epgarbage

"They say that these are not the best of times, but they're the only times I've ever known.  And I believe there is a time for meditation, in cathedrals of our own...For we are always what our situations hand us, it's either sadness or euphoria."  - Billy Joel, "Summer, Highland Falls" (1976) Reporting of cases in Larimer County has been drastically slowed, and rather than a smooth curve up or down, we have herky-jerky cumulative jumps as a week's worth of cases get entered into the database in one day.   No matter.  In two years, Estes Park has reported 2000 cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection, or 1000 cases per year.  Either the denominator is 6000, or 10,000, or somewhere in between.  Larimer County doesn't seem to know the difference, or much care.  Our town administrator doesn't want to stick with a number that makes us look bad, so just keep inflating the balloon.  Annex Grand Lake, for all we care.  Just report the numbers and move on.  1 in

Kirby Nelson-Hazelton 2045 Scott Webermeier 1569 Marie Cenac 1536 Kevin Benes 1521 Karen Randinitis 1498 John “29” Meissner 429 Public Notices summarized in Trail-Gazette?  Yes 1609 No 1384 Further De-Brucing?  Yes 1964 No 1091

Oh, it ain't over.  The fact that we have essentially stopped testing will make this wave hit harder, but as teachers and staffers and waiters start not showing up for work, shutdowns and the return to ether will be the soup de jour: Knock Knock Who's There  

Is America dead?  Well, we have one million fewer citizens than we did two years ago, and no one seems to care much.  Certainly I have yet to hear an apology from Bent Dick Turd Ferguson or Dan "Damn the Covidpedoes" Demming.

The town ordinance related to the impact fee on STRs passed 4-2.  Get ready for the lawsuits.

Despite the number of cumulative deaths from SARS-CoV-2 in the United States officially surpassing 1,000,000 when the cock crows on 3-23-22.  One million deaths means nothing, it means everything.  Two years ago, the most some could comprehend was, maybe, 60,000 deaths, worst case scenario.  Two years ago, Dan Denning took me to task for “fear-mongering”. I guess, two years removed, I would prefer the company of someone who stood their ground and predicted correctly over someone who kept their head up their ignorant ass, yelling partisan nonsense into an echo chamber lined with poorly-digested meat.

Remember back on March 11 when we talked about 1943 being a good year? Well, 1956 was not a very good year (think Suez Crisis and Fidel Castro), and we've arrived there in less than one week.  Wastewater analysis, and increasing case numbers in Europe, suggest this ain't over yet folks.  Pays your money and takes your chances, but I'm following my own masking and social distancing guidelines for the foreseeable next few days/months.

Remember two years ago, when Estes Park had yet to report its first COVID-19 case?  Now we have one thousand nine hundred and forty-three cases over two years of our good lord, or an average of 971 cases per year.  Once the Chamber director heads south, that should reduce the case load somewhat (she may account for 50 of these alone), but that is still 1900 that could have been prevented by following basic steps intended to reduce disease transmission of aerosolized viral particles, and keeping up-to-date on vaccine doses, for a vaccine that is the most efficacious and least harmful in the history of medicine. I don't know if the denominator for these 1900 cases are 6000 people living in Estes Park or 10,000 people living in the Estes "Valley" or 4 million people visiting RMNP every year.  In any event, if it is somewhere between 6000 and 10,000, that means, best case scenario, one in five Estes Park residents, were unable to keep themselves virus-free over the past 730 d

For the past two weeks, even with Florida hiding their numbers, the death toll in the United States has dropped to less than 2000/day.  Note that I am not riding a false premise to death.  I am admitting that things in early March are much better than they appeared in February, when we were stuck on 2000 deaths  despite most everyone dropping any pretense of being interested in following any suggestions or remaining (largely ignored) mandates.  But let’s not pretend for a second that this is over, or that 1000 deaths per day equates to zero deaths per day.

And the amount of indifference will be suffocating.  Covid isn’t over just because anti-vaxxers want it over..........

  The sad state of America n indifference

We are currently only losing an average of 10 people per state of the union per day.  As the unvaccinated continue dying or getting infected naturally, less of the U.S. population remains to transmit Covid-19.  Johns Hopkins data (generally considered more accurate than the competing statistics below, although both are gross undercounts) indicates 960,000 dead in America - If we could only maintain 0.5K per day (which we won’t, tune in tomorrow), we would go around the 1 million mark in 80 days.

What can you conclude when Florida refuses to play?

As they appear on the ballot - Eric Owen John Meissner David Batey Drew Webb

And if Gov. DeSanta Claus would stop forcing people to take off their masks.  Remember all that talk about freedom?  Are people in Florida no longer free to wear what they want?  

This is the sits on March 1: Colorado with 12,500 dead, U.S. still on the path to 1 million officially dead by Easter.  Officially because we actually passed that number a long time ago, what with Florida’s purposeful undercounts and you know the drill.  Joe Holzman now contends we would all be fine if we just took Vitamin D.  In Colorado.  One of the states with the highest number of sunny days per year, and no slouch when it comes to per capital consumption of ice cream.  We are somehow deficient in Vitamin D.  Whatever.  At least Joe is not still advocating drinking your own urine.  So we are making some progress on the Below Average Joe front.