You can't make this stuff up - Part 2

(c) Mike Luckovich

Today was initially scheduled to mark the end lockdown.  We're going another two weeks, until end of April. Then what?

Global confirmed cases of Covid-19 infection beyond two million, 640,000 plus in US alone. The US economy is in shambles, the global economy is following suit.
But fear not. The poster children for nepotism are on the case as Trump appoints Javanka to Council to Reopen America.

After several hours of giddy optimism about demonstrably good South African leadership on the pandemic (read yesterday’s post), I made the mistake of continuing to track news from around the world.
Congo’s news sobered me up.
Another Ebola outbreak in the eastern city of Beni as cases of Covid-19 erupt around the country. With more than 2,000 deaths from Ebola in the past 18 months, hand washing and social distancing is entrenched among Congolese. As they do their rounds, community health workers educate about coronavirus by word of mouth but fears mount.

Five-plus million Congolese and millions more people around the world depend on support from World Health Organization.  The same WHO that Prez Trump/US is threatening to defund to the tune of US$237 million in assessed fees, plus US$656 million in voluntary contributions. Voluntary contributions are “earmarked for programs including polio eradication, health and nutrition services, vaccine-preventable diseases, tuberculosis, HIV — and preventing and controlling outbreaks.”

WHO works around the world, including South Africa. (What WHO does.) Makes more sense to me to trim US military budget - Fiscal Year 2019, approximately $693 billion (US$693,058,000,000 or ZAR12,952,333,401,010,91) – and concentrate on life and health instead of oppression and death. But then, I’m anti-war not pro-business and that makes all the difference.

Moreover, the great irony is Trump defunding the WHO is largly designed to deflect scrutiny of his own administration's slow response to the outbreak. That's Trump the Businessman for ya!

Other women, actual leaders with, y'know, actual qualifications and stuff, are doing a disproportionately great job at handling the pandemic. So why aren't there more of them?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Earlier this week, I mentioned an autumn chill in the air. That’s borne out by two photos of … snow dusting the Drakensburg.

Drakensberg from Rosetta (click to enlarge)

Drakensberg from Kamberg (click to enlarge)

California is warming up. Yesterday’s temperature along San Joaquin River, in Sacramento Delta, where I dock my houseboat, was 80 degrees Fahrenheit (26.6 C). Cliff swallows likely are arriving from South America to rest and nest (one couple nests above my boat’s pontoons). Hummingbirds are wondering where I am and why I’m not filling their damned feeders.
I miss it.

Read Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3

Question of the Day: Whither Democracy?

 No truly “fair and balanced” person can watch the president of the United States and not worry.
Check out this April 14 press briefing  and this one, “Presidential authority is total” ...
Methinks the prez doth protest too much. He’s losing whatever marbles he had, he’s on the ropes (talking of ropes, Florida deems wrestling “essential business.”)
Be afraid. Be very afraid. The Trump/Moscow Mitch duo hath cometh – and hath bamboozled.
It’s a formidable opponent for generous-spirited people everywhere.

Jailbirds flying the coop?

Paul Manafort, set for release from Rikers prison in November 2024, seeks early release citing risk from coronavirus. 

• Ditto, Bernie Madoff, 81-year-old financial fraud schemester par excellence.
• Ditto, Michael Avenatti, convicted extortionist, busily working himself out of jail for 90 days. The Trump nemesis faces two more criminal trials.
• If I was a betting woman, I’d bet Harvey Weinstein is leveraging the coronavirus pandemic, too. And Bill Cosby. Cushy mansion/house arrest, instead?
• No ruling has been issued on a similar motion from twenty-eight-year-old Reality Winner, former intelligence analyst. Given the politics, I’d bet Winner, “leaker”/ whistleblower of a top-secret report on Russian election interference, is refused. She’s sentenced to prison for more than five years…and I’d bet she serves ‘em all.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

I’ve alluded to KZN’s astonishingly fertile soil, that I can pluck a stem and push it into the earth and, pronto, it sprouts. Last year’s veggie garden presented both the up- and downside of fertility.
Upside: already rich soil, amended with rich compost, and potatoes, onions, and squash volunteer with gusto. Initially, starter plants - tomatoes, spinach (chard in California), strawberries, thyme, oregano, basil, and Thai basil - appear willing to flourish.
Downside:

The enthusiasm of beans, peas, and lettuce is quickly dampened by uMswenya. Cutworms.
California’s dry summers, wet winters, and clayey soil present few opportunities to understand cutworms. Sow bugs, yes: similar color and shape and, like cutworms, they roll/curl.
KZN’s wet, hot, humid summers present perfect umswenya conditions. Add beans, peas, dill, lettuce, rhubarb… and the gross, juicy pests thrive just below soil surface.
They demolish emerging sprouts and stems leaving only tiny scattered flecks of green.
I engineered seedling collars out of discarded toilet roll tubes cut in half. Unfortunately, collaring constrains plants and they grow spindly.
 My revenge? Popping unswenya.
This year, only volunteer squash survived cutworms. Instead, they fell victim to marauding monkeys. Takeaways? 1) How do farmers cope? 2) Do creatures like umswenya and monkeys account for Africa’s incredibly rich, fecund soils not developing as the world’s breadbasket?

***

I’m the only South African I know who sleeps (or admits to sleeping) under a mosquito net. Divebombing and sucking mosquitos are annoying but manageable. I dab smelly, homemade cannabis oil on the bites. (Lockdown means not worrying about wafting cannabis aroma.)
Alas, the manufacturer and dispenser who supplied me last year has moved on. I’m not sure how to replenish my supply but I’m using what remains, mostly on spider bites.
Despite consistently checking for spiders inside gum boots, shoes, waders, and outside gear, spiders express their displeasure at my presence. This year, they’ve dined on my right calf, left foot, sternum, and left wrist. The latest assault left a large red splotch with two tiny, raised bite marks on my right front hip.
If I don’t scratch, the angry red bumps disappear after eight to ten days of generous dabbing.
The odd thing? Unlike mosquitos, I’ve never actually caught a spider in the act, nor even found one on my person. 
Why blame spiders? Couldn’t aliens from another planet be conducting experiments?
Well, I encounter spiders and evidence of spiders: on plants, on walls, and webs slung between plants and anywhere I walk.
When I encounter aliens, it’ll be time for me to burst out of lockdown, damn the consequences.

A positive note: finally snagged a shot of a dragonfly near the pond. (Still no sign of goldfish.)





Read Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3