Are you hunkering down?

We took the kids for a hike today and Found some moose sign, a pine sappling rubbed raw from a mule deer buck, saw a chipmunk frantically sounding his alarm as two hawks screeched above his tree, and we post-holed through a little patchy snow. There was a single .223 casing on an abandoned old roadbed (poacher? Coyote hunter? An attempt to assassinate a foreign beer can? We’ll never know.) bears are about, but we saw none. Possible wolf scat, but no wolves. Deer have trimmed the hedges along the mountain’s lawn, but they too were nowhere to be seen. Just sun, and breeze, the smell of pine on warming spring air, a boy slashing at bushes with a stick sword, and the overwhelming sensation that all of nature is watching from the next ridge over.
 
SnowTexan":1vzlhuq3 said:
We took the kids for a hike today and Found some moose sign, a pine sappling rubbed raw from a mule deer buck, saw a chipmunk frantically sounding his alarm as two hawks screeched above his tree, and we post-holed through a little patchy snow. There was a single .223 casing on an abandoned old roadbed (poacher? Coyote hunter? An attempt to assassinate a foreign beer can? We’ll never know.) bears are about, but we saw none. Possible wolf scat, but no wolves. Deer have trimmed the hedges along the mountain’s lawn, but they too were nowhere to be seen. Just sun, and breeze, the smell of pine on warming spring air, a boy slashing at bushes with a stick sword, and the overwhelming sensation that all of nature is watching from the next ridge over.

Nigel,l That sounds like really good "hunkering".

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

Low tide at Sequim Bay today
IMGP2433.thumb.jpg
 
arc":2frsp3kb said:
SNIP ...what I was doing for hunkering down... wish I had some live yeast though and some more flour! :) K
K

The cure for a yeast shortage is to make your own 'starter' w/o the packaged dry
yeast. Regular all purpose flour has some wild yeast in it. You are going to
bring it out.

This takes time (which we have now) but it works. In a clean qt jar put

1. Equal parts flour and water (by weight or 2 scoops flour + 1 scoop water)
2. Mix well, cover w/paper towel and rubber band at room temperature
3. Set on counter a day or so undisturbed. Watch for small bubbles.
4. Add another dose of flour/water. Keep watching.
5. Repeat 4. for a couple more days.

When larger bubbles form and the stuff grows in the jar, you have 'starter'.
Google recipes on how to use starter for bread/baking/pancakes, etc.
Keep unused starter going by the above. Slow it down by putting it in the
refrigerator when you are sick of it but think you'll want more later.

Oh, the joy.

Aye.
PS: If you are out of flour, you may be SOL. Try grinding popcorn...
 
Here's another yeast source. In Canada, there are beer making kits in larger grocery store's. I usually buy two every year ($15 US and no tax) when I'm up there. I just made my last batch three weeks ago and kept the lees (the pint of yeast that settles on the bottom). I have been making bread and pizza from that yeast. Slower than "quick acting" bread yeast, but generally faster than sourdough. I keep it in the cold box (a steel varmint-proof cupboard on the porch for you city slickers). I make a sponge so that I can add more flour to some of it, let it rise, and bake in the morning when the wood stove is heating up the kitchen. The yeast will probably last 6 months, about the same as the beer.

Beer kits, including yeast, are available from Amazon. I found that the lager yeast is faster than the ale yeast. Here's one for Mexican style Corona lager, probably now called Chinese beer by some. https://www.amazon.com/Muntons-Mexican- ... 271&sr=8-2

I drove into downtown Seattle last week because Beth wanted to be an essential worker for a day. I have a picture of 5th Avenue during rush hour on a Friday. It is more of a ghost town then when we left a month ago. Now nobody on the street, no cars (not even parked), and many windows are boarded up like a hurricane is coming. Unfortunately, I'm getting a message that I'm not authorised to add pictures to my photo album. I don't know what that's all about.

I've been putting in the garden. I'm not as lenient this year about letting chipmunks pull up some of the starts as I was before hunkering down. I may have to go Donald Duck against those little rascals.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcCaQhkAVIY
 
Jim from New York":2eleb0n7 said:
I thought this may be of interest to some of the landlocked C-brats here.
Some nice nautical videos put out by a tugboat captain running out of New York City. I boat around this area nice place to explore.
Any local C-Brats from New York area feel free to reach and say hi

Jim

TinBatSea on youtube

Link below

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz-HUR38AUs

Jim, are you in a marina? Or trailer?

Lots of the marinas in Mass aren't opening up until May. I heard NY/NJ marinas were a roll of the dice.
 
Hi Jasen
Boat is on a trailer it suits me best as I like to trailer to different destinations and don’t like watching the salt and barnacles attack a beautiful boat so for now no dock space I’m currently in my home Colombia South America where I snow bird to for the winters waiting for flights to open up again to get back to New York.
 
I generally walk, run, or sprint (two days off between the later two), today a long walk with wife through town. Tomorrow a birthday with sibs, carefully spaced out at several feet. Sister gave me a Dunginess crab today, we will have it with asparagus and avocado.

Here is a excerpt from a today's VOX article, "Scott Gottlieb
Serological testing is important for understanding where the virus has been and who’s been exposed. It could be important for decisions about returning to work in certain professions where there’s gonna be high exposure like police officers or EMT workers or doctors and nurses. But by and large, what we’re going to find is that a very small percentage of the population has actually been exposed to this virus. If you talk to the modelers and the experts, they say anywhere from 1 to 5 percent of the US population has probably been exposed to this virus already." This is what I fear, for all the damage we are still months from anything approaching 'herd immunity' which requires more than 60%, even if it is triple his range, still no where near close enough.
 
Currently still hunkering in Sequim, and just watched the Chinese getting ready for a rebound wave. Covid is coming back for seconds. :evil:

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

0_God_s_Pocket_Anchorage.thumb.jpg
 
Look, herd immunity will not apply to this pandemic until after we have an appropriate vaccine. I'm sorry to tell you this, but, it's true. Some of you may remember the development of Salk (a killed virus vaccine) and Sabin (an attenuated live virus vaccine). In the early '60's the US Public Health Service and Pfizer put on Sabin Oral Sundays. These were administered by states, the first one carried out in Maricopa county Arizona. On three successive Sundays over 70 % of the nations population turned out to "feeding stations" for a sugarcube containing several pink drops of Sabin polio vaccine. In NJ we immunized over 70% of the states population and effectively wiped out polio. Subsequent epidemiological studies confirmed herd immunity. Sure, you can let the disease run rampant in a particular population, but that's called an epidemic (epi=upon, demos=the people). https://www.sciencealert.com/why-herd-i ... 9-pandemic
 
Marty:

Technically, either until we have a vaccine as you mention, or enough folks have gotten the virus/recovered/developed antibodies. Either, or a substantial combination of both, would create herd immunity.

The million dollar question (Trillions actually) remains how to balance the tradeoff between economic degradation and the vagaries of a deadly epidemic. For that I have only personal opinions.

I'm encouraged that our State is joining Oregon and California in developing a strategy for resuming economic activity sensibly, including how to deal with the rebound effect due (very ironically) to our success in limiting infections. California has clearly done the best job of containment, and we're not far behind here in WA.

I personally took a long beach walk, and another after-dinner walk today. Trying to say out of my head.

Best regards, Mike
 
Good news for Wyoming. On April 22, IHME was projecting 243 deaths total. Yesterday, that was revised to a total of 6 deaths, which is what it is now, so they are saying it’s over here for the present. They also projected Wyoming would need 3 times the ICU units available & that too never came close.

The bad news is our local hospitals will likely be declaring bankruptcy as they have been essentially empty while preparing for what never came. Even in normal times the rural hospitals have a rough time keeping open.

We spent last weekend camping with grandkids & now plan boating as the ice comes off the rest of the lakes, floating the Green River down to Flaming Gorge & rv camping from here to the Dakotas & beyond as other areas open.. We are done with any form of hunkering down, though we will observe health practices that should be considered routine & some social distancing. Antibody testing is showing a death rate closer to 1 or 2 in a thousand instead of the 1 or 2 & up to 5 or 10 in a hundred that was so prevalent in the news. And of the 1 or 2 in a thousand 85% or more of those were from the very old & those with severe other health problems. As a person who has spent their life doing risk analysis for desired adventure these odds are quite acceptable. One of my sons who has a family member that has a suppressed immune system & lives in a high density population area that has had many cases is still in the hunkering down mode.

If the Canadian border was open, I’d be just a few days away from heading to Alaska.
 
Jay, I just looked at the Wyoming numbers and you all got VERY luck so far. It is going to be really interesting to see what happens over the next month as folks start to move around the country.

I spent many years working in rural hospitals, and I understand the financial edge they run on. That is where there needs to be some huge bail out money going, Our medical resources nationally are being stretched very thin right now. I still think life and health need to win out over comfort and economy.

A good time to stay healthy.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

1_10_2012_from_Canon_961.highlight.jpg
 
One White House committee has projected that there could be 3000 deaths a day by the end of May. That is a rate of 1 million per year. The President has minimally responded saying death rates will go up. Does anyone have any idea just what the White House has in mind?
 
Foggy":32iq22vz said:
arc":32iq22vz said:
SNIP ...what I was doing for hunkering down... wish I had some live yeast though and some more flour! :) K
K

The cure for a yeast shortage is to make your own 'starter' w/o the packaged dry
yeast. Regular all purpose flour has some wild yeast in it. You are going to
bring it out.

This takes time (which we have now) but it works. In a clean qt jar put

1. Equal parts flour and water (by weight or 2 scoops flour + 1 scoop water)
2. Mix well, cover w/paper towel and rubber band at room temperature
3. Set on counter a day or so undisturbed. Watch for small bubbles.
4. Add another dose of flour/water. Keep watching.
5. Repeat 4. for a couple more days.

When larger bubbles form and the stuff grows in the jar, you have 'starter'.
Google recipes on how to use starter for bread/baking/pancakes, etc.
Keep unused starter going by the above. Slow it down by putting it in the
refrigerator when you are sick of it but think you'll want more later.

Oh, the joy.

Aye.
PS: If you are out of flour, you may be SOL. Try grinding popcorn...


If you can not get your hands on yeast, make Soda Bread. Only 4 or 5 ingredients required (which you probably already have in your cupboard).
Google making Soda Bread and watch the short video. It's a piece of cake. Oops, I meant bread.

Martin.
 
could be 3000 deaths a day by the end of May.

The death toll was 2340 people in the last 24 Hours from COVID 19. We don't know what will happen with the various states "relaxing" the rules. Also an unknown is how well people will continue the social distancing. If rules had not been made and adhered to, our death toll would be far greater.

Anyone's numbers are just a guess currently. No matter what the models are, there is too much unknown.
 
My mother in law came back from Sweden a few weeks ago. The idea that they did nothing isn't correct. As a country their population has been practicing distancing and most people staying in. Their death rate per capita is higher than others in the region and higher than the US. What they are doing may very well work for them but we will only know that in hindsight, It's to early to draw conclusions. I surely hope we can open up some and not see the infections and death rates start back growing exponentially because this is destroying our economy.

They even closed the boat ramps in SC for awhile. They are open now but no beaching or rafting. We're planning am overnighter this weekend.
 
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