The PVP Diaries #65

Still not dying. I didn’t look very long, but I couldn’t find the data on age distribution. I hear tell that the median age for infection is dropping quickly, which probably (but what do I know) accounts for the increase in cases alongside the decrease in deaths.

An employee at our Trader Joe’s has tested positive, awakening all kinds of brilliant commentary. There’s something like 80,000 people in West Seattle. People are going to get sick. I am no great denier; I take precautions and work to keep my family safe and uninfected as best I can. But still I believe 100% that our problem-to-panic ratio is grossly unbalanced. Every time an employee of some local establishment tests positive, the pitchforks get lit and the torches get sharpened. Suddenly this previously cherished business is accused of failing the community. It’s absurd. In fairness, there are those that come out in support as well. “TJ’s has done a great job from the beginning, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t guarantee that nobody will get sick.” The world’s got a lot of sensible people in it, too, they just don’t head to the comments section quite as often.

It appears the vaccine conversation has already been soundly stratified into two camps: “Inject me yesterday,” and “full Anti-vaxxer.” A few people have expressed a desire to be, perhaps, cautious in adopting a brand new vaccine, its effects being naturally unknown, and they’ve been labeled dangers, threats to public health, and even (no kidding) flat-earthers. Me? I like caution and restraint. I do, however, believe that one part of the reason that vaccines take so long to become available is due to the rigorous and lengthy testing process. It’s not a guarantee of safety, but really there’s no such thing.

One person who said “I don’t want to be injected until I know it’s safe,” was met with “then your decision will result in many more people dying.”

I’m no logician, but I don’t think it works like that. The only trouble I have with the original comment is that it makes everyone the canary in your coal mine. Hard to decide whether it’s wisdom or selfishness.

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After a short total news quarantine I decided this morning to check the internet for lies about things up on Capitol Hill. It turns out they’ve changed the name from the mockably effeminate CHAZ to something that more accurately bespeaks the violence within: CHOP. The Capitol Hill Occupied Protest. Looks like they’ve been doing quite a bit of shooting up in there, so they might as well skip to the end and change the name, finally, to Chicago.

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I forgot how much I like Marcella. It’s been a long time since season 2 on Netflix, so I had forgotten about it. It’s British detective stuff – DCI this and DS that, and the 3rd season hangs out almost entirely in Ireland. It’s not groundbreaking stuff, but there’s enough difference and depth, especially in the Marcella character herself, to separate the show somewhat from the thousands of others in the genre.

Now I’m on to season 3 of Dark, which gives me my sci-fi fix. It’s German and subtitled and has a pretty convoluted storyline. After a few episodes I think I’m going to go back and watch the first two seasons again, in order to get my mind back on track with it.

But first and finally, Karamazov. About 60 pages remaining, so I need to head out to the porch with a coffee (it’s dark and rainy today) and finish that tome once and for all. I was going to read it last night after everyone went to bed, but it got to be too late, what with watching “Worst Cooks in America” with my daughter, and catching the end of “Back to the Future” with The Boy. All I could do after that was go to bed. I was already there, anyway.

Later we pack for the trip. My wife was planning to buy the groceries at Trader Joe’s today. We’ll see if she changes tack due to the Wuhan worker.

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Music again? Same as yesterday – it’s all about the sound. Reader Marica and I had a brief chat about tidy madness a while back (wow, that was 46 entries ago). She sent me down a rabbit hole involving some kind of landscape theory that I actually pursued for a couple of hours, but my memory drops everything that I don’t revisit almost daily. As for this ditty below, I don’t actually feel the morbid panic and woe in the least, but I appreciate the access to the emotion. I feel some actual joy, instead, from the marriage of the sound to the sense, the words to the way the energy rises and falls, speeds and slows. And in snatches, the poetry’s quite perfect:

WAIT – I just realized I’ve posted it before. Here’s something else, that fits all the same. The madness is plenty tidy:

Dead weight under my feet
Peeling up my honesty

Somehow I forgot what it was worth
but I’ll follow his notes
to the edges of the earth.

Creatures of the deep
Keeper of my memories
I’ve come to take them back from which they came,
A man who disappeared and left me with his name

And unless you’re honestly
coming back home,

I wish you the worst sea sickness
I hope you can feel it up inside your head
and down in your stomach
Remember to breathe
when under the water
Then you can open up your mouth
and sink to the bottom of the earth

And we’ll raise our limbs like lifeless tools

The reaching hands of your pride
are twisting up your insides,
But before you anchor your line
just give me some time.

And I will be with you until time is no more.

You can’t stop me now,
I’m a fickle raging bull
In a red caped calming crowd
You can’t stop me now
My devil’s claw is hooked
and the road I raised will send me to my grave.

Hey boy,
Don’t let go
You’re gonna find what you’re looking for
Even if that means this whole damn sea
will be turned upside down.

Hey boy,
Don’t let go
Keep your hands on that dirty rope
And an eye on things ’cause the sun’s setting
and the winds are picking up.

Hey boy,
Don’t let go
To the hand of your father’s ghost
Because up ’til now
You believed you were talking to yourself

Hey boy,
Don’t you know
that you could never come back home?
And you will die here all alone.

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Vaccinate the vaccine, Comrade Citizen!