Pallavi Gogoi: "What Would You Do If Your Child Had Coronavirus? For Us, It Was 'Room Service' Food" (NPR)
In celebrations, we spend days planning and making a vast array of dishes that could include lamb biryani, pulled pork, roast chicken and pasta, all in one meal to accommodate their many desires. And in sickness we turn to soup. So we got started on a menu. After all, for 14 days she would have at least three meals a day plus a snack. Thankfully, my husband and I both love to cook. Below are just a few of Rhea's quarantine meals. It wasn't haute cuisine, but we tried. And more importantly, we tried to keep the mood light.
Marc Dion: Mail-Order Dreams (Creators Syndicate)
As a working-class man who shrewdly avoided work by becoming a writer, the United States Post Office means three things to me. The first is that postal jobs are good jobs. Union. Seniority. Security. Benefits. Pension. Veterans' preference. All working-class people know those things. The second is that the mail comes every day, no matter how good or bad your neighborhood. The third is that the stuff I buy online or from a catalog comes to me by mail, and I love ordering things and dreaming of the day they will arrive. I'm waiting for a tweed sport coat right now. It's coming from England, and the whole world is coughing right now, so it may take a while.
Mark Shields: Words for the Class of 2020 (Creators Syndicate)
Finally, we should all be reminded of our responsibilities to one another and our debt to those who went before us: "Always remember that each of us has been warmed by fires we did not build; each of us has drunk from wells we did not dig. We owe no less to those who come after us, and, together, we can do even better." Happy graduation.
Andrew Tobias: How to Think About Re-Opening
If each infected person is contagious for a month and infects just one other on average, the health care system can cope. People will keep dying of COVID at the rate they now are - which is awful - but if you need to access the health care system, whether for COVID or some other reason, it will be there for you. If, on average, each infected person infects two others - as early models imagined might be the case - then it quickly becomes a nightmare. Think of it like money.
Hannah Epstein: Remembering 'MOOSE Crossing' - A Different Kind Of Animal (NPR)
Gaming headlines are dominated right now by Animal Crossing: New Horizons, the long-awaited sequel in a video game franchise known for - among other things - its realistic portrayal of the passage of time. I'd never heard of Animal Crossing until a few days ago but like many of us, I have suddenly become intimately acquainted with the actual passage of time.
The aurochs (pl. aurochs, or rarely aurochsen, aurochses), also known as urus or ure (Bos primigenius), is an extinct species of large wild cattle that inhabited Asia, Europe, and North Africa. It is the ancestor of domestic cattle. The species survived in Europe until 1627, when the last recorded aurochs died in the Jaktorów Forest, Poland.
Source
Mac Mac was first, and correct, with:
Cattle, bos primagensius
Mark. said:
Cattle.
mj wrote:
Based on cave paintings
They were magnificent beasts, much more impressive than modern cattle.
Alan J answered:
Cows.
Randall replied:
cattle
but they sure are tasty
Dave responded:
Cattle. The range of Aurochs once included Asia, Africa and Europe. The last Aurochs died out during the 17th century in Europe. During the last century there have been attempts to recreate the Aurochs by selective breeding of domestic cattle, but those efforts have fallen short.
Jon L said:
Had to google it: cattle
Cal in Vermont wrote:
Cattle. I suppose the ancients would go to auroch calls hoping to get picked to hoof in the next edition of the Follies.
Jim from CA, retired to ID, wrote:
The Aurochs is a giant extinct species of wild ox that was once found in Asia, Europe and North Africa. They are believed to be the ancestors of the domestic cattle.
Jacqueline said:
Aurochs are an extinct cattle. Read the very last one died in 1627. I suppose bulls/cows are today's version.
Billy in Cypress U$A answered:
Domestic cattle
Deborah responded:
Cattle are descended from aurochs, which sounds like a Star Wars creature.
Marine layer pushed inland 40 miles; we rode into it yesterday on our bike ride. There were a lot of cyclists on the roads, and many of them were not social distancing. But it was a beautiful day for a bike ride, and I have no regrets.
I'm glad my dispensary is still open.
Daniel in The City replied:
Cattle
DJ Useo wrote:
The Auroch evolved into modern cattle, apparently a popular item in many restaurants.
Kevin K. in Washington, DC, took the day off.
Micki took the day off.
Roy, the socially distant snowflake in Tyler, TX took the day off.
David of Moon Valley took the day off.
Stephen F took the day off.
Barbara, of Peppy Tech fame took the day off.
Dave in Tucson took the day off.
Michelle in AZ took the day off.
Kenn B took the day off.
Rosemary in Columbus took the day off.
Gateway Mike took the day off.
Doug in Albuquerque took the day off.
Joe ( -- Vote Blue, No Matter Who -- ) took the day off.
Saskplanner took the day off.
Ed K took the day off.
Steve in Wonderful Sacramento, CA, took the day off.
Gary K took the day off.
Leo in Boise took the day off.
PGW. 94087 took the day off.
MarilynofTC took the day off.
George M. took the day off.
Paul of Seattle took the day off.
Peter W took the day off.
Brian S. took the day off.
Gene took the day off.
Tony K. took the day off.
Noel S. took the day off.
James of Alhambra took the day off.
BttbBob has returned to semi-retired status.
~~~~~
• Famed photographer Yousuf Karsh took cellist Pablo Casals' portrait from the back, something he rarely did. Of course, Mr. Casals was playing the cello in the portrait. The portrait was once on exhibit at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts, and an elderly man came into the museum and stood in front of the portrait for a long time each day. Curious, the curator of the exhibit asked the old man, "Sir, why do you come here day after day and stand in front of this portrait?" The old man replied, "Hush, young man, hush. Can't you see? I am listening to the music."
Audiences
• Riccardo Martin was hailed as a "second Caruso," but he adored Enrico Caruso so much that he disliked the comparison. One night at the Metropolitan Opera, Mr. Martin was ill and could not sing, so Mr. Caruso took his place. Of course, the audience was delighted with their good luck in being able to hear the great tenor - all except one person, who demanded his money back because the singer who was scheduled to sing was not able to sing that night. When the ticket agent pointed out that he was able to hear the great Caruso instead, he insisted, "I paid my money to hear what you people said I was going to hear, and if I can't hear what I paid for, I want my money back!" Mr. Caruso took great delight in telling the story of the man who wanted his money back because he was going to sing.
• Frances Langford sang with a big-band style, and she was popular on the radio, in movies, and on USO tours with Bob Hope. While performing with Mr. Hope in Salerno, Italy, Ms. Langford found the accommodations very primitive indeed. For example, her dressing room was constructed out in the open. A fence enclosed the dressing area, although it lacked a roof. However, while Ms. Langford was in the dressing room, she happened to look up, and she saw a hill on which were some trees; in every tree were guys. Ms. Langford says, "I think that was the biggest audience I ever had."
• In 2009, the band known as the xx released their first album, a self-titled album that quickly became critically acclaimed. The xx's early days were rough. They played gigs during which the audience talked all through their songs, which were mostly quiet. Madley Croft remembers, "If there were three people in the front row who were into it, that was a success."
• As a young student in Italy, soprano Joan Hammond ran into a problem while attending operas. She could not afford the better seats, so she sat in the gallery. Often, while sitting there, she would feel a pinch from a man behind her. A reprimand worked, but only for a while, then she would feel another pinch. Moving didn't help, either, for a different man would pinch her.
• Felix Mendelssohn wrote interesting letters as well as interesting music. He once wrote about an audience filled with ladies wearing brightly colored hats: While he played during the concert, he watched the audience and saw that the hat-wearing ladies were bobbing their heads in time with the music so that the scene looked like wind blowing over a bed of tulips.
While watching an interview with Mike Pence (R-Mother), was kinda creeped out by the crease in his neck - looked like something Georgia O'Keefe woulda painted.
Tonight, Monday:
CBS opens the night with a RERUN'The Neighborhood', followed by a RERUN'Bob Hearts Abishola', then a RERUN'All Rise', followed by a RERUN'Bull'.
Scheduled on a FRESHStephen Colbert are Trevor Noah, José Andrés, and Willie, Lukas & Micah Nelson.
Scheduled on a FRESHJames Corden, OBE, are Taraji P. Henson, and Andrea & Matteo Bocelli.
NBC begins the night with a FRESH'The Voice', followed by a FRESH'Songland'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Fallon are Melissa McCarthy, Octavia Spencer, Megan Thee Stallion, and Dan White.
On a RERUNSeth Meyers (from 5/13/14) are Will Forte and Michael Symon.
On a RERUNLilly Singh (from 3/9/20) are Robbie & Stephen Amell, and Vanessa Gonzalez.
ABC starts the night with a FRESH'The Bachelor', followed by a FRESH'The Baker & The Beauty'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Kimmel is Snoop Dogg.
The CW offers a FRESH'Whose Line Is It Anyway?', followed by a FRESH'Whose Line Is It Anyway?', then a FRESH'Roswell, New Mexico'.
Faux has a FRESH'9-1-1', followed by a FRESH'Prodigal Son'.
MY recycles an old 'L&O: SVU', followed by another old 'L&O: SVU'.
A&E has 'Biography' (Kenny Rogers), 'Jeff Dunham: Talking Heads', and 'Jeff Foxworthy: Stand-Up Guy'.
AMC offers the movie 'US Marshals', followed by a FRESH'Better Call Saul', then a FRESH'Dispatches From Elsewhere'.
BBC -
[6:00AM] ATTENBOROUGH AND THE GIANT ELEPHANT
[7:00AM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Melt
[8:00AM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Salmon Run
[9:00AM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Migration
[10:00AM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Tide
[11:00AM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Flood
[12:00PM] NATURE'S GREAT EVENTS - The Great Feast
[1:00PM] PLANET EARTH - From Pole to Pole
[2:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Mountains
[3:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Freshwater
[4:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Caves
[5:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Deserts
[6:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Ice Worlds
[7:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Great Plains
[8:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Jungles
[9:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Shallow Seas
[10:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Seasonal Forests
[11:00PM] PLANET EARTH - Ocean Deep
[12:00AM] PLANET EARTH - From Pole to Pole
[1:00AM] PLANET EARTH - Mountains
[2:00AM] PLANET EARTH - Freshwater
[3:00AM] PLANET EARTH - Caves
[4:00AM] PLANET EARTH - Deserts
[5:00AM] PLANET EARTH - Ice Worlds (ALL TIMES EST)
Bravo has 'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', followed by a FRESH'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', then another FRESH'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', followed by a FRESH'Watch What Happens Live'.
FX has the movie 'Independence Day: Resurgence', followed by the movie 'Jurassic World', then a FRESH'Breeders', and 'Better Things'.
History has 'American Pickers', another 'American Pickers', followed by a FRESH'American Pickers', then a FRESH'Pawn Stars'.
IFC -
[6:15A] The Three Stooges
[6:45A] The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
[9:00A] The Watch
[11:30A] Tropic Thunder
[2:00P] That '70s Show
[2:30P] That '70s Show
[3:00P] That '70s Show
[3:30P] That '70s Show
[4:00P] That '70s Show
[4:30P] That '70s Show
[5:00P] That '70s Show
[5:30P] That '70s Show
[6:00P] Two and a Half Men
[6:30P] Two and a Half Men
[7:00P] Two and a Half Men
[7:30P] Two and a Half Men
[8:00P] Two and a Half Men
[8:30P] Two and a Half Men
[9:00P] Two and a Half Men
[9:30P] Two and a Half Men
[10:00P] Two and a Half Men
[10:30P] Two and a Half Men
[11:00P] Two and a Half Men
[11:30P] Two and a Half Men
[12:00A] Two and a Half Men
[12:30A] Two and a Half Men
[1:00A] That '70s Show
[1:30A] That '70s Show
[2:00A] That '70s Show
[2:30A] That '70s Show
[3:00A] That '70s Show
[3:30A] That '70s Show
[4:00A] That '70s Show
[4:30A] That '70s Show
[5:00A] That '70s Show
[5:30A] That '70s Show (ALL TIMES EST)
Sundance -
[6:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[6:30am] Hogan's Heroes
[7:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[7:30am] Hogan's Heroes
[8:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[8:30am] Hogan's Heroes
[9:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[9:30am] Hogan's Heroes
[10:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[10:30am] Hogan's Heroes
[11:00am] Hogan's Heroes
[11:30am] A View to a Kill
[2:00pm] The Spy Who Loved Me
[5:00pm] For Your Eyes Only
[8:00pm] The Hunt for Red October
[11:00pm] Eraser
[2:00am] Sniper
[4:15am] The Andy Griffith Show
[4:50am] The Andy Griffith Show
[5:25am] The Andy Griffith Show (ALL TIMES EST)
SyFy has all old 'Battlestar Galactica' all night.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas pledged on Sunday to fight Holocaust denial as a trio of former Nazi concentration camps mark the 75th anniversary of their liberation in the shadow of the coronavirus pandemic.
Memorial ceremonies have had to be cancelled or dramatically scaled back for the camps at Sachsenhausen, Ravensbrueck and Bergen-Belsen.
"Over 20,000 people lost their lives in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. If we held a minute of silence for each of them, there would be silence for two weeks," Maas said in a video statement.
Germany assumed the chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance last month, and Maas said it would use the year at the helm to "fight against those who deny or distort the history of the Holocaust."
Support for LGBTQ nondiscrimination protections edged up slightly from 2015 to 2019, but during that same time, support for "religious refusal" laws that allow businesses to deny service to gay men and lesbians increased, according to an annual survey released Tuesday by the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute, or PRRI.
Seventy-two percent of the more than 40,000 Americans surveyed said they favored nondiscrimination protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in 2019, a five-year high, while 56 percent said they opposed allowing small businesses to refuse products and services to gays if doing so would violate their religious beliefs, down from 61 percent in 2016.
Robert P. Jones, CEO of PRRI, called this a "complex finding" and noted that views on religiously based service refusals buck the broader trend of increasing support for LGBTQ rights and protections found in PRRI's 2019 American Values Atlas.
"Among conservatives and Republicans, there has been a steady drumbeat around religious liberty," Jones said, "and I think it has started to have some traction in the bigger national debate."
Opposition to religious refusals peaked in 2016 at 61 percent and has declined since, which Jones described as a statistically significant shift within the survey's margin of error. Interestingly, this shift was seen most dramatically in groups for whom same-sex marriage enjoys overwhelming support: liberals, Democrats and people under age 30.
Ana Maria broke quarantine rules to make a "home visit," while Estefania left home to sell drugs.
Survival has become a struggle for Colombia's sex workers during the coronavirus pandemic lockdown, as cupboards are bare and bills pile up.
Before the health emergency, they worked on the streets or in brothels in a country where sex work is legal. Now, with half of humanity in confinement and those places off limits, they are struggling on handouts and meager savings.
Neither will suffice, though, and many risk fines or even prison to break the lockdown. Worse still, they're potentially exposing themselves to the virus, which has infected almost 3,500 Colombians and killed more than 150.
"What can I do? I can't die of hunger," said the 46-year-old from Facatativa, a town 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the capital Bogota.
I know we're all going through a lot right now, given the state of Current Events. We're stuck at home, trying to find things to do, trying to find things to eat as grocery shopping becomes an everyday occurrence that is suddenly fraught with risks and concerns of food supplies running low. Which, presumably lead us to this moment of rapturous awe while Twitter user Dinosaur Dracula opened a can of Chef Boyardee Spider-Man pasta shapes (with mini meatballs in a tomato sauce!)... ...circa 1995.
Friends, I shouldn't have to warn you considering I just spoke about opening a can of kid's noodles from two and a half decades ago like we're opening the ark of the covenant here, but: what you're about to see is as gross as it is fascinating.
Turns out, that, unlike Enobarbus describing Cleopatra in Shakespeare's Anthony and Cleopatra, age can, in fact, wither Chef Boyardee's Spider-Man pasta shapes (with mini meatballs in a tomato sauce!).
It is kind of amazing that, among what can be diplomatically characterized as the detritus within the can however, you can still just about make out one of the shapes of Spider-Man himself.
President Donald Trump (R-Unfit) is wrongly casting blame on governors and the Obama administration for shortages in coronavirus testing and declaring victory over what he calls relatively low death rates in the U.S. That's too soon to tell.
TRUMP, on governors urging wider availability of virus tests: "They don't want to use all of the capacity that we've created. We have tremendous capacity. ...They know that. The governors know that. The Democrat governors know that; they're the ones that are complaining." - news briefing Saturday.
THE FACTS: Trump's assertion that governors are not using already available testing capacity is contradicted by one of his top health advisers. He's also wrong that Democrats are the only ones expressing concerns about the adequacy of COVID-19 testing; several Republican governors also point to problems.
TRUMP: "The United States has produced dramatically better health outcomes than any other country. ... On a per capita basis, our mortality rate is far lower than other nations of Western Europe, with the lone exception of possibly Germany. ...You hear we have more death. But we're a much bigger country than any of those countries by far." - news briefing Saturday.
THE FACTS: His suggestion that the U.S. response to the coronavirus has been better than many other countries' because its mortality rate is "far lower" is unsupported and misleading.
As a clearer picture emerges of COVID-19's decidedly deadly toll on black Americans, leaders are demanding a reckoning of the systemic policies they say have made many African Americans far more vulnerable to the virus, including inequity in access to health care and economic opportunity.
A growing chorus of medical professionals, activists and political figures is pressuring the federal government to not just release comprehensive racial demographic data of the country's coronavirus victims, but also to outline clear strategies to blunt the devastation on African Americans and other communities of color.
On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its first breakdown of COVID-19 case data by race, showing that 30% of patients whose race was known were black. The federal data was missing racial information for 75% of all cases, however, and did not include any demographic breakdown of deaths.
The latest Associated Press analysis of available state and local data shows that nearly one-third of those who have died are African American, with black people representing about 14% of the population in the areas covered in the analysis.
The coronavirus relief enacted by Congress is barely reaching Americans in need.
This week, checks of up to $1,200 are being delivered through direct-deposit filings with the Internal Revenue Service. But low-income people who have not directly deposited their taxes won't get them for weeks or months. Worse yet, the US treasury is allowing banks to seize payments to satisfy outstanding debts.
Meanwhile, most of the promised $600 weekly extra unemployment benefits remain stuck in offices now overwhelmed with claims.
None of this seems to bother conservative Republicans, who believe all such relief creates what's called "moral hazard" - the risk that government benefits will allow people to slack off.
When it comes to big corporations and their CEOs, however, conservatives don't worry about moral hazard. They should.
Our planet is constantly bathed in the winds coming off the blistering sphere at the centre of our Solar System. But even though the Sun itself is so ridiculously hot, once the solar winds reach Earth, they are hotter than they should be - and we might finally know why.
We know that particles making up the plasma of the Sun's heliosphere cool as they spread out. The problem is that they seem to take their sweet time doing so, dropping in temperature far slower than models predict.
"People have been studying the solar wind since its discovery in 1959, but there are many important properties of this plasma which are still not well understood," says physicist Stas Boldyrev from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
"Initially, researchers thought the solar wind has to cool down very rapidly as it expands from the Sun, but satellite measurements show that as it reaches the Earth, its temperature is 10 times larger than expected."
The research team used laboratory equipment to study moving plasma, and now think the answer to the problem lies in a trapped sea of electrons that just can't seem to escape the Sun's grip.
The first sign that Albert Einstein's theory of gravity was correct has made a repeat appearance, this time near a supermassive black hole.
In 1915, Einstein realized that his newly formulated general theory of relativity explained a weird quirk in the orbit of Mercury. Now, that same effect has been found in a star's orbit of the enormous black hole at the heart of the Milky Way, researchers with the GRAVITY collaboration report April 16 in Astronomy & Astrophysics.
The star, called S2, is part of a stellar entourage that surrounds the Milky Way's central black hole. For decades, researchers have tracked S2's elliptical motion around the black hole. The researchers previously had used observations of S2 to identify a different effect of general relativity, the reddening of the star's light due to what's called gravitational redshift (SN: 7/26/18).
Now, they've determined that the ellipse rotates over time, what's known as Schwarzschild precession. That precession is the result of the warping of spacetime caused by massive objects, according to general relativity. A similar precession in Mercury's orbit had stumped scientists before Einstein came along (SN: 4/11/18).
While physicists have never found a case where general relativity fails, they are searching for any cracks in the theory that could help lead to a new, improved theory of gravity. The new study confirms that Einstein's theory checks out once again, even in the intense gravitational environment around a supermassive black hole.
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