Tuesday, June 07, 2022

COVID-19: It's Okay To Be The Only One Masking | Election Day: Vote On Tuesday! | Balboa Park Disaster And Other Personal Rants |

Squirrel Monkeys at San Diego Zoo Explorers Base Camp (Taken 6.6.22)

I am super exhausted and I thought I was going to spend my night writing a big post about the San Diego Zoo since their hours are finally changing  --on Fridaythey extended hours to be open until 8pm but starting on Wednesday, they'll be open until 9pm, but this post took a little longer than planned, I'm exhausted, and there's construction on El Cajon Boulevard at the moment so it's a little hard to 'think happy thoughts' when the most obnoxious noise is permeating the neighborhood. So instead of a full post at the moment, I will just share this little secret with you: Tuesday, June 7, is going to be the best day to go to the San Diego Zoo until the end of summer. Tuesdays are typically the least busy day of the week, they're open until 8 but acclimating some of the animals to the later 9pm time so animals are staying out a little later, including the primates who I think historically would still go in early despite the later hours. If you have a membership, trust me. Tuesday is the day to go. Today I got to spend 2 hours almost entirely alone with the gorillas, who didn't end up going in until 7. And also, there are new Lion Maned Tamarins in the aviary next to the orangutans. I haven't seen them yet, but I will be stalking them, for sure. Maybe I'll see you there. 

Stay safe out there. 

  • COVID-19:
  • Politics:
    • Tuesday is Last Day to Vote in Primary Election - County News Center (6.6.22)
    • If you care to see who I'm voting for, here's how my ballot looks, after consulting with Courage California, LCV, Planned Parenthood, respected friends and other progressive groups. The big ones are in bold:
      • Governor- Gavin Newsom
      • Lt. Governor - Eleni Kounalakis
      • Secretary of State - Shirley N. Weber
      • Controller - Malia M. Cohen
      • Treasurer - Fiona Ma
      • Attorney General- Rob Bonta
      • Insurance Commissioner - Ricardo Lara
      • State Board of Equalization, 4th District - David Dodson
      • US Senator (Full Term) - Alex Padilla
      • US Senator (Partial Term) - Alex Padilla
      • US Representative, 51st District - Sara Jacobs
      • State Assembly, 79th District - Akilah Weber
      • Superior Court Office 32 - Pennie K McLaughlin (unopposed)
      • Superior Court Office 35 - Michael Flemming
      • Superior Court Office 36 - Chris Lawson
      • State Superintendent - Tony K Thurmond 
      • SDUSD Board of Ed, District B - Godwin Higa 
      • Board of Supervisors, District 4 - Nathan Fletcher
      • Sheriff - Dave Myers 
  • Rosey Rants and Things I Thought About While I Was Sick:
    • When I wrapped up my weekend post, I was thinking about all of these other things that had been on my mind all week. Little triggers. Like watching all these horrifying massacres and then the ensuing debates (if we want to call it that) and news coverage that keep putting two sides, one for more gun laws and enforcement of those laws and people against any further gun regulations, on equal footing. The local news gives these two positions equal time. The news networks just love the clickbait and give the most outrageous viewpoints the same or more time to argue against this. This is the same shit that happened with all the anti-maskers, anti-vaxxers, and anti-mandate people: they were (and still are) by far the minority position, but they're louder and whiter and more privileged and can raise quick lobby and PAC and non-profit money and give the illusion that they represent the majority. They didn't and they don't. All week we've heard variations of 75%-92% of Americans agree that 18 year olds shouldn't have AR-15s or that all guns should have serial numbers or that purchases should require a background check, but apparently we all have to stick our thumbs in our asses and do nothing while we wait out Mitch McConnell's natural life span? What. The. Fuck. 
    • So I had a few more things that I had been thinking about and I meant to address in the last post, so we'll just call this a little addendum. 
      • The City needs to get control of itself: Balboa Park is a disaster with vendor anarchy, the self- sustaining (i.e. private if you can afford it) Botanical Garden, and the committee that stands in the way of safe transit options but remains open to the highest bidder on commercializing the park. I sat through the Balboa Park Committee's Thursday Zoom meeting and it feels like a lot of people whose opinions mean a little too much, like Peter Kominsky, who should've walked away when the Centennial Celebration collapsed and never happened. 
      • Is it a coincidence that the day the Abbott formula recall was announced was the same day a new FDA director was finally confirmed? February 18. What had taken so long? And why wasn't this like a major flag to be waved in the President's face? I've been listening to Karine Jean-Pierre's media briefings and I'm sure she'll find her footing but right now she doesn't feel authoritative in her answers. People want to know who is burying shit before it gets to the President and those people need to go. 
      • San Diego's roads are abysmal but we deserve to see an overlay map of where new pipes are being installed and roads are newly paved. Paving roads or laying fresh slurry doesn't mean shit if you have street projects come in and rip up the streets after. My street is considered repaved, and since the thing was done, at least three different sinkholes arose from new pipes, and the new housing cut into the street to connect water and sewer lines. These streets aren't "complete". 
      • It is hard to be a person who believes we over-police and over-incarcerate and then want everyone involved in sideshows and street takeovers to be severely punished -- cars impounded, jail time, felony vandalism for road damage, felony reckless endangerment. These events make me want cameras everywhere. Like I'll live in a surveillance state because I fucking hate this shit so much. 
      • People say you can separate the art from the artist but I really can't and I don't. For example, I've intentionally never seen a Woody Allen movie. Fuck that creep. I also haven't seen a Tom Cruise, Will Smith, or Johnny Depp movie in this century. Fuck all of them. Creeps. As a native San Diegan, I am SO SICK of hearing about Top Gun and what it means to this city. Nothing but misogynistic military propaganda. Of course I saw the original. A lot. I was 9 when it came out. Everyone saw it. Repeatedly. I can probably recite it line for line. Thankfully I'm an adult and have far better choices about how I spend my time and money and attention and Tom Cruise has already gotten more of mine than he deserves just in this paragraph. Vomit. What a fucking creep.
  • Government:
  • Global COVID-19 Stats (JHU 6.6.22 10:20pm): 
  • 532,350,964 Known Cases/14,234,803 28-Day New Cases 
  • 6,300,053 Known Deaths/43,794 28-Day New Deaths
  • US COVID-19 Stats  
  • CDC COVID-19 Vaccination Data Tracker 
  • American Academy of Pediatrics Children and COVID-19 Dashboard 
      • JHU
        • 84,882,287 Cases/2,864,823 28 Day New Cases
        • 1,008,857 Deaths/8,764 28-Day New Deaths
      • CDC Data Tracker:
        • 98,513 New Cases/84,636,391 Known Cases 
        • 247 New Deaths/1,003,925 Known Deaths
        • 3,808 New Admissions/15,251 Current Hospitalizations
  • San Diego County  
  • Free Testing Sites and Schedule in San Diego 
  • COVID ActNow Daily Updates for San Diego Metro 
  • San Diego Unified School District COVID Dashboard 
  • County Data: 
  • 1,235 New Cases/798,795 Total Cases 
  • 5 New Daily Deaths/5,308 Total Deaths 
  • +140 COVID-19 Hospitalizations Change From Previous Reports
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