Between the Equator and the South Pole
WormInTheGrass
Shipmate
in All Saints
A thread for all southerly shipmates to surf the Omicron wave.
Hopefully also some more enjoyable events in 2022.
Hopefully also some more enjoyable events in 2022.
Comments
Happy new year, one and all!
Piglet, AS host
The last few days have been really hot in some parts of the country with temperatures in the 30s, even Zappa may be thawing out, depending on where he is, Fortunately for me it's been a bit cooler here with 27C the hottest so far. Christchurch has a cool wind - referred to as The Beasterly Easterly in the winter, but in the summer I think it makes the place bearable, unlike the Nor' Wester which is a hot dry wind - a bit like the Mistral in France, I've been told.
[Obviously, that’s not in the same stress league as having a house or farm damaged by the fires]
We are also hunkering down as we desperately want to go to the Stanthorpe funeral of LKKspouse's cousin on the 11th.
It's back to grocery shopping at 0600 hours - and infrequently at that.
Only the 4th of January and I'm feeling as if I've had a month of 2022. Our Parliament buildings in Cape Town set alight in an arson attempt, the loss of 19th-century books and archives as well as artworks in the fire; great debates here about Archbishop Tutu's aquamation or 'green cremation' by alkaline hydrolysis; Omicron rates of infection slowing but still no booster injections available. Temperatures soaring and warnings of veld fires.
I'd settle for un uneventful January after this.
I had a weird experience today searching on-line for a recipe I had lost (Rum and Raisin Muffins). I tracked it down in a post I had made myself at least 10 years ago on Trade Me (NZ's version of ebay). At that time the young entrepreneur who founded TM included a Community board with various subjects where people could ask questions, or discuss various things. or comment. My favourite was Recipes, because after my mother died there wasn't anyone I could ask those niggly questions that the actual recipe doesn't answer, but a more experienced cook can answer in two minutes. Someone else originally posted the recipe and I successfully baked it, so I added it to my Christmas baking list.
Then Trade Me was sold and the new owners got rid of the Community boards and I lost the recipe. Today I decided to see if the recipe had been shared elsewhere, and it had. Parallel to TM someone had copied all the recipes that had been shared and I found it on their now defunct site. It was strange coming across the name I used on TM writing out a recipe I really wanted. I had searched before, but I may have been using Bing which is the most useless search engine in the entire Galaxy - at least for NZ info.
I thought of you immediately on hearing that news yesterday morning
Médicins sans Frontières (doctors without borders)
I was excoriated on the Covid thread here on the ship for getting a booster (third) vaccination back in October, despite being incurably ill and immuno-conpromised for the last 3 1 /2 years.
Watch out for reactions, Huia
I so hope there's no negativity of that kind again, @Galilit. Anyone (yourself , Huia and everyone else) able to get a booster must get one asap. The issue of Western governments or multinational companies sharing vaccines and boosters is another issue.
I'm surprised @Galilit - most of us Brits are fully vaccinated and boostered - my booster was early December and my daughter was squeezed in a couple of days before Christmas as part of the big drive to get everyone boostered by the end of the year. My booster was 6 months after my second vaccine, my daughter's was 4 months gap.
I hope your arm is feeling better today rhubarb.
I'm going to check whether my usual medical centre is amongst those offering the booster. Yesterday I had a bad experience at the supermarket because I had forgotten that particular chain offer a whopping 5% off groceries to people with a Gold card ( over 65) on the first Tuesday of the month. The place was absolutely seething with people. I found it incredibly stressful. I actually told a bloke in the checkout queue that I found his lack of social distancing unhelpful. For me it wasn't so much the COVID possibility ( though of course that factored in), but I found the lack of personal space intimidating. I want to avoid anywhere where there are a lot of people in a confined space.
*'Just Another +Friendly Aucklander' or +supply adjective of your choice.
Still vigilant…
Cool. I've heard of this, but never heard of anyone having it done. It would be hard for His Grace to go higher in my estimation than he already was, but he just managed it.
Yeah - walking down the street is in general not really an issue (shoulder to shoulder in crowded high streets perhaps). You can reasonably think of Covid as any other pollutant, and the same responses are appropriate - minimize the time for which you are potentially exposed (don't hang about in the shops - get in and out), maximize the dilution (open the windows on the bus), maximize distance from the source (other people) and have everyone masked, which mostly reduces the source.
Don't dwell too much on how long you've been exposed to any single individual - that doesn't really matter. It's total person-hour contact that matters. If there are some people with Covid in the community, and you don't know who they are, then your average risks are identical whether you spend one minute with each of 100 people, or 100 minutes with one person.
I had my booster shot on Wednesday in a small pharmacy in town, so I have avoided queues and mass vaccination events (shudder).
We were in / on The Sides of the North (I didn't slip back to St. Triangles', which is a sad schemozzle these days) and I was thawing out with long (10+km) walks in the sun. Wew're back in frozen Te Wai Pounamu now
These are rough figures only as they are those for Picton and Bluff - so don't use them if you're intend circumnavigation or you could run aground at Farewell Spit.😯🙄
Zappa and I have occasionally had genial discussions about the optimal degree of latitude; mine would be anything above about 55°, and his ... wouldn't.
I think I discovered that about 15 - 0 degrees from the equator is my optimum. Beyond 15 and you start getting into that silly winter nonsense. And those other seasons. Reprehensible.
Whereas I'd not want to be any nearer the equator than I am at 50 something North. I don't hold with hot weather (>24C)
It’s nearly 8 am here and 24; pleasantly cool. Mind you 23 overnight requires a fan if no aircon.
But further north in that state is worse, with the record held by a small mining town called Marble Bar, where they once had 180 consecutive days (i.e. 6 months) where the max exceeded 40 degrees. And that was in the days before air conditioning! The story goes that one old-timer died and went to Hell, where he promptly asked the Devil for an overcoat.
19 latitude does not have winter. Some locals might say otherwise, wrapped up in beanies and woollens at about 20 degrees in July (usually at around 5am) but all we have is summer, very summer and very very summer. I think you’d cope, Zappa.
Lovely day here. Expected maximum temperature 20c.😍
Meanwhile, 3 yo grandson has put his family in isolation, as everyone at his childcare centre has been deemed to be close contacts. They're still awaiting test results, so I delivered some key foodstuffs to their doorstep this morning.
We ( and our patients)need this like a hole in the head…