Category: Personal

Day 30: It Ain’t Over

It’s tiring. I get it. Dealing with the pandemic is exhausting: wondering if any time you touch something that you’re picking up the virus, or if that person is walking by a little to close, or if it’s worth the risk to pick up some fresh vegetables from the store. It’s been months!

And it’s going to be many months more, thanks to the completely inept handing of things by the Republicans in this country. I single them out because they took common-sense safety precautions and politicized them. How is wearing a mask to limit the spreading of the virus a political question?

But thanks to Governor Abbott here in Texas, the number of new cases of COVID-19 infection is climbing rapidly. Here in San Antonio we had the biggest number of new cases (311) on Tuesday, and the most significant increase in the number of people on ventilators. Houston has the world’s largest medical center, but is so overwhelmed by COVID-19 cases that its Children’s Hospital has started admitting adult patients. Back in April Abbott issued an order that forbids localities from enforcing rules requiring face masks, in an effort “open Texas back up”. There was no evidence that the risk of contagion was gone; in fact, everything said the exact opposite. But in keeping with the Republican strategy of pretending it’s gone, he kept lifting the restrictions that had kept the infection rates low. Now the infection rates are spiking, and they’re acting surprised. The same pattern is happening in Florida, where Governor DeSantis is likewise pretending that things are normal.

And this isn’t a case of “how could we have known?”. Every epidemiologist was saying that re-opening was the wrong thing to do. Every medical authority was saying that we needed more testing to understand the extent of the disease, and that we needed stricter precautions: masks that cover the nose and mouth, full social distancing, and banning public gatherings. We have the evidence from the last global pandemic from 100 years ago: relaxing the precautions led to a second wave of infections. This may be the first time any of us have experienced a pandemic, but it isn’t the first time it’s happened, so we have historical data.

But instead the Republicans, following Trump’s lead, ignored that advice in the hope of giving a boost to the economy.

Priorities!

How is this anything but criminal? If I kill someone so that I can get some money, that’s murder. But if I kill someone to boost the economy (and, by extension, help myself get re-elected), that’s just politics?

Nobody could have prevented this pandemic. I’m certainly not blaming Trump, Abbott, DeSantis, or anyone else for it. But it could have been handled in a way to minimize the suffering and death, as we’ve seen in other countries that treat this like the medical issue it is, rather than political football.

Day 28: The Impossible Butterfly

I wrote this last Saturday evening right after it happened, and posted it to Twitter. I had plans for writing something different today, but our cat had other plans, and became ill. So I’ve just spent most of the day in the “waiting room” (sitting in the car until called), and then having the cat treated. It’s odd how doing almost nothing all day long can exhaust you!

So rather than write something brand-new, I thought I’d re-post my incredible experience. If you’ve followed this blog, you’d know that I raise caterpillars of the Easter Black Swallowtail butterfly, from here, here, here, and here.

I’m at a complete loss for words. I just experienced something I didn’t think was possible.

Earlier today a butterfly emerged from one of the pupas in my nursery. He had a wing deformity (yes, it was a male), and when he attempted to fly, he couldn’t get more than a few feet before returning to the ground

Resigned that he wasn’t going to survive, I placed him on a flowering plant in the yard, and assumed that nature would take its course, and the butterfly would soon die.

I kept returning every hour or so throughout the evening to check on him, and he hadn’t moved very far on the plant. As the evening grew late, I wanted to say my goodbyes. I know it seems silly, but raising these marvelous creatures from egg to adult creates an attachment. I placed my fingers in front of him, and he instinctively climbed up onto my hand. I spoke to him, telling him how sorry I was that his wing was deformed, so he wasn’t going to be able to fly and live his life.

After a minute or so, he started flapping his wings, and flew for a few feet, as he had done before, but quickly landed on the ground. I again placed my hand in front of him, and again he climbed aboard. I talked to him a little bit more, and again he started to flap his wings. This time, though, he flew!

I watched him fly across the yard, up over the garage, and then over the back fence. He quickly disappeared into the distance, and I couldn’t see him any longer.

I don’t know what kind of life he will have, but to be able to fly away on his own is something I truly never thought he would be capable of. I am still feeling that warm giddiness at witnessing what I had thought was impossible.

Day 27: Disc Golf Numbers, Part 2

A few days ago we covered the first two of the four mysterious numbers that are on each disc: Speed and Glide. Today we’ll cover the other two: Turn and Fade.

Turn is the ability of a disc to turn toward the direction of its rotation during the initial high-speed part of its flight. That’s a mouthful! But what does it mean?

Let’s assume that you throw the disc with your right arm, and use the common backhand delivery. When you throw it, the disc will be spinning clockwise when viewed from above, and the front edge is spinning toward your right side. That’s why we say that the “direction of its rotation” is to your right.

Turn values range from 1 to -5, where 1 is the most resistant to turn, and a -5 will turn the most. Having some Turn is good for beginners, as it tends to offset the Fade at the end of the flight, making a more or less straight throw. One problem, though, is that high Turn discs are not as stable when throwing into the wind, so in general you should avoid high Turn discs in that situation.

Let’s compare the flights of two discs that have nearly the same numbers, but differ significantly in their Turn:

The disc on the left, the Thunderbird, has a Turn of 0. Note how its initial flight is fairly straight, while the disc on the right, the Roadrunner, bends to the right for the first half of the flight. That is consistent with a Turn value of -4 for the Roadrunner. I own a Roadrunner, and I can testify that it is very hard to control when throwing into the wind.

The fourth and final number to understand is Fade. Fade represents the tendency of the disc to turn away from its direction of rotation at the end of its flight as it slows down. In other words, Turn and Fade move the disc in opposite directions.

Fade values range from 0 to 5, with 0 finishing the straightest, and 5 bending hard at the end of the flight. It might seem odd to want your disc to fade, but it can be helpful for distance control, where you want to ensure that the disc doesn’t keep sailing past your target. It’s also very useful for when you need to shape your shot around an obstacle such as a tree, as you can throw to the side of the tree, and let the disc’s natural fade bring it back towards the target.

We’ve covered what the numbers on your discs mean. So, as a beginner, how do you use that information? First and most importantly, avoid buying high Speed discs. Until you develop your technique and strength, you simply won’t be able to throw them reliably. Start with a lower-speed disc, such as a fairway driver.

Next: practice! Find an open space where you can practice without having your mistakes (you will make plenty!) cause any problems. Not too far from my house is a park that has a baseball field without any outfield fence:

I’ve circled two trees that I measured to be 240 ft. apart. This is perfect, as I can rarely throw more than 250 ft. I take my discs, noting the numbers on them, and imagine how I need to throw them to get close to the target tree. I have to also factor in the wind, if any. When I make a good throw, I then observe how the disc’s flight goes, and whether it matches what I was expecting. I gather my discs, and now throw from the other tree back towards the first. This way I can practice both throwing with headwinds and tailwinds, or sidewinds coming from each side. I repeat this several times with a set of 3 discs, and then when I have a good feel for them, try with a different set of discs. It’s really helped me understand what disc works best in different conditions. Now I just need to improve my consistency, which means: more practice!

Day 26: June2020.org

I was planning on finishing the post about disc golf today, but I started watching the live stream of The Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, and felt as though there were more important things to write about.

If you haven’t heard of this movement, please take a few minutes to go to june2020.org, and read up on it. And if at all possible, please donate what you can to help.

I watched the live stream for over an hour, and am more convinced than ever that we cannot improve our country by looking at one issue and focusing on that. Instead, it is an over-arching, systemic issue that has not arisen by accident. It is by conscious design. It needs to be addressed as a system: things such as poverty, mass incarceration, abandoned veterans, gerrymandering, unending war, etc., are not individual issues, but all symptoms of the same evil design of the society.

I chose the word “evil” to describe it, as I can think of nothing that better exemplifies what evil means. Imagine not caring about what happens to some people, as long as you profit from it. Imagine not caring about millions of people living in poverty so you can have more. Imagine not caring about people escaping violence and persecution and denying them help just so you can keep your race’s percentage of the population from diminishing even further. Imagine not caring about democracy so that you can prevent people from voting who might not want to sustain the status quo. Anyone as cold an uncaring as that, who would willfully cause millions upon millions to suffer, is the epitome of evil.

Please go to june2020.org and help in any way you can. Then continue to speak out against this unjust society, and vote for people who will at least keep it from getting worse until we can nurture a new generation of leaders who can lead us to where we need to go.

Day 25: Disc Golf Numbers, Part 1

When you start playing disc golf, you have to select the discs you will be using. One disc manufacturer, Innova, came up with a rating system for the flight characteristics of their discs, and it proved useful enough that all manufacturers have adopted it.

Stamped on every disc is a set of numbers that look like this:

Each of these numbers represents a different characteristic of the expected flight for that disc. They are, in order, Speed, Glide, Turn, and Fade.

Speed represents how hard the disc needs to be thrown in order to achieve its ideal flight. It ranges from 1 to 14. The higher the speed, the harder you need to throw the disc. In an earlier post I wrote about my difficulties getting one of my disks to fly, and that was because I wasn’t able to throw it hard enough, as I’m just a beginner. It takes time to build the strength and refine your technique in order to achieve the high speed throws that such a disc requires. The disc I was using had a speed of 12, and I wasn’t even close to being able to throw that hard.

High speed discs are drivers; i.e., when you need your throw to go a long way. More distance on a tee shot is almost always good, but you don’t want to lose accuracy, especially on a tight course. My home course is typical South Texas scrub, which includes a lot of cactus, so you don’t want to end up there! Below is where I ended up in one of my early rounds – another foot or two and it would have been painful to retrieve!

Ouch!

Speaking of distance, the second number in the ratings is Glide. This describes the disc’s ability to remain in flight, and ranges from 1 to 7. A disc spins when thrown, providing a gyroscopic effect, and also has a wing-like shape, which provides lift. Those two together determine how long a disc’s flight will last until it starts to drop. This is why the Speed is important: a harder throw will provide more lift and more gyroscopic stability, and the disc’s design is optimized to take advantage of that. For beginners, who can’t throw at such high Speeds, the driver discs are designed to Glide further by maximizing loft at lower speeds. For a beginner, the trick is to find a driver that flies the furthest that you can control. That generally means finding the highest Glide number for the highest speed you can reliably throw.

That’s enough for one post. I’ll continue tomorrow with explanations on the second two numbers, Turn and Fade.