If you remembered to put your Canon mirrorless system in the back of the Rolls Royce for the trip to the Bal Harbour mall, here’s the Google Maps suggestion for where to stop and take pictures… Haulover Nude Beach (note camera icon pin):
From February 24, 2020 (from the same date… “Nancy Pelosi Visits San Francisco’s Chinatown Amid Coronavirus Concerns” (NBC): She said there’s no reason tourists or locals should be staying away from the area because of coronavirus concerns. “That’s what we’re trying to do today is to say everything is fine here,” Pelosi said. “Come because precautions have been taken. The city is on top of the situation.”), at the Bal Harbour Shops:
The red vehicle at top left is a Ferrari Enzo, available as a 20-year-old used car for about $3.5 million.
When we lived in Maskachusetts, this is the time of year when I would start surfing travel web sites. Maybe it would be nice to go to a beach resort, a tennis destination, a sunny mountain town out West.
Now that we’re in Florida, though, even if travel were free of coronapanic-related hassles (e.g., testing and risk of multi-week quarantine/stranding) it is tough to come up with the motivation to go anywhere that the minivan or a feeble 4-seat airplane won’t take us. If we want to be on a beach, that’s a 12-minute drive with free parking and clean restrooms on arrival. If we want to be on a world-class soft white sand beach with gentle waves, that’s on the west coast of Florida, a 2.5-hour drive away (or 3 hours by plane, after factoring in driving to the airport, updating the GPS data cards, flight planning, etc., etc.). If we want to do some sort of outdoor activity, e.g., tennis or golf, that’s walking distance from our apartment. If we want sunshine, that’s almost every day. If we need our brains rewired, the theme parks of Orlando are 2.25 hours away by minivan.
There are a lot of interesting destinations that are more accessible from MIA and FLL than from BOS. The UNESCO World Heritage sites of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia (Cartagena at least!), etc. (101 cultural, 38 natural, and 8 mixed) Without cold, gray weather as a spur, though, it is tough to find motivation. Maybe that will change after we get burned out on all of the things that make our own corner of the world a popular year-round tourist destination. And I’m sure that will change on May 27 when the kids are done with school and it is 90 degrees every day.
We were invited to a birthday party for one of the kids in the neighborhood. A slender mom who appeared to be in her early thirties, on finding that we had moved from Massachusetts, said. “I have a close friend up there, but I haven’t been able to visit because she is afraid to be around anyone who is unvaccinated, even though I had Covid back in August.” It turned out that her Covid encounter was similar to what other unvaccinated friends experienced in 2020. She had a low fever, took a nap each day for a few hours, and had some body aches. Per standard, she tested negative several times before testing positive. Why hadn’t she been previously vaccinated? “Covid is not that big a deal and I didn’t trust that the immunity from the vaccine would be good enough or last long enough to be worth the risk of taking a new medicine.” She was not against older people choosing to get Covid vaccine shots, but she was against the government requiring it. #NotHerFrontDoor:
What was the anti-science Deplorable’s job? Nurse practitioner. Some Democrats explain the tendency of married women to vote Republican as due to brainwashing by husbands. Following the same logic, maybe a science-ignorant husband had controlled her mind? I asked about her husband’s job. “He’s an E-R physician,” she responded. “He got one shot and then decided it was mostly hype and never got the second one. I think all of us [in the family] have already had Covid at some point in the last two years.”
It turned out that the father of the birthday girl was a internal medicine doc and therefore more than half of the adults attending were doctors or nurses, all under age 50. Nearly all turned out to be anti-mask, anti-lockdown, anti-school closure, and anti-forced vaccination. They wanted to save lives, and in fact for most of them that was their day job, but they did not believe that salvation from SARS-CoV-2 infection was achievable via public health orders. (I.e., they might have been willing to fight a war against Covid if they believed that a war was winnable.)
None mentioned Donald Trump or any other political figure, so I don’t think that their Deplorable attitude toward Saint Fauci and the lockdowns, masks, and vaccines is driven by politics. In fact, the young nurse practitioner said, in response to my description of our old neighborhood with the political and social justice sign forest in front of most houses, “I have no interest in politics and these remote issues. I think about our kids, our jobs, and our friends.”
Separately, one attendee was from Martinique (an athletic coach, not a doctor). He talked about how the French government imposed the same rules on Martinique that apply back in France. “They’re supposed to check your vaccine passport and exclude you from a restaurant if you don’t have it,” he said, “but everyone in Martinique knows everyone. Are you going to exclude your brother-in-law from your restaurant? It never made sense because almost everything in Martinique is outdoors. They sent the military police in from France to enforce the rules. It is not a good place to be right now.” (see “France sends police reinforcements to Martinique to quell Covid unrest” from December 1)
Finally, what is the current #Science on immunity via infection versus immunity from vaccines? I personally know at least one person who became seriously ill with Covid 5.5 months into his Moderna protection period. I don’t know anyone who got Covid twice, though. And I haven’t read about people returning to the hospital for treatment of severe Covid 6 or 12 months after their first bad Covid experience. I asked some doctor friends “Do people get welcomed back to the ICU with a second case of Covid and doctors tell them ‘Here’s your old bed and ventilator”?” The answer was that it is vanishingly rare and essentially only the immunocompromised who have gotten Covid more than once.
Immunity from natural infection starts to decline after 6 to 8 months. We know that fully vaccinated people still have good immunity after a year—and probably longer.
(Just as 14 days to flatten the curve may take several years, good immunity for longer than a year runs out in 4-5 months.)
SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold (95% CI, 8.08 to 21.11) increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected, … This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity.
In the U.S., in other words, #Science says that the vaccines are way better. In Israel, #Science says that natural infection is much better (previous infection results in 1/13th the reinfection rate compared to those who got vaccines).
I met a real estate developer in Sarasota who said that his specialty of buying “Class B-/C+” apartment buildings on behalf of investors and lightly fixing them up no longer made sense. “A year ago, I was paying $60,000 to $70,000 per door and now it is $130,000 or more,” he said. “I can build something new for about the same price.” (These are buildings with at least 40 units.)
Why didn’t he buy the fanciest buildings? “You don’t want to buy in the ghetto, but these buildings are like a Toyota Camry,” he responded. “Even if the economy turns down, there will always be a market for a Camry.”
If used apartment buildings are about the same cost as building new, doesn’t that suggest that the real estate market is near a peak? I say “Yes” because (a) new is better, and (b) there is still a lot of land in the U.S. The developer, who surely knows more than I do, says “No.” He expects 3-5 more years of 20 percent annual inflation in SW Florida until prices reach parity with California. “People are moving here every day from California and also from Miami,” he said. “They want to get away from taxes in California and from the crazy congestion in Miami.”
Readers: Is there anything special that happens to the real estate market when used buildings being to cost as much or more than new buildings? Am I right in thinking that the curve will flatten? (after only the first 2 years of 14 days!)
The Mote Marine Laboratory & Aquarium reminded us that invasives will displace a native population.
As we remember the day that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, we can look at a recent attack on our shores by the Omicron variant of COVID, arriving inside the bodies of rich art world people from around the globe. Of course, I’m talking about Art Basel Miami, previously covered here in
My journey began at an Art Basel Week party in a Miami Beach house. The host is a refugee from the disorder and filth of San Francisco (wife insisted on a move due to worthy locals shooting up heroin in the driveway of the $10 million house). By the time the party was in full swing, the street looked like the aftermath of flash mobs robbing Ferrari and Mercedes dealers. The dessert table and dock (yacht on order, but delayed due to “supply chain” issues at Volvo for the engines):
I migrated from the party to the vaccine papers check tent, as previously discussed, and then entered the convention center:
In 2018, sponsor UBS was celebrating women. Not this year, however. It is unclear if this is because the term “women” is undefined in our 2SLGBTQQIA+ world, if the “imbalance” that needed rectifying in 2018 was fully addressed, or what. From 2018:
Monica Bonvicini gets my vote for maximum prescience with this 2019 work, titled “Hy$teria” (13′ wide):
John Giorno (1936-2019) should get some credit for this letter from CO2-emitting humans to our beloved Mother Earth (“You Got to Burn to Shine”; also a good tutorial on black-body radiation?):
Speaking of artwork by deceased artists selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars… The gallery owner calls the artist and says “I’ve got some good news and bad news.” Artist: “What’s the good news?” Gallerist: “A collector just came in and bought all of your paintings at list price.” Artist: “That’s fantastic. What could possibly be bad then?” Gallerist: “The collector is your oncologist.
Christine Wang can’t get credit for prescience, but this 60×60″ 2021 painting would be nice to hang right next to an original Hunter Biden.
Fair to say that this artist has never been to Walmart?
If you’re looking for something that you could replicate via a trip to Walmart, this pegboard piece by Theaster Gates seems like a good candidate:
Do you have $220,000 to spend on a pony? (there are almost no price tags, of course, but I was crass enough to ask)
Note that the guy doesn’t have a lot of hair, but if you average with his female companion, there is enough to go around. In Miami, it is not a good assumption to read this scene as a father-daughter excursion. (forgive the assumed gender IDs, which I adopted for brevity)
Torbjørn Rødland shows that Norwegians might be good at pumping oil and buying Teslas, but they are not competent at interior painting (55×40″):
Here is a can’t-lose investment, consistent with established Wall Street wisdom, “they’re not making any more USB sticks”:
The value-added tax on this one is going to be staggering (cost: some wires and hatchets):
Some local color:
Some folks who refuse to #FollowScience:
(Note the Pomeranian whose only visual hint of qualifying as a service dog is the green hair dye.)
Also perhaps suitable to hang next to your Hunter Biden collection, a work by the late Tina Girouard captioned “1992 Immigration Migration 1492”:
Generally the show is geared toward folks who have blank walls that are at least 15′ in width and 12′ in height and/or a lot of empty floor space. Here are some photos showing the scale:
If you missed your chance to buy a 1954 Rothko, come down with your checkbook:
Or just make something kind of like it (Idris Khan, 2020, 100 inches high, no doubt made with far higher quality paint that won’t fade! Apologies for perspective distortion):
Camera notes: These are a mixture of iPhone 13 Pro Max and Canon R5 with 50/1.8 STM lens. The iPhone did a much better job with white balance than the Canon.
Worth a special trip to Miami? Not unless you’re connected enough to the art world to get invited to one networking event after another and can expect to know at least 25 percent of the people who are there. Worth fighting through traffic and $65 for a ticket if you’re already in Miami? I think so!
If you’re a middle class or richer person in our corner of Florida you essentially never touch anything that is more than 25 years old. The Target that you walk into is new and is a Platonic ideal Form of a Target. The road that you drove on to get to said Target could be an example from a road system engineering textbook. You never turn left except from a dedicated left turn lane with a dedicated left turn signal. You never turn right except from a dedicated right turn lane. If you’re going straight, consequently, you never wait for someone turning left or right. When you return home to walk the dog, you’re on a perfect sidewalk. If a child is with you on the sidewalk riding a bike, there is always a brand new curb cut exactly where needed/wanted. If you are a little sloppy parking, the curb is never so high or jagged that it will tear up the car’s wheels. Gas, water, sewer, and power grid are all new and reliably functional.
Our corner of Massachusetts was super rich, fattened by a 60-year flow of taxpayer cash into health care, pharma, and higher education. Everything that was practical to improve had been improved. Nonetheless, the results were often poor quality. The capacity of the road network was perhaps 1/3rd of what has been achieved in Florida. One person choosing to make a left turn could cause a 1-mile backup. The (old) gas lines near our old house always leaked slightly, giving parts of the neighborhood a consistent ethyl mercaptan smell. Power failures lasting 3-50 hours were routine.
It occurred to me that Massachusetts is like an old Cessna airframe that has been lavishly maintained. The bones are old, but the avionics in the panel are new. In theory, it should be just as good as a new airplane.
Florida, on the other hand, is like a brand new Cirrus, engineered to the latest standards (seats that will crush on impact; parachute if things are truly going badly, ideal shape from a composite mold, thought-out ergonomics, etc.).
An experienced aircraft mechanic, when I would ask him for advice regarding the merits of a new part or a remanufactured/rebuilt one that should be just as good and/or why someone would spend 2-3X on a factory-new Bonanza compared to a perfect-condition older one. “New is new,” was often his response (in favor of the new part or aircraft!).
I’m not sure that the analogy holds up in all areas of Florida, e.g., Miami, but it seems like a useful shorthand for explaining MA vs. FL to general aviation pilots at least!
A hangar at KSUA featuring a classic Cessna 170 taildragger (no newer than 1956) and a brand new C8 Corvette (both owned by the same dentist):
If you’re going to Art Basel (today and tomorrow are the last two public days; the elites went on Tuesday and Wednesday), the pro move is to park at Miami Beach Senior High School, where the PTA opens the vast parking lot as soon as school closes (3:15 pm is the end of classes). Navigate to 2231 Prairie Avenue, Miami Beach, Florida 33139 and hand over $20, which will fund PCs, printers, and other classroom items. Ferraris, C8 Corvettes, and Lamborghinis are assigned to an “exotic area” in the grass where nobody can hit them with a door. (I wonder if Miami Beach during Art Basel has the world’s highest ratio of maximum theoretical car speed to actual car speed?)
The event closes at 7 pm and three hours is enough to see most of what you’d want to see. Reserve for dinner at Bella Cuba afterwards so that you skip most of the post-event traffic.
Remember that you need to show vaccine papers before the Art Basel folks will give you a “COVID-19 Certificate Checked” wristband. The good news for the unvaccinated is that you show a picture of your CDC card on your phone and therefore the name on the certificate is too small to be matched to your photo ID (not that there is any serious attempt to do so).
A couple of hours earlier, a mid-career artist at a party said, “You’re not going to get a grant unless your work is about BLM or LGBTQ.” If she is right, here’s an artist on track for a grant:
Masks are required inside and, since it is Florida and people can’t be expected to carry masks, they’re handed out by official Mask Karens. Not everyone can be reached by #Science, however…
Here’s one of the official Mask Karens demonstrating proper under-nose mask position:
Given the international crowd and the near-certainty of being exposed to the Omicron variant (state-sponsored media reassures us by quoting an innumerate 79-year-old who reminds us not to panic), did a lot of folks choose to use a fresh N95 respirator combined with hand-washing, hand-sanitizing, and never touching the mask? No. Cloth masks, which have been proven useless in a randomized controlled trial, were by far the most popular choice. These had been pulled from purses and pockets and therefore were pre-soaked with whatever bacteria and viruses can thrive on a moist face rag. A lady walking in front of me did not notice that she’d dropped her cloth mask on the sidewalk while getting something else from her purse. I picked it up (by the loops) and handed it to her, confident that the sidewalk germs will eventually be on her lips in addition to Omicron.
The people who are there to transact business (I didn’t hear of anything for sale at less than $220,000) were generally unmasked. In other words, those most likely to have come off multi-hour flights from plague centers were the least likely to be masked. Example:
Overall, I would say that the COVID-related aspects of the affair were handled exactly as well as you’d expect in a country that has to import all of its LCD and OLED displays and most of its integrated circuits (“chips”) from more detail-oriented nations. When it comes to COVID-19 vigilance, Yoda reminds us “There is No Try” (title of the 2020 work below by Tom Sachs):
Do. Or do not. But also, it is okay to do sometimes and sort of. And make sure to vaccinate The Child (Grogu, not to be confused with MIT’s Grogo).
If you read the news, you might think that Floridians are protected from demands to show medical records, such as vaccine papers. A November 18 story about a new law (passed by the actual Legislature; unlike other states, Florida is not simply ruled by executive order under emergency powers):
Private Employer COVID-19 vaccine mandates are prohibited.
Government entities may not require COVID-19 vaccinations of anyone, including employees.
Educational institutions may not require students to be COVID-19 vaccinated.
School districts may not have school face mask policies.
School districts may not quarantine healthy students.
Guests ages 12 and over must provide proof of a professionally administered rapid antigen test taken no more than 24 hours prior to the performance date or a professionally administered negative COVID-19 PCR test taken no more than 72 hours prior to the performance date.
In lieu of a negative COVID-19 test, voluntary proof of being fully vaccinated against COVID-19 may be presented.
In all cases, a valid matching photo ID must also be presented.
Ticket holders who do not comply with these policies will not be allowed into The Baker Museum or events on the cultural campus and may be required to leave.
So you need to bring part of your medical record (recent COVID test) or show a different part of your medical record (vaccine card). Either way, it is all voluntary.
The health and safety of our guests is a top priority for the Norton Museum. Beginning October 1, 2021, guests (ages 12+) visiting the Norton Museum of Art will be required to show proof of a negative COVID-19 professionally administered PCR test taken within 72 hours; or a negative COVID-19 Antigen Rapid Test conducted within 24 hours; OR voluntarily show proof of COVID-19 vaccination (together with a valid photo ID for ages 18+).
Masks are required at all times regardless of negative tests or vaccination status,
How about the pop-up Art Basel at the city-government-owned Miami Beach Convention Center?
Every visitor age 12 and older will be required to provide proof of a negative, lab-administered COVID-19 test in order to gain access to the halls. Alternatively, visitors may opt to voluntarily provide proof of a completed COVID-19 vaccination or documentation of recent recovery from COVID-19 – issued by a licensed healthcare provider or facility – to gain entry.
In compliance with the Art Basel Miami Beach policy and safety regulations, wearing a mask covering mouth and nose will be mandatory inside the venue for anyone age 2 and older, whether vaccinated or unvaccinated.
(The Leader of the Righteous: “Unless we do something about [busing for desegregation], my children are going to grow up in a jungle, the jungle being a racial jungle with tensions having built so high that it is going to explode at some point. We have got to make some move on this.”)
Speaking of the Biden family, I wonder how many of Hunter Biden’s $500,000 paintings will be shown at Art Basel. It would be worth showing one’s vaccine papers to get a close look at these. Considering gallery fees and taxes, if Hunter Biden can sell only 20 works at $500,000 each, he will have recovered the $2.5 million that his child support plaintiff earned.
Maybe the requirements are looser back in Maskachusetts, since Covid has been controlled via universal vaccination, indoor mask orders for adults, school mask requirements for kids, and after-school sports mask requirements? (only 2,500 cases per day currently, compared to 2,400 in April 2020) From MassMoCA:
The plague-carrying unvaccinated cannot even think of entering, no matter how high the stack of PCR tests. Harvard has a similar policy for its museums, which were entirely closed for 1.5 years:
All visitors age 2 or older, regardless of vaccination status, are required to wear a face covering.
All visitors age 12 and older are required to provide proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test. Visitors age 17 and older must also present a valid driver’s license or government-issued form of ID, such as a passport.
Vaccination documentation must be authentic and reflect that visitors are fully vaccinated, having received their final dose at least two weeks prior to the day of their visit. Acceptable proof of vaccination includes a CDC COVID-19 vaccination card and vaccination records of COVID -19 World Health Organization-approved vaccines. We will accept photo of the card records or a digital vaccine record (such as may be displayed through an app like Bindle or a digital medical record like MyChart).
I am longing for the day when every American will be able to get the purely voluntary RFID chip in his/her/zir/their neck so that vaccine status can be checked efficiently and contact tracing can be performed after a variant outbreak is discovered. Nobody will be required to get a chip, of course, but the “chip-hesitant” person will find that he/she/ze/they cannot go to restaurants, museums, airports, etc. Or maybe a chip-hesitant American will have to wait in a 45-minute line for a paper document check if he/she/ze/they wants to do anything outside his/her/zir/their home.
I hope that everyone is inspired to come visit in the near future, just in case our blue status does not last. Here’s the forecast for Jupiter, Florida (apologies to European readers for using the temperature units that God prefers):
#Science proves that you should be in Florida in the winter! (but, if the raging plague of summer 2021 is any guide, try to be somewhere else in July and August)
Separately, where in the above map can we see the effect of differential vaccination rates among states? If vaccination rate doesn’t affect transmission rate, why are we so obsessed with harassing the hesitant?
Related:
Optimum COVID-19 American lifestyle: Florida in winter; Maine in summer? (November 2020, just prior to availability of the vaccines that we were assured would halt transmission): Would the optimum lifestyle right now therefore be to live in a single-family home in a low-density part of Florida during the winter and in a single-family home in a low-density part of Maine during the summer? [Now that I am here in Florida, I realize that one need not be a single-family home to avoid public indoor spaces. Unlike in Manhattan or Boston, the typical apartment here is accessible without walking through an indoor lobby.]
Neighbors in Maskachusetts were so passionate about political and social justice causes that they would run out of space on the liftgates of their cars and/or front lawn space in their 2-acre minimum zoned lot. I decided to do a survey of all back-of-vehicle messages, except for dealer advertising, in a single parking lot. A license plate frame that mentions a sports team counts. The lot in question is in Palm Beach Gardens at an 82-acre soccer, tennis, pickle ball, spray park, and playground facility that hosts after-school soccer (“Palm Beach Predators”).
Note the Jeep, above, that was purchased in Alexandria, Virginia. Even the Yet Bigger Government gravy train couldn’t keep this family from moving to the Sunshine State! Note also that “Just a Mom with Perseverance” does not refer to a family court plaintiff (see the last part of Self-criticism today: photographer asks museum to close his own show), but to the mother of a child participating in Perseverance Basketball, a local youth sports enterprise.
I’m not sure that this is included in the 82 acres, but the courts below are country club-quality clay.:
Readers: Is this a good way to measure the overall level of discontent in a community? If so, I think the Palm Beach County Floridians are pretty happy! According to what’s on their cars, their concerns are kids, kids’ sports, kids’ schools, Disney, and pro sports teams from the frozen post-industrial towns where they used to live.
