a significant daily increase of cases. A 9 hour curfew was introduced and here’s one of the main downtown streets at 7:45pm. Meanwhile, here in the US, things seem to be going from worse to worser. I watched a video of the Chief Medical Officer in the ER at a Houston hospital. I had seen a previous video with him some weeks ago. He said that now he was dealing with two pandemics: COVID-19 and Stupidity. He said that as he just managed to get one group of patients well enough to go home, the next new group arrived. Here’s what Deborah Birx is now saying: �Deborah Birx, the physician overseeing the White House coronavirus response, warned Sunday that the United States had entered a “new phase” of the pandemic and urged people to take extreme health precautions as infections and deaths rise sharply throughout the country. “I want to be very clear what we’re seeing today is different from March and April,” Birx told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday, noting that cases were increasing in rural and urban areas. “It is extraordinarily widespread.” Birx’s remarks came after another week of grim signs that the country’s pandemic response was failing. The seven-day average for new coronavirus-related deaths rose in nearly half of U.S. states over the past week, pushing the national death toll past 150,000 and prompting health experts to warn that the trend was unlikely to reverse anytime soon. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s most recent analysis of pandemic fatalities shows weekly reports of new deaths increasing over the next month, with 5,000 to 11,000 new deaths projected in the third week of August. The national death toll could climb to more than 168,000 by that time, with a high estimate of 182,000, according to the CDC’s review. Washington Post Yesterday, I lost my fact file. I think my iPad is seriously overworked. So I cannot bring you part 2 of the innovative way people are continuing with life and work. It was a New York Times piece and perhaps you can find it for yourself. This from my friend Auli in Finland. She is growing Lapland Ribbons for the bees and she has a bee hotel waiting for occupants. Thats a very fancy bee hotel. I love those flowers! Oliver time. His first baby chino which he knocked over right after this photo. ��On our second day in France we drove from Chaumont to Annecy. Annecy is in the Auvergne-RhôneAlps region of southeastern France. Sometimes called "Venice of the Alps", this name comes from the three canals and the Thiou river flowing through the old city. It was a very pretty place. ��So stay safe, wear your mask, wash your hands, keep at least 6 feet apart from others not in your bubble and hold fast. � 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_2020-08-03_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-145 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 2020-08-03 Title A name given to the resource Day 145 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/873ec1ff993a1a5cd1e563452428b890.pdf eba772b6210e41c2685f9811c4cda9c4 PDF Text Text Day 146 by windoworks So what happened yesterday? Well, I exceeded the storage limit on my free wordpress account and it took a long time for Craig and I to even find the right person to text with. Remember that days when you could phone a customer service number and get help right away? I suspect that with the virus, more and more people are working from home and using the internet to communicate with customers. Anyway we got it sorted out but I have no idea why some photos didn’t post. We’ll see how it goes today - and at least everyone got their Oliver fix! Just to update the stats: US - 41,963 new cases, total = 4.8M and 158K deaths. Michigan - 604 new cases, total = 92,503 and 6.470 deaths. Kent County - 35 new cases, total = 6,602 and 150 deaths. In Victoria, Australia - 380 new cases, total = 12,335 and 147 deaths. In New South Wales, Australia - 13 new cases, total = 3,809 and 50 deaths. In Australia, the cases look small in comparison to the US, but the state and federal governments are clamping down hard and most state borders are closed. They have watched us here in the States and taken that as the gold standard of what not to do. Asher is completely locked down and Zoe is reading the daily updates re breakouts in suburbs around her. My brother-in-law posted this: �Yesterday we braved Meijer grocery store, and everyone was wearing a mask except one woman walking about and glaring at people and daring us to say something. It’s such a small concession to make and how small and meaningless must mask deniers lives be? I am so tired of seeing posts where someone in the ICU with oxygen supplementing their breathing, says: I didn’t believe this was a real thing. It’s a real thing! Don’t be like me. I think the second pandemic, stupidity, is gaining ground. From the New York Times: A small fraction of students in the South and Midwest have returned to classrooms, and the coronavirus is already disrupting plans. In one Indiana school district, the �superintendent sent out a note Saturday thanking students and parents for “a great first two days of school!” He also said several staff members had tested positive — and the high school was swiftly closed. “I’ve been in the business over 40 years — I have never experienced anything like this,” said Lee Childress, a superintendent in Mississippi whose district has seen three students test positive since last week. “It’s kind of like drinking out of a fire hose because it’s happening so fast.” And its not just the US: A cautionary tale from Israel: The government rushed students back into the classroom in May, confident that the country had moved past the pandemic. Outbreaks ultimately closed more than 240 schools and led to the quarantine of more than 22,520 teachers and students. New York Times. And here’s my question - why did anyone think the baseball season could open when so much else can’t? • At least 13 St. Louis Cardinals players and staff members have now tested positive, forcing the team to postpone its next four games. It’s yet another blow to the floundering baseball season. New York Times. Meanwhile, back at the White House: Contrary to the president’s claims, Article II does not give him the power to do whatever he wants. A hallmark of Trump’s tenure has been his disdain for the “advice and consent” function given to the Senate for appointments by Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution. Alexander Hamilton argued in Federalist 76 that requiring the Senate to confirm a president’s pick for important jobs was a critical “check” on the executive branch “to prevent the appointment of unfit characters.” Trump has said he loves keeping people in “acting” positions, including in the Cabinet. It also circumvents congressional oversight. The president has installed loyalists and ideologues into critical positions when it was clear they could not get confirmed by the GOP-controlled Senate for the job, such as former acting director of national intelligence Ric Grenell. Washington Post Today is a Primary Election Day in Michigan. For those of you not familiar with the American system, primaries are held state by state to determine which party candidate will run against the other party’s candidate in the General Election in November. There is some discussion about when today’s results will be available. Chump has put another ‘mate’ in charge of the Post Office and he is creating havoc. Chumps line of defense is that the mail in voting option leads to fraud, that is, it might favor the Democrats. One never knows what each day will bring in machinations and disinformation from the White House but voter fraud promises to be a biggie. ��Or hand them in at the election office in your area or post them by hand in the official ballot box somewhere near you. Yesterday Craig went to the Post Office to mail some items and the Postmistress told �him that the sorting area out the back was jammed with unsorted mail. She said her mail sorters were mostly seniors and when the virus struck, they retired. Chump and DeJoy are trying to destroy the Postal Service for their own private gain. It has been in financial difficulties for years but its the service that delivers unemployment checks and pension checks etc. How else will these deserving people receive their money? Here’s something else that happened yesterday: NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley completed a fiery, high-speed journey back from the International Space Station on Sunday, splashing down in calm Gulf of Mexico waters off the coast of Pensacola, Fla., hundreds of miles from a churning Tropical Storm Isaias in the Atlantic in a triumphal denouement to a historic mission. It was the first time in the 59-year history of crewed American space travel that astronauts had used the Gulf as a landing site, adding to other firsts that marked a new chapter in NASA’s human spaceflight program: the first launch of American astronauts to orbit from U.S. soil since the Space Shuttle was retired in 2011 and the first launch into orbit of humans on vehicles owned and operated by a private company. Washington Post And this is just to make you laugh about online teaching. �So Oliver. This was when I noticed a problem yesterday. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get this photo to load. He loves to swing. We had planned to hang a swing from the big tree in our backyard for when Zoe and Oliver visited in May this year. Oh well, best laid plans. ��Flashback: the next day on the road south in France we visited Pont du Gard. The Pont du Gard is an ancient Roman aqueduct bridge built in the first century CE to carry water over 50 km (31 mi) to the Roman colony of Nemausus (Nîmes).[4] It crosses the river Gardon near the town of Vers-Pont-du-Gard in southern France. The Pont du Gard is the highest of all Roman aqueduct bridges, and one of the best preserved. It was added to UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1985 because of its historical importance. The aqueduct formerly carried an estimated 40,000 m3 (8,800,000 imp gal) of water a day to the fountains, baths and homes of the citizens of Nîmes. It may have been in use as late as the 6th century, with some parts used for significantly longer, but a lack of maintenance after the 4th century led to clogging by mineral deposits and debris that eventually stopped the flow of water. After the Roman Empire collapsed and the aqueduct fell into disuse, the Pont du Gard remained largely intact due to the importance of its secondary function as a toll bridge. For centuries the local lords and bishops were responsible for its upkeep, in exchange for the right to levy tolls on travellers using it to cross the river. Wikipedia (of course). It is really big and impressive and expensive to visit. It was absolutely clogged with tourists. I think you can walk across it but luckily it was late in the day and we didn’t have time (well Craig didn’t). This just in from my son Asher in Melbourne. These photos were posted by the Victorian Premier, Daniel Andrews to show how successful the curfew is in Melbourne on a rainy Tuesday night. �Have you voted yet, Michiganders? Hmmm? � 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_2020-08-04_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-146 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 2020-08-04 Title A name given to the resource Day 146 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/b9db71b6cff77fc139965f466ffd5771.pdf 0d11d69670dce416acdad6f401bf77b2 PDF Text Text Day 147 by windoworks Big delay in posting his morning because I went back to the hairdresser to get my hair cut short and all the red gone. I think I’ll have her put some highlights in, as I feel a bit drab after years of red hair. Yesterday there was an unspeakable tragedy in Beirut, Lebanon. There are massive numbers of injured people and the death toll keeps rising. Lebanon has been struggling in recent weeks and this is beyond their capability to cope. For some unimaginable reason someone had stored approximately 7,450 tonnes of ammonium nitrate in a warehouse unsecured and unattended by the port for 6 years. I watched the blast which blew the photographer off his feet. From the statistics I gave you yesterday you can see that we are not gaining control of this virus - in fact hardly any country in the world has got it under control. In New Zealand they have controlled it but now they can’t let tourists back into the country for the foreseeable future. Here’s an edited piece from Ed Yong, an Atlantic journalist: For a country that prides itself on exceptionalism, America has been most exceptional in its failure to contain the coronavirus pandemic and to protect its people. Despite biomedical might, formidable scientific expertise, and immense wealth, the United States squandered every possible opportunity to control the virus. The result? A global superpower with only 4 percent of the world’s population, accounts for a quarter of the world’s COVID-19 toll: more than 4.6 million confirmed cases and nearly 155,000 deaths. What went wrong? From the failure of global supply chains and the fragility of the nation’s health-care system to the president’s egregious lies and a social-media culture that sows misinformation, almost everything that led to this catastrophe was predictable. Experts raised alarms years ago; their warnings went unheeded. We must do better. We need a full accounting of everything that happened, every weakness and every failure. We need to grapple with the multitude of preexisting vulnerabilities that have accumulated in the U.S. for years, for decades. Unless we fix that broken foundation, the country will be at the mercy of even worse plagues to come. �The White House's coronavirus response coordinator, Deborah Birx, warned Sunday that the virus is “extraordinarily widespread” in cities and rural communities across the United States, and that the national death toll could double to 300,000 by the end of the year if public behavior doesn't change. She �called the outbreaks a “new phase” in the pandemic, different from March and April, when a few cities drove most infections. As he has with other pandemic advisers who deliver bad news, President Trump promptly attacked Birx, tweeting Monday that the physician “hit us” to appease Democrats critical of the White House response. “Pathetic!” Trump wrote. In an analysis, The Post's Philip Bump wrote that the president's denial of the outbreak's severity is a danger to the country. Washington Post. So now we have to deal with the reality of what is, rather than what used to be. We may use face masks as an everyday fashion item for the foreseeable future. We will continue to miss shaking hands and hugging friends and relatives, but we’ll get used to it. I think of a family doctor we had years ago who once said to me: Pamela, you can get used to anything. How true. This is the New Now. For Craig and I, we are hoping that we will be able to see our New Zealand and Australian families in May next year, but no one knows what will be happening by then. They are racing to produce an effective vaccine but any vaccine will still need comprehensive testing before it can be offered to the public. And if we are running out of testing supplies right now, how will we have enough vaccination kits to make a difference? So this is interesting: While debates over masks have dominated headlines, more than three-quarters of respondents to a new NPR/Ipsos poll support enacting state laws to require mask wearing in public at all times.And nearly 60% said they would support a nationwide order making it mandatory to shelter at home for two weeks. A majority of respondents also said they believe the U.S. is handling the pandemic worse than other countries, and most want the federal government to take extensive action to slow the spread of the coronavirus, favoring a top-down approach to reopening schools and businesses. NPR �I just put that in to make you laugh. That President Trump would speak in a different register from previous presidents has been clear since at least as far back as his dark and dystopian inaugural address. He has addressed himself to a subset of the political community, not all of it; he has trafficked in fear and division, not uplift and unity; he has used his public platform less to offer and defend a policy agenda than to attack targets, which have included journalists, current and former executive-branch officials, private individuals, and federal judges. A recent New York Times analysis found that more than half of the president’s tweets from January 2017 to November 2019 were attacks. He has also been a font of lies and misinformation; at the time of this �writing, The Washington Post’s running tally counts more than 20,000 presidential lies over the past three and a half years. The president’s speech is, of course, not merely speech. Some of his words have had significant material consequences—entirely aside from the administration’s policy initiatives. A recent ABC News analysis identified 54 acts of violence in which the perpetrator explicitly invoked President Trump. The president’s bellicose foreign-policy rhetoric has worsened relations with adversaries like Iran and North Korea, and alienated allies across the globe. His spurious charges of absentee-voting fraud may already be causing states to underprepare for a heavily absentee-ballot-based November general election, will likely deter many voters from casting absentee ballots, and appear to many to be designed to sow doubts about the integrity of election results. His dangerous rhetoric around COVID-19, including his promotion of unproven or discredited treatment methods and his shifting messaging regarding basic public-health measures such as mask wearing, has no doubt impacted the behavior of private citizens and public officials, with the potential to result in tens of thousands of additional preventable deaths. The Atlantic This morning I looked online to see the results from yesterday’s primary election here in Michigan. There were stories that it would take longer to count due to absentee voting but the results for West Michigan are in already. Our Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is trying to persuade the Republican State Senate to allow counting of absentee ballots when received - as in Colorado. The Republicans are not persuaded at this point. However, I am encouraged by the election results and will continue to encourage everyone to vote, either by mail in (hand delivered once completed) or in person on the day, and I will continue to encourage everyone to vote BLUE (Democrat) up and down the ballot. It is increasingly apparent that chump is struggling with speaking, let alone thinking. He was interviewed a couple of days ago and the video of the interview has been touted as a comedy sketch - so I tried to watch it. I think I managed one minute and then I thought - I don’t care. And I turned it off. �A fabulous Auckland, New Zealand sunrise. Oliver. This photo is from daycare but Zoe added the caption: ��He’s a year old and he’s painting - and actually getting it ON the paper. I remember teaching 5 year olds who couldn’t paint better than him. Flashback: our last overnight stay on our way south was in Arles. We stayed in a very odd Ibis hotel on the edge of the town. The hotel was surrounded by razor topped fencing and to get in we had to call the office. Arles is a city on the Rhône River in the Provence region of southern France. It's famed for inspiring the paintings of Vincent Van Gogh. Once a provincial capital of ancient Rome, Arles is also known for many remains from that era, including Arles Amphitheatre (les Arènes d'Arles), now hosting plays, concerts and bullfights. �������From the top: two photos of the Rhône River at dawn; two photos of the Roman arena (which was closed because it was Sunday); the Roman theater and lastly me in front of the theater entrance. Next: the Camargue Here is our finished house and the driveway without the chain link gates and poles. I’m posting this again because I don’t think it posted 2 days ago. Remember: this is the new now. We can do 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_2020-08-05_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-147 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 2020-08-05 Title A name given to the resource Day 147 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/07775b246d8e3d1d6452411f4c974fcd.pdf 2118dd266d878f46d039ed2e29ac07e2 PDF Text Text Day 148 by windoworks Last night was a Covid night. You all know what I mean, right? Covid dreams - well nightmares really. Luckily this only happens once in a while. Yesterday the plumbers came to put a sleeve in our chimney. We have two chimneys - one for the fireplace and one for the furnace and the hot water heater. New code rules say that a new hot water heater must sit on a tray, must have a pipe to a nearby drain (right across the basement floor - a trip hazard just waiting to happen) and must be vented to the chimney which must be fitted with a special aluminum sleeve. This operation needed one small truck, one large truck, and 2 men - one in the basement and one on the roof coordinating via cell phone. Two hours of banging and shouting and it was done. You know our roof is steep - take a look. ��Also that chimney had no cap - the rain just fell straight down it. Luckily no animals had fallen down inside, and now it does have a metal cap with a flue. The other big event of the day was a trip to a hardware store where Craig bought a total of 18 bags of pea gravel. He had spent the day before widening the path from our back door to our new fence. It took 2 trips to the hardware store as the car could only cope with 10 bags maximum weight at one time. Here’s the finished product so far: ��We are like everyone else on our block: repairing, rebuilding, landscaping, painting etc. Everyone is at home and doing their best to do all those jobs around the house they kept putting off. We have also been watching the Covid series of the English gardening show: Gardeners World. Craig and I have a very basic knowledge of plant names which sometimes includes ‘you know, the blue flowers’. But this show in which Monty Don and his colleagues do their best to help everybody watching to have houseplants or balcony gardens or small backyard plots to grow and care for and enjoy in this difficult time is a joy to watch. I’m starting to look at flowers in a different way. So on to the stories of the day. First up Beirut. Ammonium nitrate is the same raw material Timothy McVeigh used to bomb the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995. In that deadly attack, 2 tons of the fertilizer were used. The Beirut port was holding an estimated 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate. Health officials said the blast killed at least 100 people and wounded more than 4,000. The city's governor told local media that the blast, which was heard over 50 miles away, has "destroyed more than half the Lebanese capital." Hundreds of people have been left homeless, he said. The blast was so strong that it was felt in Cyprus, more than 100 miles away in the Mediterranean Sea. Among the injured was Dion Nissenbaum, a reporter with The Wall Street Journal, who was at home with his 4-year-old daughter when the explosions hit. Despite being a half-mile away, both suffered cuts, and Nissenbaum's daughter remains in the hospital. In an interview on NPR's Morning Edition, Nissenbaum relayed how the situation unfolded. He was taking his daughter to the bathroom, he said, when he heard the initial explosion. "It sounded a lot like a car bomb that I've heard in reporting in places like Kabul, and even Istanbul. I went out into the living room to call my colleagues to find out what it was. And my daughter came running out naked into the living room to say, 'What was that?' "And then the blast, the second blast, the much more powerful blast, just blew in the glass, and the doors and everything in our house. And I just had to dive to the ground and use my body to shield her from as much of the glass and wood that was just … blew into our house and then blew back the other way, somehow. It blew through our house and then like, ricocheted off the building behind us and tossed my computer and our sofa out into the front of the street. It was unlike any blast I've ever experienced." NPR Craig and I visited Oklahoma City some years ago and went to the memorial there. That blast affected other buildings across the street and next door and that was shocking enough, but Beirut is something else altogether. �This is before and after photos of the port of Beirut. As of yesterday the death toll was at 135 and I’m not sure how many people were injured or are missing. A clear story of misadventure is emerging but apparently chump has twice insisted it was an attack - based on no actual evidence whatsoever. Meanwhile the schools reopening debate continues. The return to classrooms is not going smoothly in the United States. Teachers in Georgia's largest school district returned to work in the past week to plan for students' return, but by the next day, 260 employees had been barred from coming back because they had either tested positive or been exposed to someone who tested positive. Though Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) has said schools there must reopen Aug. 17, the state’s head of public instruction said in-person learning is still unsafe due to the surge in cases, setting up a possible clash. “Our state is simply not ready to have all our students and educators congregate in school facilities,” Arizona Superintendent Kathy Hoffman said in a statement. And with students returning to colleges and universities this month, support staff worry about inconsistent safety protocols and mask-less students jeopardizing their health. Some schools are revisiting their reopening plans as cases spike, but dozens of colleges are forging ahead with some form of in-person instruction. In New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and other cities Monday, teachers, students, parents and others protested the return of in-person classes, carrying fake coffins and gravestones. The protesters demanded that health concerns and science dictate when and how schools reopen. Washington Post. �And to update this: Chicago has declared all schools closed and switched to online classes this fall semester. Teacher’s unions are strong. Today and tomorrow I am posting some Covid-19 etiquette questions and answers from NPR’s Elaine Swann. 1.How do I tell somebody — especially a stranger — to step back because that person is just too close to me? Swann says this is the No. 1 question people ask her. Your first inclination is to yell out, "Step back!" or "Get up off me!" she says — but those reactions aren't exactly polite, and they're likely to escalate the problem. Instead, she says, try to use words like "we" and "us" in the request. For example, "Let's just put a little bit of space in between each other while we're waiting in line." This shows mutual consideration — you're thinking about how your behavior is affecting their health — and hope they are concerned with your safety too. Takeaway 1: Show mutual consideration. 2. What if I ask a person to keep their distance or put on their mask — and they say no? "Then, do what you can to protect yourself," says Swann: Turn your face away from that person, step over a few feet, walk in a different direction. Takeaway 2: Protect yourself. 3. It makes my blood boil when I see people not following the pandemic guidelines. Can I intervene? "If their behavior is not affecting you, let it go," she says. "Folks are getting into these arguments and kerfuffles because they're trying to get folks to comply with the pandemic guidelines. Stop trying to do that if the person does not want to comply. You have to let crazy be crazy and leave them alone." The only time you should speak up, she says, is if it's directly affecting your safety. Then you can try using some of the "we" and "us" language in her suggestion above. Takeaway 3: Let it go. I thought this was very helpful and I will post the last 3 tomorrow. The coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has sickened more than 16.5 million people across six continents. It is raging in countries that never contained the virus. It is resurging in many of the ones that did. If there was ever a time when this coronavirus could be contained, it has probably passed. One outcome is now looking almost certain: This virus is never going away. The coronavirus is simply too widespread and too transmissible. The most likely scenario, experts say, is that the pandemic ends at some point—because enough people have been either infected or vaccinated— but the virus continues to circulate in lower levels around the globe. Cases will wax and wane over time. Outbreaks will pop up here and there. Even when a much-anticipated vaccine arrives, it is likely to only suppress but never completely eradicate the virus. (For context, consider that vaccines exist for more than a dozen human viruses but only one, smallpox, has ever been eradicated from the planet, and that took 15 years of immense global coordination.) We will probably be living with this virus for the rest of our lives. �In the best-case scenario, a vaccine and better treatments blunt COVID-19’s severity, making it a much less dangerous and less disruptive disease. Over time, SARS-CoV-2 becomes just another seasonal respiratory virus, like the four other coronaviruses that cause a sizable proportion of common colds: 229E, OC43, NL63, and HKU1 Sarah Zhang: The Atlantic Now I know this is probably not what you wanted to hear but I do try to include the most reliable sources and Sarah Zhang at The Atlantic does very careful research. And here’s the latest from the World Health Organization: Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the World Health Organization's director-general warned on Monday: the world is reliant on "the basics" of disease control Testing, isolating and treating patients, and tracing and quarantining their contacts. Do it all. Inform, empower and listen to communities. Do it all. For individuals, it's about keeping physical distance, wearing a mask, cleaning hands regularly and coughing safely away from others. Do it all. The message to people and governments is clear: Do it all. And when the disease is under control, he urged, "Keep going!" NPR To cheer you up here are 2 photos from my friend in Perth, Western Australia ��This second photo is a metal Cockatoo with its comb extended. Very noisy birds, Cockatoos and they like to eat wooden railings on balconies. No, I have no idea why. And Oliver, of course. ��“This is my new shower cap” Our last stop before wending our way back to La Bastide de Bousignac (the French village we would be living in for 2 months) was the Camargue. Humans have lived in the Camargue for millennia, greatly affecting it with drainage schemes, dykes, rice paddies and salt pans. Much of the outer Camargue has been drained for agricultural purposes.The Camargue is home to more than 400 species of birds and has been identified as an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International.Its brine ponds provide one of the few European habitats for the greater flamingo. The marshes are also a prime habitat for many species of insects, notably (and notoriously) some of the most ferocious mosquitos to be found anywhere in France. Camargue horses (Camarguais) roam the extensive marshlands, along with Camargue cattle Camargue horses are ridden by the gardians (cowboys), who rear the region's cattle for fighting bulls for regional use and for export to Spain, as well as sheep. Many of these animals are raised in semi-feral conditions, allowed to roam through the Camargue within a manade, or free-running herd. They are periodically rounded up for culling, medical treatment, or other events. Wikipedia ������From the top: 2 photos of me on the beach at Saints-Maries-de-la-Mer, the capital of the Camarague in the south of France. By the way, it had a small bullfighting ring. It is a popular beach resort in the summer. Third photo -me shopping. Next: a salt marsh and then 2 photos of the wild horses living in the marshes. It was a strange wild area perched at the edge of the Mediterranean and the Rhône River delta. 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_2020-08-06_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-148 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 2020-08-06 Title A name given to the resource Day 148 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/43c6e798d86bee46349393b4a6ec9b19.pdf 26fe309ccc47de9890369d952e7b8d84 PDF Text Text Day 149 by windoworks Today I have been writing and posting this blog for 150 days (the first post didn’t have a number). At first I thought (naively) that I might write this for 30 days or so. I have lost photos; had problems posting; used up all my fact file; had the fact file grow to an unmanageable size; had the fact file corrupted; had articles which became out of date literally overnight; researched endlessly; switched from a free site to a paid one with double the capacity; run out of ideas; regularly forgotten to include something I wanted to post that day; agonized over what was enough each day and what would be too much; worried over an imbalance of depressing news and struggled to find anything positive to include; switched to a regular inclusion of Oliver photos and greatly expanded the flashback feature. In the beginning it was almost all my words, then it became mostly others words and lately I’m trying more of a balance between the two. I think I may be posting daily for the foreseeable future. I’m not sure how the content will change except for Oliver and Flashbacks. I welcome comments and I love receiving articles, memes and photos from my readers. I always smile when I see: here’s something you might like for your blogpost Pamela. And here’s what I really want to say: this is your blogpost as much as mine. We are all on this journey together and it is your readership which helps me get through each day. so let us continue our journey together and to start here’s something which made me smile and wince: �Thank you Kym. �U.N. Secretary General António Guterres warned Tuesday that the world is facing a “generational catastrophe” due to ongoing school closures, calling the coronavirus pandemic “the largest disruption of education ever.” Guterres urged countries to suppress the virus sufficiently to allow schools to reopen. Washington Post. And good luck with that! We keep hearing from scientists and doctors and people with brains (sorry that slipped in) that if we just wore masks and stayed 6 feet apart - and washed our hands - we would start to contain the virus. So here’s how New Zealand did it: On Sunday, New Zealand will mark 100 days without community transmission of Covid-19. From the first known case imported into New Zealand on February 26 to the last case of community transmission detected on May 1, elimination took 65 days. New Zealand relied on three types of measures to get rid of the virus: 1. ongoing border controls to stop COVID-19 from entering the country 2. a lockdown and physical distancing to stop community transmission 3. case-based controls using testing, contact tracing and quarantine. There are key lessons from New Zealand’s Covid-19 experience. Elimination of the virus appears to have allowed New Zealand to return to near-normal operation fairly rapidly, minimised economic damage compared with Australia. But the economic impact is likely to keep playing out over the coming months. Henry Cook/Stuff The only problem I can see is that once the borders are reopened, that could lead to the virus reappearing and community transmission occurring again. So to combat that, here’s another piece from Stuff which is a bit depressing for Craig and I and our hope to visit next summer: The New Zealand Government is hiring communications staff for two-year contracts with the coronavirus managed isolation and quarantine team, suggesting it believes borders could be shut for a long while. The job postings for the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment’s managed isolation team were posted in recent days and describe a two-year fixed term position. The team will handle the running of the Government’s sprawling border hotel regime, which houses all people coming into the country for 14 days. Managed isolation is a cornerstone in the defence against Covid-19 and will remain in place as long as necessary, to protect New Zealanders and those returning home. Henry Cook/Stuff Stuff.co.nz is an online news service and is worth visiting for an entirely different perspective on the world. �When Donald Trump became the president of the United States, Americans could no longer deny the racism in their country, argues Ibram X. Kendi, a contributing writer and a preeminent thinker on anti- �racism. “Just as the 1850s paved the way for the revolution against slavery, Trump’s presidency has paved the way for a revolution against racism,” he writes in our latest cover story, which is worth reading in full. Here are three major takeaways from Ibram’s piece (as explained by him): 1.Trump revealed the country’s prejudices anew. He has held up a mirror to American society, and it has reflected back a grotesque image that many people had until now refused to see: an image not just of the racism still coursing through the country, but also of the reflex to deny that reality. 2.And in doing so, he inadvertently helped power an anti-racist revolution. The America that denied its racism through the Obama years has struggled to deny its racism through the Trump years. … It has become harder, in the Trump years, to blame Black people for racial inequity and injustice. 3.What happens next is up to Americans. Now that Trump has pushed a critical mass of Americans to a point where they can no longer explain away the nation’s sins, the question is what those Americans will do about it. The Atlantic And I wanted to post this next piece so we could all think about it: White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said on Wednesday he and his family have needed continued security as a result of his high-profile statements about the coronavirus pandemic. Fauci didn't reveal any more details about the threats and harassment, but added, "I wouldn't have imagined in my wildest dreams that people who object to things that are pure public health principles are so set against it, and don't like what you and I say, namely in the word of science, that they actually threaten you." NPR So here’s how we begin to address all these problems: �Using this (in a timely manner) �Here’s the final COVID-19 etiquette points: �4, What if I'm at a socially distanced outdoor gathering and, after a few hours, people start to bend the rules a little bit? Try using the "we" and "us" language if it's just happening with an individual, says Swann — saying to the person, "Let's make sure we stay in our little sections over here." But if it's happening partywide, alert the host, she says. The person in charge has the authority to enforce the pandemic guidelines. Swann suggests: "I noticed that people are starting to get relaxed with the guidelines. I thought I'd bring that to your attention. If the host does something about it, then great, says Swann. "But if the shift doesn't happen and you're uncomfortable with the environment, then wrap it up. Just say, 'You know what — I'm gonna head on home now. I had a great time. Takeaway 4: Take yourself out of uncomfortable situations — and remember to preserve relationships. 5. A friend invited me to hang out. How do I know whether it's safe to do so? We might not be on the same page with the pandemic protocols. Don't make assumptions about how people are following the guidelines, says Swann. Some people, for example, feel safer staying at home, while others live as if the virus didn't exist. So ask a few questions in advance, she says. For example: "I wear a face covering when I'm around others. How do you feel about wearing face coverings? Is that something you're doing? Is this going to be a social distancing affair?" Listen to what they have to say. "Then take a moment to step back and ask yourself whether it is something you feel comfortable with," says Swann. "If not, say, 'Thank you so much for the invitation, but I won't be able to make it.' " And don't push them to change their plans to fit your level of comfort, she adds. "This is not the time to police our friends and our family members. Instead, we should curtail our own behavior and make decisions on what's best for ourselves." Takeaway 5: Don't assume. 6. BONUS ADVICE: What the heck do I do with my mask at a socially distanced meal? When you're eating, take the mask off completely, says Swann. And, she adds, "don't have it hanging from one ear." You're going to be chomping and chewing and drinking and talking in the duration of that time, so it doesn't make sense to try to wear it at the table, she explains. But don't even think about putting your used mask on the table, says Swann. Aside from the germs, it's a major etiquette no-no. In general, she says, "nothing should go on the table except for food." That includes your cellphone, purse, keys, hat, laptop — and, of course, your mask. Carefully "place it in your bag, purse or in your pocket. Or you can place it on your lap underneath your napkin," she says. "That way it is easily accessible when your server comes over to you." Remember to mask up when your server is around, she notes, to keep them safe too. Takeaway 6: Please don't put your mask on the table. And speaking of masks, here’s this: �Face masks are a simple way to help prevent the spread of the new coronavirus through talking, coughing or sneezing, scientists and public-health specialists say. But they need to be worn properly. While some types of masks are more effective than others, public-health officials say any face covering— even a bandanna—is better than nothing. Here’s how different types of masks stack up, and how they are meant to be used. Common masks fall into three categories: cloth masks or coverings like gaiters, intended to prevent an infected person from spreading the virus by catching large droplets; surgical masks, with a more sophisticated design also meant to prevent the wearer from spreading diseases; and N95 masks, which protect the wearer as well, and fit tightly to the face. Cloth • Typically homemade • Style and materials vary widely • Prevents wearer from spreading disease • Work in herd-immunity: the more wear masks, the more effective they are • Wash after use Surgical • Loose fit • Prevents wearer from spreading disease • Dispose after use • Made from a material called polypropylene N95 • Tight fit, must be fit tested • Protects wearer if fitted properly • Limited quantity Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Wall Street Journal For some light relief: The latest thing we never thought we would see: people eating airline food, at home, that they bought on purpose. Nope, not a joke. A leading airline food company in Israel is selling in-flight meals to the public �as a low-cost pandemic delivery option after it found itself stocked with the tiny trays of food with no one on a plane to eat them. Which begs the question: “Chicken or beef?” NPR Its Oliver time! ��A sight to make every teachers heart sing: a one year old reading a book. Flashback: so 4 months after the beginning of our epic European adventure, we made it to our last destination: La Bastide de Bousignac, a tiny village literally halfway between Carcassonne and Toulouse. First some photos of our house, in a cul de sac, on the edge of the farmland. ����Our car parked in the driveway. We actually never parked there again, we parked outside the gates instead. My little french kitchen with a stove I adored and wish I could afford here at home. Our living room from the terrace door - note the fireplace which we used every day of our stay. The terrace. Behind me are steps to the ground floor apartment and pool, both closed for the winter. I loved that house. Yesterday Craig and I went to a greenhouse and purchased 3 huge grass plants (among other things). Craig then spent a few hours finishing the landscaping around the new fence and path. It looks fabulous. What do you think? �Be brave. And register to vote right away. � 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_2020-08-07_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-149 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 2020-08-07 Title A name given to the resource Day 149 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/37549b0dce2aa6ce26af08040e546e3f.pdf 9658819279beded66bcf84c91f8131b1 PDF Text Text Day 150 by windoworks I was watching Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Nick Coatsworth in Australia, talk this morning about the coronavirus and he said: This is the new normal. Perhaps one day when this pandemic is over we might return to the old normal and be able to go to the pub with friends for a beer, but not now. Yesterday my friend Wendy and I were talking about the job of our Women’s City Club committee and organizing online events and we realized we were now operating as a committee on What Is, rather then What Was or What May Be. And that’s it really. As Wendy said - we’ve reached the other side. This is our New Now and its time to kiss the What Was goodbye and concentrate on making the What Is as good as it can be. Now it isn’t as easy as that sounds, but its a start. Dr Nick also referred to an epidemic intelligence committee (wow!) and the Black Dog Institute. I looked this up. Its primarily set up to help bipolar sufferers but it has useful daily charts to fill in and lots of non threatening advice. I’m not bipolar but during this time I do have the occasional Black Dog day. Dr Nick also talked about his experience with the daily constant anxiety which never goes away and I think we can all appreciate that. And just to let you know you’re not alone, here’s this: Michelle Obama said that she's dealing with "some form of low-grade depression" due to the coronavirus lockdown, racial strife in the U.S., and the Trump administration. In the second episode of her new podcast, the former first lady spoke with her friend Michele Norris, the former longtime host of NPR's All Things Considered. Obama described trouble sleeping and periods throughout the lockdown in which she has felt down. "Spiritually, these are not … fulfilling times," she said. "I know that I am dealing with some form of low-grade depression," Obama continued. "Not just because of the quarantine, but because of the racial strife, and just seeing this administration, watching the hypocrisy of it, day in and day out, is dispiriting." She's not the only one feeling depressed right now. More than 1 in 3 Americans reported symptoms of anxiety or depression in a recent pulse survey by the U.S. Census Bureau. A year ago, that figure was 1 in 10. Obama said that she hasn't been moving around as much during this time, so she's not knock-out tired at the end of the day, and she goes to bed later. "And I'm waking up in the middle of the night, cause I'm worrying about something, or there's a heaviness." NPR �When the president persists in saying the first foolish thing that pops into his head and easily swayed people listen, this is what happens: Americans are being warned against drinking hand sanitiser after four people died and others were left with visual impairments. �A total of 15 people - 13 men and two women - were admitted to hospital after ingesting sanitiser in the southern states of Arizona and New Mexico in May and June, a new report from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. All of them, aged 21 to 65, had drunk hand sanitiser containing methanol, an ingredient deemed "not acceptable" by the US regulator Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Four people out of the 15 died, three left hospital with new visual impairments and six had seizures as they were admitted - including three of those who died. The report said four of the patients were still in hospital as of 8 July, so there is no update on whether they have suffered long-term effects. One of the patients was a 44-year-old man who had gone to a doctor because he was experiencing sudden visual impairment. The report said he had drunk "an unknown quantity of alcohol-based hand sanitiser during the few days before seeking medical care". He had high methanol levels in his blood and while in hospital experienced seizures and had to undergo dialysis to clean his blood. The man recovered from "acute methanol poisoning" after six days in hospital but was left with "near-total vision loss". Scientists from the CDC said they started investigating the ingestion of hand sanitiser after a national FDA warning about certain hand sanitisers containing methanol prompted a call from health officials in Arizona and New Mexico. In April, the CDC warned household cleaners "can cause health problems when not used properly", a day after President Donald Trump suggested injecting disinfectant to treat coronavirus. Sky News �And to go with this cartoon: "There isn't any iceberg. There was an iceberg but it's in a totally different ocean. The iceberg is in this ocean but it will melt very soon. There is an iceberg but we didn't hit the iceberg. We hit the iceberg, but the damage will be repaired very shortly. The iceberg is a Chinese iceberg. We are taking on water but every passenger who wants a lifeboat can get a lifeboat, and they are beautiful lifeboats. Look, passengers need to ask nicely for the lifeboats if they want them. We don't have any lifeboats, we're not lifeboat distributors. Passengers should have planned for icebergs and brought their own lifeboats. I really don't think we need that many lifeboats. We have lifeboats and they're supposed to be our lifeboats, not the passengers' lifeboats. The lifeboats were left on shore by the last captain of this ship. Nobody could have foreseen the iceberg." While that is creative fiction, here’s what Trump actually said on tape, regarding the mounting deaths from the virus: “They are dying, that’s true. And it is what it is.”—Trump during an interview with Axios As the election looms nearer, Trump has begun disparaging Biden’s faith. So just in case you wondered - “Like the words of so many other insecure bullies, President Trump’s comments reveal more about him than they do about anyone else,” the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee said in a 300-word statement. “My faith teaches me to love my neighbor as I would myself, while President Trump only seeks to divide us. My faith teaches me to care for the least among us, while President Trump seems to only be �concerned about his gilded friends. My faith teaches me to welcome the stranger, while President Trump tears families apart. My faith teaches me to walk humbly, while President Trump teargassed peaceful protestors so he could walk over to a church for a photo op.” In contrast, Biden talks often and easily about his faith. He grew up in an Irish Catholic family and attended Catholic schools. “Biden almost always has rosary beads in his pocket, and frequently holds them in his hand — including while he monitored the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden in 2011. He has written and spoken at length of how faith helped him grieve the loss of his first wife and daughter many years ago, and his son Beau more recently,” Julie Zauzmer and Sarah Pulliam Bailey report. Washington Post And this next item is very important to understand as we go towards the November election: The government of China prefers that President Trump not win reelection in November, seeing the incumbent as “unpredictable,” and Russia is using a range of measures to try to “denigrate” the president’s opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, including selective leaks of information and efforts on social media, a top U.S. intelligence official said in a statement Friday. The statement by William Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, was notable for identifying three countries seeking to influence the 2020 election — China, Russia and Iran. But he portrayed Russia as the most active source of interference. Evanina also said that a Ukrainian lawmaker who has been in contact with Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, is part of a Russian disinformation effort. Washington Post Recently I read an excellent article in the Atlantic from a journalist who interviewed Gretchen Whitmer over many weeks. Embarrassingly for me as a researcher, I cannot find his name but this is an NPR piece. I will post it in sections over the next few days. One of the many disorienting features of this disorienting time has been the stark absence of executive leadership. The job of steering the nation through these epic convulsions has instead fallen to the nation’s governors. I first spoke with Whitmer on April 29, seven weeks after Michigan reported its first two cases of Covid-19. At the time, I wanted to understand what it was like to govern through a global pandemic. On that day, nearly 1,000 residents of Michigan tested positive for the virus, and more than 100 were killed by it. A few thousand people had recently gathered at the Michigan State Capitol for the so-called Operation Gridlock, the first mass protest of her stay-at-home order; some stayed in their cars, others crowded into the plaza carrying signs calling for her removal and comparing her to Hitler (“Heil Whitmer”). Whitmer’s executive order locking down the state was set to expire the following week. She intended to renew it for another 21 days over the objections of the Republican-controlled State Legislature, which was preparing to sue her. “They’ve asked to negotiate terms of reopening like we’re in a political crisis,” Whitmer told me. “We’re not in a political crisis, we’re in a public-health crisis. I can’t negotiate people’s lives.” �More tomorrow. But it must surely be Oliver time! ��See the little blonde boy in the green sweater sitting smack bang in the front? When he realized it was story time he crawled at top speed, barging through the other children to get to the front. Thats my grandchild. La Bastide de Bousignac;: this is our little village. It had a small bakery and the mayors office and that’s it! ����From the top: this is the bell tower - a design peculiar to the Ariege. Next, the Catholic Church, which had very limited monthly hours for mass and confession - they shared the priest with a number of other villages. The village graveyard and lastly, the farm at the end of our cul de sac. To finish I offer this: Everything is Going to be All Right How should I not be glad to contemplate the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window and a high tide reflected on the ceiling? There will be dying, there will be dying, but there is no need to go into that. The poems flow from the hand unbidden and the hidden source is the watchful heart. The sun rises in spite of everything and the far cities are beautiful and bright. I lie here in a riot of sunlight �watching the day break and the clouds flying. Everything is going to be all right. Derek Mahon,from Selected Poems 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_2020-08-08_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-150 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 2020-08-08 Title A name given to the resource Day 150 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/82a0c8515c0cbe48c91a2ac6009339de.pdf ff307da79d7cba26ae5e554436f9b750 PDF Text Text Day 151. by windoworks Two days ago we went walking after lunch at Highlands. This was a golf course and had closed down and fallen into disrepair. The Blandford Nature Center and the Land Conservancy of West Michigan collaborated on the purchase of the 121-acre former Highlands Golf Club in Grand Rapids in the winter of 2017 with a vision to transform the property into a natural area for community recreation, nature preservation, and land conservation. Since the last time we visited they have torn down the clubhouse and the other buildings and are in the middle of regenerating the remaining piece of the golf course. We walked along one of the many interconnecting mown paths and admired the wildflowers. ��The only landmark for not getting lost is the water tower in the distance. We couldn’t believe how high the grasses and wildflowers had grown since out last visit. It is a beautiful place to walk - just not in the middle of a hot day! I have never seen so may houses look lived in. By that I mean that at least one person is at home all day now, and gardens are gorgeous, front porches look inviting and used daily and everyone is walking or biking. Last week we went to Target and the thing that struck me was the back wall of the sports section was completely devoid of bicycles. There was only a long row of empty racks. It is surprising what stores are sold out of. The little children on our block have spent the summer with one of the older teenagers on our block as their carer. It makes me smile to see the girl I remember as a little one herself, organizing activities and keeping everyone safe and happy. The shrieks of laughter and the sound of scooters and bikes riding up and down the sidewalk has been the constant hum of the summer. So what else is happening? In virus terms, the stats continue to rise. Yesterday the US saw an increase of 55,692 cases to bring the total cases confirmed to 5.01M. Remember how shocked we were as we neared 4M? We also continue to add over 1000 deaths a day ( yesterday we added 1,109) and now the total deaths �are 162K. Its hard to comprehend these huge numbers, unless you know someone who has tested positive and then it becomes a disturbing reality. I have a friend who’s spouse is ill and tested negative, but is displaying the classic virus symptoms. And here’s a piece of worrying news: tests which are found to be negative are in fact somewhere between 70 and 75% accurate. Oh. A coronavirus model the White House cited heavily in the spring now predicts the U.S. death toll will double to nearly 300,000 by December unless Americans change their ways. The director of the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said the country was experiencing a “rollercoaster” effect: briefly following safety guidelines when infection rates spike, but abandoning them as soon as they begin to bring the numbers down. Washington Post. Speaking of people abandoning safety guidelines: One of the largest events since the beginning of the pandemic has begun in South Dakota: More than 250,000 people are expected at the iconic Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. That's scaled down from previous years, where about half-a-million people have descended on the city of about 7,000 for an event that has developed a reputation as an anything-goes festival. While the 80-year tradition isn't as raucous as it once was, festivalgoers will be largely free of social distancing restrictions common elsewhere in the country during this year's 10-day festival. Bikers flocking to the small town from around the country won't face quarantining requirements if they are from a coronavirus hot spot. And masks? They're encouraged – not required. So far, few people are heeding that encouragement, according to Associated Press reports from Friday and Saturday. USA Today. �And now we can’t even go to Canada - although I know some of you have been seriously considering it. I was packing for my road trip from Colorado to Alberta, Canada, when the text came in from a gentleman I’d been helping with groceries during the pandemic. “The Canadians are actually doing damage to vehicles with United States plates on them,” he cautioned, giving me my first inkling that it wasn’t just public health officials who were serious about keeping Americans out of Canada, where the death rate from the coronavirus has been roughly half that of its southern neighbor. As a dual citizen I was entitled to cross the border, closed to most Americans because of the pandemic. With an octogenarian father in Calgary who had been largely isolated during the stay-at-home orders, I was willing to submit to Canada’s mandatory two-week quarantine in order to visit. But my friend’s warning proved prescient. Some concerned residents who fear that the virus will be spread to their communities have been taking matters into their own hands, spurring so many reports of intimidation that the premier of British Columbia, John Horgan, reminded angry Canadians to “Be Calm. Be Kind” at a July 27 news conference. Before the pandemic, when Americans could choose most any country in the world to travel, Canada was their second most popular foreign destination, behind only Mexico. Lured by the proximity, advantageous exchange rate and safety of their northern neighbor, in the first six months of last year, U.S. residents made 10.5 million trips to Canada, the highest level in 12 years, according to Statistics Canada, a government agency. But the welcome mat was rolled up on March 31, when the border between the two countries was closed to tourists. That hasn’t kept some Americans from trying, however. Many are routinely turned away at border crossings, while other have chosen to go sightseeing instead of taking the most direct route to Alaska as required of those driving from the Lower 48 — even though violators face possible fines, jail or even being banned from Canada. There were so many interlopers that on July 31, Canada began limiting which crossings along the border with the United States can be used by foreign nationals who are allowed to transit through the country for nondiscretionary purposes. It is also requiring them to register, and making them display a hang tag on their rear view mirror with a mandatory departure date. Now this isn’t cheering: 1. The outbreak may worsen come winter. That’s when the cold will bring many indoors. “We know that the biggest risk of spread for this virus is when meaningful numbers of people gather indoors for any extended period of time,” one expert told Joe Pinsker. �2. Immunology is central to the pandemic’s biggest mysteries. Understanding it is key. “Which is unfortunate because, you see, the immune system is very complicated,” Ed Yong, who also wrote one of our latest cover stories, explains. 3. Even after this is all over, the coronavirus will likely stick around. “We will probably be living with this virus for the rest of our lives,” our Science reporter Sarah Zhang warns. “In fact, virologists have wondered whether the common-cold coronaviruses also got their start as a pandemic, before settling in as routine viruses.” The Atlantic They didn’t use just masks in the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, they were sometimes more creative. ��Well you could certainly still wear lipstick here! And I wanted to share this - a friend on a nearby block did this. Do remember I told you when you fly the American flag upside down this signals ‘dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property‘ ? Oliver time. �He loves toy trucks and cars and drives them everywhere - even on Mummy’s knee. �One of our first excursions form La Bastide was to the nearby town of Mirepoix. If we were allowed to walk over the farmers fields we could have walked there in 15 minutes and the road was too narrow and busy to walk along the side. At the heart of Mirepoix is one of the finest surviving arcaded market squares - Les Couverts- in France. The square is bordered by houses dating from the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries. The mediaeval Maison des Consuls (council house) has rafter-ends carved with dozens of images of animals and monsters, and caricatures of mediaeval professions and social groups.Wikipedia. Monday was the weekly market day and we would shop for delicious foodstuffs and Craig would put them back in the car and then we would have the Plat du Jour at our favorite cafe for lunch. It was easy to fall into the French rhythm of eating a 2 or 3 course lunch in a leisurely manner with wine and much conversation and then a picnic type dinner at home. We did eat lunch out most days and sometimes we ate a proper dinner as well. All the shops and offices closed between 12pm and 2pm or 3pm on weekdays and this made it easy to eat a longer lunch with time for a nap afterwards. ���At the top: market Monday; a view underneath the arcade and a view from the outside of the arcade looking at the houses above. I’ll leave you with the next part of Gov Whitmer’s interviews: Since then, I have been talking to Whitmer every couple of days; our conversations evolved as she found herself confronting not only a public-health crisis but an economic crisis, the catastrophic collapse of a major dam and a historic reckoning with racial inequality. She was usually in her living room at the governor’s residence in Lansing when we spoke — she set up her office there because it had the best WiFi reception in the house — though when the weather was good she would occasionally step outside and walk around the lawn. Some days, I could hear her Labradoodle, Kevin, playing with a squeaky chew toy in the background. Whitmer is not naturally introspective. Recounting the almost incomprehensibly consequential decisions she was making on a daily basis, she rarely lingered on how she felt or the magnitude of the moment. She was more inclined to review events and discuss strategy, approaching it all with the same practical mindset and vocabulary she brought to more manageable governmental challenges like fixing potholes. The effect wasn’t necessarily stirring — there was no soaring rhetoric about the need to rise to this historic challenge — but it was oddly reassuring; she was channeling panic into process. �� 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_2020-08-09_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-151 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 2020-08-09 Title A name given to the resource Day 151 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/d094dffa245d27c6ea53092e0160ca09.pdf 5336d7b3b612f4702c8166dc459e2611 PDF Text Text Day 152 by windoworks Last night my son sent an Instagram post from the Sydney Opera House - well not the house itself, but about it. The drawings talked about the closed Opera House that had a light left on in each of the theaters. These lights are called Ghost Lights and they originated as lights to keep the ghosts away, but they are also lights for safety (no falling in the orchestra pit etc). The person in charge of the lights at the Opera House said that this year she left the ghost lights on to say: we will be back. Here are the last 2 drawings from the post: ��This morning I read a very long article from Rolling Stone magazine by Professor Wade Davis at the University of British Columbia. Its a tough read. Here are 2 extracts Today, the base pay of those at the top is commonly 400 times that of their salaried staff, with many earning orders of magnitude more in stock options and perks. The elite one percent of Americans control $30 trillion of assets, while the bottom half have more debt than assets. The three richest Americans have more money than the poorest 160 million of their countrymen. Fully a fifth of American households have zero or negative net worth, a figure that rises to 37 percent for black families. The median wealth of black households is a tenth that of whites. The vast majority of Americans — white, black, and brown — are �two paychecks removed from bankruptcy. Though living in a nation that celebrates itself as the wealthiest in history, most Americans live on a high wire, with no safety net to brace a fall And The American cult of the individual denies not just community but the very idea of society. No one owes anything to anyone. All must be prepared to fight for everything: education, shelter, food, medical care. What every prosperous and successful democracy deems to be fundamental rights — universal health care, equal access to quality public education, a social safety net for the weak, elderly, and infirmed — America dismisses as socialist indulgences, as if so many signs of weakness. If you want to read the whole article, here is the link: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politicalcommentary/covid-19-end-of-american-era-wade-davis-1038206/ I was born and raised in a socialist country. Then I moved to another socialist country for my middle years. Since moving to the United States and becoming a citizen, I have never really understood the deeply ingrained resistance to socialism. All 3 of mu children have long annual leave and accruing long service leave. They are sometimes instructed to use up some of their annual leave as there are rules about accumulating too much. What springs to mind is that all 3 children hold important positions within their professions and yet the world doesn’t end if they take 6 weeks leave - and their job is still there waiting for them when they return. As for the cost of my college degree - this was 30 years ago and it has changed now but then the annual cost of my attending university was deferred under a national scheme called HECS (Higher Education Contribution Scheme) which meant I would pay the cost back at an annual percentage in my annual tax bill. But here’s the kicker - it only started once you began earning wages. In other news: Letitia James, New York's attorney general, announced civil action on Thursday to dissolve the National Rifle Association after an 18-month investigation found more than $64 million in alleged fraud by CEO Wayne LaPierre and others. James claims NRA officials misused charitable funds for personal gain, gave contracts to families and friends, and bought the loyalty of former employees with lucrative contracts. The NRA condemned the allegations, saying the action is a political vendetta intended to limit gun rights and stifle free speech. NPR I hope this succeeds. And here’s something to make you laugh from a friend: �A German nudist had the last laugh after giving chase to a wild boar that had run off with a bag containing his laptop. Pictures posted on social media show the naked man running after a sow and her two piglets to the mirth of fellow bathers at Berlin's Teufelssee, or Devil's Lake. Adele Landauer, an actor and coach who says she took the pictures, wrote that the pigs first helped themselves to somebody's pizza before grabbing the bag. When the owner realised what had happened, he “gave his all” and recovered it, she said. When he came back with his yellow bag in the hand we all clapped and congratulated him for his success,” she added. Landauer said she later showed the man the pictures she had taken and “he laughed loudly and authorised me to publish them”. Wild boars are common in the forests around Berlin and can occasionally be seen venturing through city parks in search of food. Here’s the next excerpt from Gov Whitmer’s ongoing interviews: In mid-March, as Michigan’s caseload continued to grow, Whitmer faced another tough decision: Should she lock down the state? Over the next 48 hours, Michigan’s caseload doubled to more than 1,000, and it became clear that the state had to close. But how much of it? Totten brought the revised order to Whitmer in her office on March 23. He told her that the moment she signed it, she would almost certainly be exercising more power than any governor in the history of Michigan. “There has never been a governor who literally told everyone in the state to stay home,” he �said. “That’s just extraordinary.” Over the next week, Michigan’s Covid-19 numbers exploded. By the end of March, the state was reporting 7,615 confirmed cases and 259 deaths. Both totals were far higher than those in any of its neighboring states. Michigan is the nation’s 10th-most-populous state, but it had the fourth-highest Covid-19 case and fatality counts in the country. The state’s caseload was still rising exponentially. On April 9, Whitmer signed a new executive order. This one imposed some of the most severe restrictions in the country, barring any activity that wasn’t “necessary to sustain or protect life.” It prohibited the use of motorboats, closed golf courses and, in a move almost guaranteed to provoke a backlash, required big-box stores to seal off aisles devoted to lawn care. As of yesterday Michigan had 96,726 cases in total and 6,519 deaths. I remember when we were shocked by almost 5000 deaths. Two days ago we walked along the ridge above the ravine on the Allendale GVSU campus. It is lovely, quiet and shady. ��Then yesterday I found this little guy on the corner of our front porch. �And here is Craig in his happy place: ��The ‘holes’ around the tree are where he has planted wildflower seeds. Now Oliver: ��His first selfie. In the first week one of our first excursions was to Montsegur. In 1243–44, the Cathars (a religious sect considered heretical by the Catholic Church) who had sought refuge at the Montségur fortress were besieged by 10,000 troops, in what is now known as the siege of Montségur. In March 1244, the Cathars finally surrendered and approximately 244 were burned en masse in a bonfire at the foot of the pog when they refused to renounce their faith. Wikipedia ����There is still the ruins of the fortress on the top. I climbed maybe a third of the way up before I went down again and fell down the last steep bit (but only wounded my pride). All around us were cows grazing with their cow bells clonking on the breeze. It was confronting to think of those burned alive in what is a lovely meadow now. Today I’ll leave you with this photo taken by my friend Rich. Its taken from St Ignace looking back at Lower Michigan on the other side of the Mackinac Bridge. �Remember: 89 days until the election. Vote as soon as your ballot turns up in the mail and then hand deliver it back. � 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_2020-08-10_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-152 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 2020-08-10 Title A name given to the resource Day 152 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/ccb8dc13f9611ab8c9bfd1d570668f51.pdf 0cdbd16c19bbf9506de54cc406374550 PDF Text Text Day 153. by windoworks New Zealand operates on a reverse coronavirus stage system to Michigan. For 101 days they had no community transmission of Covid-19 cases and life went back to Stage 1, that is, normal. Everything opened up except the borders and New Zealanders could be seen gathering in restaurants, bars and cafes; walking on beaches and in parks, riding bicycles and flying for vacations to other parts of New Zealand. On Tuesday night (remember, they’re 16 hours ahead of us) Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern closed the Greater Auckland area (Wellsford to Pukekohe) down to Stage 3 - all offices, restaurants, bars, cafes,schools etc closed. All Aucklanders not in essential services must stay home. All pharmacies and grocery stores to remain open but with restrictions. She closed the rest of NZ back to Stage 2, limiting group gatherings etc. PM Ardern also recommended the use of masks when visiting essential services. Why did this happen? Yesterday they discovered 4 cases of community transmission in Auckland. They are beginning massive testing and tracing tomorrow morning. We have seen this event in European and Asian countries where they have gotten the virus under control. A super quick lockdown, testing and tracing seems to bring it back under control very quickly. But its the rollercoaster effect: while the virus surges everyone behaves themselves but when it eases off, everyone throws caution to the wind. I find myself wondering - will masks become a fashion accessory? Will we color coordinate them with our daily outfit? Yesterday we went to Meijer where Craig noticed that every staff member was wearing a snazzy black mask with Meijer printed on it. A few people persisted in wearing their mask over their mouths only, but I guess its better than no mask at all. And they did have someone cleaning carts and baskets. Good job, Meijer! I felt dispirited yesterday. (Note to family: don’t worry, I’m almost dispirited). So, in anticipation of an outing I had made egg salad the day before and while Craig dropped Murphy at daycare (first time in 4+ months) I made the rest of our picnic lunch. We had intended to drive to Silver Lake, north beside Lake Michigan but the traffic was crazy (insane driving behavior) plus an added traffic jam due to road repairs, so we turned off the freeway and drove to Muskegon State Park. We stopped by the roadside and ate lunch watching the lake and listening to the waves. ��Murphy is being groomed on Thursday, so if the weather is good we might do another drive and picnic. Its an astonishing thing to say but the days are drawing in. Its dark longer in the mornings and the sun sets before 9pm. Its still hot weather and yesterday afternoon was horribly humid ahead of a storm. We were under a severe storm watch and in several states they experienced a Derecho which is a line of intense, widespread and fast moving windstorms and sometimes thunderstorms that moves across a great distance and is characterized by damaging winds. I believe the wind gusts got up to 100+ miles an hour. It went all the way to Chicago and then caused huge waves surging back and forth across southern Lake Michigan. We escaped most of the wind but the rain was a gully washer as my neighbor John said. Speaking of John, he corrected me regarding ghost lights in theaters. John has worked extensively in theater for much of his working life and he says: “The primary purpose of a ghost light is safety. Theaters are extremely dark, and with constantly changing scenery, the stage can be extremely dangerous, from tripping on new scenic elements, or walking into the orchestra pit or just off the stage itself. Ghosts are appeased with empty seats as well as a light to perform by in order they do not curse the theater. Every theater has a ghost and the light is for them not against them”. Thanks John. �Meanwhile ..... Grocery prices in the United States are rising at the fastest pace in decades after the pandemic sickened food plant workers, broke supply chains and otherwise upended the complex network of farms, factories and shipping routes Americans rely on to eat. The sticker shock is hitting people already struggling with unemployment and lost income, forcing families to reckon with a scarcity of basic necessities. Oct. 1 will be a day of reckoning for the airline industry.It's when major carriers will be allowed to lay off employees under the terms of a federal bailout, and many early ticket buyers are worried their flights may not exist. The Post asked industry experts whether it's risky to book a flight for the fall. Expect “an adventure,” one of them warned. (Safety wise, experts caution against non-emergency flights.) In the coronavirus economy, masks are king. Requirements that millions of Americans wear them in public has created a surge of demand, prompting some struggling companies to repurpose their manufacturing lines and get into the mask-making business. Meanwhile, we're all trying to get rid of our junk. Stuck at home and strapped for cash, Americans are widely engaged in a “great decluttering,” our Style desk wrote. “Not since the January 2019 purging tsunami inspired by Marie Kondo’s tidying Netflix series have Americans been so inspired to edit the junk out of their homes.” Are you? Washington Post This what the the two parties were arguing about before Trump took matters (illegally, I think) into his own hands. �And I had to post this: �Any day now Joe Biden will announce his running partner. Please keep this (above) in mind if he doesn’t choose a black woman. He’s basing his choice on a woman who can work closely with him and shares his ideals. Sounds like the best plan to me. And a word of warning: if you think that if Trump is reelected, you will just move to another country - not an option. NO ONE anywhere wants us anytime soon. Thats �because Trump and his minions have mismanaged this dreadful virus so appallingly that everyone in the world wants Americans to stay safely locked in America. They’ll let us out again when the virus has run its course. Last part of the Whitmer interviews: Whitmer and I had been talking for almost two months. We had covered a lot of ground: Her struggle to get medical supplies to her state; her inability to ban firearms from the Capitol; the bursting of a dam; the anger and pain now exploding across her state. As the weeks went by, it became increasingly clear to me that all of these different conversations about all of these different subjects were really one conversation about one subject: Her government — our government — was badly broken. During one of our last conversations, I asked Whitmer how she defined success, given the almost unimaginably daunting choices that lay ahead for her. She had just returned from another trip to Midland, where she learned that only a small fraction of the flood victims were likely to have their claims paid by their insurance companies. It was the sort of question Whitmer usually steered away from, migrating instead to firmer ground: the intransigent Legislature, the White House, the budget. She thought about it for an uncharacteristically long moment as she paced outside the governor’s residence and then offered the only response she could. “That’s a hard question to answer,” she said. “It’s one that we’re grappling with.” New York Times Just this morning Russia announced it was using a vaccine developed before clinical trials were completed. Putin said his daughter had been vaccinated. Before we all cheer, read this: Federal health official are worried Americans won't trust a coronavirus vaccine if and when one is developed, so they've launched a PR effort to assure people they won't release one before it's been tested, reviewed and vetted by an outside committee. The nightmare scenario is a repeat of 1976, when the Ford administration rushed a new swine flu vaccine out to the public, only for people to panic over possible side effects and force the program to shut down. Two days ago we walked again in Oak Hill Graveyard. Here are 2 famous local names, and one not so famous: ���BISSELL from BISSELL vacuum cleaners; Blodgett from donating the land for Blodgett Hospital and oh look! Benjamin. Time for Oliver ��He loves this empty cable reel called Rolly. No, I didn’t name it. About 30 minutes or so drive from us was Carcassone. As you approach it on the freeway, it rises out of the surrounding fields like a fairy castle. Inhabited since the Neolithic, Carcassonne is located in the plain of the Aude between historic trade routes, linking the Atlantic to the Mediterranean Sea and the Massif Central to the Pyrénées. Its strategic importance was quickly recognized by the Romans, who occupied its hilltop until the demise of the Western Roman Empire. In the fifth century, it was taken over by the Visigoths, who founded the city. Its strategic location led successive rulers to expand its fortifications until the Treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659. Its citadel, known as the Cité de Carcassonne, is a medieval fortress dating back to the Gallo-Roman period. Wikipedia �����Carcassone is actually 3 cities: the Citadel fortress, the medieval city below and the modern city further out. There were 2 ways of accessing the Citadel - the first was astonishingly steep and I hated it, and the other was an easy walk in from the adjacent parking lot. We visited Carcassone a number of times. This was our first visit to the Citadel. To leave you today, I offer this: Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars of light, are giving off the rich fragrance of cinnamon and fulfillment, the long tapers of cattails are bursting and floating away over �the blue shoulders of the ponds, and every pond, no matter what its name is, is nameless now. Every year everything I have ever learned in my lifetime leads back to this: the fires and the black river of loss whose other side is salvation, whose meaning none of us will ever know. To live in this world you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go. “In Blackwater Woods” by Mary Oliver, from American Primitive. © Back Bay Books, 1983.American Primitive. © Back Bay Books, 1983. � 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_2020-08-11_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-153 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 2020-08-11 Title A name given to the resource Day 153 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/f0d5f9ad7c0eb7338b58477396d9a345.pdf c4bc071155af373249c44f4fae848256 PDF Text Text Day 154 by windoworks It’s official! Kamala Harris will be Joe Biden’s running mate. I think it a good choice plus I’m really glad the Big Gretch is still looking after our state. Here are some reasons why Kamala is a good choice: The New York Times Joe Biden selected Senator Kamala Harris of California as his running mate on Tuesday. She is the first Black woman, and the first person of Indian descent, to be nominated for national office by a major party. �Today we turned to our colleague Alex Burns, who covered the announcement, to explain why Biden decided on Harris. 1. Broad appeal. Harris, long viewed as a rising Democratic star and an embodiment of the party’s diversity, was a relatively safe pick. She falls comfortably within the mainstream, but her embrace of a more left-leaning agenda as a presidential candidate last year meant that “liberals never mobilized against her during the V.P. search,” Alex told us. 2. Governing chops. Harris’s experience and pragmatism sync with Biden’s political style. Her ideological flexibility also matches his recent openness to more left-leaning economic and racialjustice policies amid the pandemic and protests over police violence. 3. Political panache. Harris sharply criticized Biden during a primary debate last year over his opposition to busing as a means of integrating public schools, an attack that left some advisers wary of putting her on the ticket. Picking Harris suggests a recognition that her more energetic style could prove an asset. I think Trump’s reaction was to name her Phony Kamala - and I want to say: is that the best you can think of? There are 82 days to the presidential election. When you receive your mail in ballot, hand deliver it to the appropriate office or put it in your city’s ballot box collection point, and then check online that it was received - or vote in person on the day, of course. Meanwhile in New Zealand where Zar and Alva are preparing to be at home again for COVID-19 Phase 2, the experts are still trying to figure out where the virus came from and an initial suggestion is this: i.stuff.co.nz A cool storage facility in Auckland will be tested for Covid-19, with the possibility that the virus could have travelled into New Zealand on refrigerated freight. Four cases of Covid-19 were discovered in south Auckland on Tuesday evening, ending a 102-day run of no community transmission. One of the people infected worked at Americold, a cool store company in Mount Wellington. Another worked at personal finance company Finance Now on Dominion Rd in Mount Eden Wait, what? It travels by itself on cold things? Okay, keep the bleach spray and cloths handy for everything entering your house - mail, groceries, prescriptions, parcels. You never know where that little blighter might be hiding. Yesterday Craig tried the mask test. He will be wearing the blue surgical masks to teach (I can’t even talk coherently about college reopening) and he had found his cloth masks too hard to be heard through. To �test masks, you out it on, light a match and then try to blow it out. If you can blow it out, throw that mask away, its useless. And speaking of masks, bandanas or neck gaiters are not safe: Washington Post: Not all face masks are created equal, as we have learned over the course of this pandemic. While N95s are the gold standard for and commonly used by health-care workers, most Americans reach for accessible, reusable fabrics to protect others as we run our errands. Now researchers have found that so-called neck gaiters — typically made from a very thin layer of stretchy, polyester-spandex blend — can be worse than wearing no mask at all. “These neck gaiters are extremely common in a lot of places because they’re very convenient to wear,” said Warren S. Warren, a professor of physics, chemistry, radiology and biomedical engineering at Duke. “But the exact reason why they’re so convenient, which is that they don’t restrict air, is the reason why they’re not doing much of a job helping people.” �Oh so true! Back to school. Trump has suggested and Betsy DeVos has endorsed the idea that children are able to go back to school full time and they’ll be safe - or not: New York Times: In the last two weeks of July, nearly 100,000 children in the United States tested positive for the coronavirus, according to data from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association. The speed and the scale of the infections — dozens of countries have not yet recorded 100,000 cases in total — further complicate the already daunting issue of reopening schools. In Georgia, Indiana and other �states, some schools that reopened have already closed down again after new outbreaks emerged. Recent research suggests that children can carry at least as much of the virus in their noses and throats as adults do, even if they have only mild or moderate symptoms. That has prompted fears that students who become ill at school may spread the virus to their older relatives. But it’s not just older people who are at risk — in some rare cases, a child’s health can be severely affected. Nearly 600 young people in the U.S., from infants to 20 year olds, have developed an inflammatory syndrome linked to Covid-19, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. Most of the children required intensive care. “I fear that there has been this sense that kids just won’t get infected or don’t get infected in the same way as adults and that, therefore, they’re almost like a bubbled population,” Michael Osterholm, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota, told The Times in July. “There will be transmission,” he said. “What we have to do is accept that now and include that in our plans.” ��From Zoe in Sydney where you no longer have to push a button to stop the traffic so you can cross the road. I was going to include a piece about the Big Ten canceling the football season this year, that is the big ten college football teams. But then I saw that other conferences (groups) are considering canceling seasons, so I’ll wait until that story plays out. The New Normal (NPR) Homemade sourdough bread, foraged mushrooms, open meadows, freshly picked flowers, homegrown produce, knitting, baking pies and rustic cottages. Sound like a scene from Little House on the Prairie or a spread in a 1940 Better Homes and Gardens magazine? Actually, it’s cottagecore, the new “it” aesthetic trend brought on by — you guessed it — locked-in syndrome … sorry, the coronavirus pandemic. Social media influencers and pop stars (hey, Taylor Swift!) have adopted cottagecore as a wholesome, back-tobasics response to feeling trapped and overwhelmed — sort of a honey-dipped antidote to “doomscrolling.” Ah yes, I’ll take cottagecore over doomscrolling any day. And now Oliver: ��You can just see the glint in his eye - 2 seconds later the tower was gone! One of our next excursions was to Esperaza. One of the old pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela passes this way, through the mountains and on into Spain. In the early 20th century, Espéraza was known for hat making. The town has a Hat Making Museum. Around 1815, the village experienced a considerable economic growth thanks to Bugarach hatters who settled there. First in 1830 and then in 1878 Espéraza enjoyed a prosperous period due to headwear, encouraged by the arrival of the railway. By 1929, there were 3000 Espéraza workers and 14 factories which allowed the village to become the second largest manufacturer of felt hats in the world (after Monza, Italy). But fashion had a terrible impact on the garment industry: the hat was worn less and less in the mid-20th century and Espéraza plunged into an economic depression. Now all that remains of the 14 Espéraza hat factories is a museum after the last factory burned down in 2002, although some have been converted to housing. Since the late 20th century, Espéraza has become known for dinosaur fossil bones and eggs discovered in the area. These discoveries began at the end of the 19th century and excavations continue today and new species of dinosaurs continue to be found. Dinosauria, the local museum, exhibits these fossils along with life size reconstructions of dinosaurs. Wikipedia ����This was one of the best dinosaur exhibits I have ever seen. It was so unexpected - we found it by accident, just driving through the countryside. Esperaza is a tiny town. In the 3rd photo the Tyrannosaurus Rex was motion sensitive and as I came around the corner, he roared at me. I think I jumped 3 feet in the air. Esperaza has a wonderful Sunday market and although we always intended to go, we just never got there. �Once more, many, many thanks for your readership and thanks also to all those who send me items to share. I don’t always use them and sometimes I save them for a later post but they are always welcome. 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_2020-08-12_BenjaminPamela_PD-Day-154 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 2020-08-12 Title A name given to the resource Day 154 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