Zork in Distress

 [The Intergalactic Council, Expeditionary Division, received the following batch transmission of delayed reports from Agent Zork Zynt, assigned to the Earth unit "USA."  We are still looking into the cause of the delay, but engineers suspect a misalignment in the gravitational wave membranes that provide the message relay route.  At any rate, it was these reports that led the Council to consider recalling all Earth agents and quarantining the planet for a few thousand cycles to see if the civilization might survive and eventually be mature enough for contact.  As you will see, the messages from Agent Zynt suggest a progressive breakdown in his neural transmorgification due to extreme stress.]

Encrypted Transmission #020 Agent ZZ to IEC Local Date 1.2.21    

Uh...well, he got his wish. Mob stormed building where humans make rules for running society. Disrupted final step in electoral process. Get this, some of mob dragged a security officer down some steps and beat him with flagpoles holding the national flag to "Make America Great Again," following motto of leader. My pre-departure culture briefings must have been inadequate -- have anthro guys check their database for symbolic meanings of human beatings. Transmorgification breakdown may be getting worse. I don't seem to be able to focus clearly and my appendages are shaking occasionally for no good reason.  Even Krispy Kremes have lost appeal......

Encrypted Transmission #022 Agent ZZ to IEC Local Date 1.11.21

Pandemic out of control and getting worse.  We clearly overestimated human's ability to handle our experimental challenge.  Give them a failing mark for this test.  In my political unit many people claim their "right" to be "free" gives them a "right" to infect other people by not taking precautions, like wearing a mask  Does this make any sense?  Demaz gretchop fornzib zefart agzyp....there I go again! Human scientists here did very well in developing countermeasure vaccines, but can't get it distributed and administered because of lack of coordination, planning, and political agendas. In fact, large numbers believe inaccurate info claiming vaccines are harmful, maybe even a plot to exert mind control and refuse be vaccinated.  I don't think I can take much more of this. Besides, I'm beginning to hallucinate that Kryspy Kremes are growing eyeballs and tentacles -- more evidence of breakdown?

Two Kinds of Injections, A Workout, and a Riot

  [Note: this is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.] 

1/9/21

The new Electoral College

Well, after the excitement of last week’s fireworks and wild celebrations of the New Year (yawn), I really thought this was going to be a boring week.  Wrong, wrong, wrong. Right? I don’t have much to say, other than (a) months ago I predicted violence if Trump lost, and (b) THIS is what it means to “make America great again?”  Really?  

Ok, back to something more hopeful and positive.  Our island has been moving very well on vaccinating people. Most of the hospital staff should be done by the end of the month including community health care providers, like physicians, dentists, and their staffs. Most of the residents  of nursing homes will have also received their first shots, along with workers at those facilities.  According to our Lieutenant Governor, who is a physician and is in charge of organizing the pandemic response, the vaccine will be available to people in our group by March and to the general public by May.  Of course it will take longer to inoculate everyone who wants it, probably until late summer or fall. But since we're in the geezer group, Karen and I could have both shots completed by the end of March.  We’ll see, but it seems that our state, unlike a number of others, has handled this whole thing very well.  We just received 83 k doses of the Moderna Vaccine and so we have a good start on the number needed to complete the program.  Success will depend on how quickly mainland companies can manufacture and distribute the vaccines.

Speaking of injections, today I will see my retina doctor, and maybe have another eyeball jab.  If so, it will have been 3 months since the last one, which is very, very, positive.  It will all depend on the scans and the rest of the exam to see if there is any fluid building up again.  My acuity in that eye seems to be stable, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t starting to slip. The real test is the laser scan that shows what’s going on below the retina surface.  Anyway, I’m more that happy to get the injection if there is even the slightest sign of trouble.  I’ll let you know.

We skipped our weekly workout last week because of the discombobulation of the holidays, but we went to Planet Fitness on Thursday and had a good session.  Very few people in the gym and everyone was masked and wiping down the equipment before and after using it.  The cost of skipping a week is clear today in terms of muscle complaints.  But I regard that as a good kind of discomfort.  

Our Christmas decorations will come down today and tomorrow.  Now all I have to do is store them again somewhere........

Take care, everyone.  Keep clawing your way toward that light at the end of the tunnel.  IT IS REAL.

A Dragon’s Fury, A Haircut, A Teeth Cleaning

 [Note: this is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.] 

1/2/21 

Happy New Year!

Well, I’m not so much hopeful or happy about 2021 as I am relieved to have 2020 behind me. Our last week of the year was spent mostly in activities that used to be routine but these days are anything but.  Early in the week Karen and I both had our teeth cleaned!  Wow.  And I had a haircut! Wow again. And finally, on New Year’s Eve we had lunch with some friends from Ohio who are here for their yearly stay with their daughter, a teacher at Hawai’i Preparatory Academy, in Waimea.  It was a pleasant chit-chat at an open-air beach on the grounds of Mauna Lani Resort up north on the coast, but of course required a lot of precautions that made it definitely not a routine thing.

    
I know this is all just too exciting to bear, but it gets even more intense – at about 9 pm (the beginning of when we’re allowed to set off fireworks) I celebrated with my firework – yes, just one – at the top of  our driveway.  This was something called Dragon’s Fury, which might have been a teense of an oversell. It lasted a total of a little over 3 minutes, producing some nice noise and bright lights and then just kind of ended – like the year 2020 itself. We had a glass of proseco and were asleep by 11:30.  

Karen played golf this week, too.  A highlight for her was that she saw a number of young Nene, our

endangered state bird that looks kind of like a Canadian Goose.  This really is special because there are only about 2500 and it is encouraging to see them having that many chicks. They were nearly wiped out not too long ago, down to just 50 birds.  Captive breeding and release programs have been successfully reversing that trend and they’re now increasing on their own – with protections against hunting or harassing them.

Maybe all this new life and recovery is the perfect antidote to 2020's death, destruction, and mayhem.

Off to the beach, and maybe a delayed workout at Planet Fitness.  Take care, stay warm (!) and keep yourself and others healthy.

Ever See a Baby Nene?

A what?  

The Nene is the Hawai'i state bird.  It looks a lot like a Canadian Goose, but in fact is a bird found only in Hawai'i.  Descended from some geese that arrived here about 500k years ago, Nene have decidedly different genetic makeup from their mainland relatives, and now have evolved unique physical and behavioral traits.  They spend almost no time in the water, have much less webbing on their feet, they are slightly smaller and have unique striations on their necks, and they tend to have fewer offspring. Also, they don't migrate long distances, though they do fly and do move seasonally from one area to another at higher or lower elevations, probably in response to food availability (escaping from freezing temperatures and blizzards isn't necessary).

Canadian Goose

Hawaiian Goose

Nene evolved without fear of the usual predators that Canadian geese have to deal with -- foxes, bears, raccoons, bobcats, etc. because until humans arrived there were only two mammals in the islands, the monk seal and a unique species of bat.  Neither of these was interested in tasting a goose. Their only threat came from two endemic birds of prey -- the Hawaiian Hawk ('Io) and the Hawaiian Owl (Pueo).  When humans arrived about 1000 years ago and brought with them other non-human mammalian predators (dogs, pigs, cats, mongoose, rats), Nene were nearly wiped out.  In the 1950's only about 50 survived, down from as many as 25k.  Vigorous captive breeding and reintroduction efforts have now raised that back to about 2500 birds.  They also seem to be breeding well these days, thanks in part to humans creating some attractive habitat, especially golf courses.

At the course where Karen often plays they love the open fairways bordered by trees, grass, and shrubs, and about this time each year mating pairs show up to nest and raise their goslings. Several weeks ago she counted at least 10 nesting pairs, and now the little offspring have started to venture out to forage with their parents.  On her recent outings she has seen at least 10 babies and has gotten photos of several family groups out and about. Enjoy them -- few people get to witness these rare and magnificent birds.

Babies are between parents' legs

Same family.

Easier to see all three. Two are resting.

Another family of three.

Good view of the three babies.

One more family. Dad is on guard duty.

A Present From Pele, More Vaccine, Cutting Phone Cord Report

 [Note: this is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.] 

12/26/20

Merry Christmas Everybody!

Ours was very quiet this year.  On Christmas Eve we went to Planet Fitness, had an Ultimate Burger picnic afterwards, and did some last minute grocery shopping at our new mega-Safeway store.  The mainland visitors have suddenly arrived in numbers we haven’t seen in nearly a year. This is great for our economy, but has come at a cost of choked traffic, stripped store shelves, and many high-energy lost and bewildered folks everywhere.  Hmmmmmm.
                                            
On Christmas day we had a peaceful day around the house, and then had a distanced dinner at our neighbor’s house.  Just the four of us, their dog Zoe and parrots Chico and Sweat Pea. Very nice traditional fare of turkey for the main dish.  

Of course the big excitement here is the waking up last Sunday of our Kilauea volcano after a two-year snooze.  Close-up photos provided by the volcanologists are spectacular, with fountains of lava and big streams of it flowing down into a growing lava lake.  Photos that show the real scale are much less impressive. All of this is taking place at the very summit, in the 1500-foot deep crater within the summit caldera.  The lake is now about 600 feet deep, fed by two fissures on the sides of the crater. This may keep going for a while, but the built-up supply of magma isn’t as great as it was before 2018's big eruption, so it might also be a short event.  The most negative impact for us is the sudden return of Vog that spoils the view of our coastline.  It also complicates treatment of Covid 19 patients who have respitory issues – the prediction is that it could lead to many more severe cases, We’ll see.

More vaccine arrived on island this week – a shipment of the new Moderna vaccine.  Since this can be stored more easily, it is being held while the Pfitzer is used up first.  Many front line health workers here have received their 1st shot, and now other essential workers can get it. Both vaccines have common reactions that are short-lived, with the Moderna being even more likely to produce them.  However, the Moderna is apparently also slightly more effective in preventing severe cases and more effective in geezers. I’ll take whichever is offered as soon as it is available to me. Good luck to those of you on the mainland, but I’m pleased that so far this, just like our mail-in voting procedure, is going very well. The anti-vaxers are unfortunately revving up their misinformation campaign, but I’m hoping most people will ignore it. I’ve looked into every claim they have made and I am confident it is all bunk.

After a period of frustration and disappointment with my new phone arrangement, I’ve now gotten the problems worked out. Although the call quality of the new phone is very good, the link to the cordless house phones was very poor at first. This turned out to be solved by just re-linking the cell phone to the base unit for the cordless phones.  The call quality through the cordless phones is now good – not as clear as the old land line, but very acceptable.  The other problem I had at first was that the cordless handset downstairs where Karen spends a lot of time didn’t have a very good connection to the upstairs base unit.  This was solved by just moving the base unit to a better location where the signal didn’t have to go through as many walls. Now the connection is very good.  All in all I’m satisfied and pleased to be saving $200 per year.

Ok, off to the beach for our usual picnic.  Not as clear as last week, but still very nice.

Merry Christmas, and next we will say goodbye and good riddance to 2020.

Ho, Ho, Ho! -- Let's Watch the Volcano Blow!

Let's see.  How can 2020 get even worse, you know, just to end on the lowest note possible? Oh, I have it.  Let's have Hawaii''s most active volcano blow!

And that's what happened a few days ago on Sunday, 12/20/20, about 9:30 am HST.  Kilauea has been quiet for about two years, after putting on a spectacular but devastating show for several months in 2018. It finally exhausted the available magma supply and just shut off. Period. Nothing. The best part for us, living as we do nearly 100 miles away, was the sudden clearing of the "vog" (volcanic fog) from our skies.  For nearly two years now we've enjoyed clear air, beautiful views of the coastline and of the ocean horizon, just long enough for memory-challenged humans to think this was "normal."

Actually, Kilauea has been erupting more or less continuously (in geologic terms) for thousands of years and it will continue to do so for thousands more. That is normal, as is the presence of varying amounts of vog throughout the time humans have been in the islands, about 1000 years.

Very soon after the last eruption stopped, volcanologists began recording seismic activity indicating magma moving up to refill the reservoirs under Kilauea. In November this increased dramatically and at a more shallow depth.  Other measurements, like the swelling of the summit ground, were consistent with an imminent eruption, which indeed has happened.  In other words, scientists weren't surprised, though one of the usual indicators was missing -- an uptick in the emission of volcanic gases as the magma got higher and under less pressure. 

If you've seen the photos and videos of the activity, it is very impressive.  Don't book a flight, though, because visitors can't really get that close. To be clear, the eruption is taking place only at the very summit, inside the crater within the summit caldera, called Halema'uma'u. This was a rather small crater until 2018 but when the eruption stopped, it collapsed when all the lava drained away. expanding and deepening dramatically. For about a 1/ 1/2 years ground water oozed into the bottom, forming a lake that was about 100 ft. deep.   Not now.  Lava draining into the bottom of

the crater quickly turned it all into steam in a very dramatic plume of steam, ash, and volcanic gas.  The gas is mostly SO2, which combines with moisture in the air to form vog -- which is essentially airborne sulfuric acid.

So for a while we get to breathe not only Covid19 virus particles but also traces of sulfuric acid.  Wait -- I think our stable genius president might just recommend this as a way of getting rid of the virus.  Seems logical, right, that even a virus can't stand up to acid in your lungs.  Be patriotic, breathe deep! How bad can sulfuric acid be for your lungs?

No estimate on how long this will last is yet available, but I'll be optimistic and say that since the available magma isn't all that great,  it might be pretty short-lived. Of course, this could be in geologic time, not human time. And I could be just blowin' my own smoke here.

In the meantime, a greater immediate threat to us is the volcano we actually live on, Hualalai.  It is active and past due for an eruption and is being closely monitored. Oh damn, I shouldn't have said anything -- I just thought of a way 2020 could get way worse!!

Phone Switcheroo, Vaccine Arrives

[Note: this is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.]

12/19/20

Aloha Everybody!

I’d complain about our cold weather, the frigid 65d we hit as our low the other night, how we’ve had to cope with our pool dropping to 79d, and the weather preventing us from having dinner outside by our pool, but that would be cruel, so I certainly won’t...

Ok, after much too much effort and wasted time, I finally made contact with two customer service reps who actually knew what the h*** they were doing, one at Hawaiian Telcom and the other at my new wireless phone service.  The problem was something called an account porting out passcode, which is needed for a new service to get the old service to release your phone number so it can be transferred.  As it turns out in the case of antique land lines, many local phone companies, including Hawaiian Telcom, don’t have them.  Unless you have an experienced and knowledgeable person at the new service company who knows this, you’re kind of stuck in limbo. The solution, it turns out, is simple – provide any number at all as the code and the land line company will accept it and release the phone number!  Once I initiated this process it took only 36 hours for it to happen.

So on Wednesday I slip-slided into to 21st century and if you call our old number it will go through as a wireless call to the new cheapo phone I bought.  This part seems to work pretty good so far.  There are still some wrinkles to work out with linking the house phones to the cell phone but I’m making progress.  At first I had some difficulty with Karen hearing me when I called from a location in town. Another issue is that if someone leaves a phone message it only appears on the cell phone, not the house phone base unit.  This is kind of a pain, but I haven’t tried all the options yet. A third issue is that the house phone in one room downstairs where Karen spends a lot of time has difficulty linking to the base unit, which is upstairs.  I’m experimenting with different locations for both to see if that will improve it.  Otherwise the other phones seem to connect just fine.  I’ll let you know how this goes.  Of course, most “modern” people just keep their cell phones with them at all times, so they don’t know what the issue is.

This week the state of Hawai’i received the first batches of the Pfizer vaccine and within hours it was distributed to the other islands.  Ours arrived and was immediately distributed to our hospitals and health care workers began receiving injections.  All this went very smoothly, a result of State and County planning, and even going through a practice run last week. As everywhere else, the first doses will go to health care workers and then nursing home residents, essential workers, and geezers with pre-existing conditions that would make their getting Covid highly risky.  It isn’t clear yet how this will be determined, but I think doctors will be advised of vaccine doses and can certify eligible patients to be vaccinated.  Depending on how much vaccine is manufactured and distributed, most of us on Hawai’i island could get it by late spring next year.  

Btw, I just read a very good article (https://www.wired.com/story/vaccines-are-here-we-have-to-talk-about-side-effects/) that urges an info campaign about the very likely but short-lived side effects of both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines so that people don’t freak out when they get them (fatigue 59.4 %, headaches 51.7%, muscle 37.3 %, joint pain 21.9 % chills 35.1 %, fever 15.8 %). These might sound bad, but they pass in a few days, and the alternative could be much, much worse. Some of our travel vaccines have also laid us low so we are kind of used to this. Also, here's a summary of how the Moderna and Pfitzer vaccines compare in effectiveness at various age groups and pre-existing conditions.

Ok, off to market and beach picnic. Hang in there. Stay warm.