Now Comes Nicholas

Today is September 13, the 256th day of 2021; 109 days remain until the end of the year. Today is the day of right belief, and with it, the steadfast mind is not broken.

The sun rose at 7:20 a.m. this morning and will set at 7:46 p.m. this evening for 12 hours and 26 minutes of daylight.  Tonight's First Quarter moon rose at 2:33 p.m. and will set at 12:31 a.m. tonight (technically, tomorrow morning).

It's Fiona Apple's birthday.  The singer-songwriter, who recorded arguably the best album of 2020 (Fetch the Bolt Cutters), turns 44 today.  On the day that Apple was born, British conductor Leopold Stokowski died of a heart attack at the age of 95. One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, Stokowski is best known for his long association with the Philadelphia Orchestra and his appearance in the Disney film Fantasia. Impermanence is swift.

On this date in 2008, Hurricane Ike made landfall on the Texas coast, causing heavy damage to Galveston and Houston and surrounding areas.  Today, 13 years later, Tropical Storm Nicholas is about 70 miles off the coast from Corpus Christi, Texas, and is expected to make landfall near Galveston in the early morning hours tomorrow (i.e, very late tonight).  The storm could bring as much as 20 inches of rain to the Texas coast, and heavy rain is already falling in Texas and Louisiana, including across the Houston metro area. Tropical storm-force wind gusts were already occurring along the middle Texas coast.

Nicholas was originally forecast to travel inland toward Shreveport in northwestern Louisiana.  But as it neared Texas, someone apparently told the storm where Atlanta was, and how it's changed course and is travelling further south on a westward trajectory heading toward my home town.  Great.  It should be downgraded to a Tropical Depression or even just a Tropical Bad Mood by the time it arrives here, but look how much damage Ida managed to cause New York and New Jersey after a week of traveling over land.

Yesterday's Great Buckhead Crimewave (aka, Too Many Guns) story involves a man shot in the arm  last night behind Kyma, a Greek restaurant at the corner of Piedmont Avenue and East Paces Ferry.  The man was taken to the hospital and is expected to survive his injuries. Police are continuing to investigate what led up to the shooting and have not released any information on potential suspects or motives.

Now covid cases are continuing to drop in Georgia.  The average number of new cases in the state yesterday was 7,124, down 23% from the peak of 9,224 just two weeks ago (August 31).  Encouragingly, the number of hospitalizations also seems to have peaked, and the number of deaths, while not yet showing a decrease, may have plateaued.