Why is it…

that the only people trying to steal the election are campaigning under the banner “Stop the steal”? Is it just me, or is that the ultimate in irony?

I did it. The first injection of the novel coronavirus vaccine from Pfizer went into my arm Saturday afternoon. My arm did not freeze and fall off. With a substance stored at -70 degrees C (-94 F) I was hoping they’d warm it up a bit. They did. Nothing like frostbite from the inside out. While there are supposed to be only mild side effects (like the pain at injection site you get with the flu vaccine), my employer isn’t taking any chances – I was required to get the vaccine at the end of my Saturday shift so, if I get sick, I’ll be sick on my own time and won’t miss work unless it lasts 3 days. Kinesiotape at the injection site works for the flu vaccine. We’ll see how it works for this.

Twenty four hours after injection I have an achy arm, a lot like after a flu shot. I have a vague sense of dis-ease – slight disequilibrium, subtle visual changes, very mild nausea, and a slight headache – nothing that would have kept me from working if today were a workday. In three weeks I’ll let you know how the second injection goes.

We received our new shipment of PAPRs (Powered Air-Purifying Respirators) so I can dispense with the N-95 mask and patients can see my face for the first time this year (except for a week or two in February when I worked maskless). I still need a mask for the non-COVID patients and when I am doing anything else at work, but that is just a simple mask, not an N-95. They can hear me better, too. (Photo: What the well-dressed therapist is wearing these days. Isolation gown not shown.)

I’m thinking a PAPR could come in handy for the Death Ride. Nothing like extra air delivered under pressure for the thin air at higher elevations while climbing mountains. Not to mention that I don’t expect to be ready to share air at close quarters with a couple thousand other people in July.

We added a new member to the family this week. He was a street dog from Oklahoma and came to us via a rescue organization and a foster home. He seems to like it here so far. He got a little close for this selfie but, lacking thumbs, he did pretty well I think. Especially since he was drifting off to sleep. When our daughter moves out, he goes too, so I can’t get too attached. Maybe he’ll come for sleepovers. (Then again, I got pretty attached to the kids but it was OK for them to move out on their own.)

We had our first real snow and the lake is starting to freeze. Time for the studded tires. For now, I try to avoid the icy spots and ride slowly when there is no choice.

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Rumor has it people have started skating on the shallow bay – the first place to freeze and attract ice fishers, who are on the ice before any sane creature.

A couple of days after that last paragraph, it warmed up; and the newspaper included a story about the number of ice rescues performed that day. None were from that bay, but skating will wait, as it has been above freezing for >24 hours.

In our culture, this season is often associated with conspicuous consumption – the TV ads encouraging us to surprise each other with new cars, telling us the only way you can show your love is via diamonds, helping us convince ourselves that joy comes from stuff. Delbert McClinton and friends tell us otherwise:

Check the sky tonight – Jupiter and Saturn will appear very close together, and just in time for the solstice. They will appear in the southwest sky shortly after sunset as long as, in your home on the range, the skies are not cloudy all day.

Photo by Jim Peacock, Bayfield WI, 12/14/2020. From EarthSky.org

Pandemic Tree

Every year for the past 20+ (except when they were out of town), my daughter and I have cut a Christmas tree together. We always do it on a Sunday morning. Our son was part of the tradition, but now just borrows the van to bring his own tree home.

Today was, ostensibly, no different. We had read that demand was unusually high this year, but were not prepared for the crowd, nor were we prepared for the fact that only Scotch Pines remained to be cut. All of the firs were gone already. And we were earlier than usual, as my wife insisted on waiting until after Hanukkah when the kids were little (unless the calendar made that impossible). The worker who greeted us told us that many people got their trees before Thanksgiving this year. When I said, “so they’ll be dead before Christmas”, she smiled, shrugged, and nodded. Warm weather and no snow also made it different.

There are those who claim environmental superiority for artificial trees, as though we were causing deforestation by cutting a tree. The place we go is a tree farm. They grow crops like any other farm in the area – just no corn or soybeans. They provide seasonal jobs for local students and longer term jobs for farm hands during the growing season. The trees absorb CO₂ from the air and exude O₂, just like trees in a forest. Cutting the trees gets people out of their houses and walking outside. I don’t feel bad about cutting down these trees.

The usual year involves a lot of wandering about, discussing the virtues of Canaan, Balsam, and Frasier firs; checking out the Blue Spruce and maybe a glance at the pines, Scotch and White. We pick out some trees and make note of where they are so we can come back to them to make our final choice. None of that this year. We cut the second tree we looked at, though we did take a quick gander at the woefully small remaining firs.

We cut the tree, took it home, and got it up and decorated. That’s all to make one small bicycling-related point. The ornament shown is from Markleeville, California, home of the Death Ride and home of the blog California Alps Cycling. Dang! Isn’t his name Mark? Maybe the town is named for him and I never realized it, even though he moved there only recently. Or maybe that’s why he moved there. Maybe we can get him to address that in a future post. Anyway, I bought the ornament while in town for the Death Ride about 30 years ago.

Paying for the tree was a new experience. Usually we go into a barn that has been turned into a small store. We browse their collection of ornaments and pick up some cashew brittle to eat on the way home – I mean to bring home to the family. Try the chocolate-covered. This year we paid at a window outside. Nearby, Santa Claus sat behind a snow fence. Kids could say hi to him from 6 feet away – no sitting on Santa’s lap this year. I’m hoping Santa will bring me a new president with a peaceful transition of power.