Merry Christmas!

Photo taken by my cousin at the Cleveland Botanical Garden Glasshouse.

I'm back from a wonderful Christmas in Cleveland, where my cousins and I watched movies, went to the botanical gardens and had lunch a restaurant in Little Italy. The botanical gardens had wreaths, gingerbread houses, table settings and Christmas trees created by dozens of different garden societies and individuals vying for first place. The glass house was full of butterflies and tropical plants--some of them arranged to look like Christmas trees, like the one in the picture. Outside, white statice was still in bloom and I could even smell some of the herbs. I saw roses (dormant) that I hadn't seen since I moved away from Denver: alba semi-plena, Marchesa Bocella and Salet. Hmm...maybe these could do well in Indianapolis.

Oddly, most people were wearing masks outside in the gardens even though COVID has little to no spread outdoors, and cloth masks don't stop aerosol particles. At the two Wendy's restaurants in Columbus where I had lunch, one was take-out only and the other had no dine-in customers except for me. An employee said that was normal. But the Italian restaurant in Cleveland was hopping in the middle of the afternoon. Half the employees wore masks; our waitress wore red lipstick. It was the warmest, coziest, most lively place I've been in two years.

We wore masks where required. But I'll be darned if I'm going to quarantine for 10 days or wait in line for two hours for a test when I don't have COVID symptoms. My dog sitter caught COVID right before I left, but she still came over and fed Biggs. Since surface transmission hasn't been a significant vector for COVID, I'm not worried about the little time she spent at my house. If I get COVID, it's far more likely to have come from the restaurant.

The local news showed several events being canceled in Ohio; not so in Indiana. One, we're pretty much done with the hysteria here, and two, we had a late summer wave that didn't happen in Cleveland and COVID is quickly running out of Hoosiers to infect. COVID hospital admissions here are tanking and officials have identified only one case of Omicron. Hopefully, we're starting to see the end of serious COVID.

Comments

Lowcarb team member said…

So pleased you had a good time with your cousins.
That 'Christmas Tree' looks great.

Wishing you a happy 2022.

All the best Jan

December 29, 2021

Lori Miller said…

Thanks, Jan. Hope you and Eddie had a merry Christmas, too.

December 29, 2021

COVID Test Result is In

I don't have COVID. On the one hand, it would have been a relief to have finally caught COVID and gotten natural antibodies, especially from having a mild case of it. On the other hand, I was concerned about my dog catching it from me (he's healthy, but nine years old) and it might have interfered with Thanksgiving plans. Until I'm well, I'll stay home.

HHS Doctor on Hidden Camera: "The Vaccine is Full of Sh!t"

Jodi O'Malley, a registered nurse at the Phoenix Indian Medical Center (part of the Department of Health and Human Services), teamed up with Project Veritas to expose severe COVID vaccine reactions occurring but not being reported to VAERS, the vaccine adverse event reporting system, even though medical professionals are legally required to report such injuries. During the filming, a man in his thirties with congestive heart failure was being treated; the doctor believed the cause was his COVID vaccination. O'Malley says she's seen dozens of adverse reactions. "The vaccine is full of shit" and the government wants to "sweep it under the mat," the doctor says on hidden camera. We finally know what's in the vaccine. Screen grab from Project Veritas video . The video also shows a pharmacist stating that off-label medications such as ivermectin were forbidden to be prescribed on pain of termination. Project Veritas is a nonprofit organization that does ...

Gym Influencer Doubles Down and Should Have Regretted It

Jennifer Picone isn't the most abusive gym influencer--far from it--but she may be the most annoying. In a video she posted that went viral, she was working out in a gym when another member appeared in the background by the free weights. The member was minding her own business, not looking in Picone's direction, when Picone got up and told her to move. After filming, Picone edited the video with a note about "Gym etiquette lesson #47" and accused the other gym member of "[doing] that 💩 on purpose." Shaming other gym members has gotten to be such a big genre that Joey Swoll has a YouTube channel, with half a million subscribers, dedicated to calling out these content creators. Just for Picone, he took a break from his vacation to tell her to mind her own business. This may be the first time that Joey Swoll has taken one of his followers to task. The fact that she follows him and still doesn't know better than to treat the gym like her personal studio sh...

Stay in your car!

If there's ever a lunatic outside your vehicle, do not engage. Stay in your vehicle. Drive away or call the police. Drive over the curb, lawn or median if necessary; just avoid putting innocent bystanders at risk.* Save yourself from lunatics like a boss. Screen grab from video by Fredrik Sørlie on Youtube . That advice might have saved a 69-year-old delivery driver from being attacked by former NFL player Mark Sanchez, who for unknown reasons was in an alley after midnight in downtown Indianapolis and decided to pick a fight over a parking space. I say might have because I haven't seen any video of the attack. But other incidents over the years bear out the safety of staying in your car. A neighbor was assaulted and robbed after she got out of her car after someone followed her home and blocked her driveway. And remember Reginald Denny from the LA riots? The victim maced and stabbed Sanchez, but suffered a bad cut to his face and tongue and looks like he was badly beaten. Bo...

The Under-the-Radar Ointment for Hard-to-Heal Wounds

Imagine looking in the mirror one morning and finding the side of your head black and your ear twice its normal size. That's what happened to Brad Burnam, who caught a deadly superbug at the hospital where he worked. Sometime after having emergency surgery--one of 21 surgeries over the next five years--he set out to cure himself. The result he created was a fusion of PHMB, an antibiotic common in Europe but little known in the US, in a petroleum jelly base (like Vaseline), held together with a stabilizer/emulsifier. It sticks to wounds, keeps them moist, and provides a barrier. It cured his antibiotic resistant superbug. After getting FDA clearance, he formed Turn Therapeutics, and Hexagen is now available by prescription. Screen shot from https://turntherapeutics.com/about/ Millions of Americans suffer from open wounds--chronic issues like diabetic foot ulcers. Readers probably have their blood sugar under control and avoid this condition, but might have parents, partners o...

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Search This Blog