damont

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

It's been a very busy past few weeks for me, what with preparations for Easter -- including the usual Large Pile Of Music To Sing, only this time around we've had to make recordings of everything and send it in to the choir director for mixing and synching and EQ-ing. On top of all that I have managed to get my first SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (Team Pfizer/BioNTech, if you're interested, but it was really up to the administering facility and no choice of mine). So, what with one thing and another, three ye^H^H weeks passed. Getting on for four, really. So this week in "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging combined with the usual begging post" I'll look at the rest of March with our intrepid pharmacological chemist and blogger Derek Lowe and his blog for Science Translational Medicine, and then NEXT week I'll look at what he's blogged so far in April.

To the surprise of very few, the second half of March had a lot of alarums and excursions regarding the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine.

What is Going on With the AstraZeneca/Oxford Vaccine?

The Problem with COVID-19 Clinical Trials

AstraZeneca’s US Vaccine Trial Data

Blood Clots and the AZ Vaccine, Revisited

After those links, let's shift to the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. Repeat readers can easily predict what comes next: the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some of these were "essential" and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the semi-lockdown is being tightened back up in response to pandemic surges. What these businesses have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

Last week, for the first time in 8 months, I went to Manassas, As with the last trip there, this was for an appointment with my retina doc. But this time around, major progress had been made on the interchange between I-66 and VA route 28. Last summer it was more a case of "construction is starting to happen" but now things have REALLY changed. And, I am a bit surprised but still happy to say, for the better.

You see, almost 14 years ago, VDOT made changes to that area on route 28 that were meant to improve traffic flow, but I'm still not convinced they were effective, and they totally screwed over a handful of neighborhoods, including the one where we lived. Getting from the east side of Chantilly to anywhere south was no longer really feasible, and I was reminded of the 1980s R.E.M. sing title "Can't Get There From Here". I even wrote a blog post about it so I won't go into any further detail here because you can read it there.

Now, as of last month, for the first time in almost 14 years, you can once again "get there from here" -- as part of the I-66 express lanes project between the Capital Beltway and US-29 in Centreville (just west of VA-28), they're redoing the interchange with 28... and this time they had enough funding to get certain things RIGHT. Among them, Walney Road (east of 28) and Braddock Road (west of 28) are now connected to each other by an overpass over 28. And traffic coming north on 28, as well as off I-66 in both directions, has an exit ramp up to that overpass. See this webpage for the current update.

Eventually one should be able to get fron Walney Rd onto southbound 28, or to I-66 in either direction, and the same goes for Braddock Rd northwest of the interchange. Traffic from route 28 northbound will have access to the Braddock-Walney overpass and go either way (ditto for both directions of I-66) and to I-66 eastbound. (To go westbound on 66 one must still get off one exit earlier and take US-29 south for 1/2 mile. For the time being, anyway.) Southbound route 28 traffic will be able to access I-66 in both directions, but to get to either Braddock or Walney they'll have to get off one exit previous and use Westfields Blvd, This makes a certain amount of sense given that Walney basically goes north from 28 (being Old Route 28) and Braddock basically goes northwest from the 28/66 interchange.

This is not how I myself would have designed the interchange, but it does accomplish most of the goals I'd had in mind back in the oughts. So I salute VDOT for actually doing something reasonably well for once. (Though I do recognize that lack of funds had previously been a major barrier to doing this even close to right.)

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

Let's try some more semi-random Links From All Over to share in this week's installment of "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging meets the usual begging post", again covering a very wide range of topics that all relate to the pandemic but are otherwise not necessarily related at all.

First up, a report on an odd side effect of the existing vaccines...

COVID-19 vaccine update: Radiologists report side effects mimicking breast cancer on mammograms

The SA variant of the virus does seem to be the nastiest one so far, so I'm not surprised at this next article. However, friends in the biz have pointed out that "in lab settings" is terribly vague, that "reduced" might simply mean that the effectiveness goes from "kicks viral ass" to "provides good protection", and that "depending on the 'lab settings' it might not be even be as bad as that. It might be 'serum for patients vaccinated with X worked less'. That doesn't account for epitope spreading in vivo."

Pfizer, Moderna vaccines have reduced effectiveness against South African variant, studies show

Sanofi, who already agreed to do "finish and fill" for Pfizer/BioNTech in Germany to up vaccine production, has agreed to another production-increasing deal with a different competitor. This while they still have two vaccine candidates of their own in development/testing.

Sanofi to produce 12M vaccines a month for rival Johnson & Johnson

This next video sheds some light on a casualty of the pandemic that many people haven't thought about (or the costs of dealing with the ramifications): guide dogs who are no longer going out in public, or working regularly, and are thus losing their training and will either have to be replaced (at tens of thousands of dollars each) or their partners will have to find a different accommodation...

My Guide Dog Retirement Plan + My Next Dog… *very emotional*

And, lastly but rather depressingly, the recent statistics.

U.S. life expectancy falls by a year, biggest drop since WWII

"To Me He's Not A Number": Families Reflect As U.S. Passes 500,000 COVID-19 Deaths

And now for something completely dif^H^H^H expected by now: the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. Most of you have been reading these posts for quite some time and can thus guess what comes next: the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the semi-lockdown is being tightened back up in response to pandemic surges. What these businesses have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe less than 16 hours ago, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

And yet again the "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging combined with the usual begging post" series skipped a week. I don't intend this to be an ongoing pattern, and I actually have gotten enough links together for a post next week, but LAST week a post of this type just wasn't going to happen, especially after spending so much time wielding the snowblower and shovels. (For those of you who didn't hear, where I was at the start of February got 28 inches of snow over 3 days.) For THIS week, let's check in with pharma-chemist and blogger Derek Lowe and see what he's had to say about the pandemic and related topics for the past two weeks.

Screening, Within and Without

Myths of Vaccine Manufacturing

Oxford AstraZeneca Data, Again

Adenovirus-Vector Vaccine Roundup, Feb 5: Sputnik and More

How You Make an Adenovirus Vaccine

Does Prior Exposure to [Other] Coronaviruses Protect You?

Antibody-Dependent Enhancement and the Coronavirus Vaccines

That oughta hold you for a while. :-) Now it is time to shift focus to the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. Unless you're a first time reader of these posts, you can guess what comes next: the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the semi-lockdown is being tightened back up in response to pandemic surges. What these businesses have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

The "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging meets the usual begging post" series continues today with the latest from pharma-chemist and blogger Derek Lowe. His schedule caused blog postings to be very light the past couple of weeks, but the frequency is picking up again.

Here are a couple of posts about RNA and mRNA vaccines that aren't quite as specific to COVID-19.

RNA Vaccines And Their Lipids

More Things to Do With mRNA

And the other two are more specific:

Variants and Vaccines

Johnson and Johnson, SinoVac and More

On to the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. Anyone who's been reading these posts for any length of time can guess what comes next: the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the various phases of "reopening" are more and more getting rolled back to more restrictive levels as the pandemic surges. What these businesses have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

Okay. We're still here. For now, at least.

Yesterday's thoughts of making cookies got totally scrod by the completely deplorable events surrounding (and eventually inside) the Capitol in Washington DC. I'm going to leave it at that because I want to leave the cuss words out of this post. (I have family who live nearby. I got reports.) So now I'm going to drop back and punt, as it were, and circle back around to a topic I touched upon briefly last year in the "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging combined with the usual begging post" series. Last summer the Canadian band Barenaked Ladies released a series of "SelfieCamJam" videos featuring the band members all playing in their own spaces, then synched up via editing into one video. Each of these was released in support of a different charity. Well, turns out they did another one for the holidays, as part of a larger effort ("A Very Virtual Christmas" online event the week before Christmas). So let's take a look at that, and some of the stuff from over the summer.

First off is a song celebrating its 40th anniversary. It was a hit in Canada, released there in 1980 but peaking on the charts in the late spring of 1981. In the USA it was a big hit with college radio (and the station I was at as a freshman was no exception). The band that recorded it was Rough Trade, whose two core members collaborated with BNL on this six-way SelfieCamJam version.

"High School Confidential"

Next up is the expanded version of their well-known TV theme. (Ignore the physics references in the bridge's lyrics, which do not jibe well with the current state of cosmology.)

"Big Bang Theory Theme"

Quick shout-out to one of their best known songs.

"If I Had $1,000,000"

The two last jams of the summer (but check out the entire series online):

"Lookin' Up"

"Narrow Streets"

And last but not least, here is the BNL holiday SelfieCamJam. Despite the title, the song has nothing really in common with the Stan Freberg satire classic.

"Green Christmas"

Because this is part of the no-photo series, it is now time for the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. It's pretty predictable what comes next: the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the various phases of "reopening" are more and more getting rolled back to more restrictive levels as the pandemic surges. What these businesses have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

The first half of December in "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging mixed with the usual begging post" follows up on the last part of November with all sorts of news on the vaccine advances front, so let's look at what pharmaceutical chemist and blogger Derek Lowe has had to say about it. (Again, I skipped this type of post last week, primarily out of a lack of spoons to compile links. It's been a rough couple of weeks.)

Taking Two Different Vaccines?

Get Ready for False Side Effects

The FDA Weighs Its First Coronavirus Vaccine

The Oxford/AstraZeneca Vaccine Efficacy Data

The Latest on Coronavirus Mutations

A Wider Variety of Vaccine Platforms Report

Baricitinib Follow-Up: An AI Prediction for Coronavirus Therapy

Autoantibody Problems

Now for the usual PSA-and-begging part of this post. As most of you already know by now, what comes next is the plea for those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the various phases of "reopening" are more and more getting rolled back to more restrictive levels as the pandemic surges with the onset of cold weather. What they have in common is that locally owned and operated businesses give better "bang for the buck" when it comes to keeping the local economy moving. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want. Link to the fundraiser will be provided in the comments and upon request.)

The last couple weeks of November in "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging mixed with the usual begging post" have been busy with news on the vaccince advances front, so let's check out what pharmaceutical chemist and blogger Derek Lowe has to say about it. (Yes, I skipped this type of post last week, mostly because holiday.)

This week Derek's been talking more general stuff in pharmachemistry:

Protein Folding, 2020

And in particular the issues faced by drug developers:

The Big Problems

But there was a lot of vaccine-related news in the week before Thanksgiving:

Vaccine Possibilities

More Vaccine Data, in Advance of More Efficacy

Oxford/AZ Vaccine Efficacy Data

And now, even though I'm apparently a couple days late for Giving Tuesday, it's time for the usual begging part of this post. Almost all of you can figure out what comes next: before and in addition to the usual plea for help for ourselves, I'm going to ask those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as the various phases of "reopening" are more and more getting rolled back to more restrictive levels as the pandemic surges with the onset of cold weather. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

(Originally posted to my GoFundMe earlier today, so I didn't bother to change the timestamp. This is basically copied verbatim (modulo formatting), including the fundraising stuff at the end; I *was* posting to GoFundMe after all. Feel free to ignore those bits if you want.)

Happy Armistice/Remembrance/Veterans/whatever-you-call-it-in-your-country Day, marking the formal end of active hostilities in World War I 102 years ago. In today's installment of "SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 related PSA / traditional weblogging / usual begging post mashup", let's take a gander at some Links From All Over. There have been some developments this month.

The big news, of course, has been regarding initial tests of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. Please note that there are distribution issues that still need to be solved even if the vaccine passes all the rounds of tests and gets approved, especially since this vaccine needs to be stored at minus 80 degrees Celsius which is far colder tham almost every other vaccine requires. It's far from impossible: dry ice can work, and even liquid nitrogen is far colder than that... but it does introduce complications in the logistics of distributing the vaccine, and that means it will take more time than we'd like.

Pfizer’s Early Data Shows Coronavirus Vaccine Is More Than 90% Effective

Fauci says findings on a potential coronavirus vaccine are expected by early December but widespread availability will come later

In the meantime, for those who contract the disease, one treatment has gotten emergency approval:

The F.D.A. gave emergency approval to Eli Lilly’s antibody treatment

From the Science Dept.:

Genetics Could Explain Why Some People With Covid-19 Get Sicker Than Others

And lastly, a couple items from the Bureaucracy Dept. The second is one instance of a larger movement towards "testing out" of mandatory self-isolation and quarantine periods; if there's a more general story about that available (and not behind a paywall) I haven't found a good link to one yet.

Biden unveils coronavirus crisis team tasked with curbing surging cases

Governor Cuomo Announces New Guidelines Allowing Out-of-State Travelers to "Test Out" of Mandatory 14-Day Quarantine

Now it's time for the usual begging part of this post. Unless this the first time reading one of these posts since spring started, you know what comes next: before and in addition to the usual plea for help for ourselves, I'm going to ask those of you who are able to SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES. Some businesses were essential and never closed during the lockdowns. Others, after having opened back up, are now trying to stay open to what extent they can as we struggle through various phases of "reopening" including going back to more restrictions as needed. So please do what you can to help keep your local economy a little bit more afloat. Locally owned businesses are, and will continue to be, struggling to survive and get back on their feet, so please patronize them as much as you can. BUY LOCAL. Please however, do so in a safe manner. Keep on wearing masks and other protective equipment when going shopping in person, continue social distancing. Act intelligently, because I know you can.

( Rest of the begging stuff is behind the cut. )

I first mentioned this in a comment, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt I should post it. One of my reactions to the results of last week's USA election can be embodied in the following song. In the original the singer was primarily addressing her producer/abuser/rapist... but RIGHT NOW I'm interpreting this as being addressed to every single right-winger out there, because each and every one of them needs a "Saul on the road to Damascus" moment (Acts chapter 9).

"Praying" by Kesha.

There's lots of backstory to this song, of course. We can discuss it in the comments if you like. But if there is any single song that encompasses what I've been feeling for the past six days (ever since I was convinced that Biden was going to win eventually), this is it.

I have generally not gotten too political in this journal, mostly because I would piss off everybody if I did. If the popular "political continuum" is laid out in a baseball outfield from left field to right field, I'm somewhere between the scoreboard and the blimp. But I had come to the realization that "four more years" would be the tipping point that led to not just the end of democracy in the US, but to the end of human civilization within 50 years. We managed to scrape up one last chance. I know I won't be alive to see the end of the struggle, or even to coming close. But now, maybe my sisters' grandchildren will live to be thirty.