Saturday, March 20, 2021

March 20, 2021 Ridley's Beleive It Or Not Vernal Equinox

 Ridley’s Believe It Or Not March 20, 2021

          CV World Cases: The CV pandemic across the planet continues the new year with cases now over 122 million at 122,818,961 with 586,151 new cases (a .48% increase) 21,289,308 which are active, 102,115,804 closed with 99,394,812 recoveries (97.34% and 97.33% yesterday) and 2,720,992 deaths (2.66% and 2.67% yesterday) to continue the trend of increased cases with increased recovery percentages and decreased death percentages with some plateaus.

           CV USA Cases: Total cases now over 30 million at 30,417,203 with 60.456 new cases (a .20% increase) with 7,243,670 active cases of which 8,715 (.12% of active cases and back to daily decreases and a now a decrease now of 20,556 from a peak of 29,271 on December 31) are in serious or critical condition, 23,233,989 closures, 554,794 of which have been deaths (2.39% and 2.39% yesterday) and 22,679,195 of which have been recoveries (97.61% and 97.61% yesterday). Our death rate percentage continues to improve and after many months is now .27% lower than the world rate and now .14% lower than Canada which has the socialized type medicine Biden may well want to implement here but at least has approved 4 vaccines as opposed to our 3  and on a deaths per million population measurement on a steady climb to 1669 ranks behind Belgium (1948), Hungary (1874), UK (1851) which had passed us despite leading world in testing),  Italy (1733), and Bulgaria (1731) and only slightly worse than Portugal (1647), Spain (1559),  Mexico (1519), Peru (1493), France (1410), Brazil (1370), Sweden (1307) that never closed its economy down like we did but has recently been experiencing a steady rise in  deaths,   Poland (1300), Argentina (1198) Switzerland (1173), Chile (1153), and Bolivia (1022) and we have now conducted  388,653,070 tests (now at 1,169,271/M) compared to number 2 now France at  894,795/M) as we are conducting  more tests in number and on a per capital basis for all nations (other than those nations that contain small populations like Bahrain, Denmark,  Israel, Malta, Singapore and UAE) other than the U.K. which remains off the testing charts with tests at 1,650,892/M.    
          CV Open Gate: Lost in the pronouncements by Biden and his lackeys that there is no crisis of illegals surging across the border is that fact that COVID-19 is alive and well and spreading in the Northern Triangle and Mexico which is 9th on my list of deaths from the pandemic at 1519/M and the 3 countries in the Northern Triangle in terms of active cases and deaths per million are as follows:

          Guatemala:  Active cases: 9894        Deaths/M 368
          Honduras:     Active cases: 107,830   Deaths/M 441
          El Salvador:   Active cases: 980         Deaths/M  303   

          US Vaccinations: In the U.S. as of 3/20/2021 121 million doses have been given, 2.25 million per day in the last week (sounds impressive but if the rate does not increase it will take us now reduced to some 5 months to have 75% of the population vaccinated which many believe is necessary to develop herd immunity. In California 14,276,195 total doses have been given (75.6% of doses received to again remain below U.S. average of 77.5%), but with the pressure of a certain recall coming endangering Newsom, California has remained at 36th out of 50 in terms of the percentage of doses administered as a percentage of doses delivered to the states and at 12.1% of its population fully vaccinated has moved from 42nd to tied at 41st with New York 42nd in terms of percentage of residents vaccinated. A long way to go to get herd immunity and lagging behind in terms of getting vaccines received into arms and percentage of population vaccinated compared to other states and a great reason to recall this inept governor.

         Non CV Case News: In a rare day in New York, not a new single female has come forward to allege another instance of sexual harassment but the bullying nature of the beast was revealed in a telephone recording threatening a progressive group that if it did not upgrade its “tepid” endorsement of him in his 2018 gubernatorial  race he was going to label its leader a “child molester” (from the lips of the quasi feminist so quick to blame Trump for the sick sex addict’s assault on 3 Atlanta massage parlors only the sounds of silence); COVID-19 suited up for March Madness and blocked VCU’s chance to play against Oregon for violation of CV protocols, sending VCU home and Oregon on to the next game;  Stanford plays Cal in the Big Game for the Axe Trophy but in wrestling as Stanford 162 lb weight class wrestler Shane Griffith won the national championship in his weight class even as Stanford plans to axe the program due to revenue losses in other sports caused by the CV pandemic; the CV war is active and well on college campuses as the University of Florida has suspended conservative student groups for not wearing masks and not practicing social distancing, claims the groups deny; proving that dormant when used to describe volcanoes is never really dormant, after 6,000 years Mount Fagradalsfjall volcano, located on the Reykjanes Peninsula near Iceland’s capital and its International Airport erupted;; backers of a recall effort for L.A. DA Gascon have formally started the process and have started the 160 day clock to obtain 580,000 signatures of registered voters to place a recall on the ballot https://recallgeorgegascon.com/; as Minneapolis girds for the start of the George Floyd police causing death trial leave it to the political cartoonist to capture the fears of small business owners over the lack of police protection in a riot follows a not guilty verdict: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/cartoons-slideshow.
           Chicago Gun Violence: HeyJackass.com is back to show that through March 19, 2021,  gun violence involving mostly persons of color shooting persons of color in Chicago is alive and well with 621 persons shot of whom 110 have died.

           As always, I hope you enjoy today’s holidays and observances, factoids of interest for this day in history, a musical link to “Till I Waltz Again With You” by Teresa Brewer,  the fact that you avoid ragabash people in your daily dealings and a quote from Libby Riddles on winning the Iditarod, secure in the knowledge that if you want to send a gift for any memorable events like Mother’s Day, college graduations, birthdays, weddings, or anniversaries, you know that the Alaskanpoet can provide you with a unique customized poem at a great price tailored to the event and the recipient. Please contact me for the details on the pricing.

          1. Vernal Equinox—celebrating the first day of spring and the end of winter in the Northern Hemisphere.

          2. Great American Meatout—first celebrated in March, 1985 to promote the vegan diet by encouraging the absence of meat for today. Not sure who the sponsors are but have to believe Beyond Meat today is one of the major contributors.

           3. 1953 Number One Song—the number 1 song in 1953 on this day with a run of 5 weeks in that position was “Till I Waltz Again With You” by Teresa Brewer to share number 1 status with 8 other songs that year.  Here is a recording of “Till I Waltz Again With You” by Teresa Brewer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZkTC0YmfVY Brewer was a prolific singer who recorded over 600 songs in a 50 year career and may be remembered as inspiring Elvis to sing in his first public performance “Till I Waltz Again With You.” Her waltzing ended for good on October 17, 2007 at age 76.

          4. Word of the Day—today’s word of the day as we end the “q’s” to continue the “r’s” is “ragabash” which means an idle, worthless fellow, exactly the sort you would never if you knew his background want to hire.

          5. Prophetic Name for a Band—celebrating the birth on this day in 1976 of noted singer, songwriter and occasional actor Chester Bennington who was the lead singer for the band Linkin but later formed his own band Dead by Sunrise and sadly let depression and substance abuse get the best of him and was found dead by hanging by sunrise on July 20, 2017 at age 41.

         On this day in:

          a. 1815 after escaping from exile on the island of Elba, Napoleon entered Paris with an army of 140,000 and 200,000 volunteers to begin his “Hundred Days Rule” that would come to an end following his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo.

          b. 1923 the Arts Club of Chicago opened the first public exposition of the works of Pablo Picasso.

          c. 1985 Libby Riddles became the first woman to win the Iditarod which was won for the 5th time this year by Douglas Seavey.

          d. 1987 to the joy of those suffering from HIV or who would be infected in the future, the FDA approved the anti-AIDS treatment AZT.

          e. 2003 the U.S. along with its Allies, Great Britain, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq in search of WMD that did not exist in a war we never should have fought.

          Reflections on winning the Iditarod by the first woman to accomplish the feat who fortunately lost 30 miles from Nome stopped at house in the dark and got her bearings: ”The moment when I won the Iditarod is going to be a pretty hard moment to beat, ever, in my whole life, really. One of my less famous quotes was, ‘If I die now, it’ll be okay.’ Because that was just spontaneously what it felt like. It’s like, ‘Wow, how are we ever going to beat this one?’” Libby Riddles

           Please enjoy the poems on events of interest on my twitter   account below (if you like them, retweet and follow me) and follow my blogs. Always good, incisive and entertaining poems on my blogs—click on the links below. Go to www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com for Ridley’s Believe It Or Not—This Day in History,  poems to inspire, touch, emote, elate and enjoy and poems on breaking news items of importance or go to  Ridley's Believe It Or Not for just This Day in History.

 © March 20, 2021 Michael P. Ridley aka The Alaskanpoet

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