485 old ideas, meet new ideas

Still thinking about what longer project to tackle next in this space. My brother sent some suggestions, and while fun, unfortunately someone else's fun idea isn't enough to motivate me to write, unless it's for money, or we're collaborating.

He had two fine ideas, one a sort of Paul Auster piece about a crew stranded on a ship in a harbor, abandoned by the owners. There's apparently such a ship in the harbor where he is right now (Santa Marta, Colombia). I remember reading about another similar situation, where one guy was the last crew member on a ship abandoned near the Suez canal. He wasn't being paid, and had no money. Every few days, he would swim to shore for supplies. 

Eventually, his story circulated enough that he got money to get out of there. Anyway, interesting scenario, but not what I want to write right now.

The other idea was some sort of Idiocracy thing, I need to go back and look. It was funny, but again, my brother might be in a better spot to spin it out, I've already had my laugh.

Eh, I went looking and I can't find his message. You'll just have to wait for my brother's version.

There are some ideas brewing, but for now, screencrapalooza...

So far, every wave of Covid has gone through Europe first. Right now, BA2 is something like 15% of cases in the US, and 50% in the UK. Hospitalizations are going up there, but not ICU admittance, and there's the "with" versus "for" question again.

Then there's "Deltacron" which combines the body of Delta with the spikes of Omicron.

And then there's long covid, which is increasingly being tied to lots and lots of mini blood clots. Yikes.

Why do we feel differently about Russia invading Ukraine than when they invaded Chechnya or Georgia?

In the US, we are remarkably focused on Western Europe. We call the time period between the fall of Rome around 500CE and the 1400CE Renaissance the "Dark Ages" despite the fact that the Eastern Roman Empire kept steaming along for a millennium, and Muslim scholars were doing an excellent job of spreading new math around the Mediterranean.

In hindsight, that new math is probably part of what allowed that relatively new religion to take off. Better math is better business.

It's either this built-in discrimination toward the unfamiliar, or an agenda on the part of our oligarch-owned mass media (disclaimer, even Blogger is owned by Sergey and Larry).

The headline was a long tease. The scientist actually thinks we're better off using our resources here on Earth.

But, if some of us do make it to space, we'll probably do it with some personal-modifications that might not be acceptable on Earth.

In the meantime...

What are we doing here?

We have an opportunity to thrive.

Maybe in one of these?

This is a converted grain silo. I'm not sure there's actually room to lie down, though.

It looks pretty neat, though. Might be a nice studio space.

It was made by a student. Aka, the future.

Some fun charts.

This one of popular searches from two years ago really shows our collective thinking at the start of the pandemic.

And finally...

We found Earnest Shackleton's boat. Crazy what an underwater drone and a hundred years of freezing cold, 9000 feet deep water will do.