Friday, October 9, 2020

The View from the Hermitage, Day 208

Older son and I have been playing a game each morning. What is the new October surprise? We started this last week when HWSNBN was first diagnosed with covid-19. Older son is doing better than I am with his off-the-wall predictions. Mine, that Pence will also get covid-19, just isn't happening. Older son came up with a doozy this morning. He described it as a tin-foil-hat scenario that would rival just about any other conspiracy theory view of the now. Let me see if I can remember all the details. Nancy Pelosi has introduced a bill to create a commission to monitor a president's ability to carry out the duties of the office. Moscow Mitch has committed to getting this through the Senate. The deal here is that the Democrats will stop protesting Amy Coney Barrett's Supreme Court nomination; they will also agree to not pack the court when Biden becomes President. Once a commission is established, spots on it will go to a ever-so-slightly-more Republican slant. George W. Bush will be included as the chief resource in terms of what it takes to be president. Mike Pence is in on this since the VP has to agree that the president is derelict in his or her duties for the 25th amendment to work. Once Pence is on board, the commission will move to temporarily strip HWSNBN of the power of the presidency with Pence to become acting president. Biden will win the presidency and the deal will enable enough close-race Republicans to win their races that they keep the majority in the Senate.

Yeah, we'll see if any of this might possibly come true. If any of it does, I'll wear a tin foil hat in older son's honor.

The husband says that there is another covid-19 case in his department, another graduate student. That makes a total so far of three. The case numbers for the whole university have not looked all that bad actually. Older son tells me, though, that there is discussion on Reddit of how many students are getting tested at outside sources; the university number includes only those people testing positive on tests conducted by the university. Older son said he actually saw a report (veracity unknown) that the residents in a sorority house had all tested positive on tests done outside the university. The university claims that if someone, when being tested elsewhere, indicates a connection to the university, the result must be passed on to the university. What I wonder is if they always ask if the person being tested is from the university. I can also see students lying and saying they are not connected to the university. 

I chatted with my mom this afternoon. Her assisted living facility has started to serve breakfast in the dining room. Each resident gets one or two meals there each week. Mom has been lobbying for breakfast for some time now and was quite happy to see it finally come through. Word is that they won't start in-dining-room dinner service until there's been another round of covid-19 testing. I can't say I blame them. Better safe than not. 

The kitchen curtains arrived today. After I post this, I may even unwrap and unfold them to see how they look. I expect they will need ironing. I do have the ironing board set up in the basement. I used it on an Egyptian tablecloth that younger son brought back from a high school trip there. The husband and I would love to visit Egypt, but not until that part of the world is much more stable. 

The husband just came in from mowing the lawn to say that there was a problem with the mower, said problem not sounding good at all. Older son is on his way out here to help with the problem. I think I should go provide moral support.



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