Saturday Caturday … on Sunday

The plumber was here all day yesterday.  The apartment that I’ve moved into has been empty since 1978 so the pipes don’t work as well as they should.  Since the plumber was in and out of the apartment most of the day and making a LOT of noise with various power-tools, the cats were upset and hiding.  I didn’t see Bobby all day.  I honestly thought that he had gotten out of the house or maybe down in the cellar when the backdoor was left open.  I had asked that the door remain closed but you know how it is when you have a workman doing a job … he’s not thinking about your cats.   But Bobby was in the apartment.  I don’t know where he was … but he reappeared when the plumber left & it was quiet again.

Today, we enjoyed the peace.  I did a little more unpacking but mostly read & wrote.  Jack slept on his pile of blankets.  Radar reclaimed “his” table.  Bobby wandered around & checked things out.  Soon it’ll be time to go to bed.   Tomorrow we’ll get more things put in their proper places & make this place even more homey.   I think we’re going to be happy here.

 

all photographs © polly macdavid

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Moving

I have been moving since last Friday.  I won’t be done until this coming Monday.   I never have had a move like this & of course it’s all because of the COVID-19 virus.  The movers I hired called me on Saturday & told me that they would be unable to move me because of the ban on non-essential businesses.  My son & I moved most of my things in his Pontiac Vibe … I own around 1000 books (maybe more) in 40 milk crates & various other boxes, as well as boxes filled with my diaries, poetry, & other writing.  I have a bad back; I hired movers for a reason.  However, we got most of it done.  There’s still a few things left at the old place.  & there’s the washer & dryer that needs to be moved.  I have the same landlord at the new place as the old place; he has found me a mover who will move my washer & dryer.   So hopefully, by this coming Monday, I will be completely moved in my new place & can unpack and settle in while “sheltering in place”.

The cats have been kinda freaked out but it’s not their first move, either.  They have been checking out the new kitchen cupboards before I fill them with the china.

Bobby

Radar

all photographs © polly macdavid

A Neglected Point about COVID-19 Testing

Mike the Mad Biologist

There’s an excellent New Yorker article about the failure to provide enough tests to detect COVID-19. Here’s a point I haven’t seen made elsewhere, but that is really crucial (boldface mine):

The public-health-laboratory network was never intended to provide widespread testing in the event of a pandemic. To offer tests to anyone who wanted them, as President Trump did, on March 6th, was always going to require commercial testing facilities to come on line. Still, the three-week delay caused by the C.D.C.’s failure to get working test kits into the hands of the public-health labs came at a crucial time. In the early stages of an outbreak, contact tracing, isolation, and individual quarantines are regularly deployed to contain the spread of a disease. But these tools are useless if suspected cases of a disease cannot be tested. The void created by the C.D.C.’s faulty tests made it impossible…

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An Exponential Increase in People Killed or Infected by COVID-19

It’s going to get worse before it gets better.

The Inglorius Padre Steve's World

Erring on the Side of Caution 

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

In early January a dread came over me when I first read about the novel Coronavirus in China, and the head that the first case in the U.S. had been diagnosed in Washington State. I knew then that things would get much worse before they ever got better. But for fear of being labeled a fear monger or crazy person. At that time the threat was being downplayed except by intelligence agencies whose warnings we not heeded.

I guess it was in the fall of 2008 when I had a troubling dream. In it saw our city’s Town Center, still being built up, completely empty, shops and restaurants closed, construction sites abandoned, and trash blowing through the streets. That was in the 2008 crash with the H1N1 flu pandemic just beginning. I chalked them up to my horrible depression…

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Care, compassion and empathy

Yeah, this

Ends and Beginnings

As many of you know I work in the non-profit world of affordable housing. The organization that I am affiliated with owns approximately 500 front doors, units that we lease to the elderly, people with mental health issues, HIV/AIDS, and individuals and families who would otherwise be homeless without our assistance. This is a second career for me, one that has been impactful on my life, more so than what I did in the first 30 years of my working life.

I don’t know what your grocery stores look like but the two I shop at are empty. The mission church I attend asked for care packages to distribute to the homeless population my church serves this morning. The request was simple, peanut butter crackers, fruit cups, Vienna sausages, cereal bars, granola bars, and a bottled water packed in gallon-sized freezer bag. I headed to the store last night to…

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Top 10 Reasons the U.S. Government Is Blowing This, by David Swanson

via Top 10 Reasons the U.S. Government Is Blowing This, by David Swanson

Just Sayin’

WOW. JUST WOW.

Mock Paper Scissors

Fashion Week!

It seems so obvious now.

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Self-Portrait as Film Noir Villainess

Peedeel's Blog

Leggy, emerging from shadow in a hat and veil,
dress dark as blood – red silk, perhaps, or black velvet,
liquid in the chiaroscuro. A train station, and me with a mysterious
errand of vengeance, poison with a suitcase and a mission.
If you can, imagine my background as disheveled, neglected child
with ratty hair, a nefarious case of missing persons,
and all the scenes take place in a rainstorm.
I’ve spent a lot of time in the back of police cars,
I’m intimate with the make and model of the kind of gun
you’re holding in your hand right now. I wear gloves
even in warm weather. I’m really a cipher, a plot device,
a way to let the men be heroic or not in the inevitable last scene
where I throw myself in front of the bullet, or drive into the frozen
lake. Don’t be fooled by my…

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A Goddess for the Plague

There is always a Goddess who will help in trying times!

hecatedemeter

Now that we’re regularly being reminded of the importance of washing our hands with soap and water, you might want to begin a practice devoted to the Goddess Hygieia.  The word “hygiene” comes from the same root word as her name.

Generally described as the daughter of the Greek God god of medicine, Asclepius, and his wife Epione, (thus, the daughter of medicine and healing), Hygieia is recognized as the protector of good health, especially through practices of cleanliness and sanitation.  Thus, just as all acts of love and pleasure are rituals of the Goddess, all acts of cleanliness and health are rituals of Hygieia.  When you wash or bathe, when you clean your food and eating surfaces, when you breathe fresh air, when you get enough sleep, when you go for a brisk walk, when you do yoga or meditate, you are performing rituals to Hygieia.

She…

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Saturday Caturday

Moving is a drag but it gives Radar boxes to play in.  He likes the packing paper, too!

photograph © polly macdavid