Morning statistics – An unusual lawsuit – The American Chestnut Land Trust – Manna from Heaven in the form of yeast – The last of the easy traffic conditions – A delicate matter of terminology – Evening statistics
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 AM — # of cases worldwide: 4,915,587; # of deaths worldwide: 320,520; # of cases U.S.: 1,550,539; # of deaths U.S.: 91,985.
The American judiciary system has seen its share of odd lawsuits, but the one brought about by Sylvia Driskell must be one of the most unusual. She brought a suit against all homosexuals – not merely the ones in this country but all homosexuals on the planet. Her petition is written entirely in cursive and cites no case laws, although she does quote the Bible and Webster’s Dictionary. She claimed to be an ambassador of God and His Son, Jesus Christ; in which case, no doubt, she would have been able to produce the appropriate letters of accreditation when called to depose. It’s difficult to understand what she expected to gain by this suit, even in the very unlikely event that it had been decided in her favor. She said that she wants the judge to rule that homosexuality is a sin, seemingly unaware that no judge can determine the sinfulness or virtuousness of any human activity; he can only determine whether or not it is legal. Judge John Gerrard dismissed the suit in a rather strongly-worded response, declining to recognize her self-appointed ambassadorship, rejecting the notion of a suit against a group of unidentified individuals, and saying outright that “the United States Federal Courts were created to resolve actual cases and controversies arising under the Constitution and the laws of the United States. A federal court is not a forum for debate or discourse on theological matters.” He did not allow her to amend her complaint for the purposes of re-submission, doubtless feeling that he had already wasted time enough on this silly, vain, addle-pated woman.
I learned from AD about a hiking area that I had not known about before: the American Chestnut Land Trust, a lovely park close to the Chesapeake Bay with 22 miles of trails. The weather prophets turned out to be beautifully wrong about today’s forecast. It was cloudy, but not dark and gloomy as it had been yesterday. At times the clouds overhead became pearly-white in color and glimmerings of sunlight periodically shone through. I hiked about 16 miles in all, with about 2000 feet of elevation gain. The trails are not at all rocky, which meant that even though I took time to verify at junctions that I was going in the right direction and also to stop for lunch, I could complete the route in just under five hours. It is not a very long drive either – a little under an hour and fifteen minutes from my house. It undoubtedly will take longer once traffic conditions are restored to normal. It is little-known; during the entirety of the hike I encountered only four hikers and one ranger working on a blowdown. There were, however, a couple of people just getting out of their cars when I was returning. It’s not clear to me how much hiking they expected to do when they were just getting started at 3:00 PM.
My indefatigable aunt discovered a health food store that had a supply of yeast and she sent some to me in the mail, which arrived today. It is an amount sufficient for making enough bread for two months. By then yeast should be somewhat easier to obtain, or so one hopes. In any case, I have a working starter as well. It is even possible that the bakeries will resume bread-making again, but that is not to be counted on.
The relatively benign traffic situation will probably be coming to an end soon. Metro will be shutting down parts of the Orange Line and all of the Silver Line starting from Memorial Day and lasting through all of the summer in order to accommodate construction. This change will force more traffic on the roads just as the lockdowns in Maryland, Virginia, and DC will be lifting.
Nancy Pelosi has drawn criticism for referring to Donald Trump as “morbidly obese” during a recent interview with CNN. Trump is 6’3” and 243 pounds, according to his most recent physical less than a year ago, which gives him a body mass index of 30.4. This would put him in the “overweight to moderately obese” category. Trump’s partisans have chastised her for this inaccuracy (one is tempted to say “for this gross inaccuracy”) and point out that Trump would have to gain at least 77 additional pounds to be considered “morbidly obese.” As someone who loves to promote social harmony I suggest that both parties come to an amicable compromise by calling him simply “fat.”
Today’s statistics as of 9:00 PM — # of cases worldwide: 4,985,656; # of deaths worldwide: 324,889; # of cases U.S.: 1,570,583; # of deaths U.S.: 93,533. Brazil’s case count is now about 7,000 less than that of Spain’s. It sounds like a great number, but at the rate that Brazil is reporting new cases every day, my guess is that it will overtake Spain by the end of the day tomorrow. This past weekend many revelers were out in Rio de Janeiro, most of them not wearing face masks. There have been more deaths in the state of Sao Paulo – the most populous in Brazil – than in all of China, at least all that China has reported officially. Bolsonaro has approved a relief bill that grants aid to informal laborers and unwed mothers; but since they are lining up in long queues at the bank to put in their claims, their risk of contracting the virus increases. Mexico has been 17th in the list of nations with the greatest number of cases, but it now appears to be on the verge of overtaking Belgium. Yet it will be lifting its lockdown restrictions tomorrow, which will probably aggravate matters. Russia’s case count is just under 300,000. Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin has recovered sufficiently to resume his responsibilities. The death toll is suspiciously low – still under 1%. Alexander Gintsburg, the head of Russia’s Gamalei Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology, has said that Russia’s population has acquired herd immunity. But that doesn’t explain why the same is not true for other countries – Germany, for instance, which has a much more robust health care system than Russia’s.