The Darkness Within This is no time for negativism. This is the time for us all to stay positive and optimistic that life will go on, that our species will persevere, and that the kindness of the human soul will prevail. When we saw Saudi Arabia rear up on its hind legs to push the oil production limits up at great expense to the price of their black crude, we were secretly encouraged. We all…
Insuring Insurance A month ago I wrote a story about self-insuring, aimed mostly at the business of buying insurance on travel and discretionary purchases or “toys”. I have a very different topic to consider today and it’s based, as always, on something I’ve recently read about the state of the insurance industry during the Coronavirus crisis. The Wall Street Journal reports that there is increasing pressure on insurers to broaden their policy protection to not…
The New Gold Rush $2,000,000,000,000. That’s a lot of stimulus and thank God for Chuck Schumer or $500,000,000,000 of it would be the private piggy bank of one of the worst businessmen of all time and would undoubtedly go to all the wrong places. As it is, The Democratic senators managed to put in a provision forbidding that any of this loan money for corporations can go to companies owned by Federal employees. Any idea…
The Comeback There is a great deal of discussion these days about the wreckage of the economy in progress with the Lockdowns expanding by the day. The only thing that shows any variance is how long it takes for given state governments to realize that they have no choice but to declare stay-at-home mandates. It’s almost silly how fervently those more concerned about the economy think they can will their way out of a problem…
Corona Horns Many animals have horns and when we are confronted by the horns of a dilemma, it feels like horns are there on animals’ heads to protect them from predators. This is sometimes the case, but many times not so much. Zoologists suggest that horns exist in nature for protection in some species, but they most often exist to establish male dominance and to jockey within the species for territory and mating rights. Survival…
Pausing to Pause This morning I am reading reports that only half of Americans are taking the COVID-19 forced sequestration seriously. This more or less agrees with my anecdotal observations out here in San Diego. I’m betting that three quarters again of those non-conforming people are doing so out of the extreme need to maintain their lives that are more or less hand-to-mouth and unable to afford a pause to their daily routine of modern-day…
A Reason to Believe that Every Picture Tells a Story I’m sitting in my dining room for a change of pace and because Handy Brad is painting a wall in the study where Kim’s bookshelves will go when Amazon delivers them. This WFH program requires versatility and my mid-back tweak requires me to sit upright while I write. The workman’s compensation board assigned to my WFH program tells me that care for my lower and…
Social Distancing Damn, the lingo dictionary is expanding almost as exponentially fast as the Coronavirus is expanding. In one segment on MSNBC alone I heard them use the terms Social Distancing, Hand Hygiene and Respiratory Etiquette. Hand washing is well understood, though I recently saw a Facebook video explaining how to wash your hands properly and diligently and find that I’ve been doing it wrong all these years. That might explain a lot. As for…
Calling Bullshit Today it has been announced that SXSW, the South By Southwest music/film/media festival in Austin, that has been held annually without interruption for thirty three years has been cancelled this year due to the Coronavirus.. Today, the Italian government has indicated that it is locking down Lombardy and a few other surrounding provincial areas to contain the virus at the potential cost of massively hobbling the Italian economy, where Milan and Lombardy are…
Traveling to Freedom On Sunday I am taking my first trip since moving to San Diego. I’m flying to New York, where I will work and see my kids, and then I am flying to London for other work and will transit back through New York to be home after what is, in total about eight days. Big deal. I’ve done similar trips about a thousand times (literally 1,000 times over my adult life/career). I…