Statistics

Coronavirus Radio Replay: And Notes On Welcoming Tyranny

I originally had this scheduled for Monday, but shifted to Wednesday because of the z-score mania. So I’m sure there can be many more things to add to this.

Last Friday morning I was on with Dan Proft and Amy Jacobson on Chicago’s AM 560 WIND.

First link is to the whole show, which archives the podcast. The producer of the show, Quin McCarthy, kindly sent me the video of the segment in which my voice appears.

I grow increasingly strident as the call continues. Same in real life. Every time I get going on this, the angrier I become. We did this to ourselves. And we let it be done to us. Most of us welcomed it.

I’m struggling to find one picture that sums up the absurdity of it all. Perhaps this one?

Is she saying Nyah! Nyah! Nyah!, or is that me reading too much into it?

The CDC numbers say 77 COVID-only deaths in all of Oregon (I’m writing this Saturday night; the number could rocket up to 78 by Monday morning). A whole state ordered to cower in fear because of a handful of incurable virus deaths.

What? You didn’t know there is no cure for this virus? No outside cure beside your own body’s God-given defenses, that is. Which is sufficient for the vast, vast, vast majority of people. Good luck waiting for a vaccine, O fearful ones! If we had vaccines for coronaviruses, we could eliminate the common cold, or a good portion of them. I predict no vaccine for years, and if one arrives it will not be especially effective.

What about those rumors they’ll use vaccination certificates for such things as employment or school enrollment? Why, those are conspiracy theories. True, they already have such rules in place for other vaccinations—didn’t you know? or did you forget?—so it’s not a theory in those cases. But, sure, it will remain a theory for COVID.

He had it coming. After all, he could have given someone coronavirus. Full story.

Gavin Newsome locked down Southern California beaches, perhaps the healthiest places on the planet. He’s either smart or stupid. If he’s smart, we have to ask: Does he want us to be sick?

If he’s stupid, we have to ask how we could we have purged from our memories that viruses die in the sun and fresh air? Did some idiotic scientist put out a paper that says this virus, unique among all others in all time, can survive for 1,365 hours on a grain of sand?

It’s not all bad. His Mightiness will allow his prisoners to go outside—just for a moment!—to watch the sunset.

People are fighting back, thank the Lord.

Don’t worry. Those cops are just following orders. They could have said no. They didn’t. They made their choice. Remember that.

The fool who runs Michigan was confronted by armed civilians roaming the capitol streets. “I am in charge!” shouted Gretchen. “Don’t travel between homes!” says Gretchen. Why? Does the virus know when you’re away and can sneak into empty houses? The anemic legislature finally is bringing her to court.

Meanwhile, in another progressive paradise, this:

“Don’t make us treat you like a criminal.”

Don’t make us treat you like a criminal. You little people had better welcome your oppression—or else.

What is in the heart is on the faces of these martinets. I guess she needs to violate her own “advice”, not for another haircut, but for a serious facial.

“We had to cut you off from the Body of Christ because, after all, safety first!” said the Bishops. “But please don’t cut us off from your donations,” they pleaded. “Send ’em on in! We still need funds to organize conferences for the pervert community.”

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: except coronavirus. For thou scaredest me silly with thy COVID rod.

Cardinal Cupich was too busy to meet with parishioners to talk about the restoration of public masses. He has too much else on his mind. Like saving the planet. I heard he was personally going from church to church and demoting priests caught using incandescent instead of fluorescent bulbs. Probably just a rumor.

The Bishops have the full support of Kansas City.

Why are you requiring certain businesses to record information about customers?

One of the primary means for transmission of COVID-19 is in-person interactions that last more than a few minutes. By recording customer names, businesses will enable the Kansas City Health Department to more quickly trace, test, and isolate individuals who may have been exposed to COVID-19 if an employee or customer had the virus at the time they frequented the business.

All data obtained by the Department of Public Health will remain confidential and will be used only to address public health concerns and contact individuals who may have been exposed to COVID-19.

Yeah. Sure it will. We believe you.

Full martial law in New Mexico. I do not jest. The progressive Governor issued a decree:

All roadways providing access to the City of Gallup shall be closed and only Gallup residents, those who work in Gallup, and members of the media shall be permitted entry into the municipality.

You have to like she lets the media in. If this virus turns out to be as deadly as she believes, the media being incestuous and well traveled, she will have inadvertently helped solve a major problem in our culture.

A Texas-based progressive leader, County Judge Lina Hidalgo, urged neighbors to rat out neighbors. “Report them all,” she says.

Addendum Missouri residents who tipped off county about lockdown rule-breakers fear retaliation after details of more than 900 ‘snitches’ are released online. In older, manlier days, snitches got stitches.

Udpate

Science has spoken!

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Categories: Statistics

32 replies »

  1. What we have learned from all of this is that a significant number of folks are bereft of common sense, opportunistic about virtue signaling, believe what the governments tells them thinking the government actually cares about them, and most probably Democrats.

    And once again have proven the point about lies, damned and statistics. If something can be demonstrated with numbers it must be true.

  2. Sars-CoV-2 is a virus, which by the way, has TWO variants and one is more contagious than the other and has been out there for three months at least but now we know so BE AFRAID, while Covid 19 is a tyrannical, hateful government program to turn the entire world into Hell. Please do not confuse the two.

    Kate’s sticking her tongue out like the two-year-old she is. Sorry, the idiots in Oregon WANTED this and they deserve every hellish minute of the *****. I have ZERO sympathy. I no longer get angry—I understand that a free people has to care and stupid, ignorant, LAZY sheep deserve the slaughterhouse. I am beyond caring.

    No one needed a vaccine for cure for the AIDS PANDEMIC. America ENCOURAGED spreading it. Of course, scarf doctor was in her socialist heaven then and could do that. Now, disease is bad because Orange Man Bad. Half-white Man Good and could kill and sicken as many as he wanted.

    Maybe the coronavirus vaccine will “cause” Guillain-Barré Syndrome like Swine Flu vaccine did the first run. Bankrupting companies with lawsuits is the only way progressives are defeated (lying piece of crap lawyer suing Zantac just came on TV screen—I rest my case). The party of lawsuits is really what the Democrats are. No science involved.

    How can you arrest social distancing violators without breaking the law yourself??????

    Wish they were using drones on Huntington Beach. So much easier to remove the problem. Of course, the was a report that tough cording thrown/shot into the rotors of helicopters will result in an unplanned landing, but I cannot verify that.

    Yes, yes, yes. Gavin Newsome wants you to be sick and maybe even die. All tyrants do. Sick people are quieter and more compliant.

    I have no like or respect for any cop that went along with this. Brown shirts “went along” too. We held them to be guilty of aiding and abetting a dictator. Cops get no less.

    Notice the number of FEMALE TYRANTS. I told you women were evil.

    People COULD stop this—THEY DO NOT WANT TO. Sorry, Briggs, but the power was always there and PEOPLE CHOOSE TO SIT LIKE IDIOTS IN THEIR HOMES. Forget being angry. The America you knew is DEAD. There is no Patrick Henry to save us. We don’t even want to be saved. If we did, we would save ourselves.

  3. On the upside, without Covid, we would never have seen a SWAT team arresting a bar owner for having the audacity to be open without permission. At least not until Michelle Obama becomes president (soon after the Crazy Uncle Joe/Michelle Obama ticket wins and Joe is removed from office). Enjoy the preview! Bring popcorn.

  4. Dr. Briggs, you are getting close to having better “credibility” due to the fact that you are on “Radio” (will be better once on TV). The numbers are being “padded” and the Public is very easily “Propagandized”. Fear is a serious motivator! I wonder what “Unkle Mike” will have to say about this?

  5. See the Commissars dish out PC-Prog justice:

    Texas Commissar demands confession and apology to the State. Freedom-loving citizen Luther, owner of hair salon, refuses, refutes the entire premise of the Commissar’s actions, and affirms her constitutional rights (the court-room exchange, Commissar vs. Citizen begins at 1:30):

    https://cbsloc.al/2YEw16W

    “Salon À la Mode owner Shelley Luther was sentenced to seven days in jail for criminal and civil contempt and a $7,000 fine today for defying Governor Greg Abbott’s stay-at-home rules.”

  6. Where was all this concern about, ‘Not one human life lost’, when bans/restrictions designed to ‘protect’ other than human life, at the cost of human livelihoods and lives, were implemented?

    By some mysterious mechanisms, there are solely my-way-or-the-highway approaches to matters among some groups, notwithstanding the facts.

  7. So if this whole social distancing thing is necessary because the virus is so scary, why was the cop with a tazer not wearing a mask or gloves, none of the other NYPD (New York Piece of Dung) thugs were wearing gloves, and none of the Californicator cops were wearing masks or gloves?

  8. My standard for Church donations in this time is pretty simple: If the church is open for me to pray in, I will give a donation. If it has closed its doors, then I don’t give a donation.

  9. A few thoughts from listening to the section of radio where Briggs spoke:

    The yearly flu Viruses are only unique in the same way that each human is unique.
    Influenza is a corona virus which varies enough that science can keep on top of its modifications.

    This virus IS unique. Sudden Adult Respiratory Distress (*sards)is not new.
    Before anyone non clinical had heard of google or SARS. It is just a clinical presentation description, can happen for different reasons/causes.

    The threat to public health is considered far greater than SARS because of the contagion of this virus not its case fatality rate alone. (which is higher than flu but lower than SARS). Corona’s R value is higher than both. (its spreadability).

    Those who generally think that NO public health intervention is a good one are naturally going to be feeling mad or indignant or affronted, defensive or all the other infringement words one.can muster.

    If you are elderly and you. catch this you will more than likely survive.
    That declared rate of survival hasn’t varied much from the time it was first being treated in Chinese hospitals, as data was coming in.

    I noted early on that the Chinese Drs said that the timing of ventilation was particularly critical in this disease…hence the use of CPAP machines. The first Dr’s treating this had to learn on the spot. That is healthcare for you. Briggs seems annoyed that there is insufficient clarity or certainty in the numbers which is ironic. In healthcare, people er on the side of caution until more evidence comes in. Do you have chest pain because you’ve got indigestion or are you having a heart attack? Risk is managed on the spot all day long. It takes time for best practice to filter out of the numbers. Do you have seemingly innocent symptoms which can be a sign of very serious illness? It’s the job of healthcare to find out. When that it translated into large numbers for so called protocols or decisions on a national scale they can seem strange.

    If an elderly person dies in a care home it is often debatable what they die from or with.
    Nobody clinical or executive is confused about that. Nobody is necessarily to blame for being uncertain about cause of death. There is a lot of laziness when it comes to care of the elderly. It’s not always a country wide, or global conspiracy!

    Most people who die of cancer do not die from the cells. So it’s not realistic or helpful to keep seeing every death certificate as an opportunity to impute motive in the signature. Frankly the system isn’t nimble enough to be responding to some wicked on high request to label as many deaths as FROM covid as possible. That’s a neurotic idea.

    In healthcare, when a new syndrome is learned of or known about, staff find it everywhere. Just as when you learn a new word and then hear it every day for a few days. You are just noticing, your awareness is heightened. Same for new drugs when they are first launched everybody gets a tablet until it goes out of fashion. If you’re trying to think objectively you are aware of this and no instruction from on high would make most people change their practice to please some perceived authority. If so they’re just substandard since everybody is responsible.

    Sorry to sound glib. I’m just describing it how things work very often.

    Just note that politicians on the non government side or the left seem to want to make things even more hysterical than they would otherwise be. There’s. A lot more panic in the US if those twitter images are not just a one off stunt. The girl with the flag on her head looks as silly as the usual protestors without a cause.

  10. Why are the extremists calling the “baseball card” stats?

    To maintain the Covid-19 hullabaloo figures are generalized and vague. People understand the parsing of stats / data (eg baseball cards), but that kind of resolution is nowhere to be found, it seems.

    From the USN aircraft carrier, oldish Press data:

    600+ infected (100%)
    350+ no symptoms ~58%
    ~240 sick ~40%
    7+ hospitalized ~1.2%
    ~2 ICU & 1 death ~0.3%

    With 98% mildly ill or asymptomatic why is an admiral calling this a stealthy deadly disease??? Don’t those numbers show a generally benign disease that in exceptional situations can become severe???? For generally young/youngish & healthy.

    It’s time for parsed numbers that tell the story vs relevant demographics!!!!

    If kids can understand the data on a baseball card the public can understand comparable data on Covid-19’s “baseball card.”

    From a Mar 5 report for this flu season:

    310,000 hospitalized (52.7 per 100K)
    18,000 deaths ( ~3 per 100K)
    Death rate of 6.9% (Flu plus pneumonia) … just below the “epidemic threshold” of 7.3%.

    Clearly, for some demographics Covid-19 is a thing to be feared and avoided such that extreme measures are warranted — by those in such demographic groups.

    But why is the virus given such radically extreme precautions by the broader population that is largely unaffected…to include self-imposed crippling of the economy by killing businesses off one-by-one??

    My anecdotal experience/observation is that most people do not know the basic broad numbers such as parsed above … and when they do, develop a sense of ferocious disgust at their politicians for the broad brush and often counterproductive measures & prohibitions imposed.

    The original worst-case marketing data for the virus, when most was unknown, is sorely overdue for updating and dissemination.

  11. Joy, after all that, tell us what have we seen with this illness that suggests it needed a response unparalleled in human history? We’re not talking about “risk management”, which is something that adults do, we’re talking about a hysterical grasping for a painless “solution”, emblematic of a childish culture. Anything that had even a whiff of being for the better good long ago dissipated in the ongoing, evolving grip of tyranny the state has put on the populace.

  12. I don’t know who “Joy” is nor what this persons background might be. I am tempted to compare “Joy” to “Unkle Mike”. This makes any reasonable or thought out response useless. A series of descriptors comes to mind, Troll being the one most appropriate. I have heard nothing about “Critical Thinking” and that is what is required to the best of anyone’s way of thinking. I do take offense at the “glib” attitude concerning the “medical profession”. I cannot speak for any other but I hate being painted with “anyone else’s brush”.

  13. I believe Joy works, or worked, in physio- therapy. No doubt she will correct me if I’m wrong. I’ve always found her quite sane. Even if she did compare me to the Black Prince!

  14. I live in Orygun so feel compelled to inject some facts. Yes, Kate Brown is a sick twitch commie pervert moron but she did not extend the Lockdown. She extended her Declaration of a State of Emergency.

    We are not locked down in reality, not in rural O where I live. Most stores are open and crowded, traffic is jammed, and most construction, logging, farming, etc. has never stopped. Restaurants are doing takeout. Even the multitude of coffee kiosks are open with long lines. Some people are wearing masks but many are not, including store employees.

    It could be that the Peoples Dysfunctional QWERTY Reptile Zoo of Portland is locked down. I don’t know and don’t care. They can stew in their own commie juices and go cannibal or whatever. Rural Orygun is open and functioning quite well thank you.

    Kate the Witch (she is proudly Wicca) extended the DofE for the moola, the $$$$ she hopes to bleed from Congress. That’s why she has pushed so hard for a Carbon Tax. It’s not about the carbon; it’s about the tax. The state is bankrupt. More than 30% of the school fund goes to pensions and that percentage grows every year. The Lefty Looter Class has guaranteed themselves $billions in retirement for jobs they performed poorly and briefly or not at all. The economy here has been hamstrung for decades by gross government mismanagement, obscene excess, trough slop, and porkery.

    But we residents don’t care. We go about our business and ignore the wee toddy howling weirdos. We vote by mail so the elections are rigged, which has resulted in gibbering idiots holding most offices. They are laughable stooges, but nobody makes a big deal about it. So what? We ignore them. Democracy doesn’t work, but freedom does.

    PS — Listened to your radio spiel. You were great but might be so much smarter than everybody else that your message goes over heads instead of through them. You need to dumb it down for effective communication. I have the same problem as you but have successfully learned to dumb my message down to sub moron level so even pre-literate goofs get it, if somebody else reads it to them. You know who you are…

    PPS — Lockdown Fergy went AWOL with a skank and lost his stat job. What is it about British men? The women are wild auburn beauties but the men are drips.

  15. To the Dr with the unfortunate bedside manner,: My name is Joy..

    Plantaginet yes, I am a physiotherapist. Carried out CPR a few days ago. The person is still alive and very well. We have our uses…
    (and I was always joking ab out the Black Prince and the war of the roses!)

    Would be useful if people could get into the clinical details a bit more and understand what’s going on that IS different.

    Looking at numbers alone isn’t enough if it’s solutions that are the desired outcome. The facts about the contagion are not debatable. They are not argued by anybody sensible. People argue about what amount of risk is acceptable. Ken’s figures and comment regarding the ship are instructive in that matter. What Ken considers acceptable I do not. Nor do I think two thousand Swedish people being sacrificed for the sake of the economy is correct. It all boils down to what you know in advance and whether or not you value life in general or only that of your own loved ones. Those are really the kinds of emotion governing some of this. The very same individuals become heated under the collar at the thought of sending soldiers to fight. So it is just typical human inconsistency.

    My own conspiracy theory is that the virus was engineered. .. However, Chinese Drs have been very impressive in interviews. Very caring and engaged with their patients, open with their information. Shame the same can’t be said for the jealously guarding grown up ‘risk managers who wanted the west to be kept in the dark about the genetic sequence…Sold dodgy Del- boy tests and crappy shipments of non equipment. We can make our own.
    We have come a long way in a few short weeks. 2020 will be a year for hindsight. As Trump would say, “we’ve learned a lot…!”

    It is still early days though, “It’s a marathon not a sprint.”

    As to what have we learned? Pretty well everything that we know about the virus is everything we have learned. We knew nothing before. Managing epidemics is bread and butter to some of the senior advisors in both he US and the UK and I assume the other countries too! “locking down” to break transmission is what you do when an epidemic is out of control and deaths are mounting or very likely to do so. That is about the size of it. The scary part is the financial cost but I believe that business will bounce back and minds will be concentrated after all the real tragedy has been metered out on people and they remember what really matters. Will media continue to get away with the usual? Or will the public have a new found knowledge in computer models that are used to predict disasters in 100 years time? I think so. The truth will out.

    High transmissibility
    Significant death rate (more than that of regular flu).
    New virus, therefore no immunity in the population = massive death
    Was not successfully contained with normal levels of track and trace
    can be mitigated, which it has, more or less, and variously around the world as is normal practice with infectious diseases.

  16. Dr. Bruce

    Joy is from the UK and thinks Briggs speaks another language
    I told her I blame Noah Webster
    I saw a Facebook post about husbands having Doodie Duty and thought of her (long story involving Berlitz and Noah Webster)
    Whatever Joy’s background, I think she’s retired and sells bread off a tram/cart somewhere. She has a cute story about a grandchild stealing from it.
    But sometimes she is difficult to understand if you speak and think American.
    She speaks and thinks UK. Not a troll, but she may occasionally play one.

  17. and she wheeled her wheel barrow through streets broad and narrow…
    I’m not retired and unfortunately not a grandmother. I’m a proud Aunt who’s just lost a fifteen year old dog and looking after four other elderly or otherwise vulnerable adults. I have been in lockdown for about ten years.

    Briggs does write in foreign and he does so on purpose.
    When all this started happening in China, I thought,
    “At last, now Briggs time to shine!”
    What I actually thought was how much more I was able to follow and interpret some of the numbers before we heard a peep from Downing street or SAGE on the matter.
    So I have learned much from Briggs and he knows it I hope.
    Thank you John B, considerate as usual.

  18. Joy
    Thank you – sorry about your loss
    Not to be animus (why didn’t Noah invent the word “animouse”?)
    You said: Nor do I think two thousand Swedish people being sacrificed for the sake of the economy is correct.
    Yet the UK death rate is half again as high as Sweden (I s’pose London)
    In his daily briefing, New York’s Governor Cuomo mentioned that hospitals have been surveying “new cases” and found that many recent “new cases” were people in “lock down”, and “oldish” people MOTIVATED to follow the “rules on lock down”.

  19. Dear Joy,

    My deepest condolences. One year ago today we put down our 15yo dog. Broke my heart. Have not recovered. Still dream about her. There has been much grief in my life, but none so deep. Over a dog! Love/grief is a two-sided coin; can’t have one without the other.

    Thank you for saving lives. Many blessings. You are always in our prayers.

  20. “In his daily briefing, New York’s Governor Cuomo mentioned that hospitals have been surveying “new cases” and found that many recent “new cases” were people in “lock down”, and “oldish” people MOTIVATED to follow the “rules on lock down”.”

    Something’s off there. It sounds like these people were trying to follow lock down rules religiously. Then how is it that so many of them are getting sick?

  21. Speaking of language

    Chicago Mayor:
    “This is how its gonna be……we will shut you down….we will cite you….we will arrest you….we will take you to jail….period….there should be nothing unambiguous about that…don’t make us treat you like a criminal”

    Wait … what? … if there is nothing unambiguous about that, what the hell did she just say?

    Maixiu:
    I think Cuomo just realized lock downs don’t work, but he’s double down and all in

  22. Thank you most sincerely Uncle Mike, It’s been like that for me too. Have been searching for Darcey and finding her again in dreams. Love/Grief, it’s worse than that. If you try to avoid the one in fear of the other, you just get more grief. So enjoy it while it lasts and smile that it happened…empty words! Your dog was lucky, she could have ended up with a horrible owner.

    “You know that place between sleep and awake, the place where you can still remember dreaming? That’s where I’ll always love you. That’s where I’ll be waiting.”

  23. I cannot say I have any understanding of this “my dog died” phenomena. My 13 year old dog die the while I was in the hospital having tongue surgery. Four days later I found out I had tongue cancer. I spent 6 weeks in and out of the hospital dealing with the mess. After a month of tests and checkups, when things were finally declared “over” (for now anyway), my first question to my husband was “can I get a puppy now”? My new puppy is now 5 years old and she makes me laugh daily. My husband loves her too and she adores him. I have always known that losing one dog was sad, but the next dog would bring new fun and get me to laugh again. My mother always said I was a pessimist. Reading the internet has taught me I am the world’s biggest optimist in most things. I look forward, not backward.

  24. Free countries police with consent. The mayor is a loose cannon. People will rebel against her “I dare you” talk. It’s almost irresistible. Especially for grown up countries. predictable result? more V spread. You can’t odds nature.

    As to lock downs don’t work? well they do, slowly, (if everybody joins in.) Countries/states/towns need to tailor the principles as best they can. State leaders need to be of sufficient quality to understand what’s going on. Some, even most! people just don’t need telling any of it. The message isn’t for them. That’s not the point.

    Care homes in lockdown:
    Infections are reduced to households. If that involves an overcrowded place where air is not moving and replaced *open windows and curtains!), the infection will just do what it does on ships. As to Cuomo’s remark, it shows that people are still spreading the disease in enough examples where physical distancing isn’t happening (oldish implies they’re gadding about but are at a more susceptible age.) The disease has a 2/52 incubation so nobody, of any age, who’s been protected properly from the beginning would be contracting the virus any other way than through the face. The risks of thrombosis, both from covid and from inactivity in the leg department WILL also show in the numbers however “obedient or “motivated” they are . Along with the number of cases of conditions related to inactivity. Which includes sprained ankles, back pain, fractures from trips into the loft, lawnmower accidents, baking accidents, RSI from Tech-tap, origami incidents, a million? new babies!this winter.

    “lockdown doesn’t work” and “language”:
    It works as well as people manage it. It’s not enough just to tell people to go home. Once an authority does that, they enter into something of a contract where there must be a reasonable level of expectation that “inmates” will continue to be informed accurately and with respect to the joint effort that such an undertaking really is.

    If it were same infection as flu, or even SARS or ebola, lockdown wouldn’t be necessary given the transmission and state of science of those diseases. Whether people ARE panicking isn’t the same as the false claims that lock down is happening BECAUSE of panic. It is just a management method when deadly infections are out of control. The better people adhere, the more temporary and effective it is.

    It stands to reason that the UK would have a very big problem with this virus. Care homes were always going to be hit without proper quarantine.

    Re The Naval ship:
    Infection fatality can’t be determined from just a ship. That would be case fatality. Infection fatality is as yet unknown beyond the ship in that example.

    To clarify: In my view, Swedish authorities did not knowingly sacrifice two thousand of their population, or consider such a trade of human life. That’s how it looks now, after the experiment. It’s not what they DID proactively or cynically is what I intended when saying “not correct”. People have differing sensitivities, it seems!

    In these days of maximum cynicism about life in general, there needs to be a better reason for healthcare workers to sign up. Countries will have to pay telephone numbers even to be able to access the most simple of health requirements if the media and the left run away with the ball. There won’t be enough desperate immigrants to take unwanted jobs. Stop increasing the patient numbers, close the borders and let the populous do the work for proper standards of practice and pay. The pay is not the main complaint of most staff, media talk crap. It’s the main COST/expense for governments and by far the biggest, outstripping medicine, equipment and property.

  25. and a nightingale’s going to sing in the Royal Albert Hall this evening.
    The Quenn’s going to tell us, not the ‘US’ because you’re are all too grown up and sensible.

  26. Yep John B, it was Noah’s fault again! even the giraffes got involved. *I had to look up the spelling, too.).
    In cockney-land they say “you’re having a giraffe at my expense”

    We’ll Meet Again’ – Katherine Jenkins brings the nation together in song | VE Day 75 – BBC
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKSc8BLXAJ8
    Also spotted Briggs in his top hat.

  27. Joy

    Down the rabbit hole I go (how can I NOT use that quote?)
    I hope Briggs doesn’t mind when I (we) hi-jack his posts
    https://www.britishcouncil.org/voices-magazine/youre-having-giraffe-starter-guide-uk-slang
    If it wasn’t for your comment, I might never have found this link.
    I was having a giraffe; but I hope you don’t feel that it was at your expense
    I had to look up the spelling, too! THAT was when I found out what the word meant! (I always thought animus simply meant disagreeable.) But it seems to have a much darker connotation, hence my suggestion to Webster’s to coin the word ‘animouse’ – to disagree or argue (but with people you harbor no ill-will toward).
    I already knew much of what is found in the britishcouncil link. What WAS eye-opening; and explains something I haven’t known or understood for sixty years! When I was a kid, we called our evening meal supper. When I first met my wife, she couldn’t figure out what we (my family) were on about. I quickly learned to use dinner instead. I never knew why we called it supper until now. My dad’s side of the family has UK ancestry (although I wasn’t cognizant of THAT fact ‘til later in life). Apparently my mother acceded to a concept that MY wife wouldn’t or couldn’t. (To be honest supper and dinner were sometimes blurred or interchangeable at home. I also knew “to sup” was having a light snack as the link mentions)

    Done enough damage here, I should sign off. Thanks for the Vera Lynn/VE Day/Corona tribute (I used the ending of Dr. Strangelove as a sardonic comment about those who feel that no matter how long we’re locked down, we’ll get through it.)
    Governor Mills of Maine: “People who now are staying apart, so that some day we can be together again … ”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEtldt-FI8Y&fbclid=IwAR0E0wINlIIrUsYEyytVAQHCvVa40Fd73o26OeVu8PqgUZjLz7mo3YpZiek

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