Thursday 14 May 2020

Random Ramblings - Parts XXI - XXV

Random Ramblings from the great lock down of 2020 Part XXI – Growing Up

The Ramblings turns 21 with this post and so it’s time to be a bit more adult about things.

Don’t worry, this won’t last long.

(Okay – that turned out to be wrong. This is about the longest ramble yet. But I wanted to get some things out there concerning this current situation that weren’t the equivalent of a prepared meme. And then it just kept going. Hopefully it achieves what I’d like it to – which is a place where you can go to quickly see a rationale analysis of things like “what is herd immunity?”, “what is the point of “flattening the curve”?” or “why is a vaccine taking so long”? I promise, once this is over it’s back to “great moments in sports broadcasting” and “snack foods I really wish were still around”.)

Nothing is more frustrating, I’m sure, than looking at something on the internet, whether it is on a social networking site, a video, some random tweet or a (supposedly) legitimate media outlet and seeing something that you know is either (1) wrong; (2) misleading; (3) uninformed; (4) inciteful; (5) just plain stupid or (6) some combination of all of the above.

Each of those sorts of infuriating characteristics has its own reason for being infuriating. For example, something that is inciteful (as opposed to “insightful”) is designed to provoke – so it doesn’t necessarily even have to be wrong – it could just be phrased in such a way that is designed to get a response out of people – like “anger”, at a time when “angry” might be the least productive thing to be. How about this excerpt from a recent news story:

He said: "It’s not only China, you take a look at Ireland. They make our drugs. Everybody makes our drugs except us."

He then repeated his promise to move US pharmaceutical manufacturing back to America.

"We’re bringing that whole supply chain back," he said.

(The “He” who said this is, of course, Donald Trump. When he says Ireland manufactures a lot of drugs – he’s not wrong, and when he says China is also in the drug manufacturing business, he’s also not wrong. But to mention those two countries in the same breath, while technically not “wrong” is inciteful. He’s just trying to rile people up - and not for any particular purpose. China wants to manufacture drugs in order to compete with the United States, Ireland manufactures drugs in order to help make the United States competitive. Here’s a description of the REAL reason U.S. companies establish themselves in Ireland:

“19 of the top 20 global pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical companies are based in Ireland for a good reason. By establishing their manufacturing here, this industry has great geographical proximity to the mainland European markets. Easy international shipping across the Atlantic is very beneficial for pharmaceutical exports to North America. Five of the world’s eight top-selling drugs are produced in Ireland, making it the world’s largest net exporter of pharmaceuticals and a globally recognised centre of excellence in pharma.”

So it’s not so that American companies can go somewhere and cheaply manufacture drugs to ship back home - it’s so U.S. companies can go somewhere to manufacture drugs which have proximity to OTHER markets, like continental Europe. If they did not have that foothold in a geographically advantageous spot there would be other countries that would then gain that advantage – and one guess as to which one would benefit the most.

Ding! You got it in one – China.

So, stating something like this just serves to incite – rile people up – without really informing them. Those sorts of things are bad. However, when it comes to getting under my skin nothing tops the “uninformed” opinion. Mind you – I have split “uninformed” off from the category of “wrong” because, while someone can be informed but draw an incorrect conclusion – at least they tried. An uninformed person just has no fucking clue what they are talking about, but they will happily tell you how certain they are of the correctness of their opinion and how the rest of the world are idiots – or- how the rest of the world is a member of some super-intelligent conspiracy.

Also – they must come from a place where everyone oversleeps because they seem to always be telling us all to “WAKE UP PEOPLE!”. Here is a video of uninformed people proving my point:


I don’t know how we will EVER fight off the great conspiracy of 5G, crypto-currency, radiation poisoned, new world order driven conspirators who are doing this all with a virus THAT HASN’T EVEN BEEN PROVEN TO EXIST! (Said through a mask).

Look – it’s not all one way either. Slate magazine, increasingly the purveyor of National Enquirer like stories such as “My Sex Resort of Choice Has A Racist Themed Night” have decided that they know the only way to recover from the lock down – which in an enormous coincidence happens to line up almost exactly with the economic agenda they have been trying to sell for years. Goodness, what are the chances?


No – a new New Deal isn’t the ONLY way to recover – but using the crisis as a way to insist upon advancing your own agenda is one sure way to get more people to buy in to those ideas because of the crisis, not because of the value of the idea itself.


There are, of course, attempts to combine elements of the above – for instance, you can be both uninformed AND inciteful. Here’s a dead give-away. If the content you are reading seems to follow the same path as an urban myth – it’s not to be trusted. For instance – when you see a post about how “I know someone whose mother-in-law’s friend had a husband who died of a heart attack, and the hospital insisted on listing it as a Covid related death in order to keep this FAKE pandemic going” you have essentially just been fed the equivalent of the following stories:

• The Vanishing Hitchhiker
• The Mexican Pet
• The Choking Doberman
• The Guinea Pig in the Microwave



The person or persons who are feeding you those stories are doing it because they are not taking the time to check whether what they are saying is true. There is a very simple reason for that – they could not care less about whether the story is true – they are trying to provoke and incite.

So how do we cut through the bullshit? The best way is to just deal rationally with what we actually know. Not what we think we know, what we wish we knew or what “someone’s mother-in-law’s best friend’s uncle” says they know. Let’s just take a deep breath and take stock.

1. THERE IS A PANDEMIC. IT IS CAUSED BY A VIRUS. WE KNOW WHAT THAT VIRUS IS. THIS PARTICULAR STRAIN IS NEW AND SO IS DIFFICULT TO DEAL WITH THROUGH THE EXISTING MEDICAL TOOLS AT OUR DISPOSAL.

This pandemic is not “made up” and it is not the result of 5G technology being beamed into our skulls. It comes from a viral disease designated Covid-19 (meaning it was found in 2019, not that it is the 19th Covid virus) and we know the family of viruses from which it springs. Unfortunately, this is a “novel” virus, which in this case does not mean it is a long piece of prose written by Stephen King (again) but is “novel” in the sense that it is “new”. This means that when treating or coming up with ways to treat the virus science and medicine are starting from further back in the field than they would like to.

2. THE DISEASE IS ONLY LIKE THE FLU IN CERTAIN WAYS. IT IS UNLIKE THE FLU IN TWO EXTREMELY IMPORTANT WAYS. FIRST – IT HAS A HIGHER TRANSMISSION RATE OF INFECTION. SECOND, IT HAS A LONGER INCUBATION RATE ONCE IT HAS BEEN TRANSMITTED. BOTH OF THOSE THINGS ARE NOT GOOD.

I debated whether to use numbers in this section but, in looking them up, I realised that they often varied from source to source. Not enough to undermine the basic statements above but enough to make it deviate from the basic premise of this article, which, you’ll remember, is to talk only about WHAT WE KNOW. We know that, like the flu, this comes from a virus – and in real terms that’s about as far as the comparison should go in terms of trying to understand things about what we’re facing. Oh, sure, you could get into how the virus attaches to a cell and replication rates – but that is like knowing the theory of relativity as opposed to Newton’s physics. Einstein’s is correct but for everyday life Newton’s is more useful. Let’s stick with the useful. So, both are viruses – important to know for some basic approaches – like antibiotics aren’t a primary way to fight the illness. Antibiotics are primarily for bacterial infections. So that’s about it for relevant comparisons to the flu.

Otherwise this virus is more infectious than the flu, meaning that it’s going to spread more rapidly. You know how those charts show how quickly one pair of breeding rabbits can quickly become thousands? This virus breeds like a rabbit, while the flu breeds like – well, like cats. Don’t get me wrong- there’s a hell of a lot of cats out there – but put ten cats in a field and ten rabbits in the field next to it – as long as the goddamn cats don’t kill the rabbits there’s gonna be a hell of a lot more rabbits when you come back in six months.

The second part of the above statement is even scarier.

When you catch the flu you typically get sick in a day or two. You then stay at home (or you should, cuz, dipshit, you’re sick) and remove yourself from the population for the time that you’ve got the bug, and then go back out when you are no longer transmitting the disease. Sure, for a half day or maybe a couple of days at most you’re infectious and out in public, but that’s a transmission rate that the medical system can absorb if someone gets really sick from catching the flu. (I’m not talking mortality here yet – that’s coming up).

But with Covid-19 you can be infected, transmitting the disease and SHOW NO SYMPTOMS for up to about 6 days. That’s at least three times as long as the typical flu case – so you’re a walking petri dish of disease for that whole time – and – remember, it’s with a disease that’s more infectious than the flu to begin with. That’s why this is worse than the flu – people who are transmitters are generally walking around longer, thus infecting more people - at a higher rate – and this is something that medical systems CANNOT handle. This will come up again in the section about what “flattening the curve” really means.

Before we go there however – let’s talk about what we can do to stop a disease like this and what each one of those options means.

3. THERE ARE BASICALLY THREE WAYS TO FIGHT THE DISEASE, ISOLATION, IMMUNIZATION OR MEDICATION.

OK – the first of those is easy to understand – you’re probably already doing it right now. Isolating people from each other is a way to fight ongoing transmission and people have been doing that for centuries. Back in the middle ages, during the plague, towns would be quarantined for months – sometimes it worked, other times when people went to check there would be no one left in the town. The concept is easy to understand – if you keep people from contacting each other in ways that spread infection – you slow the spread of infection. This is even better in these days when we know about such high tech things as “washing your hands” and “don’t throw your feces out in to the middle of the street”.

Ain’t science wonderful.

But look – even if it traces back to the dark ages isolation is an important part of this effort. Remember how we said at the beginning of this article that medicine and science were starting from about the two yard line because this is a novel virus? That’s true – which means that in many ways isolation is the best weapon we’ve got right now. It’s like a fighter who doesn’t have a great left, and doesn’t really have too much of a right either – the best strategy is to stay the hell away from the other fighter until he’s tired enough to not need a great punch to knock him out.

(Note to reader – in this case the “other fighter” is Covid-19).

Now let’s talk about the second weapon – immunization. There are two classic ways of gaining immunity. One is by getting the disease in the natural course, not ending up dead, and coming out the other side with the anti-bodies to fight off any further infection. Let’s call that “natural immunity”.

The other way is to trick your body in to doing that very same thing. That’s “vaccination”. Here’s the dirty little secret – it ain’t that different from natural immunity other than there is supposed to be a much better chance of you not dying.

I hear all those people in the back row jumping up and down and saying “Wait dummy, you’re forgetting “herd immunity”, what about “herd immunity”?” (not “heard immunity” as I’ve seen some on Facebook refer to it). No, I’m not. Here’s another dirty little secret “herd immunity” IS natural immunity. It’s just another way of referring to it. The idea of “herd immunity” is that if you had a herd of cattle, and they come down with a disease, the best way to get them immune in a hurry is to let the disease race naturally through the herd, accept the inevitable fatality rate (as long as it’s not inevitably fatal for all) and then, once the disease has gone through everyone, the herd is immune and life goes on. Sounds really easy.

It’s not – we’re still not at the point where we talk about mortality but let’s at least think about the concept for a bit. Letting immunity “come naturally” is the way to go if you are willing to simply accept that people will die in increased numbers and that doesn’t cause you undue concern. No lock down, no “social distancing”, you’d probably still wash your hands but why wear a mask? And listen – I’m not saying that this shouldn’t even be considered – in fact I believe it to be something that HAS to be considered.

Moreover – I will tell you right now that it is an option that is reviewed almost every year by the various agencies like the World Health Organization and Center for Disease Control when deciding how much to spend on that year’s flu vaccine program. If they think the strain they are going to face is not that bad – they will channel some of that money in to other projects.

Happens every year.

What I am saying is that for a disease like what we are facing now the inevitable decision should be to reject the concept of accelerating herd immunity. This pandemic is too deadly and we are not set up as a society to allow for the number of deaths that will result. Other societies might be, but not anyplace where this post is likely to be read. We care too much about people to just consign them to death.

Britain actually considered the herd immunity approach for a period – not because they are heartless bastards capable of turning out the likes of Martin Johnson (see one of my prior posts) – no – they care about their people as much as anyone. It was because they wondered if the disruption might be worse than the actual rate of infection – maybe, could be – let’s just see…

Then people started actually getting sick – including the Prime Minister. Herd immunity experiment over.

So, it was back to isolation – but here’s dirty little secret number three – all natural immunity, even if you apply other methods of control, eventually becomes “herd immunity”. The herd just gets there over a longer period of time.

Now, about that other type of immunity – vaccination. If I was really trying to torture you I would go in to the history of vaccination and Edward Jenner and how his greatest work other than vaccination was to write the first explanation of how the cuckoo hijacks other bird’s eggs and how the first vaccinations probably took place in Turkey anyway – but no, I won’t do that. Instead, I will simply say this – vaccination has probably saved more lives than any other medical advance in history. Anyone who is a straight out “anti-vaxxer” is an idiot. There is always a case for exercising substantial care before proposing a vaccine as safe – but there are safe vaccines and if they find one for Covid-19 we should rejoice.

The complication arises from that “substantial care” bit. You gotta be careful with a vaccine, and even if you stretch the rules you have to cover off at least three big, time consuming, concerns:

1. You have to be sure the vaccine won’t kill more people than it will save. A “cure” requires that taking it isn’t like asking for a hit when you have 15 and the dealer is showing 6. It takes some time to figure this out.

2. You have to be sure the vaccine will actually make you immune. You must check the reactions of the people who have been tested with the vaccine. It takes some time to figure this out.

3. You have to be sure that the immunity will last a reasonable period of time. It takes some time to figure this out.

Sensing a common theme here? Yes, it’s TIME. Vaccines don’t just pop up and get thrown in to the market. That’s why you keep hearing about the “18 to 30 month” period for an accepted vaccine – people who know how this stuff works know how long this takes. People who know how this works are doctors. They are not real estate developers.

A vaccine would be great – but it is (hopefully) not the option that will most effectively get us out of the current pandemic state. That is going to take a couple of things. One is re-defining what “effectively” means (that’s when we’ll talk about mortality). The other is the third leg of fighting the disease – medication.

By the term “medication” I mean something that fights the disease or its impacts without imposing immunity. We all know a classic example of how this can work – his name is Magic Johnson, and the disease is HIV.

There is no HIV vaccine, and Magic has been diagnosed for decades. When I first heard that he had HIV I remember thinking “Oh my God – Magic is gonna die”. Everybody loved Magic. I’m the biggest Celtics fan in the world, and I loved Magic. This is how Larry Bird reacted to the news about Magic:


We all thought Magic was gonna die, because HIV/AIDS back then was, in the public’s eyes, a death sentence.


Magic is still alive. Thank God.

And medicine.

He is alive because of the creation of a “cocktail” of medications which reduced the impact of the virus and the viral loads in his body. He is alive not because of any isolation or immunity but because even though he has the virus he can live with it.

That’s what the proper medicine can do with any virus – it can allow the body to fight off the worst effects and thereby increase survival rates until the body defeats the disease and becomes immune or it is time to take the next round of meds.

To be clear – in the short term this is the thing we should all be rooting for. There are some encouraging signs in certain areas – for example, Remdesivir is one of the drugs showing some positive results (and why you see lots of articles like this:)


The idea here is to make Covid-19 a disease you can have but, with medicine, you can walk in to the hospital, be given a prescription for a drug or cocktail of drugs that makes you less sick, keeps you out of the ICU, keeps you off a ventilator, gets you the hell out of the hospital quicker (if you even have to check in) and makes way for the next person to be treated. The drug doesn’t “cure” you, you’re not vaccinated, whatever immunity you get comes from having survived the disease – but less people will die and the strain on the health system is less.

Downsides? Well, there are a few – some quite concrete, others more abstract. The most immediate problems are these:

• Ummm – there is no such drug or combination of drugs yet. They’re working on it – but nothing yet.

• Once you find the drug you have to make it, and sometimes there just isn’t the capacity to make it fast enough.

• Not every story will have a Magic Johnson happy ending. Sometimes the drugs don’t work.


The more “abstract” problems are these:

• Drugs are typically owned by the company that makes them, so someone is likely going to get filthy rich off this disease if the drugs to treat it are ever invented.

• The transport of drugs might not be that easy – there is no guarantee that the breakthrough won’t come from somewhere that makes it difficult to move the drugs around. You might think this is not an “abstract” concept – trust me, the reason for lack of mobility often stems from who is getting along with who politically at the moment.

• The combination of the above factors can lead to the proliferation of conspiracy theories. If drugs are found to treat the Covid-19 pandemic brace yourself for the inevitable “this was all a set-up” stories.

Still, all things considered I would be watching the medication space most closely over the next few weeks. If there is going to be a meaningful breakthrough that has an immediate impact on how this disease is being handled I think this is the sphere where it is going to come from.

4. THERE IS A NEED FOR AN ACCELERATED PACE OF RE-OPENING SOCIETY, BUT IT IS NOT BECAUSE ANYONE’S “RAHTS” ARE BEING INFRINGED.

In the movie “Gettysburg” there is a scene where a rebel and a Union soldier meet up. They exchange views on why each is fighting. The man from the north says he is fighting to end slavery and preserve the union. The southerner says that he’s fighting for his “rahts”. Why can’t we all just live and let live he asks. It is meant to be a touching scene, but the point about “rahts” is carefully undercut when the next scene introduces an escaped tortured slave.


I get kind of the same feeling when I watch people rant about their “rahts” these days. When I say that everyone seems to assume that means I dismiss them out of hand. I don’t. The scene from the movie is meant to reflect the sincerity of the soldier’s feeling about his rights, and how he does wish to be “left alone”. The reality, however, is that his being “left alone” means someone else is suffering greatly. He doesn’t grasp that “some darky” is an actual human being who is innocent and being hurt – and for the people currently whining about their “rahts” I think they are very often failing to grasp the same thing.

I also think they are being manipulated by others who are simply trying to self-aggrandize. Take a look here at Exhibit A for that case. It is a clip of journalist Gemma O’Doherty being pulled over by the Gardai in Dublin while on her way to a court hearing to secure her “rahts”:


I cringe in embarrassment every time I watch that. It is so obviously a planned and scripted confrontation, with lines like “I pay your wages”, “you will see who your masters are” and “you are a disgrace to that uniform” being so straight out of the cliché machine, that it’s hard to believe anyone claiming to be literate could spout them. It’s also a perfect example of privilege masking itself as populism.

Much the same is evidenced in the protests that have erupted in U.S. states like Michigan, where middle aged women lean out of their pickups and bemoan their inability to go to the hairdresser while overweight “patriots” shout “lock her up”, because, you know, that’s so original.


God forbid that something as inconsequential as possibly prolonging a pandemic should stand in the way of someone getting their roots done. Still, I can’t see this rising to the level of the institution of a “police state” or that the measures taken are overly burdensome. Consider the following:

• In Britain, during WWII, people kept off the streets with the lights off or huddled with their families in the underground tube stations for months. They did this while family members died in their thousands around the globe. That’s sacrifice.

Having to stay home and watch “Tiger King”? Not so much.

• In America during that same period, you were told how much and how often you could buy meat, bread, sugar and gasoline. That’s sacrifice. 

Having to wait in a line five minutes to choose between 400 types of breakfast cereal? Not so much.

• In parts of Ireland, as recently as the late 1980’s, the announcement of a waitress job opening up would result in lines of applicants. That’s economic hardship. 

To accept a furlough (with pay) in order to ensure that a nurse or doctor who is working around the clock to keep people alive isn’t put in further danger? Not so much.

All those things are, I admit, not normal and extremely irritating. But they are not infringements of fundamental human rights under anyone’s constitution. At most some legal niceties were dealt with in unconventional (but not unconstitutional) ways.

The right most often cited as at risk as a result of the measures taken to shut things down and socially distance is the “right to assemble”. If people had an unfettered “right to assemble” this would be an open and shut case. But they do not. For instance, the first amendment to the U.S. constitution states that:

“Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Let’s cut the demonstrators seeking to secure their “rahts” a bit of slack and skip the fact that a comma and not a semi-colon is used in that last bit. We all know that the right of free speech, the first one enumerated in the above quote is not absolute. You can’t yell “fire” in a Bernie Sanders rally, and commercial speech is always heavily controlled – you can’t advertise cigarettes on television or promote sugar and water in a bottle as “Grampa Joe’s Cure Fer Cancer and Warts”. The press cannot libel someone, even if the “absence of malice” standard is pretty loose (but a good movie with Paul Newman and Sally Field).


Assembly? Well, that’s pretty much the red headed stepchild of first amendment rights. Think there is an unlimited right to assemble? Tell that to the restaurant owner who has a fire safety limit on his head count. Or the festival promoter who could sell 100,000 tickets and easily fit them in the field he has lined up - but is capped at 20,000 for “safety” reasons. In the times where those limits were set the government decided what was safe in terms of assembly and they are simply doing the same thing now. It’s just that the number that is now deemed safe is, often, zero.

The same thing with regard to that poor Garda who stopped O’Doherty. If that stop had been made because it was believed there was a bomber headed towards the Four Courts – no one would question the rationale behind the detention. Right now, instead of a bomb, we are all potentially carrying what might be a lethal weapon in the form of the virus – so we all have to put up with the inconvenience. If the measures were truly oppressive you would think the populace would voice their displeasure or at least evidence discontent – but when 80% of the people agree that the measures are appropriate – you’re not the voice of the voiceless, you’re just a feckin’ loudmouth.

The key to all this is the concept of “peaceable” assembly. Peace in this context is not simply the absence of people throwing rocks or Molotov cocktails through windows. Instead it means “peace” in the sense that such assembly will not lead to the unreasonable or unintended but foreseeable disruption of people’s lives. It is not a peaceable assembly if it can reasonably be seen to land people in the hospital, or take away their chance to go to that hospital – or kill their elderly mother.

That said – it is time to cast a stone or two in the direction of those who are directing the shut down. I’ve seen and heard of numerous instances where, without any concern about the facts or science behind such conclusions, people are being labelled “selfish” for doing such acts as:





• Wanting to go for a walk when you are supposed to “cocoon”;   https://www.dailymail.co.uk/…/Ministers-say-older-people-wa…

• Not understanding why it’s okay for a restaurant that sells all sorts of drinks to open with restrictions while a pub that would agree to all those same restrictions must stay closed. (Is being able to buy a burger that much of a reason to support such a difference?) https://www.independent.ie/…/pubs-want-to-reopen-like-resta…

• Fishing – maybe the most solitary of outdoor pursuits. Even opening it up there is a five kilometre limit imposed – is that really necessary?   https://www.rte.ie/n…/coronavirus/2020/0507/1137028-anglers/

• Here is a personal one – this past Mother’s Day the weather was beautiful, there were no travel restrictions in place, I thought it would be nice to talk my wife, son and dog for a walk on a beach. For my American readers – I know the first attached picture is what you think a beach is like:



An Irish beach actually looks like the second picture (on a day that’s considered “crowded”):



Yes, those are horses – they were probably the least socially distanced group on the beach. Get this – the next day, when you turned on the radio, you would’ve thought that anyone who had gone out for that walk was trying to brew up some Covid soup to force feed to all of Ireland’s grannies. The overreaction was unbelievable – I can’t tell you how many fingers were sprained due to them being wagged – but it must’ve been substantial. The real question is “why”? That walk was fine – but people want to feel superior.

Asking questions about these matters and advocating that they should be allowed is not “selfish”. It is simply necessary social discourse. All of the self-righteous prissy scolds who immediately label anyone who questions the rationale behind a measure or the value of maintaining a restriction well after it has been proven to not be that effective (usually just because that is the “new normal” or “the way things need to be”) are playing right in to the hands of the conspiracy theorists.

We now know that transmission outdoors is an extremely rare occurrence, and getting people outside to walk, run, cycle, climb or kick a ball around with the kids will not bring about the decline of civilisation. We know that the elderly need to get out and take part in that exercise. We know that masks are good when indoors, OK when outdoors in some circumstances, but probably not so good when they can become sweaty or moist (such as when on the face of a jogger).

Here’s the thing – imagine society right now as being at a giant company picnic. What do you do at a company picnic – you eat, you drink, you make fun of the pink argyle socks that Herb from accounting wore. You also play games – hopefully team building games. Tug of war – that’s kind of a team building game – but at the end the two teams are the same distance apart and one is sprawled in the mud. But there is another game – the three legged race (or “sack race”) that does build a team. One player can’t go faster than the other, or both fall over. Think of what we need now as a good sack racing team – the “stay at homers” have to keep up with the “open things uppers” or things fall over. The “open things uppers” have to slow their gallop in order to allow for the “stay at homers” or – same thing. We need the gadflies on both sides to get to the end of the race – but we need them to act together to do so.

We also ought to know that striving to re-open things, rather than casting about for reasons not to, is and should be the ultimate goal. This is where you say “BUT PEOPLE COULD DIE!!!”.

I know they could.

It is now time for us to talk honestly about mortality.

4. IT IS INEVITABLE THAT PEOPLE WILL DIE FROM THE COVID-19 DISEASE. WE CAN ONLY REDUCE BUT NEVER ELIMINATE THAT FACT. WE WILL THEREFORE HAVE TO REACH A CONSENSUS ON WHAT LEVEL OF REDUCED DEATHS WILL BE DEEMED ACCEPTABLE.

There have been a number of phrases that have popped up over the last few months that had not been in general circulation just a short time ago. “Social distancing” would have previously been assumed to be the space that was required between couples at a junior high dance (known as “leaving a little room for the holy spirit” at Catholic schools). Corona was a Mexican beer that you sometimes drank with a lime. A “novel virus” was something that attacked your computer from that e-book you downloaded.

And “flattening the curve” was most likely associated with a nose job.

You heard lots about curve flattening back at the beginning of this thing, and not as much since. That’s mostly because once you’re on the tilt-a-whirl it doesn’t require anyone to give you an explanation of what the tilt-a-whirl does – you’re on for the ride. It’s worth a refresher course, and I promise – I’ll only use one picture.

The one that's attached: (thanks CNBC/CDC)



See that red bubble? That’s the total number of cases if we were all still going to the movies. The blue one – that’s being stuck inside making a giant hit out of a show where one of the main characters just might’ve killed her husband and fed him to a tiger.

There are three important lines in that graph. One is shown – it goes straight across and is labelled “Capacity of health care system”. The other two are not shown – those are the lines depicting the total number of deaths per day. The first would relate to the red curve, and it would start out fairly flat and then would start to go up at a steeper angle as the health care system capacity got stretched. The other would relate to the blue curve and it would stay at a fairly consistent angle – reflecting the mortality rate that we’ve established as applying to all Covid-19 related infections.

The reason for the difference between the two lines of death is that if you exceed the capacity of the health care system, go beyond the number of beds, ventilators, drugs, nurses and doctors available for basic treatment, people who would be expected to live with a normal level of care will die.

Let’s do a little math – nothing too hard. Using this model and making some assumptions, if you had a million cases under the blue bubble and there was a 2% fatality rate – you’d have 20,000 people die from the virus regardless of how well the health system functions. If you were to operate under the red model you might have to double the fatality rate associated with the virus, since a large chunk of people wouldn’t get treated. So – at 4% you’d have 40,000 dead. That’s too low though – because with the system maxed out you’d also have people dying from untreated trauma, chronic disease, lack of access to needed operations -so add another 5,000 or so dead.

That’s an extra 25,000 dead without assuming a single additional infection. I could go in to why that might be too low an estimate, and about how the chart is a bit deceptive because the back end of the curve would never go down that fast - but I think we get the picture. That’s a curve that wants flattening. You do not want to follow the red model.

Here’s the part that doesn’t get discussed as much, but which we need to start talking about more. See the word “measures” in the middle of the blue part of the graph. If you follow that up you will see that it roughly coincides with the highest infection rates that are still within the capacity of the health system. That higher rate (even though it is within health system capacity) does equate to an increase in mortality, both because of numbers and the fact that “capacity” is not a geographically static measure. If you get sick in the Louisiana bayou you’re probably more likely to die than if you’re ill in Greenwich Connecticut, even if the U.S.A. as a collective shows itself “within capacity”.

The thing is – if you start opening bits of society you are going to flatten the curve in a way that probably makes it truly flat, rather than a bell curve. The arc starts to come down, then you open up fishing, walking limits, some retail outlets, and it stays up at around where it was and then it maybe stabilises and you open up shopping malls and theatres with social distancing – and it flattens again – then after a while when immunity rates match infection rates it drops so you open up restaurants and pubs. You see what I mean – it’s the sort of phased planning that many governments are introducing.

What isn’t being openly said is that in doing this those same governments are accepting the fact that more people will die. If you kept everybody shut down for months – more people will live out the pandemic and the cost – in lives – WILL go down. The problem, of course, is that the cost in money, quality of life and public confidence will most definitely go up.

A friend of mine put it very succinctly early on in the crisis. A health care professional, when he was asked what would have to be considered when moving towards getting things back to normal (in this particular case “normal” being playing softball) said the following:

“There needs to be a fine balance of 3 things: Viable Economy/Societal Fatigue from restrictions/Acceptable Death Toll”.

I think that’s pretty spot on. I also think there is one thing in there that needs to be openly discussed and hard questions asked – and that is the following:

“Acceptable Death Toll”.

The questions in respect of that very scary statement have to be asked in a particular way. One should NOT ask someone if they are willing to risk death themselves. People can be straight out arseholes when confronted with that proposition – just drive the M50 at rush hour some day. The other is NOT to ask the question this way:


(By the way – Dukakis should have answered “Yes Bernard, as long as I could kill him myself and then rip his arm off and beat you to death with it for asking such a stupid question.”).

Of course, none of us would want to open up more of society, be it softball, or fishing, or restaurants, or “the economy” if it we knew it meant a loved one would die. The thing is – we don’t know that. We have to look dispassionately at probabilities and the factors listed above and make a reasoned judgement as to whether the risk is worth taking as a group – and there is only one thing to say about making that kind of decision.

It sucks.

But the truth is people make those decisions all the time – increase the speed limit from 55 to 65? Statistics show that will result in more deaths – but people will get to where they are going quicker. Approve a drug that results in reduced pain but creates a fatal side effect in X% of the people taking it? OK – as long as you inform them before they decide to sign up. Not require helmets for motorcycle riders? Mortality rates for that go through the roof – but – live free or die.

The natural inclination is for people to accept or reject that sort of decision based upon the way the question is asked. I will demonstrate:

“Should retail store capacity be increased to 100 per hour if statistics show that chances are one of those people will come down with the potentially deadly corona virus?”

“Should retail store capacity be increased to 100 per hour if statistics show that less than one percent of all of those people will come down with the corona virus?”

See what I mean.

So here are some primary rules I think should be followed when assessing what an “acceptable death toll” should be (there would be lots of “sub-rules – but these are the four biggies).

1. It should never be a number that exceeds the health systems capacity (no red bubble shit).

2. The tendency should be to favor re-opening things, rather than keeping them shut down. This does not mean the default should be to re-open something – but if you have a 50/50 call – re-open.

3. Don’t be afraid to go backwards. I hear lots of politicians saying “We need to go slow re-opening because we never want to have to go backwards”. Sounds good – but – here’s where I can be a real pain in the ass – I ask that most annoying of questions – “why?”. Why can we never go back? If you’re in a maze and find you’re going down the wrong way – would you just plow into a dead end because “I can never go back?” Of course not. If you re-open restaurants, and things are cool – then you reopen pubs. If things are still cool you can re-open hotels. Should things still seem to be OK – try and re-open concerts and sporting events with less than 10,000 people. Oops – there’s a spike there? Close those suckers back down and maybe throw a few other restrictions back in place to slow things down. But now you know how far you can go. Otherwise – you’re going to be creating huge pressures on two key elements (viable economy and societal fatigue) without really knowing WHY you are doing it. Which brings us to the fourth and fifth rules.

4. Collect data every freaking way you can. That deserves a discussion of its own.

5. Then accept that more people will die because of what you are doing than might otherwise have died. Yes, we understand that this does, indeed, suck. Then move on and try to do better.

5. THERE MUST BE AN ACCEPTANCE AND RELAXATION OF THE BARRIERS TO COLLECTING DATA DURING THE TIME OF THIS CRISIS. SORRY – BUT THIS MUST HAPPEN.

Look – I understand how much people hate the idea of our lives being broken down into algorithms and tendencies by fleets of market analysts and consumer behaviourists. I understand how the fear of governmental interference in our private lives needs to be taken seriously. I understand how technology can easily cross the line from useful to intrusive. But if someone gives me a choice between an old manual typewriter and this computer to compose this ungodly long post – I’m taking the computer every time. It’s a better tool. And we have better tools to fight this pandemic and we should be using those as well.

Example number one – there is an app which can be placed on people’s phones that traces contacts with infected people. In one of those amazing coincidences it’s called a “contact tracing app”. I won’t go in to too much detail about how it works, but here is an explainer:


True, it is somewhat intrusive, but measures can be taken to limit that. No one should be forced to download it but the following measures should be approved which will make that more likely:

• If you have a mobile phone you will not be eligible for unemployment benefits or other government funds specifically provided for corona virus relief unless you have the app.

• Employers should be able to bar employees who do not have the app on their phone from entering a place of work. If working from home is not a viable option then failure to upload the app should be grounds for dismissal.

• All government employees should be required to have the app uploaded.

• All elected officials should have the app or they will not be allowed to vote in assembly, attend any legislative proceeding or draw their salary. Any official deciding not to upload is free to do so under those conditions, but will be subject to a recall election. If it’s good enough for the public it’s good enough for them.

• Any students of adult age receiving government assistance to attend college or university should have the app. Any campus should be entitled to require having the app as a requirement for attendance at any campus event.

You want to go off the grid – fine, but there are consequences. And more data points should be collected. Where are people shopping, where are cars travelling, are there infectious “hot spots”, what type of payments are people making – how much is cash, what is via remote payment, how much contactless – is there a correlation with the use of any one of those and infection? What type of HVAC units are in various buildings? Any correlation there? Does weather impact infection rates? Is it more or less after a rainy day/night? We should be analyzing EVERYTHING.

Unemployed people should be offered and trained for temporary positions as analysts for the purpose of putting these numbers together. We should try to know everything so we are less afraid to try something. During the time of this pandemic we should be hoarders of data, tracking everything we can, not just for this pandemic – but for the next one – and it should be clear now – there WILL be a next one.

Then, after this is over – all of these measures should be subject to “sunset” – ended, hopefully never to be seen again. Extraordinary measures should be seen as just that – extraordinary.

So – that’s it. I have been writing shite about Hostess Fruit Pies, Seinfeld fan fiction, Luis Tiant being unfairly kept out of the Hall of Fame, beginners’ guides to softball, and all the other stuff for so long in an effort to get through this that I thought it was time to actually write more about what is actually happening. Then, 8000 words later I wonder if I’ve said enough or if I’ve just loaded on more shite. (Don’t worry, I do know that either way I’ve said enough). The bottom line is that, hopefully, there are going to be good people out there making the right choices for the right reasons.

For me – I think the next ramble will be about a turtle recently discovered living in the Royal Canal here in Ireland. He (or she) must’ve been brought here involuntarily because turtles are not native to Ireland but this one seems to be taking his isolation in stride, making the best out of the situation and using it as an opportunity to lie out and get some sun.

We all might do the same.


POSTSCRIPT:  In the days since this was first posted an approach to the response to the disease that is very similar to what I set out here has become widely accepted.  Called the "Hammer and the Dance" this view of how to treat the disease essentially follows much of what is said above - that you make sure (through the use of the "hammer") that the spread of the disease is contained in a defined region, and then you begin the "dance" - the sort of well documented and observed re-opening that I advocate - without the fear of having to "go back".  "Going back" is part of the dance - just ask Ginger Rogers.  Anyway - the link to this very important and well thought out approach is attached.  Makes almost as good a read as mine...  https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-the-hammer-and-the-dance-be9337092b56



Random Ramblings from the great lock down of 2020 – Part XXII – To Shea, Turtle.

As you might have heard, Ireland has a problematic relationship with reptiles. Now, it seems it wasn’t always heading that way, as it was on Ireland’s rocky shores that we have some of the first evidence of tetrapods, precursors of both modern day amphibians and reptiles, having trod on semi-dry land. They left their slimy little footprints in the mud of what has become modern day Valentia Island, a beauty spot located just off the Ring of Kerry. Some 365 million years later a geology student, in a moment that must certainly have earned him or her an “A” for the class, found a fossil record of the critter’s tracks on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean. The tetrapod (or pods) left a series of trails, some of which even show their tail dragging behind. That’s a long time for footprints to stick around. There’s a sidewalk on the edge of our housing estate where a cat walked through the concrete before it set – but I doubt that anyone who wanders by 365 million years from now (if we are let out of our houses by then) will find any record of the event.

After that great start things gradually tapered off for cold-blooded terrestrials who were looking to set up home in Ireland. There are no Irish crocodilians, for example, but that’s not so surprising. You might have thought there would be a few other representatives, but on the amphibian side there are only a few “frogs in the bogs” and one thing called a “smooth newt” (not related to any American politician). When it comes to reptiles things are even more sparse. I wrote a book about the Royal Canal which covered fish, mammals, butterflies, birds, biting flies, and flowers at length. This is all I was able to say about Irish reptiles:

“Of course, reptiles are famously underrepresented amongst Irish fauna. Whether or not you blame St. Patrick for casting away the snakes there are only a couple of fairly uncommon species of lizard and a stray sea turtle or two to hold up the reptilian banner on the emerald isle.”

The lizards are not easy to spot (I’ve only seen them twice) and the sea turtles are, for the most part, lost if they turn up in Ireland. As for the reference to St. Patrick – here is the best explanation I can find for why he drove the snakes from the shores of the Emerald Isle:

So – no snakes, no crocs, feck all lizards and turtles only when it gets crazy out in the Atlantic – Ireland is not the place to go to get your “Reptile Studies” merit badge. (Yes, there is such a thing and I got mine back in the day).

Remember that.

Now, I enjoy a bit of wildlife photography when I get in to the great outdoors. I especially enjoy it when I get back to the States – both because I’m usually on holiday so I’ve got more time for it, but also because there is just a greater variety of wildlife to pick from. I’ve got some great shots of things like wild turkeys, some deer, some excellent pictures of whales out in the ocean – and a good selection of birds. But, for whatever reason, I seem to have had particular luck getting photos of reptiles. In Florida one time I got some great shots of an alligator that was lounging in a nearby lake.

There was also the time I went for a hike with the family by the edge of a wetland in Western Massachusetts. We hadn’t seen too many animals until we hit this one stretch of about two hundred yards or so where every couple of steps you would look off the side of the trail and there would be snakes curled up in the underbrush. There were snakes on top of snakes – and the weirdest part was that it wasn’t even the same type of snake. Garter snakes would be lying next to black racers or milk snakes would be stretch across a water snake. It was crazy, and I got some interesting pictures.





That was quite a hike, though none of those is my favorite reptile picture.. That one I took on a nature trail in Southeastern Massachusetts, very close to Gillette Stadium (where the Patriots play). The largest turtle in the New England area is the snapping turtle – and they can get pretty big – with a shell that can be about fifteen inches long and a head, neck and tail that can make them even longer. They live a long time, long enough for moss to grow on their shell, and while not uncommon you don’t see them all the time. This is one kind of turtle that cannot retract its head into its shell, but that’s mostly because it doesn’t have to. They’re called a snapping turtle for a reason, and if you find one on land and you have the guts – put a stick about the width of your finger in front of his mouth – he’ll snap it right in half. Now imagine that is your finger and leave him alone.

There are other turtles that live in the region, the most common being the painted turtle, which is about 5 inches in length. You see these guys sunning themselves all the time, and they are docile enough to pick up if you see them on the land, but they probably don’t like it that much.
So, here I was walking along this trail with a sort of bridge which brings you right across a marsh, when I look down in to the water and spot one of the largest snappers I’ve ever seen in my life, with a painted turtle right next to it, as if to say “go ahead and try to pick me up now, buddy”. I got the picture – it remains my favorite reptile photo, and until recently probably my most notable.
I say “until recently” because, just last week, while cycling along that same Royal Canal that is the subject of my book, I saw something that was not supposed to be there. For once this did not mean that I had spotted an old bicycle, or shopping cart, or Bulgarian national chopped in to pieces and stuffed in to a Glad bag.

No - as I wheeled myself along I spotted what, for all the world, looked like a turtle on a log in the middle of the canal.

Again – there are no freshwater turtles in Ireland. At least there aren’t supposed to be.

I looked at the turtle, just to make sure it wasn’t a strangely shaped bit of the log. I knew this not to be the case when the turtle turned his head to look back at me.

I only had my phone with me so I could only manage a somewhat distant shot that day – but it was clear that I was not seeing things. There was, indeed, some kind of a turtle hanging out in the vicinity of Clonsilla, County Dublin, Ireland. The question was – how?
I figured that the guy I saw represented a pet released into the wild that had managed to make itself at home in the canal, but first I wanted to get a better photograph. I went back the next day hoping that the turtle in question was a creature of habit – and, luckily enough, it was. I ended up with a few better shots of our friend, which I attach.

Once I had something that could identify a few more of the characteristics of the new found visitor I posted this message to Facebook, which a few of you have already seen:

“Went for a cycle along the canal today and saw the typical sights (ducks, etc.) until I hit a spot in Clonsilla and was greeted with a view of a turtle sunning itself happily on a log. This is something that would be unremarkable where I grew up in America - but, here's the thing. Officially there are no freshwater turtles in Ireland. There are reports of some released pets being seen (and that's probably where this one came from), but the reason given for why they don't survive to breed in Ireland afterwards is suspect. The official line seems to be that it's too cold in winter. That's wrong. It's much colder in New England during the winter than it ever is here. More likely is (a) little boy turtles haven't met little girl turtles on any of the "turtles gone wild" dating apps available in Ireland at the moment, or (b) the summers are too cold, not the winters. I'd tend to lead towards reason (a), especially as things heat up, but spotting a turtle in that part of the canal, which is largely inaccessible to pet owners, shows that things may be getting active on turtle tinder...”

I also sent along a few of the pictures to the Royal Canal Amenity Group who forwarded the message on to Waterways Ireland who, in turn, sent it on to their Environmental Group. They seem to have had some familiarity with the phenomenon of turtles in Ireland, and responded thusly:

“What you saw is a Yellow Bellied Slider, a form of non-native turtle which are common pets. This particular individual gets reported a lot and is most certainly the same individual as opposed to a new population of the species. He was obviously no longer wanted and disposed of in the canal.
He poses no threat to local biodiversity and appears to be content in the canal. He is a number of years old and has no doubt acclimatised to this new home and we would be concerned the stress of capturing him and re-housing could cause him harm.
There seems to be a few along the system even here at Ashtown!”

Thanks to Jenny for that answer which seems to solve things. Though an invasive species this Yellow-Bellied Slider (as opposed to the brown-backed sliders shown in the accompanying photo) seems to pose no threat to our well being.
The only thing left to do seems to be to name the little guy, and I attempted to gather nominations on another Facebook post. There were a number of helpful suggestions, ranging from “Yertle”, (derived from the Dr. Seuss character), through “Fyrtle” (which could lead to more turtles), to “Myrtle” (sensing a theme here) through to “Billy” (he has no mates), “Sunny” (he likes the sun) and “Chris O’Mish”, which is a play on the Latin name for “Turtle” (Chrysemys picta). There was even a suggestion to name the turtle “Touché” after the famous 1960’s Hanna Barbera cartoon:

In the end however, the naming became kind of obvious. In this turtle we are faced with a visitor to Ireland who, though not expecting to be here is making the best of the situation and creates a bit of a stir whenever he is spotted in public.

Ladies and gentlemen – I give you the name for our national turtle:

Matt Damon.

This was a bit shorter than the last post (so is “War & Peace”) and more of a photo essay. Since the Canal was starting to show all its colors during the past few days – I've added a few more pics to enjoy:










Random Ramblings from the Great Lockdown of 2020 – Part 23 “The Covid Cookbook”.

With the current state of affairs being that all or most of us are being kept close to home without the option of going out for breakfast, lunch, dinner or a snack, two things are bound to happen. First – lots more food delivery services end up on speed dial than ever before (for instance, I now know a falafel place that will deliver. I’ll be honest - wasn’t getting too much falafel delivery up to now), and, second, we all end up doing much more cooking than we did in the past.

The second of these consequences also means we end up doing a bit more experimentation with types of cuisine, recipes, combinations of foods, styles of cooking, etc. Some research seems to show that extended confinement and the accompanying desensitisation can lead to an increased desire and liking for spicy foods – that the lack of outside experiences makes the body crave stimulation from other senses – so you upgrade from a korma to a vindaloo, or go for the pepperoni on the pizza rather than the mushrooms.

I don’t know about that – but I do know that there has been an increase in cooking experimentation in our house, mostly led by Margaret but I’ve tried a few different things. I strongly suspect that the same may be happening in other households as well – so I’m going to try something a bit different here and make this ramble somewhat interactive. I’ll start with a few Covid inspired recipes and then if people want please reply with a comment containing your own recent culinary undertaking – feel free. Also – definitely not required (since I hate when people say you have to do this) but certainly everyone should feel free to share this and cast the net as wide as possible. Maybe in the end we’ll have enough to circulate a “Covid Cookbook” that we can sell to raise money for a charity or something similar. At the very least we’ll have some new recipes to try out and maybe avoid calling out late night for someone to deliver Pad Thai with extra chili peppers.

Anyway – here’s a few to get started:

PORRIDGE BREAD

Margaret’s started making this a lot and it is simple and tastes great – especially, we’ve found, lightly toasted with some cream cheese and smoked salmon on top – better even than the typical brown bread.
INGREDIENTS
1 500ml tub low fat natural yogurt
2 natural yogurt tubs/approx 360g porridge oats
1 egg
2 Tsp bicarbonate of soda
Pinch salt
2 tbsp chia seed (optional)
Half a handful of pumpkin seeds (for topping – optional)
2lb loaf tin
- Preheat oven to 180 Celsius
- Combine yogurt, bread soda, salt and egg in a bowl.
- Add porridge oats and mix.
- Add chia seeds if using.
- Turn into loaf tin, lined with parchment paper.
- Put pumpkin seeds on top and press down slightly if you choose to use them.
Bake for 40 mins at 180 C
Remove from tin and continue baking for a further 10 mins.
Cool on a wire rack.



POOR MAN’S PAELLA
This is a recipe that we’ve used for some time but, given the array of flavors it contains, it has proven an especially big hit during lock down. For purists – please note this is not claiming to be true paella (folks can get very defensive) – it’s a relatively quick and easy attempt to capture some of what makes that dish so good.

500 Grams of risotto (arborio) rice
1200 Millilitres of chicken or vegetable stock
2 Peppers
1 Onion
3 or 4 cloves of garlic
1 Chorizo Sausage
2 Chicken Breasts (pre-cooked is fine)
20 (or so) King Prawns (again, pre-cooked is fine)
Level teaspoon each of Paprika, Cayenne Pepper and Chili Powder (more or less to taste).

Prepare the risotto as per the directions on the package, adding the stock a bit at a time. About halfway through add in the spices. (I use a large wok to do this – it’s easier when everything gets mixed together).
While the rice cooks (usually about 25-30 minutes) put the veggies to a large pan with a bit of oil and begin to slowly stir fry.

After they have started to cook cut the chorizo into ¾ inch sections and put them in the pan to heat up with the veggies.

If the chicken and the prawns aren’t pre-cooked you should cut the chicken into pieces and cook it up in a pan.

Once it’s done set it to the side and then and then flash fry the prawns. (If they are both pre-cooked then it’s much easier – just put each into the pan with the veg and chorizo when there is about 5 minutes left on the prep of the rice).

When the rice is done just stir in the veg, chorizo, chicken & prawns. Let it heat up together in the pot for a bit (5 minutes or so).



SCALLOP AND CHORIZO PASTA

While we’re on a bit of a chorizo kick let’s try a bit more in case we need that sensory stimulation that can come from a bit of quality spicy sausage. (Yes, a line like that will probably get you arrested if you were to come out with it in a bar. When, you know, there are actually things like bars open).
I came up with this recipe when the local Lidl was having a special on frozen scallops which would’ve been a sin to pass up. My kids aren’t too gone on scallops by themselves – but thought this might bring ‘em around. It worked for me – you might find you (and the family) like it as well.

(Increase the recipe as you need more – this is to feed four).

Two bags of frozen scallops (assuming 10 to a bag).
One chorizo sausage, cut in to ¾ inch sections
Can of chopped tomatoes
3-4 minced cloves of garlic
One Onion, chopped
Two Green Peppers – chopped however you like them.
Basil, oregano, parsley and bit of pepper to flavor the sauce to the level you like.
Enough spaghetti to feed four.

Make the spaghetti while you cook up the rest of the stuff. Put some olive oil in a pan, heat the chorizo and then push it to the side and heat the onion, peppers and garlic. Then add the tomatoes and the spices to the mix, heat it up and let it simmer for about ten minutes. By then the spaghetti will be ready and you can pour the sauce over it and mix it up. Don’t clean the pan yet. Using the oil that is still on the bottom of the pan, which should have some good flavor in it, pan fry the scallops for about two/three minutes on each side. When they are done add them to the pasta and mix them in too. Serve with some hot garlic bread and a side salad.

BANANA BREAD WITH BLUEBERRIES
This is great as either a snack or for dessert. Thanks again to Margaret.

1 and 3/4ths cups of all purpose flour
2/3rds cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup mashed ripe banana (2 to 3 medium bananas)
1/3rd cup shortening, margarine, or butter (75gr)
2 tablespoons milk
2 eggs
150 grams of blueberries

In a large mixing bowl combine 1 cup of the flour, the sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the banana, shortening and milk. Beat with a mixer (low speed) until it all blends together. Then add the eggs and the rest of the flour and blend it all together. Then add the blueberries and gently mix them in to the batter.

Pour the batter into a greased pan (8x4x2) and bake at 35o degrees for about an hour. Use the toothpick check to make sure it’s done. After it cools send me a piece.

So that’s it for this one but to make it work we need a bunch more recipes – so, what’s been your “go to” dish during the lock down (or what have you tried that’s new that has worked out)?


Random Ramblings from the Great lockdown of 2020, Part XXIV – The Argument

Back in 1960 a German lad got in to a bit of an argument with his girlfriend. Wanting to cool off (and being in her house and all) he went for a walk into the night and ended up in one of the rougher sections of town. Hearing some music coming from a seedy looking bar he decided to duck in for a drink.

He was not really familiar with the type of songs that were being played (being more of a jazz guy) – but was completely taken by the group, who, in addition to having a catchy sound had a great repartee with the audience, even though part of the act seemed to be one of the guitarist/singers shouting out “We won the war you lousy krauts!” You know, just typical English tourists.

For the singer was English, the city was Hamburg and the band was the Beatles. The fellow who met them that night couldn’t wait to get back to his girlfriend’s house to tell them about this new phenomenon and, evidencing that they were able to get past the argument and that he hadn’t lost the girl, they all followed him out the next night to see the band.

Then he lost the girl.

That girl was Astrid Kirchherr, an aspiring artist/photographer and she was lost to the band’s then bass player, Stuart Sutcliffe. Sutcliffe was not much of a bass player (the guy who took his place, “Paul” somebody, has done OK) but he was also an aspiring artist – actually very highly regarded already, having won prizes and being considered a stellar student at the art school he attended with the band’s leader (“John” something – name escapes me). The boyfriend who lost out realised he couldn’t stand in the way of the couple, and all remained close friends.

If you know a bit about the Beatles you probably already know about Astrid and Stuart’s tragic story, how they became engaged only to have him die of a brain hemorrhage in 1962, just before they were to be married. Even if you don’t know of this story you have probably, at one time or another, seen copies of Astrid’s iconic photographs taken of the group in those early days. I attach a couple of examples of her work.





When it comes to music those are among the most viewed images of the last 60 years. There are few decent recordings of the Beatles from their Hamburg period, when many claim they were at their best on stage. So, we don’t really know what they sounded like. There is no doubt we know what they looked like – the pictures capture the personalities, as well as the images, of the group.

Now these rambles are designed to go wherever they end up taking you – along the lines of “Connections”, as explained in an earlier post. So maybe we should think about what the band may have sounded like in order to start our journey. We know they were good – good enough at least to draw a pissed off boyfriend in off the street. These were early days – so they probably weren’t in any way “polished” as an act. The rock ‘n’ roll was probably pretty raw. It was also probably mostly covers – like 80%.

The Beatles and covers are kind of a mixed bag. Some of them are simply amazing – their version of “Twist and Shout” is THE version, even though the Isley Brothers did a great job on their take. The Chuck Berry stuff is quite good, I actually like Ringo’s “Act Naturally” and the Motown/girl group based covers are good and a bit unconventional – “Boys”, “Please Mr. Postman” and “Chains” are both catchy and slightly gender-twisting.

Then there are the showtune/standards. To be honest, cuts like “Mr. Moonlight”, “Besame Mucho”, and “Till There Was You” aren’t among my favorite Beatle’s tunes. It seems that if you were performing around Liverpool at the time your set was expected to include at least a couple of these type standards – for instance, “Till There Was You” comes from the play “The Music Man”, while another Broadway show (“Carousel”) spawned “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, done by Gerry and the Pacemakers, which is about as fooking Liverpool as you can get mate. (A little trivia – before the Beatles did it the best known version of “Till There Was You” had been done by Mrs. Partridge herself, Shirley Jones -




One of the Beatles more tolerable theatrical tunes came from the highly regarded play “A Taste of Honey”, which was a daring and ground-breaking work done by playwright Shelagh Delaney. The tune was originally an instrumental composed for the Broadway performance of the work. Lyrics were written and one of the play’s original cast members cut a version. This then obscure actor went on to rule over a city in the clouds as Lando Calrissian – you might also know him as Billy Dee Williams.

The tune was also covered by artists like Julie London (best known musically for “Cry Me A River” and as an actress for her role as nurse Dixie McCall on the 1970’s show “Emergency”. She played opposite her husband, Bobby Troupe on that show - Troupe also had a musical background – he wrote the classic beatnik hit “Route 66”). Barbra Streisand and the Hollies did versions as well. The Beatles track closely followed the example of Lenny Welch, making the tune into a near waltz. This version, found in a rough recording of the group live in 1962, captures some of what Astrid may have heard when she went to a Beatles show in the period after first meeting up with the group.


As I said, this is one of the better Beatles covers of a “show” tune – but for once their cover is not the most well-known or best-selling version of the song. That honor belongs to Herb Alpert, who included an instrumental version on his 1965 album “Whipped Cream and Other Delights”. First, let’s talk about the cover for that album, because – along with “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” it is one of the 1960’s most iconic. Take a look. 



This is obviously because of one of those unavoidable truths – you got it – “Whipped cream sells”.

Number one rule in advertising.

In fairness, Alpert’s version of the song is pretty original – it’s almost hard to pick it out as the same tune at first listen. In fact – you may have heard it without putting the two together:


Now – I told you that this is a ramble and the goal is to link things together – but I’m sure you’re wondering, in between looking at that album cover and listening to the song, how the hell this all hooks up. Trust me, we’re getting there.

Alpert was one of the rare artists who managed to conquer the music industry rather than be taken in by it. He founded his own label with a guy named Jerry Moss (A&M Records) – a company they eventually sold for about half a billion dollars back in the day when that was real money. Anyhoo, A&M would eventually sign much of the top talent through the 1970’s and, in an effort to promote that talent would spend money on lavish concerts/parties to introduce a new artist or album.

Back in 1971 or so they had signed Cat Stevens and were going to throw such a party for him, where Cat would come out and sing some of his songs like “Wild World” – mainly for an audience of insiders. An agent that knew some of the top people at A&M worked hard to get one of his artists on to the bill as an opening act. Her name was Carly Simon, and even though she was quite prone to stage fright she managed to get on the bill, perform for the crowd and further her career.

This, of course, led to her releasing a string of hit records through the ‘70’s – the best known of which might just be “You’re So Vain”. Carly liked to work with top session musicians, like drummer Russ Kunkel, so for that recording she hired highly regarded back-up people (including an uncredited Mick Jagger on background vocals). There was one guy who she had her doubts about – the bass player. He had only taken up the instrument about a decade earlier so she was listening closely as he played the opening notes.

He absolutely nailed them. It was so good they kept her reaction on the final recording – that’s where “Son of a gun” comes from:


The bassist who pulled that off was named Klaus Voorman. Yes, he was the German lad who got in to a bit of an argument with his girlfriend, Astrid, back at the beginning of this post. He lost the girl but picked up the bass as a result. Yes, they did all remain close friends. And, yes, that argument was one where lots of people ended up winners.

So why today for this post?

Unfortunately, word has just come out that Astrid Kirchherr passed away in Germany this week “after a brief but serious illness”. Could’ve been Covid related, but it really doesn’t matter.

Rest in peace Astrid.

With all of us shut inside and, undoubtedly, having a few arguments – let’s hope we try to make them as productive as the one between you and Klaus 60 years ago. And thanks for the photos – they’re amazing.





 
Random Ramblings from the great lock down of 2020 – Part XXV – The Irish Hour
Many of these rambles have been musically themed, whether directly or tangentially, and this one will be as well.   I’m going to try to talk about “Irish” music, which is a concept about as hard to pin down as Donald Trump’s position on coronavirus (“It’s nothing that a little sunshine, some internal disinfectant, ultra-violet light and a minor miracle won’t solve.  If that’s not enough for you, I suggest you go ask CHINA”.).  For when I talk about “Irish” music I’m not (just) talking about traditional music like you’d hear in a pub session, or the updated Planxty type take on that.  Nor am I speaking alone of the wave of artists like Christy Moore or Paul Brady who have clear roots in that traditional sphere.  I suppose I am speaking of “Irish” music only as a concept rather than a true genre.  Whether something is Irish or not is much like the definition of pornography as set out by Justice Potter Stewart in one of the American Supreme Court’s most quoted decisions:
 
“I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description ["hard-core pornography"], and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I KNOW IT WHEN I SEE IT…”.
 
Sure we do. Of course – YOUR hardcore pornography (you prude) may be my Disney channel movie, while YOU, lurking over in the corner (you pervert) may deem acceptable the kind of thing that would make my innocent eyeballs melt.  Much the same applies to what constitutes Irish music.  Do you count the tin pan alley “Irish” standards like “Danny Boy”?  How do you classify the many types of “Irish” rock? Van Morrison might make the cut for some, but not for others.  In certain circles the Corrs’ first album qualifies but once they got to “Talk on Corners”, their second, – not so much.  Hey – let’s compare – I include a track called “Toss the Feathers” from their first album and “Breathless” from the second.  You decide.
 
 
 
(OK – that was mainly an excuse to look at videos of the Corrs.  RTE once broadcast a puppet show called “Podge and Rodge”, which was somewhat off color in the same way that the Cliffs of Moher are “somewhat steep”.  My most memorable moment from the show was when Podge was asked what his favorite sandwich was – “Andrea Corr, Me, Sharon Corr” was his quick answer.)
 
There are some calls that are easier to make.  The Pogue’s “Fairytale of New York” qualifies, while Ronan Keating’s version fits another definition of pornography/obscenity ("no socially redeeming value"). For others the call isn’t so easy.
 
So, the relative “Irishness” of music is a tough one to pin down.  I first became aware of the concept of “Irish Music” through my mother’s constant playing of the Clancy Brothers records and an album made by a group known as the “Irish Rovers”, a band made up of Irish ex-pats living in Canada.
 
The Clancy’s are, I believe, underrated, though when I was a kid growing up I would never have listed them on my top 1000 “must listen” groups.  They are certainly Irish but didn’t really come together as a group until they were all living in New York City.  There they fell in to a crowd of Greenwich Village folkies that grew to include such legends as Dave Van Ronk, and this guy, who had a few good things to say about them:
 
 
The other great source (in our house, anyway) of “Irish” music, was the aforementioned Canadian based music of a group of Irish ex-Pats, the Irish Rovers.  The Rovers had a single great hit, “The Unicorn” which purports to tell the tale of how unicorns were left by Noah to a watery grave because they forgot to set their watches to daylight savings time.
 
 
 
Now, let me state that there is no doubt whatsoever that the song is not of Irish origin.  In fact, it was written by the great Shel Silverstein, who, unless the lost tribe of Israel was hiding out in Galway for a spell, was not of Irish descent. Silverstein was one of those people who seems to pop up all over the place.  He also wrote “A Boy Named Sue”, which Johnny Cash turned in to a classic, “The Cover of the Rolling Stone” for Dr. Hook (along with “Sylvia’s Mother”), and the Country number one hit “Marie Laveau” for Bobby Bare.  The classic children’s book “The Giving Tree” was written and illustrated by Silverstein, who was also a well-known cartoonist (an example of his work is found below). 
 
 
 
How a Jewish-American writer/cartoonist penned a song about an invented antediluvian legend that ended up becoming a supposed Irish musical staple after being sung by a Canadian folk-group is a mystery right up there with “How the hell did Donald Trump ever become President?”.  Still – it happened and you can look it up:
 
 
Many Americans to this day consider “The Unicorn” to be their favorite “Irish” song of all time. Meanwhile, I have found that people in Ireland, (you know, “the Irish”) generally have never heard of the tune other than the occasional random encounter with a Yank who will break in to its chorus with an expectant grin of comradeship in this shared experience.  My wife, for example, has never gotten used to the fact that in any American bar where “Irish” music is played the highlight of the night will often be a roomful of people dancing around scratching under their arms at the mention of “chimpanzees” and poking each other in the eye when unicorns are brought up.  It is a truly bizarre custom that should be thoroughly enjoyed.
 
 
Forgetting unicorns for a moment (which, by the way, God SPECIFICALLY told Noah not to do) the Rovers album is actually very good – including a great version of Percy French’s “Bridget Flynn” and one of the best renditions I’ve ever heard of “The Black Velvet Band”.  The Clancy’s and Rovers provided my èntree to Irish music, though, as I say, one group was formed in New York City, and the other in Calgary, Canada.
 
There was another mode of introduction, one that included much “real” Irish music (as well as many tin pan alley hits) and that was a weekly radio program which my mother listened to religiously, every Sunday.  “The Irish Hour” was a local show hosted and produced by a guy who I will refer to only as “Jim” (because his name was Jim).  Here’s a bit of foreshadowing as to the production values associated with “The Irish Hour”.
 
It was 120 minutes long.
 
Now, you might expect that my sister and I, being of a generation that focussed more on Led Zeppelin and Bruce Springsteen than old style “Oirish” music, might have avoided the “Irish Hour” entirely, taking to our rooms or the outdoors.  Truthfully – we weren’t huge fans of the music, but we listened to the show with rapt attention each week, for Jim’s devotion to Irish music was matched only by his ineptitude as a radio producer/presenter.  It was guaranteed that at least once per show there would be some kind of gaffe committed that would leave us in gales of laughter.
 
These typically would fall in to two major categories – the first was that of technical screw ups, the sort of equipment failure that would evidence itself over the air, leading to unrestrained hilarity as the malfunction dragged on and on.  Putting a “skipping” record on air was a standard occurrence, where, for extended periods, the radio would broadcast:
 
“Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes, are – are- are –are – are – are…”
 
– leading to my father, in tears of laughter yelling “C’mon Jim – tell us what the damn pipes are doing…”
 
Then there was our personal favorite “technical difficulty”, where Jim would put a record on at the wrong speed, which would lead to such oddities as an upbeat version of “Carrickfergus” seemingly being sung by Mickey Mouse, or, if it was going the opposite way, Paul Robeson intoning a somber “Finnegan’s Wake”.
 
The other type of gaffe would be strictly one of presenter screw ups, such as Jim introducing one song, only to play something completely different.  This could lead to much hilarity as Jim would instruct the audience to “clap along with this great foot stomper, “The Wild Rover” from the Dubliner’s” only to have some other song, usually a slow ballad such as “A Bunch of Thyme” come out of the radio’s speakers.  This would be followed by hearing Jim fumble for the correct record while apologizing over the air and changing the song, usually to another incorrect cut and often at the wrong speed, granting his listeners a bonus blooper.
 
Jim struggled with the dedications for songs as well, often playing wildly inappropriate tunes in connection with a given event.  These were even funnier than the technical mishaps, but you would have to pay attention – and couldn’t always be sure if it was Jim’s fault or someone taking the Mick. The show would be going along swimmingly, when Jim would announce “This next one goes out from Paddy to Nancy, his bride of 20 years.  Nancy, Paddy says happy anniversary with a song that describes you well – this is “Easy & Slow” by the Dubliners”. 
 
Other classics would be along the lines of “The next song goes out to the newest member of our listenership, little Maggie O’Riordan who was christened yesterday in St. Paul’s church.  Welcome Maggie and this is the Wolfe Tones with “The Men Behind the Wire”.  After which sweet little Maggie would be ushered into the world to the strains of “Armoured cars and tanks and guns, came to take away our sons…”
 
But what I consider to be the all time Irish Hour classic moment was the following dedication, which I swear to God went out over the Springfield airwaves back in the ‘70’s (names have been changed to protect the innocent).  A solemn sounding Jim introduced a song to a dear, departed listener as follows:
 
“Our next dedication goes out to the family of long-time listener Gerry O’Toole, on this the fifth anniversary of his tragic passing.  Gerry was an avid follower of Irish music and this show.  So, in his honor we play one of his favorites “I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen” and to you Gerry, the best from all of us at the Irish Hour and” – (pause, as Jim pondered how to best close this touching remembrance of the late Gerry)…
 
“…GET WELL SOON”.
 
Ah, the healing powers of music.
 
I think my Dad was mid swallow of his lunch when that came through the speakers, and he damn near choked to death on his ham sandwich and joined poor Gerry right there and then.
 
Damn story never gets old.

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