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fatehbaz · 4 years

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In Indigenous lands where nuclear weapons testing took place during the Cold War and the legacy of uranium mining persists, Indigenous people are suffering from a double whammy of long-term illnesses from radiation exposure and the C0VID-19 p@ndemic. Yet, we have not witnessed in the mainstream media and policy outlets a frank discussion of how the two public health crises have created an intractable situation for Indigenous communities. The Diné are drinking poisoned water, putting them at risk for more severe coronavirus infections.

From 1944 until 1986, 30 million tons of uranium ore was extracted on Navajo lands. At present, there are more than 520 abandoned uranium mines, which for the Diné represents both their nuclear past as well as their radioactive present in the form of elevated levels of radiation in nearby homes and water sources. Due to over four decades of uranium mining that supplied the US government and industry for nuclear weapons and energy, radiation illnesses characterize everyday Diné life. [...]

The nonprofit Navajo Water Project says the Diné are 67 times more likely to be without running water or a toilet connected to sewer lines than others in the United States. As a result, many are forced to drive or even walk several miles to the nearest communal water station. Some instead get water from an unregulated source, like a livestock trough. But research shows uranium mining may have contaminated many wells on the reservation. A large portion of the area’s groundwater has been contaminated with uranium as well as other mining by-products like arsenic that were mobilized by the mining operations, according to researchers who presented their findings at a 2019 American Chemical Society conference. [...]

According to a 2019 report by the environmental groups U.S. Water Alliance and DigDeep about access to water, the number of cases for gastric cancers doubled in the 1990s in the Diné areas where uranium mining had taken place. [...]

In a study published last August in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, researchers found a relatively high percentage of households on Native American reservations lacked complete indoor plumbing. While only 0.4 percent of homes in the United States lacked indoor plumbing, on Indigenous reservations that number was 1.09 percent. For the Navajo Nation, it was 18 percent. [...]

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The Diné have paid a heavy toll during the pandemic.

According to the Navajo Times, there had been at least 27,887 reported positive cases of COVID-19 on the Navajo Nation by late January, including 989 deaths. [...]

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The Navajo Nation Council banned uranium mining under the Diné Natural Resources Protection Act of 2005, but much of the mining contamination remains. While the Environmental Protection Agency says that $1.7 billion has been secured through legal settlements with mining companies and other agreements dating back to at least 2014 for cleanup at 219 of the 523 abandoned uranium mines on the Navajo Nation, the Diné say little of the work has been completed. “The biggest thing is that out of the $1.7 billion dollars I think the total amount that has been spent as of today is $116 million on studies. … Out of the 219 that were funded, not one site is 100 percent ready to be cleaned up,” Navajo Council speaker Seth Damon said last year, according to the Navajo Times. The newspaper reported that the Environmental Protection Agency hopes to begin cleaning up the sites by 2024.

Indigenous organizations are doing a tremendous amount of work to address radiation poisoning and water scarcity in the Diné community. These include the Red Water Pond Road Community Association where activists like Terry Keyanna are fighting for environmental justice every day. The Navajo Water Project, a section of the larger non-profit DigDeep, is doing valuable work to address the lack of access to clean water in the Diné community. Since last March, Gavin Noyes and Woody Lee at Utah Diné Bikeyah have provided food and supplies to more than 800 homes, and delivered “175,000 gallons of new water storage capacity to over 600 families without water.” The Navajo and Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund is another grassroots organization, started with a GoFundMe page created by former Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch that raises money for two weeks’ worth of food for Diné and Hopi families in self-quarantine. Their work is a pivotal lifeline in pandemic times.

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Headline, images, captions, and text published by: Jayita Sarkar and Caitlin Meyer. “Radiation illnesses and COVID-19 in the Navajo Nation.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. 3 February 2021.

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forsetti · 5 years

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On The Myth of American Individualism

In light of people completely, and sometimes arrogantly, defying public health recommendations to address a pandemic in the name of “Freedom” and “American Individualism, I thought I'd repost this article I wrote in 2012.

Recently, New York Times resident hack pundit, David Brooks, wrote an article arguing that Republicans are the party that “celebrates work and inflames enterprise”. The GOP come from a long lineage of hard working, God fearing individualists that can be traced back through American history from Mitt Romney to the first Pilgrim who stood, buckled shoed, atop Plymouth Rock. Here are his opening two paragraphs: “The American colonies were first settled by Protestant dissenters. These were people who refused to submit to the established religious authorities. They sought personal relationships with God. They moved to the frontier when life got too confining. They created an American creed, built, as the sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset put it, around liberty, individualism, equal opportunity, populism and laissez-faire.

This creed shaped America and evolved with the decades. Starting in the mid-20th century, there was a Southern and Western version of it, formed by ranching Republicans like Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. Their version drew on the traditional tenets: ordinary people are capable of greatness; individuals have the power to shape their destinies; they should be given maximum freedom to do so.”

For Brooks, America was built by hard working people who cowered from a smiting God, lived like Ted Kaczynski , didn’t accept handouts and loved the soft reach around from the Invisible Hand. From this great tradition sprouted great men who were the salt of the earth, ordinary men who lived off the fruits of the sweat of their brow. People like Mitt Romney and George W. Bush, two men who grew up in luxury, went to topflight prep schools and colleges, were able to walk into business with a long list of powerful, influential people already in their contact lists and didn’t fuck up and when they did, had other doors and opportunities open for them because of who they are and who they knew. I highly doubt that John Q. Colonialist could get a government bailout to safe his business (Romney) or have one failed business after another yet have people willing to throw money and opportunities at you over and over again (Bush).

On the claim that Republicans are the party of work and this tradition has been passed down from John Smith and Patrick Henry to Laura Ingalls Wilder and Belle Starr, I call “Bullshit!” This country was discovered, settled, expanded, progressed and rose to the world’s greatest economic power because of the community, not the individual. This love affair and worship of individualism in America is not based on its history or facts. It is a complete myth. A myth that has become a fundamental underlying principle of today’s Republican Party. A myth, that Jim Jones-like devotion to has resulted in horrible, often progress stifling, policies. It is an even more deeply rooted myth in conservative lore than Ronald Reagan being a tax cutting, small government, hard line hawk.

The first wave of immigrants that came to America came for economic, not religious reasons and they didn’t migrate to our shores to frolic in the Fountain of Laissez-Faire. They were employees, mostly indentured servants, of major trading companies who sent them here to harvest resources like timber and furs. They were “company men”, not individuals who were looking to forge a new life by braving the elements or testing their mettle. The manner in which they worked and lived was communal.

The next wave of people coming to America was the religious immigrants. For Brooks, this meant the hardworking, God fearing Protestants who sired America’s work ethic, loved the eight pound, six ounce baby Jesus and who planted the love and respect of individualism into the country’s psyche where it grew and flourished for three hundred plus years and can now be seen in the standard bearers for the Republican Party. Unfortunately, “There goes another wonderful theory about to be brutally murdered by a gang of facts.” (author unknown).

There certainly were groups of very devoutly religious people who came to America during this time. However, what Brooks conveniently omits are the multitude of the other groups that also made their way across the Atlantic to avoid the religious persecutions and heavy handed dogma in Europe. Atheists, Deists, Agnostics, etc., left Europe for the New World because of the religious environment in Europe. Being part of the religious wave didn’t mean you were religious, it meant you left because of religion. There were just as many, if not more, non-religious, non-fundamentalist immigrants to America during this period than the “Forebears of Freedom and Republican/American Greatness” as Brooks would have it. This group played as much a role in America’s formation as a country and culture, if not more, than the Puritans or Quakers. Some of the non-religious people who played a bit part in the formation of America include: Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Benjamin Franklin, Adam Smith…

The fundamentally religious in early American history was not the dominant group and it was not individualists. They in fact were the opposite. They were communal socialists. In order to afford ship passage to America they often pooled their money together to ensure they could travel as a group. They formed settlements where they helped build each other’s homes, businesses and defenses. They had community storages and would mete out food and other resources as necessary. They didn’t cut off someone who was sick. Instead they would get together and, as a group, figure out the best way to address this or any other problem. What they didn’t do is as they were ascending the gangplank of the Mayflower wave to each other and say “Good luck! Maybe I’ll see you around.” They stayed together, worked together and helped each other. They didn’t abandon the sick and weak or withhold food or shelter. If you want to see the modern day version and descendants of the early religious settlers to America, visit the Amish community in Ontario Ohio or Lancaster Pennsylvania. The Amish, Mennonites and similar groups have been the ones to continue the traditions of the early settlers. One word that is never used in describing these groups or their members is ‘individualism’.

Not to mention that there were a lot of other settlers in the early America who were not the Protestant, white New Englanders yet had just as much impact on society and culture then and now. The Spain heavily influenced Florida, California and the American Southwest. France’s influence was felt all along the Mississippi River and Great Lakes areas. To ignore or deny these groups’ impact on American culture in favor of a tiny sliver of white, New England Protestants, is intellectually dishonest. Brooks takes a sliver of early America, ascribes general characteristics to it that were not true and then claims these traits are what made this country great.

Let’s fast forward a dozen score years or so to the early 1800’s and visit another group of people touted as the champions of The American Spirit of Individualism-The Pioneers. You know the salt of the earth, lovers of capitalism and all things holy, the people who settled the West and spread the seeds of rugged individualism like they were John Holmes at Burning Man. According to people like Brooks, the Pioneers were the hardworking, Bible toting, individualist progeny of John Smith, William Bradford and Adam Smith. Again I call “Bullshit!” Hardworking? Absolutely. It was pretty difficult to not have to work hard to survive during this time unless you were filthy rich. The technology at the time was better than it was in colonial times but it still wasn’t good enough to diminish the day-to-day demands of life in the 1800’s. Individualists? Hell no! I don’t even know where this idea came from. Even the most cursory look at this era shows quite the contrary.

Remember the stories and pictures of the Pioneers moving across the Great Plains along the Oregon Trail? Did they make this trek one wagon at a time, as individuals? No. There is a reason they were called wagon trains because they moved as groups. When they arrived at their intended destinations did they head off in different directions and go all Jeremiah Johnson? No. They either joined settlements already in progress or started their own, as a group. They moved as a group, built communities as a group, defended their properties and families as a group… I come from Pioneer stock. My genealogy tree has a branch that goes back directly to Brigham Young (of course with 56 kids from 16 of his 55 wives, you can’t swing a dead cat along the Wasatch Range of Utah without hitting someone who is related to Brigham). Every single aspect of Mormon history, from moving to and building up Nauvoo Illinois, to crossing the prairie, to Brigham leading the faithful into the Salt Lake Valley through Emigration Canyon and pronouncing “This is the place”, to building Salt Lake City was a group, not an individual activity. It was so communal and such a collective effort that Marx and Engels would have been “Whoa, lighten up a bit, let a brother get some alone time.”

One argument against my take is-“These groups had to band together for pragmatic reasons. There were extenuating circumstances and variables that forced them to operate as a group in order to survive.” My response to this critique is-“Yeah. Your point being what?” Either working together, spreading out risks and rewards works and yields positive results or it doesn’t. What the reasons are for doing so are irrelevant. It doesn’t and shouldn’t matter what the reasons are for opting for the group versus the individual approach. I fail to see how changing the reasons either changes the efficacy or the results. Another way of looking at it is to ask the question, “Do you think they could have achieved the same results via the individualism route?” There doesn’t seem to be any historical evidence to support that they could. I’m skeptical that the Pioneers didn’t know how to deal with the big issues they faced and followed the community approach to problem solving out of ignorance, stupidity or tradition. If you think they could have achieved the same or better results by acting as individuals, I would need to see some evidentiary support to back up this position.

The next defense of individualism is along the lines-“That was then, this in now. The world has changed so the need for the community approach has diminished in importance and has been replaced with the superior, individualism approach.” There are two main problems with this argument. First, Brooks and the defenders of individualism are not saying, “The community approach WAS the driving force behind early American exceptionalism but now it is the individual.” The view they hold to be innately true is that it WAS individualism that made America great. Individualism brought to this country by God fearing, religious freedom seeking, hardworking Europeans, passed down through the generations or absorbed by some sort of osmosis where the trait, like blond hair to Scandinavians, is dominant in conservatives. Brooks and company might admit that the community approach played a role, just not THE role in making America great. It was individualism that built that. Uh......., no.

Second, the “but the circumstances have changed and the individual plays a fundamentally more important rule” argument is also bullshit. Certainly the nature of the problems have changed. We don’t typically worry about packs of wolves, marauding Indians, small pox, the plague, dysentery, being snowed in an unable to get food for weeks in today’s society. We live in a much more technologically advanced world where these types of problems have adequately been addressed and dealt with. When it comes to many of the problems and situations that faced the early settlers, we will never face them. Why? Because are Founders and those that came after them, as communities, found solutions to those problems. But, just because those problems either don’t exist or are rare does not mean that we currently are sans problems. With the advancement of technologies, the world has expanded where people are not limited to living in a small area of the world most of their lives, where commerce and ideas travel around the world at an unbelievable speed. We’ve gone from regional to a world economy. While the small, regional problems of the past have been handled, there are larger often global problems that need our attention. I don’t see how, if individualism couldn’t properly deal with the small, regional problems, it can possibly take care of larger ones. If anything, the larger problems need a larger community.

Imagine a small town in Nebraska in the late 1800’s whose local bank is having a cash flow problem. The town needs the bank so they come together and as a group, deposit enough money to keep the bank going. Fast forward to September 2008 where the large banks and financial institutions in the U.S. who have branches across the country and all over the world and also have deep, financial ties to other countries’ banks. They have a serious cash flow problem. One of these banks was Bank of America. Imagine the B of A branch in Minden Nebraska, population 3000. It doesn’t matter how community minded and organized the kind citizens of Minden are, nothing they do can safe their local bank from collapse because it belongs to a much larger entity. So, in order to address the problem, the definition of community needs to expand. The financial problem was nationwide so it took the entire nation to adequately address the U.S. banking problem. The global financial problem took the global community to address and fix it. It is not that individuals have not made significant contributions but outside the arts, very few have had a big impact on the economy or culture of America. What makes America great and the advantage we have over just about every other country is our diversity. Homogeneous societies can accomplish a lot and often quickly because as a group, they think pretty much alike. Their greatest limitation is thinking outside their cultural box. America, with its wide diversity of cultures always has voices outside the box providing input. This is a major force behind our innovations and progress the past couple of hundred years.

Name a major economic event in America’s history that was the result of individualism. There might be some but the majority are ones undertaken by either groups or the government (group) for the betterment of its citizens (huge group). Louisiana Purchase, Seward’s Folly, Transcontinental Railroad, Interstate Highway System, Tennessee Valley Authority, Space Race, WWII, GI Bill, Erie Canal, St. Lawrence Seaway, Panama Canal, Hoover Dam…all were paid for by the group, built by groups and benifitted groups of the population.

Individuals who have been put on the pedestal of individualism didn’t accomplish what they did by themselves. Edison is thought to be one of America’s greatest inventors (Tesla was much better but Edison was a better marketer). Growing up, the image of Edison was him laboring long, arduous hours by himself in is laboratory. The reality is he had a very large team of some of the world’s top people working in his lab in Menlo Park and was heavily funded.

Individualism is important and certainly has played a role in America’s rise to power. But, individualism didn’t have the starring role in “Making America Great”. That role was played by a cast of thousands. Individualism was a bit player whose name wouldn’t come up in the end credits until half the audience had already left the theater.

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techcrunchappcom · 4 years

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New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/covid-19-news-live-updates-on-vaccines-variants-and-global-cases/

Covid-19 News: Live Updates on Vaccines, Variants and Global Cases

Here’s what you need to know:

Vaccines were still being administered on Thursday at a community center in the Bronx.Credit…James Estrin/The New York Times

With vast swaths of the United States pelted by heavy winter storms that brought Covid-19 vaccinations to a near-halt over the past week, health officials say a daunting task has become even more difficult.

But not impossible.

“We’re going to just have to make up for it: namely do double time when this thing clears up,” declared Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, a top pandemic adviser to President Biden.

Jennifer Psaki, the White House press secretary, said the Biden administration was working closely with manufacturing and shipping partners to assess weather conditions, and would have more updates on delivery issues on Friday.

The brutal winter weather delayed the delivery of hundreds of thousands of doses across the country just as vaccine distribution was beginning to gather steam in the United States. Part of the problems is that the storms affected a FedEx facility in Memphis and a UPS facility in Louisville, Ky. — both vaccine shipping hubs.

Shipment delays have been reported in California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, Utah and Washington, among other states, forcing vaccine sites to temporarily shutter and coveted appointments to be rescheduled.

In Texas, where millions of residents lost power during the powerful storm, a delivery of more than 400,000 first doses and 330,000 second doses was delayed. A portion of those shots, roughly 35,000 doses of Pfizer’s vaccine, were sent to North Texas providers on Wednesday, but shipments will continue to depend on safety conditions.

Chris Van Deusen, a spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services, said on Thursday that the state was “asking providers that aren’t able to store vaccine due to power outages to transfer it elsewhere or administer it so it doesn’t spoil.”

On Monday, health officials in Texas scrambled to give people more than 5,000 doses after a power outage in a storage facility where they were being kept. But Mr. Van Deusen said that “reports of vaccine spoiling have been minimal.”

The Houston Health Department said on Thursday it would restart vaccinations for second doses this weekend and schedule additional first- and second-dose appointments next week. The Federal Emergency Management Agency said that more than 2,000 vaccine sites were in areas with power outages.

In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a news conference that “a vast majority of the resupply” the city was expecting for this week had not yet shipped from the factories.

The city has had to hold off on scheduling upward of 35,000 appointments for first vaccine doses because of shipment delays and vaccine shortages. The opening of two new distribution sites was also postponed.

In Los Angeles, the city said that appointments for about 12,500 would be delayed.

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida said that while 136,000 Pfizer doses had arrived this week, the state had not received its shipment for the week of 200,000 Moderna doses. He said the shipment could be delayed as late as Monday.

“Because the storms we are seeing in the rest of the country, it’s basically sitting in the FedEx warehouse — and I don’t think they can even get into it because of everything,” Mr. DeSantis said at a news conference, encouraging those who had appointments rescheduled to “hang in there, the doses are going to get here.”

Dr. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, called the weather delay “significant.”

“Obviously it’s an issue,” he told MSNBC on Thursday. “It’s been slowed down in some places, going to a grinding halt.”

Dr. Fauci said, “We’re just going to have to make up for it as soon as the weather lifts a bit, the ice melts and we can get the trucks out and the people out.”

As of Thursday, the C.D.C. said that about 41 million people had received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, including about 16.2 million people who have been fully vaccinated.

United States › United StatesOn Feb. 18 14-day change New cases 71,874 –44% New deaths 2,620 –39%

World › WorldOn Feb. 18 14-day change New cases 405,130 –24% New deaths 11,497 –17%

U.S. vaccinations ›

After taking office, President Biden directed federal agencies to come up with “a framework for donating surplus vaccines, once there is sufficient supply in the United States, to countries in need.”Credit…Oliver Contreras for The New York Times

An international effort to speed up the manufacture and distribution of coronavirus vaccines around the globe got a boost Thursday on two fronts: White House officials said the Biden administration would make good on a U.S. promise to donate $4 billion to the campaign over the next two years and the pharmaceutical company Novavax committed to eventually sell 1.1 billion doses of its vaccine.

President Biden will make his announcement on Friday during a virtual meeting with other leaders from the Group of 7, where he is also expected to call on other countries to step up their contributions. The $4 billion was approved last year by a Republican-led Senate when President Donald J. Trump was still in office.

Public health experts often say that unless everyone is vaccinated, it is as if no one is vaccinated. One of the officials, who spoke anonymously to preview the president’s announcement, noted that the move to help with efforts abroad to diminish the impact of the pandemic was also in the interest of international security for the United States.

Countries such as India and China are already using the coronavirus vaccine as a diplomatic tool; both are giving away doses to other nations in an effort to expand their global influence. National security experts said the United States should consider doing the same.

But, an official said, the United States will not be able to share vaccines now, while the American vaccination campaign is still continuing to expand.

The international vaccine effort, known as Covax, has been led by the public-private health partnership known as Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, as well as the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the World Health Organization. It aims to distribute vaccines that have been deemed safe and effective by the W.H.O., with a special emphasis on low- and middle-income countries.

So far, the United States has pledged more than any other nation, according to the White House. Officials there said the money would be delivered in multiple tranches: an initial donation of $500 million right away, followed shortly by an additional $1.5 billion. The remaining $2 billion will delivered by the end of 2022

The Novavax sale will not come immediately; its vaccine has not yet been approved by a government regulatory authority. [An earlier version of this article incorrectly described the company’s planned action as a donation, not a sale.]

Under a memorandum of understanding between Gavi and Novavax, the company agreed to provide “1.1 billion cumulative doses,” though it did not specify a time frame.

Mr. Biden was not the only G-7 member urging greater contribution to the global vaccination effort. President Emmanuel Macron of France said the United States and Europe should allocate up to 5 percent of their vaccine orders to developing countries.

“We are allowing the idea to take hold that hundreds of millions of vaccines are being given in rich countries and that we are not starting in poor countries,” Mr. Macron said in an interview with The Financial Times.

António Guterres, the United Nations Secretary General, also offered choice words for what he described as a “wildly uneven and unfair” distribution of vaccines. In a high-level meeting of the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday, Mr. Guterres called vaccine equity “the biggest moral test before the global community.”

He called on G-7 countries to “create the momentum to mobilize the necessary financial resources” at their Friday meeting.

Syed Hussain, 14, serving food at his father’s restaurant in Queens on Wednesday.Credit…Victor J. Blue for The New York Times

In the few days since indoor dining resumed in New York City, customers appeared to be trickling in, but usually in modest numbers, and interviews with owners, workers and industry experts suggested that many people were still leery of being inside.

Industry experts also say that allowing restaurants to open their doors to patrons at 25 percent capacity is unlikely to significantly reverse the economic damage that the pandemic has inflicted.

Thousands of New York’s 25,000 restaurants, bars and nightclubs have closed for good. Many others are barely holding on. They are way behind on rent, furloughing or laying off workers and making a fraction of their usual revenues.

The restaurant industry, one of the city’s most vital economic pillars, once employed 325,000 people. It has shed more than 140,000 jobs.

A survey by the New York City Hospitality Alliance, an industry group, found that 92 percent of restaurants reported being unable to afford their rent in December, up from 80 percent in June.

“We have been the eye of this crisis,” said Andrew Rigie, the alliance’s executive director. “When Covid-19 hit, we were told to socially distance, but restaurants are where we come together to socialize. Restaurants are part of not only the economic foundation, but also the social and cultural fabric of New York City.”

The return of indoor dining has renewed public health concerns after a post-holiday spike in infection rates across the city, the emergence of new virus variants and limited vaccine supplies.

W. Ian Lipkin, a professor of epidemiology at Columbia University, said he would still be cautious about where he dined indoors, despite having been vaccinated. He said he would choose only restaurants that took appropriate safety measures, including spacing tables at least six feet apart, maintaining adequate air flow, installing high-quality air filters and requiring servers to wear masks and gloves.

Not even the draw of a warm seat in the frigid winter could bring some diners inside.

“I’m still not ready to do indoor dining,” said Jennifer Brehm, 37, a teacher who huddled with her 8-month-old daughter, Cassia, at an outdoor cabana at Queen Bar & Restaurant in Brooklyn, noting that Cassia “can’t wear a mask yet.”

Ms. Brehm said she was concerned about new virus variants and had been following the vaccinate efforts. “Until it seems more under control,” she said of local virus caseload, “I won’t be ready to eat indoors.”

The day before Thanksgiving last year at a nearly empty LaGuardia Airport in New York City.Credit…Jonah Markowitz for The New York Times

Air travel has recovered somewhat in recent months, but it remains deeply depressed compared with 2019, and no one knows when business will return to previous levels.

Now and for the next several months at least, airlines are flying whomever they can wherever they can. That often means catering to a small group of people who are undeterred by the pandemic to travel to ski slopes or beaches.

“As a quick strategy, fly where people are,” said Ben Baldanza, a former chief executive of Spirit Airlines, the low-cost carrier. “That’s been a real smart strategy, but that’s not a long-term way for those airlines to make money.”

Such leisure travel offers limited comfort to an industry so thoroughly clobbered. Tourists and people visiting family and friends typically take up most of the seats on planes, but airlines rely disproportionately on revenue from corporate travelers in the front of the cabin.

Before the pandemic, business travel accounted for about 30 percent of trips but 40 to 50 percent of passenger revenue, according to Airlines for America, an industry association. And those customers aren’t expected to return in great numbers anytime soon.

The four largest U.S. airlines — American, Delta, United and Southwest — lost more than $31 billion last year, and the industry over all is shedding more than $150 million each day, according to an estimate from Airlines for America.

The industry spent much of the past year scrimping and saving, trimming older, less efficient planes from their fleets; renegotiating contracts; and encouraging tens of thousands of workers to take buyouts or early retirement packages.

But it hasn’t been enough to offset a drop of nearly two-thirds in air travel as public health experts and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continue to discourage travel. Airlines for America does not expect passenger numbers to return to 2019 levels until at least 2023. And airlines might have to wait even longer if the economic recovery falters because of the spread of coronavirus variants or a delay in vaccinations.

Some experts say that corporate travel may never return to peak levels, with many in-person meetings replaced by video conferences and phone calls.

Airlines are more hopeful, perhaps because they rely heavily on corporate travel.

Ed Bastian, Delta’s chief executive, said on a conference call last month that about 40 percent of Delta’s big corporate customers expected their business travel to be fully recovered by 2022, and an additional 11 percent by 2023. Citing the airline’s internal research, he said 7 percent expected that business travel might never be fully restored, while the rest said they were unsure when things would return to previous levels.

American is “very optimistic” that corporate travel will return as vaccines are distributed, Vasu Raja, the airline’s chief revenue officer, told investors and reporters last month. But, he added, “the rate of that is unclear at best.”

Waiting for passengers arriving on international flights before getting transported to their place of quarantine, at Suvarnabhumi Airport in Thailand in November.Credit…Diego Azubel/EPA, via Shutterstock

BANGKOK — Once again, a Thailand hotel guest who posted complaints online faces the threat of a defamation charge. This time, it centers on the guest’s claim of cockroach legs in his macaroni.

Topp Dunyawit Phadungsaeng, who spent 14 days in coronavirus quarantine at the Ambassador City Jomtien Hotel after arriving last month from San Francisco, had plenty of time on his hands to record complaints about the quality of the food, the lack of cleanliness and the presence of bugs.

On Monday, after checking out, he posted on Facebook about his stay, including 46 photographs and four videos that he took of the hotel, a government-designated quarantine facility. His posts were widely shared, especially a photo of what he said were the legs of a cockroach in his stir-fried meal.

“It turned out to be the worst 14 days of my life,” he said in his post. “Don’t call this quarantine. A forced prison stay looks better than this.”

His complaints were widely picked up by the Thai news media. And a day after his post appeared, the hotel issued a statement calling on a “certain group of people” to stop posting “false information” with the intent of damaging the hotel’s reputation. Otherwise, the hotel said, it had the right to pursue civil and criminal charges “to the utmost.”

Because of the coronavirus, anyone coming to Thailand must spend 14 days in quarantine. The government will cover the cost of some hotels, including the Ambassador City Jomtien, which is near Pattaya city. Guests can pay to stay at higher-end hotels, including some with five stars, that are designated quarantine sites.

Mr. Topp said he regretted not paying for better lodging. Among his complaints were that his room had no Wi-Fi but plenty of mosquitoes and cockroaches. Water dripped from the ceiling, bedsheets were moldy, and he was served food that was sometimes inedible, he said.

“I didn’t expect it to be a luxury five-star hotel,” he wrote. “But have you ever been disappointed despite not having any expectations?”

In September, an American hotel guest was arrested and charged with criminal defamation after posting complaints on TripAdvisor about his stay at the Sea View Koh Chang resort on Koh Chang island.

The guest, Wesley Barnes, eventually made a formal apology in exchange for the hotel’s dropping the charges. But the Sea View’s strategy backfired. It was widely criticized on social media, and TripAdvisor posted a notice warning travelers that the hotel was behind the jailing of a guest for harsh reviews.

A spokesman for the defense ministry, which has a role in overseeing quarantine facilities, said he hoped Mr. Topp and the Ambassador City Jomtien Hotel resolve their difference.

“In this case, it is the right of the reviewer,” said the spokesman, Kongcheep Tantravanich, “but we would also ask for sympathy for the hotel owners.”

Fran GoldmanCredit…Ruth Goldman, via Associated Press

To get her coronavirus vaccination last weekend, Frances H. Goldman, 90, went to an extraordinary length: six miles. On foot.

It was too snowy to drive at 8 a.m. on Sunday when Ms. Goldman took out her hiking poles, dusted off her snow boots and started out from her home in the Seattle neighborhood of View Ridge. She made her way to the Burke-Gilman Trail on the edge of the city, where she then wended her way alongside a set of old railroad tracks, heading south. Then she traversed the residential streets of Laurelhurst to reach the Seattle Children’s Hospital.

It was a quiet walk, Ms. Goldman said. People were scarce. She caught glimpses of Lake Washington through falling snow. It would have been more difficult, she said, had she not gotten a bad hip replaced last year.

At the hospital, about three miles and an hour from home, she got the jab. Then she bundled up again and walked back the way she had come.

It was an extraordinary effort — but that was not the extent of it. Ms. Goldman, who became eligible for a vaccine last month, had already tried everything she could think of to secure an appointment. She had made repeated phone calls and fruitless visits to the websites of local pharmacies, hospitals and government health departments. She enlisted a daughter in New York and a friend in Arizona to help her find an appointment.

Finally, on Friday, a visit to the Seattle Children’s Hospital website yielded results.

“Lo and behold, a whole list of times popped up,” she said in a phone interview on Wednesday. “I couldn’t believe my eyes. I went and got my glasses to make sure I was seeing it right.”

Then came the snow, which would ultimately drop more than 10 inches, in one of Seattle’s snowiest weekends on record. Wary of driving on hilly, unplowed roads, Ms. Goldman decided to go to the hospital on foot. She took a test walk part of the way on Saturday to get a sense of how long the trip might take.

And on Sunday, she trekked all the way to the hospital to get her vaccine.

“I hope that it will inspire people to get their shots,” she said. “I think it’s important for the whole country.”

The rollout in Washington State, like many around the country, has been complicated by failures of technology, shortfalls in equity and a persistent imbalance of supply and demand. State officials have struggled to set up the infrastructure necessary to schedule and vaccinate the millions of people who are already eligible.

Ms. Goldman is scheduled to receive her second dose of the vaccine next month. She plans to drive.

Arriving to get vaccinated at the Maccabi Health vaccination centre in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv-Jaffa.Credit…Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Israel has raced ahead with the fastest Covid-19 vaccination campaign in the world, inoculating nearly half its population with at least one dose. Now its success is making it a case study in setting rules for a partially vaccinated society — raising thorny questions about rights, obligations and the greater good.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet voted this week to open shopping malls and museums to the public, subject to social distancing rules and mandatory masking. For the first time in many months, gyms, cultural and sports events, hotels and swimming pools will also reopen, but only for some.

Under a new “Green Badge” system that functions as both a carrot and a stick, the government is making leisure activities accessible only to people who are fully vaccinated or recovered starting from Sunday. Two weeks later, restaurants, event halls and conferences will be allowed to operate under those rules. Customers and attendees will have to carry a certificate of vaccination with a QR code.

Israel is one of the first countries grappling in real time with a host of legal, moral and ethical questions as it tries to balance the steps toward resuming public life with sensitive issues such as public safety, discrimination, free choice and privacy.

“Getting vaccinated is a moral duty. It is part of our mutual responsibility,” said the health minister, Yuli Edelstein. He also has a new mantra: “Whoever does not get vaccinated will be left behind.”

Four million Israelis — nearly half the population of nine million — have received at least one dose of the Pfizer vaccine, and more than 2.6 million have gotten a second dose. But about two million eligible citizens aged 16 or over have not sought vaccines. The average number of new daily infections is hovering around 4,000.

Israel’s central government — eager to bring the country out of its third national lockdown without setting off a new wave of infections — was spurred into action by local initiatives. Chafing under the country’s lockdown regulations, an indoor shopping mall in the working-class Tel Aviv suburb of Bat Yam threw its doors open last week for customers who could prove that they had been vaccinated or had recovered from Covid-19.

In Karmiel, the mayor made a similar decision to open his city in the northern Galilee region for business. Other mayors want to bar unvaccinated teachers from classrooms while some hoteliers threatened unvaccinated employees with dismissal.

Mr. Edelstein, the health minister, said on Thursday that vaccination would not be compulsory in Israel. But his ministry is now proposing legislation that would oblige unvaccinated employees whose work involves contact with the public to be tested for the virus every two days. And he is promoting a bill that would allow the ministry to identify unvaccinated people to the local authorities.

#covid #World

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storagechef · 1 year

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Prepper Food Storage

If you are searching for food storage near me, Storage Chef is one of the best food storage companies in Utah that serves good and tasty food that people love. For more details, call +1 801-349-1255.

#Emergency Food Supply

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storagechefutah · 8 months

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Food Companies in Utah

Great Tasting Food Storage for Your Family!

Satisfy your cravings and streamline your kitchen with Storage Chef!

As one of the top food companies in Utah, we understand the importance of keeping your ingredients fresh and easily accessible.

Our food storage solutions will not only elevate your cooking game, but also save you time and money.

#Food Storage #Storage Ideas #Food Companies in Utah

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olko71 · 4 years

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New Post has been published on All about business online

New Post has been published on http://yaroreviews.info/2020/12/moderna-shot-expected-to-bolster-u-s-vaccine-efforts

Moderna Shot Expected to Bolster U.S. Vaccine Efforts

A green light for Moderna’s vaccine would help meet a federal goal of getting a vaccine to anyone who wants one by the spring or summer of 2021.

Photo: Hans Pennink/Associated Press

Peter Loftus

Updated Dec. 18, 2020 7:58 pm ET

Health officials across the U.S. are counting on the arrival of a second Covid-19 vaccine to boost scarce supplies and sidestep logistical issues encountered by the first vaccine, which began distribution this week.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized the vaccine from Moderna Inc. MRNA -2.62% on Friday after an advisory panel recommended the agency approve its use. It will join a vaccine from Pfizer Inc. PFE -0.92% and BioNTech SE BNTX -2.06% that received authorization on Dec. 11.

The green light should nearly double this month’s expected U.S. supply of Covid-19 vaccine doses and help meet a federal goal of getting a vaccine to anyone who wants one by the spring or summer of 2021. Moderna expects to add 20 million doses of its vaccine to Pfizer’s expected U.S. supply of 25 million in December.

A Food and Drug Administration vaccine-advisory panel voted in favor of Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine for broad distribution, clearing the way for the FDA to grant an emergency-use authorization for the second vaccine in the U.S. Photo: Henry Ford Health System/AP

“The addition of the Moderna vaccine to the response will be huge,” said Claire Hannan, executive director of the Association of Immunization Managers, whose members direct state vaccination efforts. Not only will the Moderna vaccine boost the supply of doses, but also it will “be much easier to send [it] to smaller providers and rural areas,” she said.

Moderna’s vaccine has easier storage and handling requirements and will be shipped in smaller quantities, health officials say. It can be stored in most standard medical freezers, while Pfizer’s must be shipped and kept at ultracold temperatures requiring either specialized freezers or dry ice, resources more common in large hospital systems and urban areas.

More on the Covid-19 Vaccines

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

When do you expect to be able to get vaccinated? Join the conversation below.

Write to Peter Loftus at [email protected]

Appeared in the December 19, 2020, print edition as ‘Moderna Approval To Double Supply.’

#PAID

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perogipoj · 4 years

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Drinkin’ The Kool Aid

Drinkin’ the Kool Aid

-dedicated to all misguided alternative medicine doctors, and Julie Glockenspiel, Esq., who told me teaching is a very flexible job.

I have belonged to two cults: Essential Oil.com and Charter School, Inc. The first one required deprogramming. The latter I always knew was bullshit, but I was willing to be a slave for the measly paycheck.

I still do not understand why you need my social security number, I said, filling out an order form to purchase a small package of lavender, peppermint, and lemon essential oils. They did smell good, and I would receive a 5ml bottle of wild orange for free. She was a good friend, however, and I wanted to support her.

This was, however, a covert operation.

My first day of preplanning at Charter School, Inc. started out as amazing. Incredible. It was a luau with plenty of food and surprisingly OK weather for an August day in Florida. Each team of teachers had its own table in the auditorium/lunchroom/facility storage/uniform exchange/recycling center multipurpose room. Teachers are always grateful for a free meal, even if it is stale bagels and cream cheese tubs with that small pool of liquid circling the top; one can always mix that up with a spork. I asked where the faculty lounge was. Oh, darling, my hand patted, you are too funny.

It then occurred to me to look at the preplanning schedule. In the past, I scanned to see what meetings were useless and when I could just go to my classroom to actually … preplan. My eyes grew wide, and my feet became numb as I slid off my sketchers and sat cross legged in my chair, grabbing a handful of M&M’s.

Monday: AM Luau, Raffle Prizes for Summer Forum only for those who attended it for a week in July.

Tuesday: [New Teachers Only] Absorption of our Founder’s book, “Why Life Should Not Come in the Way of Work: The Power of a Rubber Band Ball.”

Wednesday: Dress as your Favorite Color Rubber Band! Mandatory delight in Charter School, Inc. Bingo and Plinko. Light refreshments, such as leftover Cheerios from last year’s after school program, will be served. Encouraged to stay and play District Risk and try to win more students from good schools!

Thursday: Professional development; Word Walls, Data Binders, Interior Design of a Classroom, Which Committee you will be forced to join, Your paper limit for the copier and how to Teach with no resources, How to never Fail a student, How to Be at Three Meetings at once, Navigating the Muddy Field you have to park in. Join us at 11:00 PM for a Domino Pizza Party and enjoy cutting your own bulletin board paper in our multipurpose room Please limit to two slices of pizza and BYOW (Bring your own water!)

Friday: Cruise Day! Get ready for an exotic trip! Just like a real one, train how to wear a life preserver and survive the Journey: Run to and from our stations at car-loop duty, lunch duty, mopping your classroom floors, carrying a 20 pound clear plastic box of standardized tests, creating a gift basket for each student to say Way to Play for the FSA! Join us after lunch provided by yourself for a meeting with our school Guidance Counselor: Strategies to enhance your Charter School, Inc. experience. How to Allow Alcohol to Cope. Being OK that you Alienate your Friends and Family.

Saturday: Useless and discouraged, but feel free to meet with our Human Resources “man” we borrowed from The Office. Know your rights, and please use your mother’s or husband’s insurance.

Sunday: Let’s get rolling! Feel free to plan for yourself on your own time. Please contact Carl, our only facilities employee, on his beeper to open the gate.

Merriam Webster: Cult; great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work.

Within days, I received no fewer than ten emails from EssentialOil.com. Congratulations on becoming a Health Advocate! You have dedicated your life to sharing powerful essential oils with your friends and family!

A “healthy lifestyle” has always been my front to cover up inadequacies in my personal life and relationships. When a good friend invited me to a pamper party, I was surprised that when entering the door, I was given an order form, and corralled into a lecture with a PowerPoint. I made note to take the glass bottle of Perrier and head back home on a Wednesday night. Somehow, I had managed to become a certified yoga instructor, and was interested in general, but was honestly confused. I did not know what a pyramid scheme was. I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

My “friend” sent flow charts of how much income I could accrue by only purchasing $100 worth of product each month wholesale, all the while inviting friends and family to join as it was a win-win situation. When people balked when asked about their social security number, I glowingly explained that they can make so much income that they would be taxed, that is all. Look at your medicine cabinet, I was trained to explain. Everything you have is toxic. Instead, you could purchase a kit of essential oils for $500 and responsibly cure your family from everything to the common cold, mental illness, diabetes, and cancer. All research was conducted by the company itself. My own friend claimed to cure her husband of thyroid cancer with frankincense and a blend of essential oils historically found obviously unsuccessful to eradicate Bubonic Plague.

Merriam Webster: Cult; a system for the cure of disease based on dogma set forth by its promulgator.

Teaching is a profession, an art, and a balancing act, no matter where you teach. Most students are remarkably similar, even if they are quite different. Jesus said give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. Maria Montessori wrote “the greatest sign of success for a teacher... is to be able to say, ’The children are now working as if I did not exist.” The Buddha asks us for acceptance and appreciation of the present, to not seek joy, but contentment. To me, it means work. Good work.

It seemed to come within weeks that I was asked to join the International Conference for Essential Oils.com. in Provo, Utah. I had realized that I made a profit of $80.00 the entire scheme while purchasing hundreds of dollars of oils each month. Uplines were granted ranks of precious metals and gems as they were the only ones making money, and lots of it.

Join us to share the incredible experience of our family and our world-changing health and wellness expo.

I, regrettably, cannot join, as I do not want to pay my way to Utah and all my room and board. Out of curiosity, I watched it on YouTube. A stadium full of mostly women, lights and music, a fervor of excitement over new products. It competed with a Superbowl half-time.

Teachers, after a schoolyear of exceptional work by our students and administration, we have had the most successful year ever! Teachers are instructed to clear their calendars July 4-10 for Forum, our opportunity to meet with all the regional Charter Schools, Inc. The bus will leave at 6:30 AM from the Manatee car loop to head to Tamarac, in the good ole’ F-L-A. We reserved five rooms at the La Quinta at a somewhat reduced rate. A wedding is also occurring, so please plan to pay four to a room with two double beds. Vending machines are down the hall. A cash bar reception will be held from 3:30 to 4:30, happy hour. Please drink up so you Imagine that this is a good experience.

Mark Twain wrote that “education consists mainly of what we have unlearned.”

I told Charter Schools, Inc. that my daughter had an orthodontist appointment five days in a row. I went to CVS and bought the most toxic bar of dove soap. I finally felt clean.

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mrhenryharrell · 5 years

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March 11 Green Energy News

Headline News:

“Call to Double Vermont’s Renewable Energy Capacity Ignites Debate” • A bill requiring utilities to get 100% of their electricity from green sources by 2030, up from the existing requirement of 75% by 2032, is viewed by many lawmakers as one of this session’s most consequential pieces of environmental legislation. But the bill has some opposition. [Seven Days]

Installing a PV system (Norwich Solar Technologies image)

“Why Russia And Vladimir Putin Are Waging An Oil War With America” • Vladimir Putin knows America’s fragile oil industry is built on a mountain of debt. Moscow’s refusal to join with OPEC to mitigate oversupply is aimed in part at drowning US shale oil companies that compete with Russian oil but rely on higher prices in a sea of cheap crude. [CNN]

“The Purple Food Changing California” • Since 2014, parts of the California coast has lost more than 90% of their bull kelp forest due to problems related to climate change. Losing the kelp forests could mean an ecosystem cascade that would devastate many species and local economies. The solution may involve eating purple sea urchins. [BBC]

“Does This Tiny Island Off The Coast Of Maine Hold The Answer To The Future Of Electricity?” • Isle au Haut gets electricity via underwater cable from the mainland, about 7 miles (11 km) away. But that cable, installed in 1983, is old and could fail at any time. Islanders have been looking at a local microgrid to replace shore-based electricity. [Ensia]

“Plan Advances To Convert Utah Coal-Fired Power Plant To Run On 100% Hydrogen With Storage” • The Intermountain Power Plant in Delta, Utah is coal-fired. It is being transitioned first to run on natural gas, then to a mixture of gas and hydrogen, and then to 100% renewable hydrogen by 2045. It will have a capacity of 840 MW. [S&P Global]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

March 11 Green Energy News posted first on Green Energy Times

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truthisgoldenau · 5 years

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Character Bio: Frederick Fazbear Sr.

Born: July 24, 1957

Race: Mixed (Mom was white, dad was black)

Sexual Orientation: Bi

Tattoos: 2 dates, wedding anniversary and kid's birthday, on his right arm.

Personality: Early on, extremely outgoing and excitable, easy to get along with. Later, closed off and distracted.

Married: February 14, 1980 to Madeline Hartford.

Franklin Isaiah Fazbear was considered one of the luckiest people in Spring Valley. He struck oil. He successfully found gold (by accident, at that!). And he scored one of the prettiest young women to ever make her way to the small Colorado city, a socialite from back east named Eliza Ann Farnsworth.

They got married early, and money was never a problem. They were rich and practically famous. Franklin's oil business was booming.

Then they had a child. He would be their only one. Frederick Fazbear was a careful decision; both of them felt it was the natural next step in their relationship. They assumed it would be easy to raise a child.

They both realized rather quickly that it wasn't so easy as they imagined; being parents didn't come naturally to them and their relationship with this new piece of their family was politely... Detached.

It wasn't so much that they didn't love him; they very much did. They just had no idea how to go about showing it without feeling like they were bribing their child to love them.

Fred grew up aware of his parents lack of knowledge on how to parent; he often felt far more attached to the family cook than his parents and often found himself envious of the families where the parents put effort into their kids lives. Not that he didn't love his, but they sure didn't feel like parents.

He started getting the idea for what would later become Fredbear's and Freddy's while in high school. He had a friend (really, only the one) who convinced him to sneak out to this small family place out of town. Despite it being just the two of them, Fred found he loved the atmosphere the place had and wished he could come up with something like that.

He went to college aiming for a business degree. At the time he still hadn't mentioned to his parents that he might use the degree for something other than continuing the Fazbear Oil Company. He still didn't know if he was serious; but the more he thought about it the more he liked the idea.

It was during the first year of college that he met Madeline Hartford. She was a barista at this gimicky little cafe on campus that also advertised open mic nights for singers, comedians, and poets. He tried to ask her on a date immediately; she turned him down, but in amusement said she'd gladly be friends with him first.

After 3 months she finally let him ask her out on a date and he took her up on the offer.

Maddie did have to constantly remind him that he didn't need to buy her love. Fred had no end of access to his family's money, and he just kind of expected that the best thing to do was buy her nice things. Once Maddie talked him out of it, he was just... An incredibly hopeless romantic. And Maddie loved it.

He shared his idea with her about a family centered place and she loved it. She encouraged it and helped him start forming ideas for it. They'd stay up late talking about the kind of place it ought to be and what kind of things it should have.

He asked her to marry him in early 1979. She said yes. They both graduated from college in May, and spent a lot of time planning both their wedding and the future restaurant. Fred's parents were offering to pay for the wedding; and they had after a lot of long talks decided to fund the opening of Fred's dream restaurant. They were a little worried that the idea might fail; Fred promised if it did that he'd take over the family business instead as he'd always been somewhat destined to.

By the end of 1979, the animatronics for Fredbear's Family Diner, as Fred and Maddie had taken to calling it had been commissioned. It was a steep price that Fred's parents gladly paid off. Anything to help him get started.

Fred and Maddie's Valentine's Day wedding in 1980 was gorgeous and perfect. Fred had tried to convince Maddie to go big or go home (saying she deserved it) but it ended up being a rather small event. Maddie had a more notable guest list than Fred; he never seemed to mind.

They honeymooned in Paris, Maddie letting Fred spoil her on that end.

Once back in Spring Valley, the rest of the planning for Fredbear's got going full force.

Fredbear's Family Diner opened in January of 1981 with Fredbear and Spring Bonnie front and center. They were also able to be worn as suits, and Fred and the Fredbear's mechanic Henry Emily were usually the two to suit up. At least for the first six months- an accident with the springlocks meant the suits stopped being worn. Henry was able to keep them in good condition so that they could continue performing, and despite them being somewhat quarantined to the stage, everyone loved them.

Near the beginning of 1983, Fred's parents died in a freak plane accident.

The company was left to the Vice President; but a majority of the fortune was left to Fred with a note from his parents in his dad's will that if something were to happen to them, that the money was to be used to continue his dream. That his dad was proud of him and what he'd accomplished so far and that he hoped the Fazbear family luck would live on for him.

As sad as it was to lose both his parents at once, he knew it wouldn't do to be sad forever. And that if his dad had been proud of him despite never setting foot in his place, it was no time to mope around.

By the end of 1983, Fred had begun planning for a bigger, better place. With more animatronics, for more people to spend time in. Fredbear's Family Diner closed its doors just before New Year 1984 with the tease that soon something bigger was coming.

The planning for his new place, which he started calling Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, felt like it took forever. Ben Anderson, one of the employees from the diner who had worked the whole time in the kitchen, stuck with him and actually helped him plan a lot alongside Maddie.

Henry Emily decided to move back to Hurricane, Utah with his family. He'd enjoyed working at Fredbear's, but his and his wife's extended families were both still in Utah and he wanted his toddler twins to be able to get to know the family. Fred made him promise to stay in touch (it was a promise Henry never broke).

Planning for the new place was chaotic- Fred was often so excited about ideas he'd cut himself off mid sentence with new plans. They hit a small roadblock when the Spring Bonnie animatronic was heavily damaged during its move to storage- but Maddie convinced Fred that whoever they'd find as a new mechanic could fix it. With that and the designs he had for new animatronics, they plowed ahead.

In the middle of 1984 Fred started hiring for his second place. People who'd worked at Fredbear's rarely made the return (a few stopped by just to see the building). But it was well known throughout town that Fred had paid his employees ridiculously well and was a great boss.

Ben of course came back, Fred once again having him run the kitchen. Ben liked that job enough, at least.

Sometimes Maddie was convinced Fred hired certain people because they had sad stories. Fred had always been a talker, and half his interviews were somewhat sidetracked casual chats.

Like Damian, the kid who applied to work the prize counter, who Fred had told Maddie about as "this punk kid who lives in a trailer with his mom and aunt and three sisters. Poor kid sleeps on the couch, can you believe that?!"

Or Hailey, the high school student who'd told him she really wanted to run her own restaurant someday.

Maddie was always amused by how astounded he was at things like that but sometimes the rich kid Fred had been still came through. Unsurprisingly, they were still stupidly rich, even with all the money poured into this new place.

There were only two applications for mechanic- one from some guy who'd worked at a car dealership for 10 years named Scott something that Fred interviewed and complained about having the personality of a brick.

The other was Pierce Graves, and Fred wasn't sure about him at first because his application was very vague on whether or not he even knew how to fix things. Maddie remembered the name, having looked over a lot of applications from Fredbear's with him. Fred remembered they had only not interviewed him back then just out of curiosity because they'd already had Henry and two mechanics for two animatronics was a little much.

Anyone else would have taken one look at the 21 year old kid with a full sleeve of tattoos that he'd forgotten to hide, in a rival company's uniform, showing up late to an interview as a complete 3 strikes. Fred was not "anyone else". Fred was fascinated. And Pierce aced the easy routine maintenance stuff Fred had left on his new animatronics. So he hired him as soon as he got back around to it (he had a lot else going on can you blame him?).

With help from Pierce designing Foxy the Pirate, and the rest of the pieces falling into place, Freddy Fazbear's Pizza opened in December 1984. The crowd opening day was huge- Spring Valley had loved Fredbear's, and word of a bigger better place had gotten out.

Henry and his family even showed up to see the full extent of Freddy's.

It was a hit from day one- the different sets of animatronics performed on different days, they had a full arcade of as many games Fred could get, the food was great, and people kept coming back. Fred knew a lot of the regulars by name, and Maddie even often spent time at Freddy's.

Business got even better after Foxy the Pirate was introduced; it was a hit. Particularly with this little red headed kid who Fred wasn't so sure spoke English, and pretty soon Fred had become friends with the very shy Katherine O'Malley and her son Finn who had moved to Colorado from Ireland. They were almost constant fixtures at Freddy's, and Fred would always make sure to mention when new Foxy merch was going to show up at the prize counter. When the plushies started coming out, he offered to give Finn one since they were going to be a high ticket item, but Finn excitedly turned it down so he could win it himself.

(Later, Katherine would ask him to please thank the mechanic for helping her and Finn get the remainder of the tickets for the Foxy plush, as apparently they'd been close to getting enough when the mechanic had given them all the ones he hadn't needed to use. Fred did and Pierce just shrugged it off)

Discovering Pierce had powers similar to his own that he'd never tried to learn was an accident- but a good one. He'd been terrified of them, and Pierce was a little concerned he'd never learned how to use them. Pierce offered to help him learn so it'd be less of a startle reflex that could potentially backfire- Fred accepted on the condition that Pierce not mention it to anyone.

On his and Maddie's 7th wedding anniversary, she told him they were going to be parents. Fred was ecstatic- him and Maddie had both wanted kids, but he'd wanted to make sure Freddy's was running smoothly first, and they'd made a decision in mid '86 that it could be time to start seriously trying for kids, and finally here they were.

1987 was a good year for Freddy's at first. Business was still booming, the Spring Bonnie animatronic was getting closer to being show ready again, and Fred finally got the cheesy TV ads he wanted airing. The local news station even ran a whole half hour special about Freddy's that featured Fred and Pierce (by this point Pierce and Fred hardly needed to have full coherent conversations about what kind of show changes they needed, both kind of picking up what the other meant when it came to certain things. Pierce wasn't well liked by the other Freddy's employees, but Fred and him were close as hell and for the most part Fred kept Pierce from pissing people off at work more).

And the Fazbear baby turned out to be Fazbear babies- Fred and Maddie found out they were expecting twins. Fred didn't think he could be happier. A hell of a lot of planning went into the nursery for the boys, as they learned they'd be, as well as Fred getting Freddy's themed stuff made for both of them. They decided on names long before the twins were born- Frederick Jr and Franklin. Maddie didn't mind that both her husband kind of took over naming.

And then August 1987 happened, and just when Fred didn't think life could get any better, he had to tell his mechanic that Foxy was being decommissioned. The conversation didn't go well, and Fred would later agonize over how he should have handled it. And how he should have waited until he was less stressed and sleep deprived. He knew that his decisions and how he'd worded things basically ended the close friendship he had with Pierce, but he didn't know how badly he'd ruined it until...

November 13th, 1987.

The bite of '87.

That horrifying, wordless scream from Finnegan O'Malley.

The screams from the other kids, ones he saw on the ground clutching their heads in a pain that looked... Familiar.

He had no idea if Pierce orchestrated the bite, but he damn well knew that the other kids in pain- that was Pierce. That was that power. And he lashed out with everything he had to the point he scared himself. And in a moment of clarity he knew that he had to do something to save Finn, and used his power for that.

Pierce and Spring Bonnie disappeared.

6 kids in Spring Valley suddenly had new features that no one could explain. Doctors were uncertain if Finn would even survive, but he pulled through. The accident cost him his memory, they said.

Fred paid all of their hospital bills off. Told the O'Malleys if they ever needed anything, they could call him. Got questioned six ways to Sunday by cops just trying to figure out what had happened, if this was an accident or foul play. Tried not to think about the blood stains on the stage, found the ones in Parts and Services though. Stopped by the main stage on his way out again and noticed, for the first time, the loose board. Right where Foxy's foot path was. Saw the animatronic in his head fail to correct as it hit the uneven surface and fall.

The bite had been an accident, but the other 5 kids had not.

Freddy's officially closed by the end of the year. He kept his night guard on until he could move everything into storage, and kept getting told that the Toy animatronics and Foxy acted "weird". Too human. Confused. Had to play off that he didn't know why.

The Fazbear family moved across town, and for the first few years of the twins lives, Freddy's was only a fun fairy tale their father told them about to get them to go to sleep. Fred hated that he'd had to close, and he wanted so much to open it again.

So in 1990, he started planning the 3rd place.

Maddie said it was a bad idea, but that she would continue to support him.

Ben also had his doubts, but promised to still come back.

Everyone else he tried to bring back hung up on him. Jeremy was silent for a good minute on his phone call from Fred, and finally said he'd recommend another guard he knew. Jeremy had been in therapy since then, convinced the bite was his fault since he was supposed to make sure no one got hurt.

Fred reused the unconnected animatronics for the new place, but all of the existing ones were kept in the building anyways. For parts, he told the new mechanic (Fritz Smith, who was a somewhat nervous fellow). Not that Fred would let anyone touch the Toy animatronics to be used as parts.

Opening day for this third iteration of Freddy's was sad compared to the grandeur of the previous place. People knew about the bite and felt it in poor taste that another place was opening so soon.

It never quite hit the same level of popularity, and as business dwindled, Fred got more and more ... Not himself. Fritz oftentimes didn't have the expertise to work with the dozens of fixes that Pierce had made to the animatronics, either because there were no instructions on what exactly they did or just because they made no sense to anyone but Pierce. When Fritz would ask if Fred could please just call the guy up for clarity (Fritz was not from Spring Valley and had only just moved there so he didn't know about Pierce), Fred would just give him a look.

The turnover rate for employees was often high, the place understaffed, although it was still magical for his twin sons. Maddie is would often tell him, gently, that it might be better to close. Out of a stubborn sense of pride, Fred never did.

Then on August 8th of 1993, his kids were affected by another event. It was like '87 all over again, minus the bite, and Fred only caught a glimpse of his former mechanic in the back of the building before he made the better decision to check on his kids. It was a threat, he knew. Pierce could still find him and would do anything to get back at him.

At the hospital, Maddie pulled him aside and told him that she was furious. That this was the last straw, and if he ever reopened Freddy's again, she'd leave with the boys. He didn't doubt she would.

He paid off the bills for the other two kids affected, and Freddy's closed down, this time permanently.

Fred quietly paid off the entire property so that it wouldn't be demolished without his permission. He couldn't put the animatronics back in storage. He did put heavy locks on the doors and boarded up the place to try and discourage people from getting inside.

They moved again, this time to a somewhat cramped house where the twins would have to share a room. They didn't complain, excited to have a bunk bed at last.

Despite the setbacks, the Fazbear family still had enough money that Fred didn't need to go back to work immediately, and he tried to make things work smoothly as a family. For almost two years after the incident, the family was happy. Just after Fred finally found a job elsewhere (Ben managed to get him a job as a manager at some local place), some new tragedy happened.

Maddie called his work desperate, telling him that Frankie had quite suddenly and painfully lost his voice and they were at the ER, and could he please meet them there. He promised he would and left work in a hurry. Except he ended up driving home instead. Leaving Maddie a note.

'I'm sorry. Give me some time.'

And with some kind of determination, he headed to his former 3rd business.

The place was beginning to show signs of disrepair, plants growing through cracked cement. As he thought, the chain across the main door had been cut with bolt cutters and he knew without a doubt who had been there.

So he was going to leave a message.

He found the spare Freddy he'd had made for this place as a just in case. Set it up, made sure it could run properly. Considering he'd last even done small maintenance back in the early '80s, he didn't know for sure that what he was even doing was working. But it seemed to work enough.

Pierce had told him that things that affected an animatronic connected to someone affected the human in a similar way. It's how Pierce had found issues with the machines. Connect yourself to them, the problem spot on the machine will be a little bit of a painful spot. Then just work in that area and you could find the issue. Worked great with animatronics because they were very much oriented like humans.

Pierce had also taught him a trick. If you bound yourself to an animatronic and didn't let the bind affect you physically, you could essentially program it to do something that it normally might not be able to. It was less useful for repairs and more useful as a fun joke (Pierce had many times made it so some animatronic would not physically stop trying to find Fred for a hug, and in return as Fred had gotten better at it himself he'd sent animatronics to Pierce with notes like 'hello jackass' or 'you're shoe is untied').

This would not be a fun joke. If Pierce was going to send a message that his kids weren't safe, then he was going to make sure Pierce knew he wasn't going to just sit back and let the man intimidate him.

So he bound himself to the spare Freddy with one goal in mind. Keep Pierce away, by any means necessary. It was a strong order for this type of connection, one that kind of pushed the boundary of what it could do, and while Fred didn't gain any features from the bind, he watched with a morbid curiosity as the suit pieces shifted to a dark purple.

Shadow Freddy was now protecting all the animatronics from Pierce.

#the lore

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reeganvs35-blog · 5 years

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