Category: Pandemic

Monday, December 7    Deaths   1,045 (+12)   New cases  1,331

Early on a Monday morning the Mother of Markets was almost empty. We went there together. We know you’re not supposed to do that. But it’s a big airy place and E is getting tired of the Co-op, with its low ceilings and narrow aisles. We split up to do much of the shopping, so we were in and out fairly quickly. We spent a lot of money, though; there’s nothing cheap about Mother of Markets. The good news today was that our grapefruit shipment arrived from Pittman-Davis in Texas. Otherwise, just the normal stuff, a Zoom class, some puttering around outside, naps in the afternoon, and a long walk after dinner to see the Christmas lights in a nearby neighborhood. 

Tuesday, December 8   Deaths  1,080 (+35)   New cases  1,341

Grapefruit for breakfast. Harika! After that, we had to attack our Turkish homework to prep for tomorrow’s lesson. We had a couple of vocabulary worksheets focusing on more or less common adjectives. Go ahead, ask either of us how to say “soft cotton” or “slow turtle” in Turkish. You could even ask us to say “soft turtle” and “fast cotton” if you wanted to. We could do it. Of course you’d have to ask us to do that pretty soon, because, at our age, we don’t know how long we’re going to remember these words. We also had to prepare short oral presentations. E’s is about a dog; M’s is about a car. This took all morning; it was past noon when we knocked off for lunch. In the afternoon we went for a walk in the forest. The weather was nice, partly cloudy with temps in the high forties.

The Turkish word for forest is orman. The word for in is da and in Turkish it comes after the noun instead of before. So ormanda means in the forest . The word for walk is yürü and and the past tense first person plural verb ending is dük. So yürüdük means we walked. Therefore, We walked in the forest would be Yürüdük ormanda. Except it isn’t. In Turkish the verb and all its endings come at the end of the sentence. Hence: Ormanda yürüdük. All this stuff is really easy once you get used to it. We know this from personal experience, not because we personally are used to it because we’re not, but we have personally listened to Turks speaking Turkish. You should hear them when they get going. None of it bothers them at all. Little kids even…

After our walk M found time to wrap two presents and waste some time online. E found time to continue to support local clothing stores in their time of trouble. This time she didn’t want to go inside the store, which is a bit cramped. She found, however, that they have put much of their inventory onto a website. So she used that to make her selection and to pay. Then she called and made arrangements to go downtown and have the sweater brought out to her rather than shipped.

Watched another episode of The Crown. The Duke of Windsor has died. Charles has fallen for Camilla. Good acting and writing. Nice cars. But it’s a swindle, this mingling of fact and fiction. It’s just another kind of reality TV. 

Wednesday, December 9   Deaths  1,110 (+30)   New cases  1,205

Turkish class. Walk up the hill. Wrap presents. Prepare xmas letter. Random reviews via Zoom. Country Strings via Zoom. The guest on Country Strings was David Alvin. David and Phil Alvin came to some prominence in the 80’s in a band called The Blasters. David’s musical inspiration, then and now, was roots music, especially blues, about which his knowledge seems vast. In the Zoom session from his home in California, Alvin played some of his own songs that featured wonderful acoustic blues guitar. Awesome. American Strings is a local university-sponsored free concert series, and since it is now on Zoom, it is available to all. We don’t know the line-up for 2021, but past guests have included Noel Paul Stookey, Tom Paxton, Sarah Jarosz, Roseanne Cash, Country Joe McDonald, Carlene Carter, and Bill Frisell. The format is half an hour of music talk followed by a half an hour of live performance.

After posting last week’s Pandemic Diary, we have had an outpouring of support for our Christmas tree. We have been urged to be more mindful of its feelings when we report about it and we are taking this advice to heart. However, honesty compels us to report that the tree has developed a drinking problem. The tree’s caregivers have noted an extraordinarily high level of liquid intake. This is not meant as a criticism, merely a matter of concern at this point. The tree’s behavior has been placid and uncomplaining with no sign of wobbling or other instability, at least so far…

Thursday, December 10   Deaths  1,123 (+13)   New cases  1,286

FaceTime tertulia with J and R this morning, then E went right into Zoom Better Bones and Balance while M noodled around on the computer. Dull weather today, thick morning fog giving way to a featureless gray sky. Cold rain showers in the late afternoon. With not a breath of wind, the raindrops fall straight down, thousands of perfectly parallel vectors. 

E’s hair stylist is retiring at the end of the month; they had their last appointment today. E’s hair looks great. But what will she do now?

Friday, December 11   Deaths  1,138 (+15)   New cases  1,610

It’s the 260th day of the pandemic and the Oregon death rate continues to rise steeply. The number of deaths per 100,000 residents has reached 26.5. 

Saturday, December 12   Deaths  1,149 (+11)   New cases  1,440

Lovely day, not too cold, cloudy with periods of sun. E went out to the country again to take dog Pepper for a walk. Around midday, both of us worked outside doing fall chores, including pruning our respective roses. M pruned the ones in the back, a motley assortment inherited from the previous owners. E pruned the miniatures that we brought from our old house. They’re in large pots and are nice enough to go in front of the house.

In the afternoon M ventured out to the liquor store. Business was booming and the store was enforcing a limit of five customers in the store at any one time. At the checkout counter the store was still using a credit card reader that required a signature on a touchscreen. That seemed primitive at a time when other stores have moved to no-touch credit card readers. Ah but wait. As soon as M removed his card and the signing screen popped up, the clerk pulled the reader back, made a quick X on his behalf and wished him a nice day. Very sensible. 

Thus resupplied, we had a lot of fun doing a Zoom happy hour with B and B. For a Zoom background we used a photo from the last time the four of us went snowshoeing. 

Dinner was take-out from Pastinis. We ordered online, which we have done before, but this time the process failed. We received our confirmation email as usual, but when we arrived at the appointed time, the staff at the restaurant had never heard of us. Sigh. We reordered right then and waited in the car. It didn’t take too long, but it is not good to have such problems when one is hungry. As best we can tell, the transaction failed as soon as it was made, but despite the failure, the system (TableUp) sent us a confirmation anyway. TableUp baka desu. TableUp çok aptal. TableUp es estúpido.

Sunday, December 13   Deaths  1,155 (+6)   New cases  1,048

A day of rest. After we read the paper, M did the crossword and finished a mystery novel. E had a Zoom get-together with some old friends. We opened a shipment of new cotton/rayon towels, cabernet for M and raspberry for E. They are made in Turkey of course, because that’s where we became towel snobs. What a treat it was to buy towels there! Bur never mind the history. These new ones are lovely and feel very nice. As for how they perform, we shall see.

We’re trying out the idea of online grocery ordering and curbside pickup at the Co-op. E has submitted her list and the Co-op site tells us that they will call us when our order is ready, promising that this will be either Monday or Tuesday. We’ll pay on the phone and then go pick it up.

But the big news today is that we are having a houseguest. Pepper’s owner is having cataract surgery on Monday and won’t be able to care for him properly for a few days. E will go out and pick him up today just before dark. M will stay home and make spaghetti. 

We continue to hatewatch The Crown. Hopefully, we’ll be done soon.

Monday, November 30    Deaths   912 (+7)   New cases  1,314

Grocery shopping again today. M braved the vastness of Winco at 8:15 in the morning. It was far from empty, but it was even farther from its usual packed condition, which we have not seen lately but clearly remember from days past. Prices are good there, and it’s easy to find Reser’s bean and cheese burritos. Winco also has graham cracker crumbs, condensed milk, chocolate chips, and coconut–four critical Christmas items. Check-out was slow, with only two lanes open, and M was late getting back home. E was impatient, stamping her foot, probably the left one. Immediately as he arrived, she departed for the smaller and somewhat claustrophobic Co-op, where she did her part of the dreaded shopping. At least it was a nice morning to be out and about. Both shoppers reported seeing rainbows during their respective journeys. 

In the middle of the day, M glimpsed the sun and started putting up lights on the house, while E, with all critical items in hand, started work on The Bars. Later on, E delivered a birthday cookie to her friend A and picked up some take-out falafel for dinner. After dinner we sampled the bars. And after bars a little TV, the last two episodes of Bir Başkadır. The series had a nice ending. Basically everybody got in touch with their feelings–well, almost everybody–and felt a lot better. Even the little boy who never spoke started talking. Meryem fainted again, but that’s all right since it was mostly from happiness. 

Tuesday, December 1    Deaths  936 (+24)   New cases  1,223

The Oregon Health Authority reports today that there were 24 COVID deaths on Monday, a new daily record. Today is also the 250th day of the Pandemic Diary and so it is time for another chart. The news is grim. As always, the chart tracks average deaths per day per ten day period. Again the scale of our chart has had to change; the vertical axis now extends to twelve. 

The overall total of 936 COVID deaths brings Oregon’s per 100,000 rate to 21.76. The current rate for the U.S. as a whole is 81.93.

Wednesday, December 2    Deaths   953 (+17)   New cases  1,244

We started the day with Turkish class, always a bracing experience. After that, the main event was that we did some Christmas shopping. Stores are open in downtown Corvallis, but they seemed, from our limited experience, to be mostly empty. We were wondering about E’s favorite store, the place where we often get her present. So E called to see what the situation was there. They talked about how they were sanitizing everything after every customer and even offered her a private after hours appointment. It was also clear that hardly anyone was coming in. Also relevant is that the store is in an historic building with high ceilings and an open loft level. All in all, we decided to take a chance and do a modified version of our usual Christmas time custom. First, E went down to the store at 11:00 in the morning just as they opened. For most of her time there she was the only customer and there was only one person to assist her–which happened to be the owner. E picked out a number of things to try on, focusing on sweaters and eventually narrowing down her choices to half a dozen favorites. She then asked the owner to hold a group of the best items, so that M could come in and make final choices. (In this way E is sure to be pleased on Christmas Day and is generally also semi-surprised because by the time the day comes, she can’t really remember all the ones she tried.) M did his part of the process after lunch. The store was slightly more populated when he got there–two assistants and two other customers–still not much for such a large place.

For dinner, E is making her famous spinach lasanga. M will assist by opening and pouring a modest domestic red. Now that we have finished Bir Başkadır, we are somewhat at a loss for TV. 

Thursday, December 3    Deaths   973 (+20)   New cases   1,151

E was out walking early this morning and found the moon still bright in one direction and the sun just about to rise in the other.

Also in the morning came Zoom tertulia with J and R, a Zoom exercise class for E, and a haircut for M. For some years now, M’s barber has been splitting his time between the cutting business and the home building trades, especially painting. Lately he’s been into painting more and more. In times of pandemic it’s a lot less stressful to go into an empty house to paint it than it is work in close quarters with a parade of people. Good for him, not so good, maybe, for M.

After lunch we went up to the Baskett Slough refuge and walked around a bit. The refuge consists of oak savannah hills above many acres of wetland that provide winter habitat for ducks and geese. 

Friday, December 4    Deaths   1,003 (+30)   New cases  2,176

A busy day today. E spent the morning preparing and packing up Christmas presents for the faraways, then rushed off to the post office to mail them. She came back pleased with herself for having got there before the noon rush and having had to share the place with just one other customer. M, meanwhile, dealt with a failing kitchen light. It was a new LED type fixture, which means, as M discovered early in the process, that there are no bulbs to replace. Instead, the fixture is “integrated” which is to say that when one wears out, you buy a whole new one. Fortunately the replacement that M found was 1) not very expensive, and 2) required a kind of installation process that was not new at all. (Newness is all very nice, but there is only a certain amount that can be tolerated.)

After lunch, E and M should have just rested on their laurels and taken a couple of long naps. But instead, we ventured out to get a Christmas tree. And indeed we did get one. That is, we visited a kindly tree seller, selected a tree, paid $55, stuffed it into the back of the CX-5 and took it home. We placed it in a stand and looked at it. We noticed after a few moments that this was the most fundamentally misshapen tree that either of us had ever seen. The main trunk was in fact curved throughout much of its length, and not curved in any particularly elegant way. There was no possible way to make the top point straight up without somehow making the bottom go sideways. What kind of people could possibly have picked out such a tree? We shudder to think. Somehow we will just have to make this do. We will not, of course, be inviting anyone to our house to view our tree because of the pandemic, so there is that. We just have make sure that we don’t accidentally include it in a Zoom or FaceTime backgrounds.

To distract ourselves, we had to watch two episodes of The Crown. (We’re still in Season 3.)

Saturday, December 5    Deaths   1,027 (+24)  New cases 1,847

The number of COVID deaths in Oregon has been high recently, especially in the last five days. All signs suggest that this trend is likely to continue, at least for a time. As we learned very early on, deaths are the only reliable measure of the seriousness of the situation. Other numbers, including those based on case counts and those based on test positive ratios, may be useful and interesting in some ways, but they are problematic. The total of confirmed and presumptive cases, for example, rises steadily as more and more people are tested. But it is not feasible to establish with any certainty the relationship between that number and the number of people who actually have the disease, either during any one period or at any one moment . And those latter numbers are the ones that would be most interesting and most useful. As always, PD will continue to report daily Oregon death data. We will no longer report total cases as this number is becoming more and more complicated to interpret. We will continue to track the number of new cases reported daily. This number is heavily dependent on the number of tests given, but as long as testing in Oregon remains robust, the number of positives will generally be of interest. 

Sunday, December 6    Deaths   1,033 (+6)   New cases  1,290

Tomorrow is our major grocery shopping day, but this morning we made an early run to Market of Choice, so as to have some fresh salmon for dinner tonight. That was just after we had some croissants that E picked up from Le Patissier on Saturday. Darn good, even when a day old. And speaking of Saturday, that is when M took advantage of the dry weather to take the Porsche out for another spin. Went down Peoria Road a ways, turned east and made a loop back. Interesting route. The way back up passed a little more quickly than the way down. One advantage to driving in this season is that there were no bugs on the windshield when he got home.

Today after lunch we had Turkish coffee. Then E finished making the tree beautiful while M made refrigerator pickles. We keep thinking about the treats we’d like to make for the holidays season, but then we think about the weight we’re gaining. So far we’ve just had the bars; we’re holding off–so far–on the cappuccino truffles and the shortbread. We hardly need more treats when the sweets cupboard is bulging! Burst’s nonpareils, two bars pf Hershey’s dark , Dove dark chocolate hearts, Nestles semi-sweet chips, some leftover Halloween Almond Joys…Jeez.

Monday, November 23    Deaths   826 (+6)   Cases  66,333 (+1,163)

Shopping day. M drifted through Market of Choice and purchased a half turkey. Yes, a ten-pound half turkey, which was a twenty-pound whole turkey not too long ago. But let’s not think about that. Now if we can only find a half-oven to cook it in. E again went to the Co-op and bought whole versions of a veggies, fruits and a cheese or two. She then began her serious daily work and made crust for the blackberry pie that she is making for the Andees. After that she sent out twenty-one email notices telling everyone who they’re supposed to be giving to in the Chambers family gift exchange. She also went on two walks, cooked dinner, and finished the blackberry pie. Meanwhile, M went out to the back yard and pruned apple trees with his new toy, a cordless electric chainsaw on a ten foot pole. It worked fine but left him pretty well tuckered out. Did I mention that E also did a Zoom yoga class today?

Tuesday, November 24     Deaths   847 (+21)   Cases  67,333 (+1000)

We drove up to Vancouver WA today and dropped in on Andrea to deliver birthday presents. It’s  Andy’ b-day today and Andrea’s is coming up soon. We were able be in their living room for a bit because Andrea opened the patio door and the entrance door and there was a stiff breeze. We kept our coats on and had a nice visit. Andrea had made cake balls, which we got to see. Didn’t meet Andy, of course, since he was slaving away working long hours for the post office–which is not necessarily a great place to be at this time of year, especially in this particular year. We chose to go up in the middle of the day looking to avoid traffic problems and that worked out well with smooth sailing both ways. We reviewed our latest Turkish homeowork to pass the time. Not much rain while we were on the road, but in the early evening it rained like crazy (deli gibi yağmur yağdı.) By midnight the storm had passed and before going to bed (yatağa gitmeden önce) M spent a few minutes (biraz zaman geçmirdi) watching wisps of cloud float across the bulging moon.

Also in there somewhere, we found time to watch the last two episodes of Winter Sun. It was a very satisfyihg ending. That which had to be resolved, was resolved. And nothing overly ridiculous was required to make it so. We recommend this Turkish soap to all. 

Wednesday, November 25     Deaths   867 (+20)   Cases  68,503 (+1,170)

Turkish lesson today and then a couple of quick shopping things that we missed on Monday. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving Day is never a good day to shop, of course, but actually Bi-Mart was relatively empty, and for vegetables, we went to Natural Grocers, which is never crowded. 

The Thanksgiving feasting, for us, has already begun. M made a pie crust and E mixed up a pecan filling and baked it. After dinner (akşam yemeği sonra) we had some. It was good. It was very good. We were encouraged in this early start on the goodies by our friends B and B, who are doing exactly the same, except that the pie that they have already cut into is apple. E has also started the cranberries. Tomorrow, of course, is the real thing.

Thursday, November 26     Deaths   882 (+15)   Cases  70,006 (+1,503)

And so there it was. Şukran Günü* in time of COVID. Turkey cooked, potatoes mashed, gravy stirred, wine poured. And then, at about 1:30, some small portion of it all was eaten, along with stuffing, green beans, cranberries, and a small relish tray just right for two. Despite a minor misstep or two, upon which we will not dwell, all was delicious and all was well. We delayed dessert for a few hours, and finally made a very satisfactory supper of pecan pie–Chambers pieces. Could be worse. Could be much, much worse. 

E moved furniture to create a cozy window table. 

*Şukran Günü means Thanksgiving Day. Şukran (from Arabic) means thanks, gün means day and ü is the compound noun marker. Relatedly, güneş means sun, and in the title Kış Güneşi (Winter Sun) the compound noun marker is the final i. 

Friday, November 27     Deaths   885 (+3)   Cases  70,832 (+826)

Zoom meeting with the Chambers brothers. James has made news by being out in his Corvette and having it get away from him for a moment. Whether it was a spin or just a series of fishtails is not clear. The driver reports that the proximate cause was a slick spot in the road with “old gas” being another significant factor. We’ve not heard before of this connection between lack of control and old gas, but of course we are young yet and there is much we do not know. John is enjoying staying in his new lakeside cottage. Normally the Chambers Camp closes up in October, so he is getting to see a very different scene than in years past. The early winter views are lovely and with most of the humans gone, animals have reoccupied the area. Among other wildlife, he reports seeing groups of loons, as many as twelve together. Lacking a Corvette, he is driving a leased Volvo C60 plug-in hybrid, a somewhat better vehicle for a north woods winter. 

Later on we watched an episode of our new Turkish TV show, which Netflix calls Ethos, but which in Turkish is called Bir Başkadır.  Our Turkish teacher recommended it and it reminds us of something a teacher would recommend, i.e., not shallow, not ridiculous, not completely artificial, and not glossing over crucial social issues. It is also completely lacking in beautiful, expensive cars. So what is the point you might ask? Well, it’s still quite a drama, with lots of people angry and unhappy, often in conflict with those around them, and often unaware of how much their own blindness and self-absorption are actually responsible for their problems. And of course it has some scenes in a hospital, which is a box that all TV dramas must check off sooner or later. Another bright spot is that we recognized two of the actors, having seen them before in other series. One is the actor who was Naz’s husband in Intersection, and another is a woman who  played Efruz in Kış Guneşi. In Bir Başadır, she plays a soap opera actress! And one of the themes of the show is how real people spend time watching facile popular dramas in the midst of their own actual crises. So that’s pretty cool.  Our Turkish dictionary does not translate “bir başkadır” as “ethos.” We need to ask our teacher about that one.

Saturday, November 28    Deaths   896 (+11)   Cases  72,506 (+1,669)

E went out to the country to walk Pepper again today. While she was gone M moved an azalea and did some more pruning of the rearmost apple tree. After lunch Eve called The Inkwell and asked them to pick out four greeting card sized advent calendars for her. The clerk went and got them and gave her a little bit of a description, then took her money. The E got some stamps and address labels ready and found a driver to run her downtown, where she called again and had the cards brought out to the car. We sat in the parking lot for a minute, preparing two of the cards that most needed sending, and then cruised by the post office and dropped them in the slot. Slick. 

On the way home we stopped at a Coffee Culture drive-thru to get a couple of lattes and discovered they were having a one day sale, fifteen per cent off almost everything. We didn’t need everything, but we did in fact need some decaf beans, so we stocked up a little. When we got home, a Zappos box was on our porch with some new slippers for E to try. The package happened to arrive on the day that Tony Hsieh passed away, Hsieh being one of original founders of Zappos. 

Sunday, November 29    Deaths  905 (+9)   Cases  74,120 (+1,614)

A quiet Sunday. E and M got up late and sat around reading the paper, then went for a walk up Garryanna and down Rolling Green. What kind of name for a street is Rolling Green? M thought about putting up Xmas lights in the afternoon. He was waiting for a glimpse of the sun, which his weather app had promised. No sun was glimpsed.

However, we did get a surprise visit from H and T. It was nice to see them both again. We had a socially distanced tour of the yard and then sat for a time on the back patio. Was it cold? Yes. The guests, being intelligent people, were well-prepared and came bundled up in many warm layers. The hosts, being slower to grasp the nature of reality, hadn’t put on enough. We all had some hot tea, though, and some good conversation. From T we heard a little about how it is to be a pediatric clinician in these times. She is doing a certain amount of appointments remotely, and lots of those have been cases of childhood depression. Remote medicine keeps her safe, of course, but it’s basically a sedentary lifestyle. She misses the activity and natural exercise of work in the clinic. 

Also today, we finished our jigsaw puzzle, a painting by Robert Bissel. It should be titled A Couple of Bears Looking at the Sunset during a Butterfly Invasion, but the painter has inexplicably chosen to call it The Golden Hour instead.

After dinner, another episode of Bir Başkadır. It’s good, but kind of a downer. Just two more episodes to go. We fear it may not end happily, but of course we must see it through, just to find out.

Monday, November 16     Deaths   765 (+4)   Cases  57,646 (+781)

Grocery shopping, Yoga, revision of the instructional tech article. We’re still pondering the Thanksgiving question. We’re thinking now that eating together with the Andees is just too problematic. Might just meet briefly on the Tuesday before and give them a pie. 

Tuesday, November 17     Deaths   778 (+13)   Cases  58,570 (+935)

Quite a busy morning as we had to get ready for the cleaner, fit in a Zoom exercise class, make corrections to the latest diary posting, and pack a picnic lunch, all of this before 10:00. At ten, we drove out to North Albany to deliver a small birthday cake to the B’s and walk around to see how their greenhouse is coming. Then we went back to town and got shingles shots, for E it was her second, for M his first. Then we stopped at the post office before heading south on Peoria road, searching for the picturesquely named Snag Boat Bend Unit of the Finley National Wildlife Refuge. That’s a long name for a fairly small area, but it is lovely and not much frequented. We had only vague memories of the place and we were pleased to see how nice it was. It was a damp and breezy day with intermittent light rain and temperatures in the fifties.  We hiked along among the backwaters of the Willamette, past a picnic table at the halfway point and all the way to the blind at the end. On the way back we followed a flicker who flashed from tree to tree going our way for a minute or two and then disappeared. We saw some lovely tall slender trees, tops swaying in the wind. Poplars maybe?

Then we had lunch, not out in the wind and rain, but rather back in the car with the heater on. It was leftover Indian food. It was great! Once we got home we got down to the important business of taking naps and then had a cup of tea and studied Turkish for an hour. Then M made dinner while E did mysterious things on her computer. Later, there was an after dinner bon-bon for each of us and an hour or so of Winter Sun. As expected, there’s trouble. Efruz, the bright young doctor, has been fired for faking a death certificate in order to spring her long-lost dad from jail. He’s back in jail now and things look bad for both of them. Efe is jealous of Bora, the new guy in Nisan’s workplace and Nisan is jealous of Efruz, whom Efe seems awfully eager to comfort whenever she’s down. Plus, Seda knows that Nisan has not told Efe that evil Yakup, thought to have drowned, is actually still alive. Seda is plotting how best to use that little tidbit to make both Nisan and Efe as miserable as possible. And now for some vocabulary. First, Nisan means April in Turkish. We’re not sure what Seda means in Turkish, but we know it means silk in Spanish. The name Efe reminds us of the similar Turkish word Efes, which refers to Ephesus, a town on the west coat of Turkey, ancient home of the biblical Ephesians and modern site of some excellent Roman ruins. These days, Efes is also the name of a popular brand of Turkish beer. Good to know, eh? You betcha!

Wednesday, November18     Deaths   788 (+10)   Cases 59,669 (+1099)

Grim COVID news today with a relatively high level of both deaths per day and new cases per day. 

When analyzed by age groups, the statistics continue to show that the infection is much more dangerous for older people than for younger ones. Ninety percent of all deaths have been in the age group of sixty and above. (Eighty years and above: 50%. Sixty to seventy-nine: 40%. Zero to sixty: 10%) 

This does not mean that younger people in Oregon are not getting COVID. On the contrary. People under sixty account for eighty-four percent of all confirmed cases. But when they do get the disease, younger people are less likely to require hospitalization and much less likely to die. 

Thursday, November 19     Deaths   808 (+20)   Cases  60,873 (+1,204)

FaceTime tertulia this morning with J and R. They are both doing well. After discussions with their family, they have decided that the best way for them to celebrate Thanksgiving is to just stay home and not try to sit down with anyone else. Instead, they will be dish sharing with the family and then having remote contact via Zoom. We have been thinking along similar lines , though it will be a bit trickier for us since Andrea and Andy are two hours away. Still, it can be done. E will make a pie for them at least and we will deliver it on the Tuesday before the holiday, when we hope that traffic will be lighter. 

Yesterday E went to Coffee Culture and got us two very tasty sweet rolls. We had them for breakfast today just before our FaceTime tertulia. They were delicious. It reminded us of what we used to do when we could meet J and R in person at the café. After tertulia, M went outside to work in the yard and E had her Zoom exercise class. M raked leaves and did yet more lawn mowing–hopefully for the last time this season. E came out too, to plant her ornamental cabbage plants. It was a splendid fall day, not too cold with a mix of bright sun and light clouds. Just a drop or two of rain. It’s time to get the patio and garden ready for winter. Besides cutting back some dead and drooping stalks here and there, we also put away some hoses and put the cover on the big patio umbrella. 

In the afternoon E went to a HEPAJ meeting. It was held in P’s garage, which she has furnished with a big piece of carpet and strings of lights. Also, of course, the place was neat as a pin. How do people manage that? P had also made cookies, which everyone thought were delicious. She confessed that when she had first tasted them, fresh from the oven, she had found them to be a bit dry. Her remedy was to spread butter on them. Very sensible. 

After that, E still wasn’t done. She got back in time to do her Zoom based Laughter Yoga class. The class is going on right now, actually, as M is writing these notes. The class theme for this week is Australia. What’s so funny, you might ask, about Australia? We shall see.

Tonight’s dinner plan is for M to make Haloumi pita sandwiches. Haloumi is a cheese from Cyprus, where we lived for a couple of years. Cyprus is a bicultural island, part Greek speaking and part Turkish speaking. Haloumi is the Greek name; it’s Helim in Turkish. 

Friday, November 20     Deaths   812 (+4)   Cases  62,175 (+1,302)

Some time ago we sent out four audio cassettes and 1 VHS video to have them digitized. E downloaded the results yesterday and this morning we spent time figuring out how to play and store the results. The cassettes were from Eve and were recorded many years ago. In one of them we hear the voices of both Becca and Andrea. Andrea was mostly incomprehensible. That seems strange for someone who is so articulate now. Of course she was only about six months old at that time.

The video that we sent was from M. It was a compendium of stuff from when he lived in Yemen in the late eighties. Boy did we get a surprise when we went to play that. Instead of an hour and half of Yemen scenes, we got three minutes and forty-nine seconds of a group of twenty contestants rehearsing a group dance segment for a statewide beauty pageant–Miss Minnesota, to be exact. The year wasn’t clear, but appeared to be in the eighties or nineties. The dancers were all enthusiastic and energetic, but somehow M was still a little disappointed. 

After that excitement, we did some garden planning and research. E then called around to some local plant places, but no one had Pearly Everlasting. We ended up ordering seeds from Joyful Butterfly. Besides the Pearly, we went for some Common Milkweed. (Seeds seem pretty cheap at JB.) That done, we rested until lunch. In the afternoon we ran some errands and took an hour-long forest walk on the Calloway Creek Trail north of town. For transportation we took the Porsche, which had been sitting unused for many weeks. We’re going to have to put that car into storage for the winter, especially if we want our garage to be as lovely as the garage that Eve was invited to on Thursday.

The days are short now and by the time we had done a grocery stop and had a rest, the daylight hours were over. Dinner was what E calls the week in review, with a green salad for freshness. Friday is nobody’s night to cook, so we had to cooperate. With two of us hungry, preparation just zoomed along.

After dinner, we watched Turkish TV. (Akşam yemeği sonra Türk televizyonunu izledik.) Burak bought a diamond ring and proposed to Nadide. (Burak bir elmas yüzük aldı ve Nadide’ye evlenme teklif etti.) So they’re very happy. (Yani çok mutlular.) But a lot of people are miserable. (Ama birçok insan mutsuz.) Efe is mad about everything. (Efe her şeye kızıyor.) Kadim and Efruz feel terrible. (Kadim ve Efruz berbat hissediyorlar.) Everyone hates Nisan and now she has leukemia! (Herkes Nisan’dan nefret etiyorlar ve şimdi lösemisi var!) Only Bora is being kind to her. (Sadece Bora ona iyi davranıyor.)

Saturday, November 21     Deaths   819 (+7)   Cases  63,668 (+1,493)

This is the 240th day of the Pandemic Diary curve tracker database. We use the db to generate average death rates per each ten-day period. As can be seen below, the Oregon death rate is continuing a steep rise. There have been 77 deaths in Oregon in the last ten days, for a daily average of 7.7. This has required a change to the scale of the PD chart. On previous charts the vertical scale went from zero to six. On the new chart it goes up to eight.

Our chart maker well remembers the early days, when thirty deaths in ten days seemed like a lot and when the drop down to one death per day at the end of May seemed like a such a hopeful sign. It seemed possible that the pandemic might soon end. Well…that didn’t happen.

Sunday, November 22     Deaths   820 (+1)   Cases  66,170 (+1,502)

So, this person goes into a store and asks ”Are there any eggs?” (Yumurta var mı?) and the person behind the counter answers “Nope, no eggs.” (Hayır, yumurta yok.) Hilarious, right? 

On Winter Sun, Nisan’s leukemia was not responding as well as the doctors had hoped, so she needed to be hospitalized. On her way to check in, however, she got kidnapped. The thugs took her into the woods and locked her into the back room of a charming little hunting lodge. She escaped by breaking a window shutter, but now she’s lost in the forest and the thugs are tracking her with a pair of bloodhounds. They will almost certainly recapture her, because how else could the head bad guy call Efe and make his demands? We shall see. 

Monday, November 9  Deaths   734 (+4)   Cases  51,155 (+707)

We did grocery shopping today. M went to Market of Choice and Eve to the Co-op. We know that some of the items that we buy in both these places are available elsewhere for quite a bit less, but we just don’t feel like chasing around town. Partly this is laziness; partly it is caution.

Partly cloudy today and quite cold, thirties in the morning and forties in the afternoon. M did a little yard work today despite the conditions. E did Zoom yoga and worked on her photo project. She has been planning with Andrea about how to get together on Thanksgiving.

Tuesday, November 10     Deaths  737 (+3)   Cases  52,770 (+754)

Still cleaning up the garage, M made trips to Bottle Drop and Goodwill and then did some raking and lawn mowing. Lawn mowing at this time of year? Bah! E did a dog walk with a friend and had Laughter Yoga in the afternoon. Her photo project is done–500 photos sent off for scanning, six or eight albums emptied. M made stew for dinner and E had a Zoom meeting with what we call the knitting group, a bunch of old friends from work.

After that, we watched another episode and a half of Kış Günesi. Sadly, Efe is now divorced from Nisan and married to Seda. But wait, you might say, how can he get divorced from Nisan if he was never married to her? And is he really married to Seda if he married her under an assumed name? Bilmiyoruz. Farketmez. (We don’t know. Never mind.) Whatever the legal tangle, the emotional tangle is worse. 

Wednesday, November 11    Deaths   742 (+5)   Cases  47,839 (+861)

Tis the 230th day of record keeping here at PD, time for a new chart. The death rate in Oregon has climbed again, up to an average of of 5.1 deaths per day over the last ten days. The latest deaths bring Oregon’s overall death rate to 17.25 per 100,000. The rate for the U.S. as a whole is now 73.26. 

Meanwhile, it is M’s turn to cook today, but he’s not really cooking. He’s getting a pizza and making a salad. (O gerçekten pişirmiyor. Pizza getiriyor ve salata yapıyor.) 

After a long internal debate, E decided to risk her life today by visiting the seamstress. The workshop is a vast, high-ceilinged room in an old bank building downtown and generally there is only one customer in the place at one time. Plus, if you don’t stop to talk too much, a visit can be quite brief. So that’s all good. But it’s also true that, for whatever reason, appointments don’t always go off like clockwork, shall we say. So E had to deal with a bit of overlap with a mom, dad and two children who were there unexpectedly. But the seamstress shooed them away fairly quickly. After the appointment E went to reward herself with a coffee from Tried and True just down the street and on her way came across a young man talking on a cell phone saying “Yes, I’m waiting for you.” Only he didn’t actually say those words but said instead “Evet, seni bekliyorum.” He said it twice and Eve understood it both times. She was excited.

Thursday, November 12     Deaths   746 (+4)   Cases  53,879 (+1,109)

Zoom terutulia today with J and R. Later, E took her friend’s dog Pepper to the vet, a major operation as Pepper lives way out in the country on the opposite side of town from the vet’s. As anyone could see from the energy Pepper exhibited running around our back yard today, the dog is not seriously ill; he just needed some shots. 

Eve’s turn to cook today. She’s making minestrone soup. (Sebzeli italyan çorbası yapıyor.) Delicious.

Last night we watched episode 30 of Kış Gunesi. The situation is grim. Efe and Nissan are both having personal crises related to what they are finding out about their families’ pasts, but they are estranged due to the Seda problem and thus each must face it alone.

Friday, November 13     Deaths   753 (+7)   Cases  54,937 (+1,058)

M worked today on some old work stuff. Long ago, he co-wrote an article about what language program administrators need to know about educational technology. It was published as part of a handbook used for administrator training. A few years ago, the handbook was revised and the article had to be updated. Now, there is the possibility of yet another edition of the handbook and once again the editors have requested an updated version. So there he was this morning, slaving away, thinking about things that he hasn’t thought about in a while. 

In the middle of the day, we went for a visit to the wildlife refuge to see the swans that J and R had told us about at tertulia on Thursday. First we took a rainy stroll on a boardwalk through a wetland ash forest. 

We finished our walk just as the rain eased off and then, while driving farther into the refuge, we came across a herd of about 40 elk, who were happily munching on new grass that often pops out in these parts when the fall rains come. Finally we went off to see the swans. They did not disappoint. 

The temperatures are no lower than they’ve been recently, but the dampness got to us and we felt chilly for most of the afternoon. For dinner we had thoroughly heated leftover stew, which helped. 

Another odd tweet from the President today. In the first sentence he boasted of his administration’s unprecedented success in ensuring that U.S. elections were unriggable and in the next sentence asserted that the most recent U.S. election was rigged. In other news, he has also asserted that the voting results that we now have show show him losing by just the “thinnest of margins.” He did not mention that in the electoral college his losing margin in 2020 was exactly the same as his winning margin in 2016, which he described at that time as “the biggest landslide in history.”

Saturday, November 14     Deaths   759 (+6)   Cases  47,839 (+790)

The COVID situation is worsening in many parts of the country and Oregon is no exception. OHA has reported more than 10,000 new cases per day for three straight days. Test positive rates have averaged more than 10% for the last fourteen days and daily death rates have climbed to near record levels. Governor Brown has announced a two-week freeze to begin next Wednesday. During the freeze restaurants and bars will be limited to take-out service, all indoor recreational and cultural facilities will be closed, church services will be limited to 25 people indoors and 50 people outdoors and the prohibition of indoor visits to long-term care facilities will be re-instated.

Up until this week, we had no personal connection to anyone who had the virus. But now one friend has reported that her daughter and granddaughter have both tested positive. Another friend reports that one of her granddaughters is also affected. 

Our activities today included Eve going out to the country to walk Pepper and Michael collecting leaves from the front lawn and taking them around back to mulch things. Dinner was take-out from an Indian restaurant, not exactly a low calorie meal, but pretty tasty. After dinner we watched TV, another hour or so of our Turkish soap. Big doings there, as Efe/Mete finally revealed to everyone that he is really Efe and that his twin brother Mete was the one who was murdered. Efe’s adoptive mother–the saintly Fatma–is ecstatic; his birth mother, Leyla, is devastated. Leyla has lost her husband (one of the guilty parties) and is also terribly hurt by Efe’s deception. And Seda, who was pregnant with Mete’s child, got so upset that she had a sad but convenient miscarriage. Efe is miserable too. He has succeeded in finding out who killed his father 20 years ago and his brother just recently and it seems that the guilty parties have been punished. But he now sees that this success has come at great cost and he just wishes that none of it had every happened. He just wants everything to get back to normal. We know, however, that this is only episode 34 of 50. There’s not going to be much time for regretting or for normal anything because his troubles aren’t even close to being over.

Sunday, November 15     Deaths   761 (+2)   Cases  56,880 (+862)

Andrea came by in the afternoon today. In the morning, E made an applesauce cake for the occasion. When Andrea arrived the three of us first did an exercise walk around the neighborhood and then we sat down with our cake and tea out on the patio. The rain held off for most of the day and temperature was in the mid 50’s, so being outside was not so bad. We talked about what to do about Thanksgiving. The tentative plan is for us to go up there and have a meal on their back patio, but that’s not ideal, especially if it is stormy. We’ve also thought about doing a meal in our garage, with doors arranged to give lots of ventilation. It’s all plausible, but is it worth the stress factor? Should we just all eat in our own homes and make a Zoom connection instead? Don’t know.

Monday, 11/ 2/20     Deaths   692 (+1)   Cases  45,976 (+549)

Shopping day, M going to one store, E to another. We had fairly short lists today; a lot of edibles were already on the premises. What shall we do with all that Halloween candy? 

M tore down the old cooktop, separating the metal parts from the nonmetal ones. Lots of metal in those old appliances. Simple construction too, easy to take apart with just a screwdriver or two. You get to see how it was made, which is fun. Then you haul the metal off to the recycling center. Just half a grocery bag of non-metal pieces left over for the landfill. 

Bright sunny day. Warm enough to be outside and have coffee with a friend. Met R at 2:30 at Coffee Culture. No free tables on the terrace when we arrived because everyone had the same idea. And then…just when our order was ready, a couple of guys got up and walked away. Had a nice talk remembering our adventures in various foreign parts. R had a new Dodgers hat, celebrating a World Series victory by his favorite team.

We’ve settled on one hour a week for this month’s Turkish lessons, starting Wednesday. Harika!

Tuesday, November 3     Deaths   701 (+9)   Cases  46,460 (+482)

Here we are finally at election day. A scary moment. All kinds of optimism among those hoping to get rid of Trump. Living in a dream world. Why do we have so much faith in polls when we know for sure that polls don’t work, a lesson learned just four years ago? Humans are strange. 

At 8:45 p.m. Pacific Time Biden is leading in the electoral college race 192-114. But all the decider states are leaning red. What would it be like to be in a state where your vote really mattered? Maybe not so good, considering who half your neighbors would be. I read a thing that suggested that most voters are casual voters. They mostly vote party lines and don’t pay a lot attention to the issues, especially if they are complicated. They feel no need or desire to dig out the truth behind the slogans. They don’t much care because the government is mostly not real. The government never actually helps you, they just take your money and tell you all kinds of things that you’re not allowed to do. No wonder people instantly respond to the idea that making the government smaller will make a lot of problems just go away. 

It was another busy day for E and M. E went over to the optician and ordered herself some new glasses, something she’d been meaning to do for a long time. She also got some fabric for our custom made storage rack, which will consist–if we get it finished–of a cloth-covered wooden frame with two shelves. After lunch she went over to H’s house for a visit, walking part of the way there and all the way home. M stayed home working on cleanup and organization of the garage and shed environments. He broke up some stuff, again separating metal from other materials. The metal pieces are now stowed in the back of the car waiting another run to recycling. He then started installing hooks and holders in the shed so as to bring forth order from chaos. Busy hands are happy hands.

At 10:15 it’s Biden 215 to 171, with Trump closing fast, having just won Florida. At 10:30 it’s Biden 219 to 209.

Wednesday, November 4     Deaths   705 (+4)   Cases  47,049 (+589)

We had the first of our new Turkish lessons today and had a great time. We learned how to say “seventy million idiot voters” (seçmenlerin yetmiş milyonu aptal)  and “We want a new country.” After that, to pass the time while waiting on election results, E researched native plants and wrapped a package. M worked on the garden shed (bahçe kulübesi), installing the last of the wall hooks and then giving the place a good sweeping. For lunch we went for a short walk and picnic up in the forest, stopping off at the recycling center on the way. After that we had some Türk Kahvesi and worked on a couple of other projects. 

By 4:00 p.m. both PBS and Fox have Biden up 264 to 214, with four states still in play–Nevada, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia.  

One of M’s projects involved wandering through different times and different places. Somewhere or other he ran into this cowgirl. Quite a looker.

Thursday, November 5     Deaths   710 (+5)   Cases  47,839 (+790)

M went in for dental surgery today, part of the implant process. All is going well. Post-op instructions require a diet of (and we quote) “ice cream, pudding, yogurt, milkshakes and cold drinks.” Dutiful patient that he is, M jumped on that train immediately. Another appointment in two weeks, then on to the business of getting the crown. Nine months or so from start to finish. 

Later on M opened up his new iMac up and got it running. Somewhere along the line it had been stored in a place with water on the floor. The bottom two or three inches of both the outer and inner boxes were permeated, the outer one being a little drier. Because of the way it was packed, the dampness never reached any part of the computer. Still, it was disconcerting.

The electoral vote count is unchanged. Sigh. Surely something will happen tomorrow?

Friday, November 6     Deaths   716 (+6)   Cases  48,608 (+769)

Lots of seasonal garden work today–M was raking leaves and E was planting bulbs and seeds that need to winter over. M is mulching the new meadow area in the back with leaves from the neighbor’s tree in the front. It’s a big tree and it’s upwind from our yard. It should provide all the leaves we need before it’s done. M keeps on working despite being forced to survive on a diet of ice cream, chocolate pudding and liquids. Enough is enough, though, and he is planning to eat the food he is cooking for dinner tonight: samosas, sag paneer, and leftover purple cauliflower. 

The election seems to have gone to Biden, but the interminable wait for a final count goes on and on. Meanwhile virus case numbers are rising steeply all over the country, including in Oregon.

Saturday, November 7     Deaths   729 (+13)   Cases  49,587 (+979)

The AP called Pennsylvania for Biden at a little after 9:00 this morning, which put him past the 270 electoral votes that are needed to win the presidential election. E and M heard about this almost as soon as it happened by means of an email from a friend in Chile. Lots of people are celebrating; there is even a certain amount of smiling here at the house on Oak Avenue.

Part of the festivities included a Japanese take-out dinner from Sada. E had vegetable tempura and grilled salmon. M had curry katsu, which he loves, partly because he considers it one of the most ridiculous dishes he has ever run across. For TV, we watched two episodes of Winter Sun (Kış Gunesi). Not much politics there. Who has time? Someone is trying to have Kadim killed while he is in prison, but Kadim is very hard to kill. His long lost wife Farise has finally stirred from her coma. She can’t move but is able to speak, at least enough to tell Efruz about the key to Reşat’s safe deposit box, which contains information that may help Kadim get out of prision. Reşat, a dirty cop who for many years took orders from criminal mastermind Yakup, is dead, having been killed by another of Yakup’s henchmen because he knew too much. Efe and Nisan now have the key and are trying to figure out how to access the box. But Efe has been busy dealing with Seda, who is pregnant with Mete’s child, but who has become Efe’s problem because Mete is actually dead. Efe and Mete are twins and Efe has taken Mete’s place because he thinks that’s the only way to find out who is actually behind all the killing and gun running. (Only E, M, and 300 million other viewers worldwide know that the real bad guy is Yakup, who also happens to be Nisan’s father. And of course Nisan and Efe are becoming friends, so, you know, possible trouble ahead there.)  Anyway, Efe (as Mete) has just promised to divorce Nisan and marry Seda because Seda convinced him that otherwise she’s getting an abortion. Both Efe and Nisan want the baby to be born because it is all that is left of Mete, their childhood friend, who was also Nisan’s husband although they never really clicked. She knows he’s dead and has agreed to help Efe unravel it all, but nobody else knows that except for Kadim and Efe’s best friend Burat. But the point of it all is that Efe and Nisan are living together as husband and wife even though they totally aren’t. Of course they’re not sleeping together or even kissing, but boy are they starting to think about it. 

Sunday, November 8     Deaths   730 (+1)   Cases  50,448 (+861)

We did grocery shopping today. M went to Market of Choice and Eve to the Co-op. We know that some of the items that we buy in both these places are available elsewhere for quite a bit less, but we just don’t feel like chasing around town. Some of this is laziness; some of it is caution.

Partly cloudy today and quite cold, thirties in the morning and forties in the afternoon. M will do a little yard work today despite the conditions. E will do Zoom yoga and work on her photo project. She has been planning with Andrea about how to celebrate Thanksgiving. Possibly, we will be having a meal on their back patio. 

A couple of things about the election come to mind. One is that the margin of victory was much smaller than any of the polls predicted. That makes two elections in a row wherein pollsters seriously underestimated Trump’s appeal. Will poll makers learn from making the same mistake twice in a row? Probably not. Will we all pay really close attention to the polls next time anyway? Oh yeah. There are some arguments against having polls at all. Some countries have laws that prohibit release of polling data in the weeks immediately preceding an election. Which reminds us that 22 countries worldwide, including Australia, have laws that require all citizens to vote. There’s a thought.

Beyond election technicalities, however, there is a larger issue. How do we come to terms with the fact that more than sixty million people would vote for a candidate like Trump? We want to find an underlying cause. Maybe it’s something that could be fixed. But–people being what they are–that probably won’t happen. And you know what they say: You can choose your friends and these days you can even choose your gender, but you can’t choose your species. 

Monday, October 26     Deaths   655 (+2)   Cases  42,436 (+335)

Erken kalktık (We got up early) so as to have a time for a little more study before Turkish class. Class went pretty well. Çarşamba ekimdeki son dersimiz. (Wednesday is our last class in October.) We need to decide in the next day or two whether to continue for another month. We’re conflicted. 

Tuesday, October 27     Deaths   664 (+9)   Cases  42,808 (+372)

Wednesday, October 28     Deaths   671 (+7)   Cases  43,228 (+420)

Beautiful weather this week, very cold nights and mornings but warm afternoons. We decided to seize the day and change tertulia from the breakfast hour to happy hour. J and R brought pastries and we supplied tea and a bottle of Bordeaux on our patio. Nice. 

We had our last Turkish lesson of the month today and talked to the teacher about continuing. We’d like to continue but three hours per week is too much for us. So we’re thinking of maybe changing to just one hour a week if the school can work that out. Today we learned how to say Kendine iyi bak–Take good care of yourself–a useful notion for these times.

Thursday, October 29     Deaths   673 (+2)   Cases  43,793 (+565)

M went for a drive today, taking Highway 22 from Stayton to Santiam Junction. That stretch includes the towns of Mill City, Gates and Detroit Lake, which were all in the path of the Beachie Creek fire. (Video news report here, including an account of how it felt to be evacuating with burning trees on both sides of the road.) Here are some scenes from that area today. This is the town of Detroit Lake.

The fire spread very fast in the 40-50 mph wind. This fire truck was caught in it, perhaps while the crew was trying save this building. The left side of the truck looks fine; the right side, not so much. The sideways lean comes from the fact that the tires on the right side are gone while those on the driver’s side are intact. M felt a little ghoulish taking pictures of all this misfortune. Not that there weren’t plenty of other people there doing the same thing…

About 45 minutes after leaving Detroit Lake, M found somehow found himself 50 miles further east waiting in line outside the Sisters Bakery. So he pretty much had to go in and get something. Fifteen minutes later, he made these notes:

Sisters, Oregon 1:20 P.M.  Chocolate donut? Check. Fritter for tomorrow? Check. Half cup of caffeinated coffee? Check. Full tank of premium gas? Check. Is the Mackenzie Pass highway around here somewhere? Oh yeah.

The last time M went over MacKenzie pass he was in the Jaguar. That car handled the road competently, but it was really too big for the tight, narrow curves. On the other hand, there were no bicyclists on the road that day. This day there were just enough cyclists to make M very cautious. You have to just assume someone’s going to be there every time you go around a blind curve–and all the curves are blind to some degree or other. Doesn’t mean you can’t go a little fast, but you’re constantly recalculating based on angles of vision.

When an exhausted M got home, he found E in the living room doing yet another Zoom class. 

Friday, October 30     Deaths   675 (+2)   Cases  44,349 (+556)

There have been over 1,100 new COVID cases reported over the last two days. The Oregon Department of Education has announced new metrics for school re-openings. Some districts will be able meet standards now, but many more have a long way to go. 

Saturday, October 31     Deaths   689 (+14)   Cases  44,932 (+583)

Fourteen COVID deaths reported today, a new daily record. The youngest victim was 66. All had underlying conditions. 

We did a number of errands today, some of which involved going downtown. The weather was nice and lots of people were out and about. Everyone was masked, but with so many people on the sidewalks, we didn’t feel all that comfortable, even outside. Paranoid maybe, but there it is. We did not linger. 

We learned that the Habitat for Humanity store has reopened on a limited basis and is accepting donations. We have a couple of largish items that we have been saving for them. Donations are accepted by appointment. E made us one for Thursday.

Sunday, November 1     Deaths   691 (+2)   Cases  45,429 (+497) 

This is the 220th day of the Pandemic Diary database. During the last ten days, the daily COVID death rate average was 4.5 per day. This is slightly lower that the previous period, a welcome change after forty straight days of steadily increasing rates.

It got down to 28 degrees last night, but today is sunny and warm. Nov. 1 is the first day of our annual respite from the horror that is Daylight Saving Time. Must enjoy it while we can. M is doing DIY today: mini towel bar in the kitchen, light fixtures for illuminating the new pantry cupboard in the garage, building a lightweight storage rack to go on top of new pantry cupboard. Still to come is the installation of the solar powered light for the interior of the equipment shed plus the assembly and testing of the new cordless pruning gizmo. Project mania. It will pass.

E is doing good again today by taking care of dog Pepper for a few hours while new furniture is being delivered at his owner’s house. The dog is very active, always nervous. E is tired.

Monday, October 19     Deaths   628  (+8)   Cases  39,794 (+262)

A couple of short walks, just around the neighborhood. E had Better Bones and Balance via Zoom while M did a final run-through of his Chile talk. Then we did an hour of Turkish study , preparing for our next lesson, which will be on Wednesday since the regular Monday class has been changed to Thursday. E also did a last run-through for Chile; then she switched gears and practiced using the LearnCube white board for Turkish. But that was after she went to Bi-Mart for misc. goods and Halloween candy. E made another simple and healthy dinner. Then we settled in to watch the last episode of Season 2 of The Gift. It was very disappointing. The show has many virtues, but without a good season-ender we don’t feel that it has been a good investment of our time and attention. Will we ever watch Season 3? Well…it’s not impossible.

It was a cool and partly cloudy day with a beautiful sunset. Probably should be spending more time outside instead of doing all this digital interaction. 

Tuesday, October 20     Deaths  633  (+6)   Cases  40,136 (+242)

The Chile webinar, long awaited and much feared, has now come and gone. It went okay. M forgot to tell the young teachers to be that they’re going to have to love their students, but that might have been a little too mushy anyway. It’s a great relief to have it over with.

We celebrated with a take-out dinner from Tacovore, complete with a large glass of their incomparable lime juice, which we knew how to turn into a couple of margaritas. 

Wednesday, October 21     Deaths   635 (+2)   Cases  40,443 (+307)

In Turkish class today we learned how to say on the left/right side of something (street, page, river, etc.) You start with the thing you’re talking about, such as street. Then you make that word possessive by adding the proper possessive ending (in,nin,ın or nın). Then you add sağ (right) or sol (left) followed by the correct genetive ending (i/si/ı/sı). Then you add the locative suffix “da” but when you do that you have to remember to use the “n” spacer. Oh, and don’t forget that when you add the possessive ending to a word ending in “k”, such as “sokak” (street) the “k” changes to a silent ğ. So there you have it, sokağnın sağında, on the right side of the street. Wasn’t that easy? No. But is it logical? Yeah, it pretty much is. 

After class, we were off to the nursery to buy some trees and poppy seeds. We’ve been considering what to get for a long time. We are committed now to making our yard more of a native environment for birds, caterpillars and whatever, so we needed native plants. Garland has a good selection of natives, all in one place. Nice. For trees we ended up choosing a cascara and a vine maple. Then it was time for lunch, after which E went off on more garden related business, picking up some bulbs and seeds at the fall plant sale connected to the Tribal Native Plant Program of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde. M headed out to the back yard to begin the process of converting a portion of our back lawn to some sort of prairie. 

In the evening we watched a couple of episodes of Winter Sun (Kış Günesi) a Turkish series we watched once before long ago. We’re trying to see if we catch more Turkish this time. So far, M has understood mostly just the old standbys: I love you, calm down, etc. But E is understanding a number of bits and pieces, including Trust me, which another basic staple of Turkish dramatic dialog.

Thursday, October 22     Deaths   646 (+11)   Cases  40,810 (+367)

Nice talk with J and R today. We had to do a Zoom tertulia this time since the temperature in the morning was too far down the scale to allow having coffee and scones outside. This time the menu was oatmeal for J and R, waffles with blueberries for M and E. We had to cut tertulia a little short so as to be ready for Turkish at 9:00. A kind of review and catch up lesson today. We went over the endings for present/present continuous verbs. It’s a bit like Spanish, in that the person is shown by a verb ending and you don’t actually need a pronoun. For example, in English we have a series of three-word sentences: I am happy, you are happy, she is happy, we are happy, you(all) are happy, and they are happy. Spanish does it with a series of two-word sentences: estoy contento, estas contento, esta contenta, estamos contentos, estais contentos, estan contentos. Turkish does it with a series of one-word sentences: mutluyum, mutlusun, mutlu, mutluyuz, mutlusunuz, mutlular. More importantly, we learned that the word for hot (sıcak), when it is used to describe a person, indicates that the person is warm-hearted, not that they are that other thing. 

After Turkish, it was time for rest, recovery and lunch. Then E had to get ready for her HEPAJ meeting at H’s house, from which she had to hurry home to do laughter Yoga. M dug in the dirt and planted trees.

On this the 210th day of PD recording keeping, the Oregon COVID news is not so good. In the most recent 10-day period, we had an average of almost five deaths per day, continuing the upward trend of the last 30 days and coming close to the peaks we had in August and early September. Here’s the updated chart.

Friday, October 23     Deaths   649 (+3)   Cases  41,348 (+538)

Did an outing today with B and B up to Mary’s Peak, up to the top where one of the B’s had never been. Drove in separate cars up to the parking lot, then hiked together up to the summit. Mostly sunny when we arrived with great views in all directions. Cold wind, though, and we all bundled up. It got considerably cloudier as we walked back down to the cars. To get out of the wind, we drove down to the campground to have lunch. Delicious! B–the one who does most of the cooking–had made chocolate chip cookies. Super, as the Turks say, (although when they say it, they stress the second syllable, so it sounds like zoo-PEAR). E brought a thermos of hot tea, which was extremely welcome. M brought a flask with just enough Aberfeldy for everyone to have a mini-shot. Also welcome. When we got back to town the temperature was up in the mid 50’s and our coats were way too warm.

E talked to her old friend L. in Vanautu in the afternoon, a FaceTime call out of the blue. L left upstate New York many moons ago and went to live with husband T in a tropical paradise. We visited them in the late nineties to see it for ourselves. Some years later L came to Turkey while we were there and we traveled around Ephesus together. E and L hadn’t been in touch for the last few years, so it was wonderful for them to catch up.

The last little while has been crazy full of international contact. Besides Vanuatu, we had Zoom Turkish lessons from Germany, Zoom webinar presentations to Chile and the Skype call with Margie in Spain. It makes M’s head spin.

Saturday, October 24     Deaths   653 (+4)   Cases  41,739 (+391)

Eve did her usual heroic Saturday duties. First she walked over to the Patissier for croissants. She says that the guy with the oxygen canister on his belt was there again, serving as an example to us all. Let not a mere breathing problem keep you from croissants. She then went out to do a dog walk for her friend but found the dog cowering indoors because of some shooting going on out there in the country. She decided to bring Pepper back to our place in town and let him run around the back yard for a while. That worked fine; Pepper pretty much stayed in constant motion till it was time to take him home. M, meanwhile, was still digging in the dirt, preparing an area of lawn to become a ‘meadow’ next spring. The dog made a contribution. 

Dinner was take-out from Ba’s Vietnamese Comfort Rood in Albany. We had to take the Porsche to pick it up because the Mazda was ailing. E got the vegan curry, M the beef pho. We both got the large size portions, which we carefully halved as soon as we got home, one half to eat and one to save for another day. 

After dinner we had a FaceTime call with Andi and Andy. Andy is settling into his new job working for the Post Office. He has to work tomorrow, as the USPS does package work for Amazon on Sundays. Andrea is starting a new job with Banfield next week, one that she expects will be more challenging and more interesting than what she has been doing.

Sunday, October 25     Deaths   653(+0)   Cases  41,101 (+362)

Zoom meeting with the siblings today, E from Corvallis, Jim from Clifton Park, and John from the new cottage at the lake. Jim reported that he has not been getting messages on his phone as it is locked outside in his car. Joanne can still answer a landline however, so that’s how the meeting organizer was finally able to contact him. Jim still has his old Corvette and they’ve been out in it quite recently. Good for them. John moved his camera to show us his canine friend, Mabel, who is currently keeping him company up at the lake. Mabel is a Puerto Rican immigrant, a refugee from Hurricane Maria. E showed a picture that she had come across while perusing old albums. It was of one of their great grandfathers on their mother’s side, one Luther Ochampaugh, a Vermonter worked with his brother as a cheesemaker. 

After the meeting E and M put the jumper cables on the Mazda and got it going again. Once it started up, we noticed that the gas gauge read empty, which seemed absurd, but there it was.  M put in half a gallon and we headed off to the gas station. After half a block, the gauge jumped up to one eighth full. Good news. After three blocks it jumped to more than a quarter full. By the time we got to the station it had settled in at about three fourths full. Very peculiar.

After lunch we got outside for a bit and then, when we were nice and tired, our Turkish teacher sent us the homework for tomorrow. Dragged ourselves through that. We’ve learned that preparation pays. 

Dinner was roast chicken, mashed potatoes, and salad. Lezzetli! (Delicious!) Daha sonra iki televizyon programı izledik. (Later two television programs we watched.) One was an episode of Kış Güneşi and the other was Part 4 of Flesh and Blood on PBS. We’ve now watched all four parts of the latter. It’s not terrible, but that’s as far as we’ll go.

Monday, October 12     Deaths   599  (+0)   Cases  37,467 (+218)

Having seen a near record high number of deaths reported last Thursday, we now get a second straight day of zero deaths. That helps some, but the trend is again upward. Here’s an updated chart on this the 200th day of the Pandemic Diary database. 

Tuesday, October 13     Deaths   605  (+6)   Cases  37,770  (+259)

Last night we watched more of The Gift, a Netflix series filmed in Turkey by a Turkish production company. It’s very good. There are lots of beautiful location scenes, both in the city and out in the Anatolian steppes. Much of the action in Episode 4 took place on Mount Nemrut, a site in southeastern Turkey where lie the ruins of the tomb-sanctuary of King Antiochus I Theos of Commagene. In Episode 3 Atiye dodged one bullet by bailing out of her wedding just in time. She’d been conflicted already, and when she learned that her mother had lied to her about nearly everything, that did it and she was out of there. But she cannot dodge her destiny. By the end of Episode 4 we understand that the mantle has been passed. Her sister Cansu, meanwhile, has broken out of the friend zone…but now feels terrible.

This morning E had an exercise class and doctor’s appointment; M did some grocery shopping. Weather wet and blustery. Turkish homework in the afternoon. 

Wednesday, October 14     Deaths   608  (+3)   Cases  38,160 (+380)

Turkish lesson this morning. We learned how to say “Shopping to do going am I” which is of course  “Alışveriş yapmaya gidiyorum.” That means we should also be able to say “Shopping to do went I” (Alışveriş yapmaya gittim.) So the next time M or E goes shopping at the Co-op, we should be able to report the fact in Turkish–provided that we remember any of this beyond the next few hours.

With all this attention toTurkey, we have been thinking a lot about our good friend Neşe, who unfortunately passed away about two years ago. Eve met her when both were working at the Turkish American Association in Ankara. After we left Turkey, Neşe came to visit us in Oregon. It was blackberry season when she was here and our neighbor Rich invited us to come picking at a place just south of town. Rich, who has also since passed away, was a former professional football player. Here’s a picture of the two of them. Presumably, Rich picked the high-up berries while Neşe got the ones lower down…

We also visited Neşe after she had moved from Ankara to the Mediterranean coastal city of Alanya, where she worked with a Georgetown study abroad program. Here’s one of our favorite photos from that time.

Thursday, October 15     Deaths   611  (+3)   Cases  38,525 (+365)

Tertulia at Bohdi’s once again. Although the sky was clear and the sun was bright, and it was a little chilly at 8:30 in the morning. You have to dress for it. At the other end of the day, we had dinner and wine with J and B (or was it B and J? We forget.) Anyway, that was also very nice. They have a large front porch that was designed–along with the rest of house–by B himself. It’s just right for this pandemicky sort of entertaining. Even if it had rained we would have been cozy. 

Friday, October 16     Deaths   617  (+6)   Cases  38,935 (+410)

Worked on Zoom skills in the morning. At lunchtime we went hiking once again in Mcdonald Forest. Several miles, so not just a walk. Had a visit from R. who came over by bicycle around 4:00. He’s looking well. Our friend P. also came over around 5:00. Weather was fine and we entertained both the guests on the back patio. Nice. Had some olive and cheese sandwiches with P and then later on dined on leftover chili. We got some carrot cake cupcakes from Trader Joe’s in honor of P’s birthday. Hm. Probably won’t do that again.

Saturday, October 17     Deaths   620  (+3)   Cases  39,316 (+381)

Spent most of the day prepping for seminar coming up next Tuesday. Ridiculous behavior. Splurged on take-out dinners from Sybaris. M liked his entree; E was disappointed by her pumpkin stuffed ravioli. We shared a Boston cream pie for dessert. Neither of us was disappointed by that. We were thinking that while we do miss going out to restaurants, having restaurant food at home also has its points. You can say whatever you want or laugh as load as you want anytime; plus the wine is a lot cheaper.

After dinner we watched more of The Gift.

Sunday, October 18     Deaths   620  (+0)   Cases  39,532 (+216)

The Patissier was closed but E fetched breakfast for us anyway on her morning walk–a chocolate donut for M, a cherry danish for herself. Then more Zoom practice. Then E had a Skype visit with her friend M in Madrid. M reports that the virus continues to be a serious problem in Spain. She says that most people wear masks while walking down the street, but then they go into crowded bars to meet their friends and of course everyone removes their masks to drink and talk. Sigh. M has two granddaughters, one seven and one three (?). She wants to teach them some English while they’re young. She’s having some success with the older one but less with the younger. The little one has been known to say (in a three-year-old’s Spanish) “I want to sit with grandma now, but not for studying English.”

M meanwhile was opening up our newish furnace to check the filter. Sure enough, the weeks of smoke and ash from the fires has left it sorely in need of replacement. The filter size turns out to be not a common one, so he had to order online. Once he started thinking about the garage, M was moved to try and tidy it up a bit. This involved moving the Porsche out so as to get better access to some storage shelves and etc. and etc. We still have debris from the great cupboard delivery and he got rid of some of that as well. Then, since the little car was already out in the driveway, it seemed like a good time to take a quick ride. While he was gone and the garage was sort of clear, E rearranged some of her stuff in her quest to create more free space, possibly enough for a bicycle. Then it was time for a walk, which took us to exotic places like Anjni Circle and Angelika Avenue. We ran across a street party, a dozen or more neighbors on lawn chairs arranged in a large circle on the pavement in the center of their cul-de-sac turnaround. They were a friendly group, even offering to let us join them if we paid a $2.50 entry fee. Back at home we had a bit of Turkish study and then E jumped in the car and took our completed ballots down to the drop box at the courthouse. It turned out to be a kind of party atmosphere with a line of cars and people saying ‘Yay for voting!” She says it was an energizing experience. When she got home, it was time for dinner: leftover spinach dal (once cooked by M), leftover raita (once whipped up by E), and fresh cooked but oddly mushy rice also courtesy of one who shall be nameless. Sunday night TV included two episodes of The Gift and and one episode of Flesh and Blood on PBS. Lastly we had to check the daily Oregon COVID news and as noted above, it turns out nobody died that day, which is quite fine and deserves a mention.

Monday, October 5     Deaths   572  (+0)   Cases  35,049  (+279)

Had our first Turkish lesson today, coming to us from Rostock, Germany via LearnCube. Yo! It was hard! LearnCube seems pretty cool but first we have to learn how to use the tools and remember how to type the Turkish alphabet. We have bitten off a lot here.

After class we had to pack up for the coast, including food for the first 24 hours. Did a poor job of this. As it happened, M remembered to pack many items of food, but not the three most important ones, one of which was the fat slab of chocolate lovers cake from the Market of Choice bakery! Had to make an emergency stop at Ray’s Food Place in Waldport. Arrived at the hotel around 4:00. Beautiful day, sunny and cool. Big waves.

As the sun set we had our dinner in the room with food brought from home and Ray’s. Quite adequate. The Adobe Resort was built in the 70’s (we remember) and was quite a place back then. It’s still very nice, although a few bits of seventies décor are looking tired. There are spectacular views from the restaurant and bar, where almost every table is at or very near one of the long wraparound windows. And there were definitely people eating and drinking in there, seated at every other table. We’re still leery of indoor dining.

Tuesday, October 6     Deaths   581  (+9   Cases  35,340  (+291)

Hiking day. Leisurely breakfast in the room, then a short drive down to Cape Perpetua. We hiked the Cook’s Ridge trail, which leads eastward away from the sea and climbs 1100 feet into the beginnings of the Coast Range. We knew better than to do the 8.0 mile loop and instead did a 5.8 mile up and back. That was plenty. Amazing trees. They grow fast here, so even the big ones are only 100 to 200 years old. The trees were hemlock and Sitka spruce in the first half of the climb and later some cedar and fir. We learned from a signboard that in this climate hemlock will outgrow Douglas fir; M had thought that nothing could. More beautiful weather. Here’s E about a mile up the trail exploring the remains of a very old tree, probably a hemlock.

For dinner we got take-out from the hotel restaurant and again ate in the room. Very good food. E loved her vegetable cacciatore. When you first look at the Adobe menu, it seems a little too regular American. But looking deeper E found a non-pasta vegetarian entrée–that in itself is a miracle around here–and it turned out to be really delicious. M had halibut fish and chips, also very pleasing. We washed it down with Rioja brought from home.

Wednesday, October 7     Deaths   583  (+2)   Cases  35,634  (+294)

Another hour and a half Turkish lesson today. We had not expected to be doing it on this particular date when we made hotel reservations. But…things change. Turkish and LearnCube are still hard, but we’re getting excited. We might possibly learn something. (Which we will then proceed to forget, but never mind.) But wait, our 9:00 A.M. Turkish class was not the first important event of the day. At 7:30 sharp we were third in line when the doors opened at the Green Salmon Coffee Shop in downtown Yachats. M had a star-shaped classic Danish and E had a cherry-rhubarb turnover. Plus we had our half cafs. We took it all back to the room and sat looking at the sea and making happiness sounds until it was time to start the class. 

After class it was time to check out. The drive home took just over an hour. We spent the whole time trying to master possessive adjectives. In English that would be my, your, his, her, its, our and their. Seven words and you’d be done. But not in Turkish, oh no. In Turkish there are twenty-eight; six basic words each with four different variations, except for third person plural, which seems to have eight variations. In practice Turkish possessives are quite logical–there are good reasons for all those variations–but it’s not easy to remember them all. 

Thursday, October 8     Deaths   594  (+11)   Cases  36,116 (+482)

A sobering number of Oregon COVID deaths was reported today, the highest Oregon daily total since Aug. 17 and the third highest ever. The fatality rate per 100,000 is now 13.8. 

We did an hour of Turkish study on our own this morning. Such motivation! E also had laughter yoga. Both us spent time catching up on paperwork and bill paying. We’re worrying about our Chilean presentations. Florencia sent us a copy of the seminar announcement. Our names were on the list of presenters. Oh no! We only have ten days to prepare! We’ll never be ready in time! 

Friday, October 9     Deaths   597  (+3)   Cases  36,526  (+410)

Grocery shopping this morning, M went to Winco and E went to the Co-op. Then Andrea stopped by for lunch on the back patio–cucumber sandwiches and a can of Amy’s lentil soup. Good cooperation from the weather. After that E contacted Chile to nail down some specifics of how our presentations would go. Then we worked on how to adapt our stuff to Zoom. Mostly we practiced screen sharing.

Online shopping update: M’s EarPods arrived.

Saturday, October 10     Deaths   599  (+2)  Cases  36,924  (+398)

The Corvallis Greek Fest is going on this weekend, but not in the usual way. Usually it’s a big party with food, drink, music and dancing in a giant party tent. This year there was no tent, no dancing, no drinks and no music. They did the food though, by golly, serving it up drive-through style. When we heard the plan we wondered how that would work. Friday was the first day and we heard that some people had to wait an hour and a quarter. So when we went on Saturday we took some reading materials with us–Turkish lessons actually–so as to have something to pass the time. But when we arrived around noon, there were only eight or ten cars ahead of us and the line was moving fast. E had typed up what we wanted to order (for ourselves and a friend) and there was a big crew of clipboard carrying order takers and tablet carrying payment staff. We took our haul over to H’s house, where she had set up a beautiful fall themed table on her covered back patio. It was a damp, cool day with intermittent splashes of rain, so we had to bundle up. But the menu was grand: pork souvlaki, falafel, spanakopita, Moroccan Chicken, braised lamb, vegan dolmas, fasolia, and pasticcio plus baklava and a bunch of kinds of cake. We didn’t actually order all of that, but we did our best. M made Greek coffee in his new Turkish coffee maker and served it in cups he had brought along for the occasion. 

Later on we started watching a new Turkish TV series. It’s called The Gift and concerns a painter living in Istanbul who discovers a mysterious connection between the images that have always inspired her painting and some images recently discovered during archeological work on an Anatolian hillside. Her obsession begins to affect her behavior and becomes a cause of  concern for her family and for her rich and rather boorish fiance, whom she inexplicably seems to be excited about marrying. At first everyone thinks she is just goofy, including the handsome young archeology professor that she tracks down, hoping that he can give her some explanation for what is happening to her. He initially assumes that she is just a nut and shoos her away. But he is forced to rethink when he begins to find evidence for some of the crazy things she claims, things that she could not have known, secrets that been buried deep in the earth for at least 15,000 years… 

Sunday, October 11     Deaths   599  (+0)   Cases  37,225  (+331)

Zoom meeting today with two siblings and one cuz. Nice to catch up with them. John is still in his new cottage at the lake and is thinking of living there through December. Cuz’s sabbatical year is being disrupted by the pandemic. She had planned to be doing a number of projects involving international travel, but that’s not going to work. She is adapting. J and J had some severe storms in their area last week and lost power for many hours, which would have been long enough to melt their ice cream had they not taken pre-emptive measures. E and M have been trying to learn how to use their new green screen. One thing we discovered was that when E wore a particular green turtleneck and vest, the computer assumed that her torso was part of the background and erased it, which left only her head floating in the middle of the screen. A little unsettling but hilarious. We wanted to let the group see this. Unfortunately the computer began to get smarter and in this session it insisted on keeping her torso firmly present. So disappointing. By changing up the lighting and camera angles, however, we were able to briefly recreate the effect. So everybody got to see the floating head, if only for a few seconds. 

Next we needed to do a little Turkish. The teacher has sent us feedback about our compositions, plus an extensive word list and lots of grammar notes. Argh!

Chili and corn bread for dinner. Flesh and Blood on Masterpiece for TV.