#MicroblogMondays: Odds & ends

• It hasn't been a good week here. :(   
• The weather this weekend was dark, rainy and gloomy, and the furnace kicked back in after taking a vacation for several weeks. (It could be worse:  my parents had SNOW where they live -- albeit the farmers in the area are thankful for the moisture.)  
• COVID-19 case numbers soared to record highs, almost exactly two weeks after the Easter long weekend (4,800+ new cases in one day in my province -- current 7-day average about 4,400 cases). ICUs are jammed and reaching the point where some pretty awful triage decisions are going to have to be made. We had some truly frightening projections released late last week, predicting anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000 (!!) new cases daily, depending on what action is (or is not) taken.  
• This was followed by (more) new restrictions from our provincial government -- most of which were clearly (still!) not enough to ward off disaster (e.g., most construction sites and factories remain open, whether truly essential or not, and the government adamantly refuses to implement paid sick days, which healthcare officials have continually requested) and some of which were almost immediately rescinded (playground closures, anyone?!) or tweaked yet again (new police powers to stop and question anyone out after certain hours about where they live and why they're out -- most police forces immediately said they would not be doing this, and the government "clarified" that police must have a valid reason for stopping anyone).  
• The Washington Post actually published an op-ed on the weekend (from a Canadian writer) calling for the premier's resignation (!).  
• He has been calling the other provincial premiers, asking if they can spare any medical staff and/or vaccine doses. In most cases, they have their own problems and capacity issues to deal with. The cavalry will not be riding in to save us. 
• At the same time, we learned that Moderna will only be shipping half the expected doses of vaccine Canada was promised to receive soon -- although, happily, the federal government was almost immediately able to purchase more vaccine from Pfizer to make up for that, and then some. (Meanwhile, appointments for AstraZeneca -- the vaccine dh & I got two weeks ago -- are going unfulfilled.) 
• On the bright side, Manitoba lowered the eligible age for vaccines there, and my sister was able to make an appointment. My whole family will have received their first shots by the beginning of May.  Progress!! :)  
• I set my alarm clock on Saturday morning for 7, so that I'd be showered and had my breakfast before TV coverage of Prince Philip's funeral began at 9.  (MUCH more civilized than the 4 a.m. wakeup calls I'm used to for royal weddings!  lol). 
• I was chatting on Facebook with several friends about the funeral as it was going on, and my New Zealand pen pal of (gulp) 40+ years told me it was 2 a.m. Sunday morning there... so I guess I really shouldn't complain!  
• I thought it was a lovely funeral -- the venue and the music were glorious -- and it was actually much more intimate with just the family there (and however many millions of us watching on TV/internet, lol). But I did feel sad seeing the Queen sitting all by herself. :(   
• Dh has been working on our taxes these last few days (deadline: April 30th). I'm actually getting a refund this year! 
• If you are following this blog by email, please take note:  I got a notification from Blogger that my "FollowByEmail" widget (Feedburner) is going away. It will be discontinued in July 2021.  "After July 2021, your feed will still continue to work, but the automated emails to your subscribers will no longer be supported. If you’d like to continue sending emails, you can download your subscriber contacts." I checked out the link that supposedly explains how to do this, but I must admit it's all Greek to me... There may be a way to continue to host email subscribers, but I have no idea how to do that... my apologies!  
• Personally, I have always followed blogs on a blog/RSS reader. Since Google Reader was discontinued some years ago, I've been using Bloglovin, although I know a few people who use Feedly and like that. 
  
• In 1978, Gloria Steinem wrote a now-classic article titled "If Men Could Menstruate."  I recently ran across a piece in Ms Magazine (which, of course, Steinem helped found) speculating "If Men Had Miscarriages."  Not quite as satirical/funny as Steinem's original piece, but still worth a read. 

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.