Cop Car's Beat

Because the nurses in our family should not miss this....

More from Slashdot.org - level of wariness for COVID-19

I started my own stay-at-home protocol on Wednesday, March  3, 2020 - two weeks before our governor closed the schools in Kansas for the school year, 22 days before our county health commissioner issued his stay-at-home order closing down most businesses, and 27 days before our governor closed down most of the businesses in Kansas with her stay-at-home order. [Please note that my protocol allows for "essential" trips away from home for medical, legal, and minimum grocery shopping.] I pulled the trigger only slightly faster than did many people in the USA, as determined by electricity usage.

Your ZIP Code and Your Life Expectancy (nytimes.com) 60

Posted by msmash on Thursday May 21, 2020 @10:45AM from the closer-look dept.

New submitter moogmachine shares a report: New data on electricity consumption has offered an insight into Americans' level of wariness in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic: Many appeared to be staying home to avoid the virus even before lockdown orders were issued in March. The data, on consumption in homes in 30 states, shows that energy use began to rise in many states about a week before stay-at-home orders were issued but after states of emergency were declared. The data comes from Sense, a company based in Cambridge, Mass., that sells a device to help homeowners track energy use through a smartphone app. The information comes with some caveats. For instance, the devices tend to be popular with tech-savvy early adopters, and the typical Sense home is larger than most. Overall data came from about 5,000 of the devices across 30 states that were geographically representative of the country, the company said.

Like a recent study of electricity use in New York City apartments, the Sense data shows a sharp rise in consumption, with most of the increase coming during the day, when in normal times many people would be at work or school. Across all 30 states, the company reported a 22 percent average increase in overall domestic consumption from March 10 to April 10 this year compared with 2019. The data was adjusted to account for weather differences. Broken down by date and state -- the company looked at data for California, New York and seven other states individually -- the results are even more intriguing. George Zavaliagkos, the company's vice president of technology, said that when he first started looking at the data, he expected to see a rise in energy use in a given state when that state's government issued a lockdown order. California was the first state to order a statewide lockdown, on March 19. New York and other states followed quickly.

Three more trees

Three guys came out from Hillside Nursery, yesterday, to plant three new trees that I had asked nursery employee John to pick out for me and send. As always, I knew that John would be better at picking out trees than would I. Since as far back as 1968, Hillside Nursery has been happy to fulfill orders that my family members have phoned in and John has been helping me for at least 20-30 years (he says that he is 10 years my junior although I would have guessed 20).

Two of the trees were more Prairie Pink Dogwoods. Three dogwoods are shown in the photo, below; but, the center one was planted one year ago and bloomed so beautifully this year (see here and here) that I had to give it some siblings. I'm looking forward to next April!

The third tree planted is a pink crabapple. We used to have one; but, I had it taken out a couple of years ago, when I replaced several trees and bushes with sod (see here). This (below) is the new tree.

I'm hoping that the new crabapple will be as pretty as the one I had taken out - shown, in 2012, below.

While I'm at it, I'll show a few of our irises - the kind that has nearly completed its bloom period.

And, lastly, an update on Hunky Husband's red roses, the buds of which were shown here.

Mr Lincoln:

Oklahoma!: Although the photo makes some of the petals appear to be bruised, the dark parts are really deep red and velvety.

Early report on Hunky Husband's roses - 2020May15

Last year at about this time, I posted Something strange in our rose bed. The main theme was that among the roses that I had planted in March, 2019, was a rose that was supposed to be a Mr Lincoln, but which was producing yellow buds (the later blossoms were a creamy yellow), as opposed to the deep red that a Mr Lincoln is expected to produce. On the last day of March, 2020, I posted A little (more) work done which featured a hybrid tea rose bush that I had just planted for Hunky Husband - a Mr Lincoln.

Today, two of the roses blossomed and the two red bushes produced large buds - of the correct color!

NOT a Mr Lincoln:

Rosie the Riveter:

Mr Lincoln:

Oklahoma!:

Unfortunately, with the copious rain that we've been receiving, the fragrances have been washed away (the creek is up, but not out of it's banks, from the 4" of rain we've received.)

More from Slashdot.org - How ignorant can we get?

'Murder Hornet' Meme Inspires Stupid Americans To Kill Pollinators En Masse (latimes.com) 159

Posted by EditorDavid on Sunday May 10, 2020 @12:34PM from the bug-hunt dept.

An anonymous reader writes: You really can't make this stuff up, but Americans across the country, out of fear of "murder hornets," have begun killing all kinds of bees en masse. According to Doug Yanega, senior museum scientist for the Department of Entomology at UC Riverside, a national panic has led to the needless slaughter of native wasps and bees, beneficial insects whose populations are already threatened...

"Folks in China, Korea and Japan have lived side by side with these hornets for hundreds of years, and it has not caused the collapse of human society there. My colleagues in Japan, China and Korea are just rolling their eyes in disbelief at what kind of snowflakes we are..."

"I don't want to downplay this — they are logistically dangerous insects. But having people in Tennessee worry about this is just ridiculous. The only people who should be bothering experts with concerns about wasp IDs are living in the northwest quadrant of Washington (state). And really, right now, nobody else in the country should even be thinking about this stuff," he continued.
"The facts are, experts said, two dead hornets were found in Washington last December, a lone Canadian live nest was found and wiped out last September and no live hornets have yet been seen this year," reports the Associated Press.

And when they spoke to the Washington Agriculture Department entomologist working on the state's response, he issued an additional correction for all the journalists covering this story. "They are not 'murder hornets.' "They are just hornets."

"Heroism, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder." CC

VE Day

Winston Churchill waving to crowds in Whitehall on 8 May celebrating the end of the war - Wikipedia

Seventy-five years ago buzz bombs stopped falling on English cities, carpet bombing stopped hitting German cities, and most of the various armaments in Europe were silenced. Truthfully, as a second grader, I recall when FDR's death (April 25, 1945) was announced on the intercom system at school, but not the announcement of the cessation of hostilities that occurred not quite two weeks later. Perhaps it was not announced at school. OTOH: I recall the birth of my brother (December 13, 1941), but don't really recall Pearl Harbor. I was too young to understand the enormous consequences.

VE Day preceded the end of our war by a bit over three months. VJ Day didn't come until August 15, 1945 - during my school's summer vacation. Not remembering the event, I can only speculate that I was spending a few weeks at my Grandmother H's farm or with Great-Grandparents S's at the time.

From the National Archives timeline:

May 8, 1945

V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day) Nazi Germany surrenders to the Allies, ending the war in Europe.

 

 

Week in Review - 5/6/2020

The first few photos are for Bogie, with a plea that she help me apply a name to a plant that we last decided was "The Magic Plant". This plant has been growing in about the same spot for about 15 years, I think, and I have misidentified it variously as basil or as sage for several years. On a winter holiday visit, Bogie corrected my identification. This past winter holiday visit, Bogie changed her identification of the plant. I no longer recall what the identifications Bogie made were; but, perhaps these photos of the plant in bloom will help her tie it down. Obviously, since the only time Bogie gets to come visit us is during the winter, she hasn't had the benefit of seeing the plant in any other season.

The whole bush - that came up from a small section of the original bush's roots, most of which was hacked out/dug up when the back porch/deck was replaced two and one-half years ago. It seems to me that, in the past, the flowers were a deeper purple; but, I do <i>not</i> remember colors at all well.

Closer look at a stem with blossoms

I'm sure that Bogie recalls that the stems are square, that the leaves are velvety and opposing, and that the leaves are on different sides of the stem as one moves up or down the stem. That is, if one set of leaves is on the left and right sides of the stem, the adjacent set of leaves is on the front and back sides of the stem. The symmetry and placement of the sets of blossoms are like those of the leaves; opposing, and adjacent sets on differing sides of the stem. When crushed, the leaves release a spicy scent. (Which reminds me that I think Bogie mentioned lavender?) Or, how about catmint - except - the original bush grew to quite a large size, so maybe not; but, I recall buying catmint seeds one year. (But, I always thought this plant grew from a pot - albeit, I remembered it as being some sort of basil; but, it made dreadful pesto!)

After Hunky Husband mowed the lawn the other day; and after I mowed along the "new" edge of the woods (after taking out trees that had formed the "old" edge of the woods); and after Adam trimmed along his fence; and after I trimmed around trees, daffodils, and marking flags, I took some photos to record such a stupendous occasion. The marking flags, btw, keep HH from mowing full-tilt over the roughly eroded area of the lawn at the "old" edge of the woods.

The pole in the midst of the daffodil plants is there to support a hummingbird feeder. I've put it out there so as not to have to move it when the handyman starts painting the house later this month. Tomorrow, I'll move the two other poles that support peanut, sunflower seed, and safflower seed feeders. We've not yet seen a hummingbird and I'm beginning to worry. Most years, I think, at least one has arrived by now - flying up and bobbing just outside our living room window or breakfast room sliding door if I have failed to have a feeder awaiting her arrival.

Yesterday, I installed a new, 100' garden hose at the front water spigot and another at the back water spigot. The one in back replaced three of the four lengths of hose that I had strung together last fall in order to water the new gingko trees in back. It turns out that I had misjudged how long those three lengths amounted to. The new hose plus the longest of the old hoses must add up to 175' instead of 200' (I haven't checked.) They barely stretched far enough when I watered the trees, today - and - they did not reach the walnut that is inside the wood, transplanted there three years ago.

The house finch babies have fledged from the nest in the miniature swing that hangs from the ceiling of the front porch and the bluebird babies seem to have fledged from the bluebird nesting box; but, we failed to catch any of them in the process, this year. Yesterday, when I started to water the houseplants that are in their summer home on our front porch (using the new hose in front), I was startled when I flushed a bird from the upper plant. I won't bother the bird to get photos of its nest; but, I'm sure it's a Carolina wren nesting there. I posted photos of one such nest back in 2012, two photos of which I repeat, below.

The nest - doesn't look like much from the outside

The eggs - found by peering down the tube of the nest

IT roles we old times never filled

Excerpts from NETWORKWORLD

Cisco spotlights new IT roles you've never heard of

A Cisco report on IT trends says new jobs to address changing IT needs include business translator, network guardian and network detective.

By Michael Cooney

Senior Editor, Network World| May 4, 2020 10:18 am PDT

 

From the networking study, Cisco put forward a number of new or developing roles it expects to see in the future, including:

• Business translator: The business translator works to better turn the needs of business into service-level, security and compliance requirements that can be applied and monitored across the network. The translator also works to use network and network data for business value and innovation, and their knowledge of networking and application APIs will help them glue the business to the IT landscape.
• Network guardian: A network guardian works to bridge network and security architectures. They build the distributed intelligence of the network into security architecture and the SecOps process. This is where networking and security meet, and the guardian is at the center of it all, pulling in and pushing out vast amounts of data, distilling it and then taking action to identify faults or adapt to shutdown attackers.
• Network commander: Intent-based networking builds on controller-based automation and orchestration processes. The network commander takes charge of these processes and practices that ensure the health and continuous operation of the network controller and underlying network.
• Network orchestrator: This position translates business needs into network policy. It focuses on policy translation and automation, and policy alignment across network and IT domains.
• Network detective: A network detective uses and tunes network assurance tools that employadvanced analytics and AI to ensure that the network delivers on business intent. They work with IT service-management processes and SecOps teams to identify network anomalies and close potential security holes. Like the network guardian, they use data proactively to identify faults and attacks.

“These new jobs represent a growing tie between business and technology,” Clarke said. "Piece parts of these new criteria are handled by different people but what we are seeing is a need for a hybrid engineer to handle a blend of duties they don’t typically deal with today."

For example, the business intent might be high-quality video calls from a remote workspace that then might be moved from one place to another. The network doesn’t understand that but an engineer can take a multistep configuration to make that happen. How you deal with security, control bandwidth, QoS and use analytics and automation together is part of an evolving role, he said.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Disclosure: I own a few shares (fewer than 200) of Cisco; but, they know nothing about me or my blog and this posting is not, in any way, endorsed by them.

Good neighbors are here

Please notice two things in the above photo of our back lawn: 1) The grass was mowed, today. 2) The grass along the fence has been trimmed. Credit Hunky Husband for the first, our neighbor Adam for the second. Adam came to our front door to ask permission to trim along the fence, which I've been reluctant to tackle for fear of damaging Adam's fence (and it's been too darned hot for me to tackle it!) Adam pointed out that no trimming would be needed had he not installed the fence, so he would like to trim it each time he mows their yard. How sweet! However, I told Adam that his kindness did not really make up for his having installed the fence in the first place since it deprives HH and me of the opportunity to see their children play.

Adam made short work of the trimming - the 150 feet took him about four minutes. He said that he had done lawn work to make his money while he was in school. Terrif! While Adam and I chatted (at about 20' spacing), Krista brought Holly (age 4-5) and Reece (age 8 weeks) over - my first real sighting of the wee one, and he's a cutie (but not very large - 8#). Flynn was inside taking his nap - just as was HH.

News on the COVID-19 front: Adam thinks that he has had it. He and his partner (EMTs) had picked up a patient in early March. Shortly thereafter, both EMTs came down with a fever for a few days. As testing wasn't available, then, Adam's not sure. I'm hoping that he has had COVID-19 and that having had it gives him some measure of immunity.

BTW: We are watching to see if we can catch the fledging of the bluebird babies from that nesting box at the extreme right of the photo.