Alabaster DePlume

All music, without exception, is a direct expression of the buddha-dharma.

Turbulence

These are the times and this is my record of the times.  

Ever since Hurricane Zeta dropped a massive tree on my house in October 2020, I've been monitoring the U.S. Weather Service's National Hurricane Center website on a daily basis.  It's been a quiet year (so far) with only three named storms (so far), but no fewer than three systems are currently being tracked by the NHC.  Of particular note, a broad area of low pressure over the central Atlantic (the orange X above) is producing a large cloudy area of disorganized showers. Gradual development of this system is expected over the next several days and a tropical depression is likely to form later this week. The disturbance is forecast to move slowly toward the west and then west-northwest at 5 to 10 mph, toward the adjacent waters of the northern Leeward Islands. No word yet on when it will reach Atlanta.

These are turbulent times and not just meteorologically. In other news beyond the weather, political consultant Simon Rosenberg points out that just in the past couple of months alone:

1. Former one-term "president" Trump apprently stole national secrets and then lied to the FBI about it.


2. Trump's CFO pled guilty to 15 felonies. 


3. Trump himself took the fifth 440 times in an investigation into his crooked finances. 


4. The Jan 6th committee established that Trump led a massive illegal conspiracy involving hundreds of GOP officials and sought to overturn an American election, unleashing a violent attack on Congress as part of its strategy. 


5. The Trump family took $2Billion from the Saudi government, and launched a new business venture with them here in the U.S. 


6. The Supreme Court went on an extremist field day, ending Roe, legalizing coercive prayer, and weakening common sense guns laws. 


7. Numerous states passed medieval abortion restrictions, creating a public health crisis in the United States. 


8. A leading Republican organization brought Putin's closest ally in Europe, Hungary's Viktor Orban, to the U.S. while our Ukranian allies are fighting Putin to defend their homeland. 


9. There were more mass shootings. 


10. Election deniers have won GOP primaries across the country. Some of them will get elected this fall. 


11. Liz Cheney lost her primary to an absolute fucking lunatic. 


12. Trump has encouraged violence against the FBI and DOJ and attacks have already taken place. 

"It's been a tornado of malevolence and venality unlike anything we've seen in American history," Rosenberg concludes.

Hard Rain's A-Gonna' Fall

No, that's not the system of showers and thunderstorms formerly located in the East Atlantic, west-southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands. That system has petered out but just as it did, a new, disorganized system of showers and thunderstorms has popped up over the north-central Gulf of Mexico.  The storms are associated with an area of low pressure centered just off the southern coast of Louisiana. This system is expected to drift west-southwestward and approach the Texas coast over the weekend. Locally heavy rains are possible along portions of the Texas coast this weekend ("Houston, we have a problem").

But enough about the weather (for today). This is now a cat blog, and Wednesday I had to take my friend Eliot to the vet.

He's been losing weight, and the other day I noticed that he looked absolutely emaciated, even though he's been eating.  Worse, he's been losing fur, not just shedding per his usual summer pattern, but whole tufts of hair coming off in plugs easily plucked from his body (you can see a typical plug on the right side of the examination table).  He's now 13 years old, and cats are considered to be elderly once they reach 11 years, with senior cats defined as those aged between 11-14 years and super-senior cats 15 years and upwards.  I understand that the first two years of a cat’s life equate to 24 human years, and every year thereafter is equivalent to 4 human years, so 13-year-old Eliot is the equivalent of 68 human years old.  Coincidentally, that's the same age as me, his human friend.  We old men stick together.

Anyway, the news is mostly good, or at least not bad.  Based on the exam and the blood work, it's not a thyroid problem as I had feared, but he apparently is dehydrated.  Not that he's not drinking, but for some reason his metabolism isn't taking up the water he drinks.

The doctor recommended I give him Purina's HydroCare formula - basically, (liver) flavored water with added glycerin that helps a cat's metabolism take up water.  Fortunately for everyone involved, Eliot seems to like the liver flavor and laps the formula right up, while Izzy, his feline brother, isn't as interested and doesn't try to consume Eliot's treatment. I have a box of 24 HydroCare packets, which should last for 12 days (Eliot needs two packs a day).

The challenging task will be Part 2 of his treatment.  To regain the weight he's lost, the vet recommends feeding Eliot high-calorie kitten food.  The challenge will be keeping Izzy from eating the kitten chow. Izzy is already obese - to be frank, he's one fat cat. He's almost to the point of requiring a visit to the vet for himself. Having him eat from the bowl of high-calorie kitten food will only make his condition even worse.

My house, this pile of bricks on a hill, is single story, and there's no practical way to keep the two cats separated all day while the food is out (they nosh on the kibble throughout the day).  I could lock one or the other up in a bedroom all day, but it would feel like a punishment to that cat - and to me as he mewls and cries all through the day. I have to figure out a way to feed Eliot one brand of feed and Izzy another.

I don't have a solution yet but I'm sure I'll come up with something.

Inordinate Amount of Satisfaction From a Small Task

I changed a lightbulb today.  Yippee!

A little context here: my kitchen has recessed lights in the ceiling, about ten of them.  On most days, the daylight is too dim to do much in the kitchen without those lights on, so the lights may be on anywhere from 10 to 18 hours a day when I'm home (which is most days).  Naturally, the bulbs eventually burn out, even the new, super-efficient LED bulbs, and I'm frequently replacing them.  I usually keep a box of a dozen in the pantry to replace as needed and when the box runs out, I buy a new one at the supermarket.

I must have bought a batch of deficient light bulbs, as when I went to unscrew one burned-out bulb recently, the glass part twisted off leaving the metal part still in the socket.  Days later, another bulb did the exact same thing.

I've been living in this house, this pile of bricks up on a hill, for some 18 years now (this Saturday will be my 18th-year anniversary).  I've been replacing at least one bulb a month since then, sometimes more, and this has never happened before.  And then twice in the course of a week.

Now, how to get the metal part of the bulb out of the socket?  Obviously, I turned off the power first, and tried using a pair of pliers to grab a lip of the metal so that I could screw it out.  But the broken part of the bulb was deeper into the socket then it was long, which is to say there was no exposed lip to grab onto. I tried using a pair of needle-nose pliers to get a grip, but all I managed to do was deform the metal base and make it harder to remove. To make matters worse, with the lights out, it was hard to see what I was doing up in that recessed socket, even with a flashlight, and the confined space of the light canister meant that my own hands would obscure the view of my activities.

Well, shit.  What to do?  Feeling frustrated, I took a break for a day and then tried again with a fresh attitude, but my luck was no better.  I looked online for advice, but most sites said to do exactly what I was doing - use needle-nose pliers and be patient.  Some sites suggested using a potato - slice a raw potato in two and jam the exposed surface into the socket.  The potato will fill the socket, they asserted, and then you can twist the potato to unscrew the remaining bulb.  I intuitively knew this wouldn't work, and would just fill the socket with a lot of mashed potato, making matters only worse.

Was I going to have to call an electrician or a handyman over to change my lightbulbs?  Was that what it really was going to come down to?  Had I become so incompetent that I have to pay someone to come over and change my lights?  How many Retired Old Men does it take to change a lightbulb?  Two - one to slice a potato in half and another to call an electrician.

On my like 11th Google search for advice, I got a pop-up ad (not a search result) for a bulb extractor tool.  It was a simple enough device, a sort of reverse pliers - squeeze the handle and the jaws open up. You put the plier head into the socket, open the jaws to grip the bulb head from the inside, and then unscrew the bulb while keeping the handles squeezed tight.

I ordered the tool from Amazon Monday morning - at least two weeks after the first bulb broke - and it arrived last night.  I used the tool on the second bulb this morning - the one I hadn't mangled with the needle-nose - and it came right out.  Dang, the thing actually worked!

The second bulb was a little more difficult due to the aforementioned mangling, but I eventually managed to get it out, too.  I replaced both bulbs with lights from a new batch of bulbs made by a different manufacturer.  So after several weeks, I've got all 10 (or so) lights in my kitchen working again.

A small enough victory, but one that's helped my self-esteem more than it should have to.  No, I'm not so incompetent after all that I have to call (and pay) for help to come over on what should be the simplest of household tasks.  

Little crises, little confidences.  Life as a ROM.

Top picture: the bulb extractor tool (foreground), the metal bulb pieces that had been stuck in the socket (midground), a complete light bulb surrounded by the two bulbs that broke (background).

Maybe Not Danielle After All

The showers and thunderstorms associated with a tropical wave in the eastern Atlantic seems to be running out of steam.  The system is now several hundred miles west-southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands and is expected to continue to move westward to west-northwestward at 15 to 20 mph during the next several days.  However, further development into a tropical depression or a hurricane is becoming less likely due to environmental conditions, and forecasters now say there's only a 20% chance of it developing into something of concern.

Doesn't mean it still won't hit Atlanta, though.

 

I Fear No Man . . . But These Things, They Terrify Me

 

An average of 4,203 covid cases per day were reported in Georgia in the last week. Cases have increased by 13 percent from the average two weeks ago. Deaths have increased by 10 percent. Since the beginning of the pandemic, at least 1 in 4 Georgia residents have been infected, a total of 2,699,050 reported cases. At least 1 in 283 residents have died from the coronavirus, a total of 37,640 deaths.

This latest increase in case numbers has me concerned.  Not only is it almost assuredly an undercount due to the increased availability of home testing kits, it doesn't have the "spike" geometry of the previous waves of infections.  Historically, the average number of new covid cases spiked upwards for one or two months, and then rapidly declined over another one or two months. In December 2021, as cases of the omicron variant were starting to spike, I felt comfortable buying tickets for March 2022's Big Ears festival, as the overall pattern indicated that the cases were going to drop again just as rapidly as they rose.

But this latest rise doesn't appear like a spike at all.  It's a slow, gradual increase more reminiscent of a rising tide than a viral spike.  How long will it keep going up? How high will it go? When will the numbers start to decline? Will they ever start to decline?  It's difficult to estimate future activity based on past performance with an increase like this.

Making matters worse, people seem to be "over" with concerns about the covids.  Yesterday in the supermarket, although the case numbers were as high as they've been during the winter 2020 spike, the delta spike, and the omicron spike, I could count the number of other people I saw wearing masks on one hand.  Yes, many of us are vaccinated now and not likely to die or get seriously ill from the current form of the virus, but we can still spread it.  And the virus, if left unchecked, can still possibly mutate to a more deadly form, perhaps one our current vaccines can't protect us from. But we seem to show no interest or will to control its spread.

Meanwhile, kudos to the Senate for finally passing the first major piece of climate change legislation.  It took decades and is arguably decades too late, but it's something.  Something is better than nothing.  

Even as the bill goes over to Congress for them to diddle around with, that large area of disorganized showers and thunderstorms over the far eastern Atlantic is now south of the Cabo Verde islands and is continuing to move westward to west-northwestward across the ocean.  It still has a 40% chance of forming a tropical depression in the next 5 days, and could arrive in North America as Hurricane Danielle.

Danielle?

After weeks and weeks of no activity, a tropical wave off the west coast of Africa is now producing disorganized showers and thunderstorms over the far eastern Atlantic. Environmental conditions appear generally conducive for gradual development of this system while it moves westward to west-northwestward at 15 to 20 mph across the eastern and central tropical Atlantic, and there's a 40% chance a tropical depression could form around the middle part of this week. Murphy's Law holds that it will develop into a full-force hurricane (Hurricane Danielle) and hit Atlanta, Georgia before the month is over.

An odd sound woke me up late last night (around 2:00 a.m.) and I realized it was the power shutting off.  No electricity, but it almost immediately came back on.  I heard it shut off and then come back on again a little later but didn't even bother rolling over to check the hour that second time.  When I woke up this morning, the power was off and didn't come back on again until 10:30 a.m.

A neighbor who's usually in the know about these kinds of things told me that a motorist a couple of blocks away had hit a power pole last night.   That's happened before, especially at the location she mentioned (drunk drivers apparently have a difficult time negotiating a curve in the road at that spot), but it doesn't explain why the power was flickering on and off in the early morning hours.  Either the power pole is down or it's not.  Other than that, life goes on as usual.

The Infinity Stones

This past winter, the Georgia Bulldogs won the 2021 National Championship.  They are the reigning national champs this year, and I hope they remain so for several years to come.

If this were boxing, they would have a belt to show for their championship, and the belt would be theirs to keep until some other team beat them and took the belt away. I like to fantasize that a new belt is minted each year for the winner of every National Championship Game, and that those winners then have to defend their championship belt or hand it over to any team who subsequently beats them.  That new team has to then defend the belt or hand it over when they get beat, and so on.   

For example, when Georgia beat Alabama in the National Championship Game earlier this year, I imagine that a championship belt was minted for the Bulldogs. But Georgia also got a whole lot more from Alabama with that victory. To understand what else Georgia won, we have to go back several years.

The Odyssey

The story begins, as many stories do, in 2016 at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida, when the 13-1 Clemson Tigers beat the 14-0 Alabama Crimson Tide in that year's National Championship Game, spoiling Alabama's bid for a perfect season. As a result of their win, a belt for the 2016 season was minted for Clemson. 

Although Clemson defended their belt for the first six games of the 2017 season, they lost to Syracuse by a field goal that October on a Friday the 13th, and Syracuse took possession of Clemson's 2016 belt. It seems like some sort of curse might have fallen on Clemson's 2016 belt that Friday the 13th, some sort of spooky Jason Voorhees mojo, because Syracuse couldn't keep the belt long.  No one could.  

The next weekend after beating Clemson, Syracuse lost to the Miami Hurricanes, 27-19. The Hurricanes were having a pretty good season that year and almost went undefeated during the regular season. However, a few weeks after taking Clemson's 2016 belt away from Syracuse, the 10-0 Hurricanes were upset in their last scheduled game of the season by the lowly, 4-7 Pittsburgh Panthers. If it's any indication of the strength of the Friday the 13th curse on Clemson's 2016 belt, after winning 15 straight games going back to the 2016 season, Miami then went on an 0-4 skid after holding the belt for just one week. They lost not only that last regular season game to Pitt, but also the ACC Championship Game (and to Clemson at that), their Orange Bowl game against Wisconsin, and the first regular-season game of 2018 to LSU.

In any event, Clemson's 2016 belt was then in the possession of Pittsburgh. Despite beating Miami, Pitt didn't make the 2017 ACC Championship Game or even get a bowl invitation.  In the second game of the following 2018 season, Pitt got blown out by Penn State, 51-6, and Clemson's 2016 belt not only went to the Nittany Lions, but went from the ACC to the Big 10.

In 2018, the Ohio State Buckeyes were the dominant team in the Big 10, and three weeks after Penn State took Clemson's 2016 belt away from Pitt and the ACC, Ohio State took the belt away from the Nittany Lions in a narrow, 27-26, win over Penn State.

Despite their dominance, Ohio State held onto Clemson's 2016 belt for only two weeks before falling to the Purdue Boilermakers, 49-20, on October 20th. And then the week after that, Purdue lost to the Michigan State Spartans, 23-13. And then on Nov. 10, 2018, Michigan State lost to Ohio State, 26-6, and the Buckeyes got the cursed belt back again.

Ohio State held onto Clemson's 2016 belt through the rest of the 2018 season, the Big 10 Championship game, and their win in the Rose Bowl over the Washington Huskies.  While that might suggest that the curse on Clemson's belt might finally have been broken, in a controversial decision, Ohio State was not invited to the National Championship Playoffs that year, despite their 12-1 record. One wonders how much of the playoff snub was due to bad luck from the cursed belt.

While still defending the cursed belt, Ohio State went undefeated during the following 2019 season and won the Big 10 Championship game. But then Clemson showed up to take their 2016 belt back from Ohio State in the 2019 National Championship Playoffs. Clemson beat the Buckeyes, 29-23, in the first round of the playoffs and Clemson's 2016 belt ended its long, three-season odyssey through the ACC and the Big 10 conferences. It was finally back at Clemson, where it had all started.

Still with me?  That's a long, strange trip, but the odyssey of the Clemson's cursed belt between 2016 and 2019 can be summarized as follows (don't worry - this won't be on the final test): 

Clemson > Syracuse > Miami > Pittsburgh > Penn State > Ohio State > Purdue > Michigan State > Ohio State > Clemson. 

Flashback: Alabama

But we got ahead of ourselves.  In 2017, two seasons before Clemson reclaimed their accursed 2016 belt, the Alabama Crimson Tide beat the Georgia Bulldogs (sad, but true) in the National Championship Game and a new, 2017 belt was minted for Alabama.  The Tide went undefeated during the 2018 season, beat Georgia (again) in the SEC Championship Game, and then beat the Oklahoma Sooners in the first round of the National Championship Playoffs. 

But Clemson had also gone undefeated during that 2018 season and faced Alabama in the National Championship Game.  Clemson won the game, beating Alabama 44-16, and Clemson was awarded the newly minted 2018 championship belt. With the win, Clemson not only won the 2018 belt but also took Alabama's 2017 belt away from the Tide, so Clemson was the proud bearer of two championship belts - Alabama's 2017 belt and their own 2018 belt. This was a year before they won their cursed 2016 belt back from Ohio State in the 2019 Playoffs, so at the time they managed to unify the 2017 and 2018 belts, but their own 2016 belt was not yet theirs.

The next year, Clemson went undefeated through the 2019 season.  They defended the two unified belts by beating Virginia in the ACC Championship game and, as described above, beating Ohio State in the first round of the 2019 National Championship Playoff and thereby taking back their 2016 championship belt. When Clemson beat Ohio State in 2019 in the first-round playoff game, they managed to unify three belts - their cursed 2016 belt, the 2017 Alabama belt, their own 2018 belt.

But now that they had their 2016 belt back, Clemson found out that the Friday the 13th curse was still active. After beating Ohio State in the first round of the playoffs, Clemson lost the National Championship Game to the LSU Tigers, 42-25, in in the second round (it was the Tigers' undefeated, 15-0 season that year). 

As a result, LSU unified four belts - their own newly minted 2019 championship belt, Clemson's 2018 belt, Alabama's 2017 belt, and Clemson's cursed 2016 belt.

Covid & Bad Mojo

But the curse was still not done yet. No team could keep the four belts for more than a week. In the very first game of the covid-infected 2020 season, LSU turned the four unified belts over to the Mississippi State Bulldogs.  Mississippi State then lost to Arkansas the week after winning the belts from LSU, and then Arkansas lost to Auburn the week after winning the belts from Mississippi State.  After taking the belts away from Arkansas, Auburn lost the next week to South Carolina.  

LSU managed to reclaim the four belts by beating South Carolina, 52-24, the week after the Gamecocks had won them from Auburn. This time, LSU managed to hold onto the belts for three weeks, first by taking two weeks off (remember, this was the year of the covids) and then by beating Arkansas (or maybe Arkansas just didn't want the three belts back again and tanked the game). But on November 28, LSU lost the four belts for a second time, this time to Texas A&M. 

The Aggies somehow managed to keep the four belts for the rest of the 2020 football season (three games, including an Orange Bowl win over North Carolina) and the first three games of the 2021 season. But the four belts finally managed to make it back to Arkansas again, whether they wanted them or not, when the Razorbacks beat A&M on September 25. Possibly due to the curse on Clemson's 2016 belt or possibly not, the very next week, Arkansas lost all four belts in a 37-0 shutout loss to the Georgia Bulldogs on October 2, 2021. 

So as of October 2, 2021, the Georgia Bulldogs were in possession of the four unified belts. Again, that's a lot of information, so here's a summary of the long journey of the four belts after LSU managed to unify them:

LSU > Mississippi State > Arkansas > Auburn > South Carolina > LSU > Texas A&M > Arkansas > Georgia

Another Alabama Flashback

But we're getting ahead of ourselves again.  During that covid-infected 2020 college football season, Alabama went undefeated, including a win over Florida in the 2020 SEC Championship game. They beat Notre Dame in the first round of the National Championship Playoffs and then beat Ohio State in the National Championship Game. As a result, the Crimson Tide were the owners of the newly minted 2020 belt. 

Alabama defended their new belt for the first five games of the 2021 season. However, on October 9, 2021, Texas A&M took Alabama's 2020 belt away from them by beating the Tide, 41-38. A&M had lost to Arkansas two weeks earlier that season, so the Aggies couldn't unify Alabama's 2020 belt with the other four belts at that time.  A&M held onto Alabama's 2020 belt until Nov. 13, when they lost to the Ole Miss Rebels, and the Rebels held the belt for the rest of the regular season.  

In the 2021 SEC Championship Game, Alabama faced off against the Georgia Bulldogs. Alabama, didn't have their 2020 belt at the time of the game, as it was being held by Ole Miss.  On the other hand, the Bulldogs were the bearer of the unified four belts, including Clemson's cursed 2016 belt, after beating Arkansas earlier that season.  The curse seemingly didn't affect the Bulldogs, as they were undefeated that season (12-0), including 7 straight wins after taking the belts away from Arkansas. But on December 4, Georgia lost the SEC Championship Game to Alabama, 41-24, and the Bulldogs had to hand all four belts (including Clemson's cursed 2016 belt) over to the Crimson Tide.  

Despite holding the cursed belt, Alabama managed to beat Cincinnati in the first round of the 2021 College Football Playoffs.  But in the second round, they faced Georgia again and this time lost the National Championship Game, 33-18, to the Bulldogs.  As a result, Georgia not only won the newly minted 2021 belt, but also got the four belts back again from Alabama.  Georgia is now the bearer of five (count them, five) championship belts - the 2021 belt they earned by beating Alabama in the Championship Game, as well as the cursed 2016 Clemson belt, the Alabama 2017 belt, the Clemson 2018 belt, and the LSU 2019 belt. 

The Infinity Stones

The Bulldogs have effectively unified five belts. The only belt missing - the 6th Infinity Stone - is the Alabama 2020 belt. That belt was held by Old Miss at the end of the 2021 regular season but in the 2021 Sugar Bowl, Old Miss lost the game and the belt to the Baylor Bears. At the beginning of the 2022 college football season, Baylor holds Alabama's 2020 belt, the 6th Infinity Stone.  Here's the Cliff Notes summary:

Alabama > Texas A&M > Ole Miss > Baylor

Like Thanos in the Marvel Multiverse, Georgia wants that 6th Infinity Stone to complete the Infinity Gauntlet. But Georgia doesn't play Baylor this year, so they have to hope that Baylor loses Alabama's 2020 belt to some other team. Further, as Georgia and Baylor don't have any common opponents scheduled for this year, the Bulldogs have to hope that Baylor loses the belt to a team that then loses it to some other third team that does appear on Georgia's schedule.  

With Alabama's 2020 belt lost in the insular maze of the Big 12 conference, the belt, the 6th Infinity Stone, might get passed around from shit-tier Texas team to shit-tier Texas team without a true contender getting a shot at it. Texas defenses take longer to rush opposing quarterbacks than the Uvalde police need to overtake a school shooter, so a Championship-level matchup between Georgia and a Big 12 holder of Alabama's 2020 belt doesn't seem likely. It might take several games - it might take several years - for Georgia to get the chance to win Alabama's 2020 belt and complete the Infinity Gauntlet.

Who knows what happens when the Gauntlet is complete? At the very least, it may finally break the Friday the 13th curse on Clemson's 2016 belt.  Georgia appeared immune to the curse during the 2021 college football season, but that immunity may not last forever.  Maybe the fifth belt, Georgia's own 2021 championship belt, will somehow make the 2016 belt unstable again (who knows how these things work?).  And what would happen if Georgia loses the five belts to some other team, or - perish the thought - to another conference?

Georgia opens their 2022 defense of their championship title and the five unified belts with a September 3 game against Oregon.  With the PAC-10 in disarray after UCLA and USC announced their intention to leave the conference for the Big 10, there is nothing (NOTHING) the PAC-10 wants more than to beat the reigning National Champion in the opening game of the season.  Nothing (NOTHING) would be better for the morale and prestige of Oregon football and the remaining PAC-10 that a win over Georgia.  But if Georgia loses the unified five belts, not to mention their own 2021 Championship belt, to the PAC-10 it might take years to get a chance to win it back.

If Georgia can hold onto the unified five belts and win the missing 2020 Alabama belt, it may usher in a new millennium of SEC dominance led by the Georgia Bulldogs.  Or the completed Infinity Gauntlet may result in the annihilation of the known universe and the end of existence itself.  Who knows? Good times!

tl/dr: Go Dawgs!