Tired of being Angry, Tired of being Sad, Tired of being Tired. Just plain tired!

Even thinking is difficult these days. so I have avoided it. I feel too much like the little boy in the picture, all huddled up inside my brain. My inbox and FB newsfeed are full of too many articles to even read all the headlines. And most make me angry or sad. I am skipping about 75% and that still leaves too many. I haven't started drinking yet and don't intend to other than hard cider after my walk.

Heather Cox Rischardson's Letters from an American (https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/) is a good summary of each days news. Saves me reading a lot of articles. She writes it every night before she goes to bed, sometimes at 3 am. She is an American political history prof. 

I also follow the statistics, knowing that from some countries they are not very accurate. funny how authoritarian governments are like that. These are the links I use:
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries . Data is in table format, with charts for total cases and total deaths in either linear or log format. Countries are listed and linked for details. USA also provides details for states.
http://91-divoc.com/pages/covid-visualization/ charts data by country and also America by states, in linear or log. It also charts both countries and states by population. Very useful for visual comparisons.

America took 25 days to go from 100 cases to 100,000 and then 32 days to go from 100,000 to 1,000,000. It took 31 days to go from 100 deaths to 10,000 and 25 more days to reach 60,000.
Canada took 26 days to go from 10 cases to 1000 cases but only 12 days to go from 1000 to 10,000 and 27 days to go from there to 50,000. It took 27 days to go from 10 deaths to 1,000 deaths and a further 13 days to reach 2850 deaths. Ukraine took 18 days to go from 10 cases to 1000 cases and will reach 10,000 cases by the end of this month or 27 days.. It took 17 days to go from 10 deaths to 100 deaths and 14 more days to reach 250 deaths.

The problem is that confirmed cases are a  function of testing per population which varies from country to country and state to state. Deaths are also a function of testing and do not necessarily include people who died at home or even in hospital untested. Comparisons of reported deaths from all causes compared to expected deaths as per long term data, revealed more than double expected deaths in BRitain of which less than half were counted as Covid-19 deaths. Depending on how they are calculated, death rates are all over the map.

Countries are gradually opening up and whether we get second waves or not will be interesting to see. Reasons for opening up and who is going back to work is rather fascinating if one has a morbid sense of humour. States that are opening up are making sure that white collars who can work from home continue to do so while the low paying jobs must go back to work so that they stay off unemployment insurance. The disease is a Republican's wet dream as it kills poor and blacks at a 2:1 ratio with elderly and preexisting conditions making up the majority of deaths. Workers in health are just collateral damage.

The one bright spot in my day is walking the dogs on the backroads. Lucky is 8 months old, 75 lbs and has far too much energy. I keep him on a leash. Volk is an old hand at this and as long as there are no chickens or cats, heads us up and we follow. Lucky loves Volk and tries to copy him which wears me out. Drag me, stop and sniff, drag him then he drags me, stop and sniff. Repeat constantly.

I have a number of walk routes that go 3, 4 or 5 km and have added to make it 6 km the past two days. I kind of power out about half way but it is atleast a challenge. Now to work up to 7 and 8 km. I hit the edge of town but do not go into it. There are a few pedestrians and cyclists but a German Shepherd on a 10' leash is a good distancing tool. He is friendly but people don't take chances. Yard dogs are annoying as they bark constantly when we walk by. Everyone has a 6' to 10' fence and a dog. Sometimes the dog is small and yappy, others have big guard dogs that spend their life on chains. I hate that. There are a few feral dogs but they don't bother us.

Volk hates our neighbours dog, going back years. Ronald is a big dog, on a chain by the fence. Volk runs up to the fence and barks and snarls at him. Last night Ronald was out on the street. Volk took one look at him and ran into our yard. I laughed.