Mourning in America

The Logical Endpoint of All My Group Exercise Classes

All my group exercise classes are on Zoom at the same time:

Small Blessings

Liking that I live in Sacramento:

In a surprise finding, the Sacramento region has the lowest reported coronavirus infection rate among the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the country, according to a Sacramento Bee analysis.

The Bee review of metros with more than 1 million residents showed the highest per capita rates are in larger and older East Coast and Midwest cities, where people often live closer together, and in many cases where leaders were slower to impose “stay at home” orders. The highest rates are in the New York City and northern New Jersey area, followed by New Orleans and Boston.

At the opposite end of the scale, Sacramento, San Antonio, Tampa, Fla., and Portland, Ore. had the lowest infection rates, in that order. Each of those areas has density in urban cores, but also has a considerable population base in suburban areas where detached, single-family homes are the norm, giving residents more elbow room.

Exxon, Faceplant

2020 is a no-good, very-bad year:

As for the lower earnings and sliding share price, Woods assured his conference-call audience that things were under control. Oil prices languishing in the $60-a-barrel range weren’t a problem but an opportunity. “We know demand will continue to grow, driven by rising population, economic growth, and higher standards of living,” Woods said. “We believe strongly that investing in the trough of this cycle has some real advantages.”

...Over the next several weeks, Covid-19 ravaged the oil industry by vaporizing global demand just as Russia and Saudi Arabia launched a price war. Investors were stunned to see oil fall to an 18-year-low of $22.74 a barrel at the end of March. An agreement aimed at cutting output and boosting prices failed to halt the slide, and on April 20 some oil contracts were trading for less than zero—sellers were paying buyers to take the crude. The fallout for producers large and small has been devastating. “You’re seeing fragilities exposed,” says Kenneth Medlock III, senior director of the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. “Covid-19 is doing things that nobody could have imagined.”

She Silently Waved Hello

Jasper was probing the foliage with his nose, as he always does on his late-night, 1 a.m. walk, when suddenly he jumped back in shock. What was in someone’s front-yard bushes to startle him so?

I got close and peered into the darkness. Suddenly I realized I was face to face with a woman hiding behind the leaves - like a homeless fairy or leprechaun in this upscale neighborhood. She silently waved hello.

Unsettling.

By Bicycle: Midtown/Downtown Sacramento - Part V

Liking the look of these modern apartments on Quinn.

There was a group of low rider cruisers booming around town on Sunday afternoon, but wherever they went, they got turned away by the cops. Here they try to enter Miller Park on the Sacramento River, and they get turned away because the park is "full."

I got excited by this graffiti because I thought I recognized it in a video, but I was wrong.

Sacramento's iconic Tower Bridge.

On the Sacramento River.

The low riders show up in Old Sacramento.

The cops say no dice.

The passage between Downtown Plaza and Old Sacramento (and as used in Corina's video that I posted yesterday).

Downtown Plaza.

Here is that silly Sacramento Kings robot again.

As used in Corina's video that I posted yesterday.

Sacramento train station.

It's amazing how ominous this building feels as it looms above the rail yards.

Rail yards.

Mysterious grass fire north of the railroad tracks on a Sunday afternoon.

I spent a number of tedious afternoons in the Sacramento County courthouse listening to testimony over the years.

The Sutter Club near the State Capitol on a Sunday afternoon.

The alley adjacent to the Sutter Club.

No idiots protesting at the State Capitol on a Sunday afternoon.

The B-Side - a clever-looking restaurant on a Sunday afternoon.