It's good to be back home

Back on the grid, so to speak, after a quasi-family reunion in Carlsbad, California last week. Six of the eight siblings made it for at least part of the time, which feels like a victory when there are so many of us and we are scattered from Iowa to Washington to California.

The age range was from me (72) to six months, so there was a lot of somewhat controlled chaos. 

Masking appears to be over, by and large, even in the LA area, though you never know how many are fully vaccinated, boosted, etc. 

I see Mr. Biden has tested positive again, but has no symptoms at all. I guess that is news, mostly due to the virus still being "new." I can't recall reading any stories like "President Bush had a mild sore throat and a slight fever yesterday." Colds are old news.

I can't imagine how many times I might have had some version of some illness (colds, coughs, etc.) over the years, and no one ever cared. Sometimes, I likely had something but just shrugged it off. Heck, I couldn't be 100 percent certain I haven't had Covid already, in some mild form. I have had the occasional runny nose in the past year but nothing rose to the level of "I need to test." 

It's not entirely clear what Americans are supposed to do if and when they DO test positive for the virus. That makes all the CDC data a bit suspect, IMHO. If most people are not reporting their virus status, whether negative or positive, it all seems like a series of guesses.

Only one measure is valid -- hospitalization rate -- and even that may be suspect, since some states either have stopped reporting or are allowing late reports. 

I see some parents have decided to become one-issue voters over the whole mandatory vaccines and school closings issue. Cool. They can hang with the other one-issue voters: on abortion (yea or nay), on gun safety, on Hillary Clinton (still a favorite of so many to hate/love).

Meanwhile, there is a chance that the supposedly unpopular Joe Biden has somehow shepherded some critical legislation through a dysfunctional Congress, inflation is moderating, the stock market is slowing rebuilding, and Trump is in peril of several criminal charges.

The "experts" have already decided the midterm elections, it appears, making it seem silly to even hold the election. Let's just declare it "rigged" right now and let Clarence Thomas decide?

But Americans have the attention span of goldfish, so there are solid chances that something dramatic will occur before November and that white nationalist radicals will go so far as to appall voters and prompt a backlash to their bigotry and fascism.

So, masks or no, August is looking up.