Bullies

While in exile, Leon Trotsky and his wife were deported from Norway on December 19, 1936, and put on an oil tanker, The Ruth.  They arrived in Mexico on January 9, 1937, and moved into La Casa Azul (The Blue House), the home of the painter Diego Rivera and Rivera's wife and fellow painter, Frida Kahlo, with whom Trotsky had an affair. After quarreling with Rivera, Trotsky moved to his final residence in Mexico City in April 1939. 

On May 24, 1940, Trotsky survived a raid on his villa by armed assassins led by agents of the NKVD, the Soviet secret police agency, a forerunner of the KGB.  A young assistant and bodyguard of Trotsky disappeared with the attackers and was later found murdered; it is probable that he was an accomplice who granted them access to the villa. 

On August 20, 1940, Trotsky was attacked in his study by Spanish-born NKVD agent Ramón Mercader, who used an ice axe as a weapon.  A mountaineering ice axe has a narrow end, called the pick, and a wide, flat end called the adze. Although it's commonly said that Trotsky was killed with an ice pick, it was actually the adze end of the axe that struck Trotsky, fracturing his parietal bone and penetrating 2.8 inches into his brain.  The blow failed to kill him instantly. Witnesses stated that Trotsky spat on Mercader and began struggling fiercely with him. Hearing the commotion, Trotsky's bodyguards burst into the room and beat Mercader nearly to death, but Trotsky stopped them, laboriously stating that the assassin should be made to answer questions. Trotsky was then taken to a hospital and operated on, surviving for more than a day, but dying, at the age of 60, on this date, August 21, in 1940. Impermanence is swift.

Good day.  It's the birthday today of actor, director, and screenwriter Melvin Van Peebles (age 89).  

After a lot of long, difficult consideration, I finally decided not to go to tonight's show at The Earl by the band Bully, even though I already have tickets (purchased back in April).  Georgia seems to be setting a new record for the number of new covid cases every couple of days, and it's clear that we're now in a fourth wave of infection every bit as bad, if not worse, than the previous ones.  Sure, I'm vaccinated, but evidence indicates that even vaccinated people can contract and spread the virus, even if they don't suffer serious illness themselves.  It's a sold-out show, so The Earl will be at full capacity, and a crowded show in a small, moderately ventilated facility is not the best setting to avoid the virus.  Add to that a cheering audience exhaling onto each other, and moshers and crowd surfers climbing all over each other, and you've got the perfect recipe for exchanging microbes.  

The band is insisting that all attendees show proof of vaccination and wear masks, but it feels like voluntarily putting myself into such a precarious setting as a small, sweaty club is just an unnecessary risk at this place (Georgia, with its abysmally low vaccination rate) and time (the middle of the fourth wave of infection).

I was about to give my tickets away for free on line, and then realized that if I really wanted to protect others, I shouldn't add two more bodies to the sold-out show.  The band will still get to keep my money even if I'm not there, so I'm still supporting the arts, but it's probably better for everyone if there were two less sets of lungs at the show.

Please batten down your hatches if you're in the Northeast U.S. - Henri is coming and it looks more and more like it's going to cause major damage as it leisurely strolls across Long Island and the New England states.  Please take this threat seriously and prepare for the worst.  You've got about 12 hours left to buy some drinking water, batteries, candles, and easy-to-prepare, no-cook food.  The coast will be clear again (literally) by Tuesday.