oybay

[oybay]

Nov 22, 2024 Trading One Plague for Another

The current nominee for dismantling the health system in the US is a strong voice for reducing the use of unnecessary additives in food. One of the plans is to cut back on sugar in the general food supply with a focus on the complete removal of all sweetie temptations directed at children. Outlawing gummy bears is one of the proposals. This fairly reasonable sounding proposal – after all there…

[oybay]

Nov 15/24 Take a Breath Now

Each day becomes more of a challenge. I’m really trying to avoid the topic of the day for a couple of reasons. Firstly, this journal/blog/whatever you want to call it is supposed to be about the overlap of politics with CoVid – sometimes a little more one than the other. Secondly, in the deep days of the Trump/Vid intersection, I made it a practice to shut off the political podcasts and…

[oybay]

Nov 8, 2024 Gobsmacked

With a smidge of PTSD. The world is in denial right now as the eponymous figure for this blog has actually managed a comeback of tragic proportions. It has taken a few days to be able to actually mention it out loud – the shock has been deep and pervasive with the texture of cold sick. The recovery process will be a long one. Few current, tentative discussion of ‘the result’ include the felon…

[oybay]

November 2, 2024 Covid is still here but 7 Million People have exited through the COVID Gift Shop.

Or 14 million if you go by excess mortality (for 20/21) . The only errror factor is from countries that don’t keep/publish accurate death statistics. As the circus continues each year’s grim plague total will be added. The odd thing is there are more vaccine deniers now than ever before. It may be difficult to determine numbers of Covid anti-vaxxers (the claims of mind control, genetic…

[oybay]

September 8, 2023 F’Tang-F’Tang-Ole-Biscuit-Barrel

So if conspiracies and plagues go together like imaginary ham and real eggs, where are we now? There are some of the classics, of course. The rise of pandemics is because God is angry at: a) our sinful ways; b) the persistence in the belief in evolution and of course, c) so many folk embracing miscegenation Not much new about that. Of course there’s always the return of that perennial…

[oybay]

Evolution of conspiracy theories: what’s science got to do with it.

There is the tradition of conspiracy theories during plague times going all the way back to the Bronze Age. The easiest explanation is it’s a desperate attempt to find an answer to why cousin Bucketta went to bed humming a happy tune and woke up dead the next day. Followed rapidly into the hereafter by the rest of Bucketta’s family including the dog. The moon? A red sky at noon? An improperly…

[oybay]

May 1, 2023 Okay, it’s not for everybody…

Walking around these days everyone is pretty chill about the whole pandemic thing. In stores staff and customers wearing masks are definitely in the minority. More clerks stay masked because they are still in the respiratory droplet line of fire. Anyone who has worked with amounts of cash know money is literally filthy so it’s not a stretch to imagine the air around the people forking it over is…

[oybay]

April 20, 2023 What did I miss?

Sorry, got distracted by a great comet of life crashing into my world. Okay, maybe not a comet – more a matter of dealing with the pervasive fatigue attached to my ass like a helium filled boulder. I managed stitching some paragraphs together but they lack continuity. Sometimes within the paragraph. Anyway, I’m sure I can winkle out some meaning from them and maybe even piece together a few…

[oybay]

March 18, 2023 On the Other Hand

So, the Wuhan lab theory is now being pushed aside by cute pictures of raccoon dogs. Yep, I’ve never heard of them either but as a poster animal they’ve got bats beat. It is a critter that has been known in the past to play host to viruses capable of making the jump to people. Of course that doesn’t mean it happened in this case. Apparently some early samples of SARS-CoV-2 had trash panda puppy…

[oybay]

March 11, 2023 The Day The World Changed

3 years ago today, the W.H.O. officially declared the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak a pandemic. Let the denials and body counts begin. As previously noted, it seems like it was a lifetime ago and yesterday at the same time. It could be nicknamed COV-TARDIS SARS-2 because everyone has difficulty placing events that took place within 2 years of today’s anniversary. I know 2023 has only clocked 3 months…

[oybay]

March 7, 2023 Updates, personal mostly and some extrapolating

Let’s start with the anecdotal update: I had COVID and am now declared free of the sodding little….virus. This is almost 4 weeks out from the first positive test and consistently testing negative for weeks now. The interesting part is I felt well enough after 7 days to go out and about for a few hours at a time. The provincial guideline is it’s no longer necessary to isolate if symptoms are…

[oybay]

March 3, 2023 Haven’t We Moved Past This?

We now resume our regular plague journal because, contrary to popular opinion and behavior, the damn thing is thriving. Hospitalization numbers are up, fatalities still rolling along and, thanks to the new variants, vaccinations are more important than ever. The scary thing is it is still being used as a political football instead of a public health threat.We have politicians repeating bad…

[oybay]

March 1, 2023 Wear a Leek, Make Some Soup, Repel a Saxon

Today is St. David’s Day. Traditionally Welsh people around the western world wear a leek—yes, the veggie that looks like a green onion with a pituitary tumour. I’m not sure if it the tradition is still followed or if it’s become one of those commercial cultural appropriations like green everything on St. Patrick’s Day or hearts and expensive dinners on St. Valentine’s Day. On the other hand, if…

[oybay]

February 27, 2023 Now You’re Just Being a Pain in the Ass

Last week there was a protest in the emergency room at a local hospital. 5 people came in without masks and, even when offered one, refused. They weren’t there for any emergency assistance; just making a FB live vid cast to let the world know the good fight was still being fought in this corner of oppression that is the Canadian Medical system. It’s my assumption there was no medical emergency…

[oybay]

February 22, 2023 The Long and Winding Road

So I had my first official negative test yesterday. We’ve become so casual about it now, however, I’d been working for almost a week. Each test was getting fainter and fainter but a year ago it would be enough to keep the yellow plague cross painted on the door and a box on the top step where family could leave bread, beer and toilet paper. This is the beginning of the 3rd week since the virus…

[oybay]

February 20, 2023 Time

One of the common comments I’ve noticed from the people I talk to and people on various media is the difficulty in figuring out when something happened in the past 3 years. Even saying “3 years” seems strange because, technically it was 4 years since the virus was first noted. 4 years, however is just too long ago but 3 years seems like much less. As in “Wasn’t that last week?” “Nope. That…

[oybay]

February 17, 2023 How Did it Become a Choice?

It was inevitable. Members of the family have had COVID and a couple have had it two or three times. We seemed like the hold outs but it took a super spreader company dinner to finally break the record. Not any of my co-workers or the pre-school Petri dishes I deal with on a regular basis. Nope. It was the folk who work with my husband. After 3 years since the last Christmas/Festivus gathering…