In other words, relief from the central planners will arrive some weeks after CVS was forced to mark COVID-19 tests down due to oversupply.
I remarked on the low price and ample quantity available, saying “Those would have been very valuable a month ago.” The 6-year-old immediately responded, “let’s buy some now and keep them at home and then sell them for $20.99 during the next wave.”
I’m not going to leave him alone with any Dr. Seuss books (re-sold for up to $1,700 on Amazon before being banned there)!
Readers: Did your tests from the central planners arrive? If so, when? It was supposed to be “seven to 12 days” from January 19.
Speaking of COVID-19, let me take this opportunity to give a shout-out to selfless front-line workers, such as the physician (see the license plate) who parked this Ferrari on the street near the above-mentioned CVS:
Who knows Ferraris well enough to say what model this is and estimate the value? My guess is a Portofino retractable hard top (worth about 250,000 in 2022 mini-dollars).
When Nadirah Pierce picked up her children from IC Kids Montessori earlier this week, she noticed they were covered in black paint. They said it was for a Black History Month project.
Pierce didn’t think much of it until the school posted photos from the activity for parents online on Wednesday. That’s when she saw the children had painted faces on paper plates using the black paint and were holding them up to their faces.
IC Kids Montessori in Newton issued an apology for the Blackface incident but removed the post about an hour later and subsequently removed the school’s Facebook account entirely.
“To all who are offended, we sincerely apologize for what happened with one of our classroom activities: black face,” the school originally wrote on Facebook. “Our intention was to celebrate Black History Month. Unfortunately we didn’t do enough research on black history and carried out a wrong activity. We are sorry about it and we mean it!”
The photos also included children planking in rows. This and the popular 2011 trend by the same name mirror the way slaves were often transported on slave ships.
“Planking was a way to transport slaves on ships during the slave trade, its [sic] not funny,” Xzibit tweeted, according to the Washington Post. “Educate yourselves.”
But the National Museum of African American History and Culture told CNN that’s not an excuse.
“Minstrelsy, comedic performances of ‘blackness’ by whites in exaggerated costumes and makeup, cannot be separated fully from the racial derision and stereotyping at its core,” it said.
“I hope this is a lesson for all daycare centers,” she said. “Do your research. Ask people in your community, reach out to the parents.”
From the BBC, a successful graduate of this Montessori school:
Speaking of following Science, the current personification of Science is from Newton, MA: Rochelle Walensky.
For folks who’ve been beguiled by press releases from Otto Aviation, the Piaggio Avanti is a reminder that most of the great ideas in aerodynamics were implemented in the 1980s. The Piaggio designers threw out the rulebook on what an executive turboprop should look like and came up with a three-wing plane that goes 100 knots faster and 10,000′ higher using the same engines as a (two-wing) King Air.
The folks behind Piaggio have long claimed that the Avanti is exceptionally quiet inside, throwing out a 68 dBA number that never seemed credible.
A friend owns a 1992 Piaggio and graciously took me up to 17,500′ to make some measurements. Note that the company claims that the latest Evo model, which has a more advanced Hartzell propeller shape, is actually “20%” quieter. My friend says that a 2008 Piaggio that he flew was noticeably quieter than his 1992 model, so there may actually be three levels of Piaggio Avanti interior noise and the numbers below are the worst that one will ever see.
At Pilatus PC-12 speeds, i.e., 289 knots (222 indicated), sound at the pilots’ ears was about 72 dBA and up to 76 dBA in the passenger cabin (closer to the props spinning on the back of the main wings; closer to the door that whistles a bit (there is a trick to sealing it with a cloth that we didn’t apply for this short flight)).
At 311 knots (240 indicated), cabin noise was 1-2 dBA higher.
The owner says that the plane is noticeably quieter at its normal long-distance cruising altitudes so it is possible that the 68 dBA number is real at FL410! (He’s usually at FL370 and 370 true on 580 lbs/hour; against a headwind (and there is always a headwind because G*d hates pilots!), this is less fuel per mile than a single-engine PC-12.)
Should we all be envious of Piaggio Avanti owners? The plane is more complex to operate than the newest twin-engine turbojets that are certified for single pilots. There are switches to turn on the bleed air, for example, that typically should be thrown just before taking the runway (you’re probably taxiing with a tailwind and the result of leaving the bleeds on is some exhaust smell in the cabin). The steering has two modes, controlled by a switch on the yoke, and one is used for taxi while the other is used once 65 knots is reached on the takeoff roll. There is an autofeather mechanism that will reduce drag from a dead engine and it needs to be verified operational. Speeds are terrifying from a Pilatus PC-12 or even a Cessna Mustang pilot’s perspective. Rotate at 110 knots. Vmc is 100 knots (you can’t fly slower than this with one engine at full power and the other dead with prop feathered), final approach speed is 120-125 knots. The plane slows down very effectively with beta (twisting the prop blades to get some reverse thrust) and therefore a 5,000′ runway is plenty, but it will never compete with a Pilatus or King Air for short field performance. The Piaggio is also the wrong machine for grass, dirt, and loose gravel runways (see Burning Man for turboprop pilots for what a PC-12 can easily do if the Bay Area heroes are ever brave enough to gather again).
My friend says that the cabin is bigger than the PC-12’s (see diagrams below), but it felt smaller to me. Maybe it is the lack of a flat floor. Certainly you’ll never appreciate the genius of the Cirrus Vision Jet designers in making the pilot seats slide back 4′ until you’ve tried to get in and out of a Piaggio front seat. The pedestal extends all the way back to the seatbacks. Unless you’re a 5’2″ tall Italian yoga instructor, I’m not sure how it can be safe to get in and out during flight (without knocking a lever or switch). There is a bathroom all the way in the back, but it is not externally serviced (i.e., the owner-pilot of the $8+ million new Piaggio Avanti Evo will end up carrying a bucket out of the plane…).
The ice protection system is far better than on most newer planes. There is an automatic ice sensor that turns on the boots that protect the engine inlets. The main wing is heated via bleed air. The front wing is electrically heated. The tail is left alone and somehow the plane passed all of the certification tests and also has worked well in the real world (the Italian military operates some with more than 15,000 flights hours). (The HondaJet has a sensor-activated anti-ice system; most airplanes rely on pilots to use their eyes to notice ice building up and then set switches correctly.)
The pressure differential is 9 psi, enabling a sea level cabin up to 24,000′ and 6,600′ cabin altitude at FL410. Compare to 5.75 psi on the PC-12 and a cabin altitude of 10,000′ when the plane is at its service ceiling of FL300.
The older planes can be converted to dual Garmin G600TXi for primary flight display, but, due to the small number of eligible planes out there, there is no likelihood of Garmin certifying its modern engine instruments and GFC 600 autopilot. Below is my friend’s panel. Note the tall stack of warning lights right next to the tall stack of round dials for engine indications and remember that behind each warning light is a system that could suffer an intermittent failure that is challenging to troubleshoot. The old Collins autopilot is in the top center of the panel and the autopilot mode is currently indicated only on the lights above the switches (i.e., not on the PFD).
It would be interesting to see what could be done by upgrading the airplane with the latest GE turboprop (more fuel efficient and FADEC) and a lot more automation, e.g., changing the steering mode automatically, descending automatically in the event of depressurization (the latest planes with Garmin flight decks can do this), land itself if the old/rich guy in front croaks (trophy wife remains in middle seat and has reactivated her Tinder subscription before the flaps and gear are down), etc. If the number of switches and dials could be reduced to what you see in a Cirrus Vision Jet, and the service and support could be more like what the rest of the Jet A-powered world is used to, the Piaggio Avanti would live up to its revolutionary promise.
Some photos from our lunch-time excursion and the POH:
How does the above cabin cross-section compare to the PC-12?
If we assume 2.9′ as the mean radius of the Piaggio, that’s a cross-sectional area of 26.4 square feet. If we multiply the above numbers for the PC-12, we get roughly 24.2 square feet.
The PC-12 does seem to be longer in the back, 16’11” from the front of the passenger door to the rear of the cargo area. On the third hand, the Piaggio has a heated, but not pressurized, 67″-long baggage area behind the cabin.
Science, August 2021 edition: Getting COVID-19 (e.g., in Florida) is due to stupidity, irresponsibility, failure to get injected with an emergency use-authorized vaccine, Science-denial, and support for Donald Trump. It’s mostly old people dying, which is why we need to redouble our restrictions on the young.
Science, February 2022: Despite a near-record death rate, Governors should drop the mask orders and other restrictions that they had imposed starting in March 2020. The immunocompromised can fend for themselves. If SARS-CoV-2 wants to have a mutation party in an unmasked school, that’s okay too. It’s mostly old people dying and there are thousands of such deaths per day, but we don’t need to do anything special to try to prevent these deaths.
Some Americans cheered the moves, mostly by Democratic governors, but others questioned the timing, with more than 200,000 new virus infections being reported each day.
New York’s governor said on Wednesday that she was ending the state’s indoor masking rules. The governor of Massachusetts announced that face coverings would soon become optional in schools. And by day’s end, the governors of Illinois, Rhode Island and Washington said that they, too, would loosen coronavirus rules.
… others asked whether states were moving too fast at a time when more than 200,000 new infections were being announced each day and when the country was reporting more than 17,000 deaths a week, more than at any other point in the pandemic except last winter.
Note that it is “Democratic governors” who are delivering freedom to the people and who are being cheered.]
What’s the situation in Washington State, for example, where the governor is loosening the rules dictated by Science? Deaths tagged to COVID-19 are at an all-time high:
The above progression seems inconsistent with “normal science”. A paradigm shift (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy; Wikipedia) has occurred, apparently, and that requires “extraordinary research” according to Thomas Kuhn. But who did the extraordinary research?
My vote is Dr. James Kraus, MD, PhD. His/her/zir/their discovery was “Everybody takes a beating sometimes.” (I apologize for the source, but this is one video moment that the New York Times and CNN don’t seem to have covered.) Dr. Kraus, MD, PhD tells us that, as occupiers of the biosphere, humans are fated to be attacked periodically by viruses and we shouldn’t try to defend ourselves.
Dr. Kraus, MD, PhD’s results and conclusions were rejected by peer reviewers (the jurors in the Kyle Rittenhouse case), just as Thomas Kuhn predicted. But, also as Kuhn predicted, when data inconsistent with the old paradigm (saliva-soaked bandanas are effective PPE against an aerosol; shutting down schools while keeping marijuana stores open will make a respiratory virus go away) became too glaring to ignore, Dr. Kraus, MD, PhD’s new paradigm was accepted.
February 9, email from the “person of color” who is the principal of a high school in Maskachusetts:
Last night I announced that Lincoln Sudbury would shift from mask required in school to mask optional effective Monday, March 7. … The notion of stepping away from the mask requirement will evoke a range of response and emotion from members of our community. … Mask wearing absolutely remains an option for everyone. I expect we will respect each person’s personal choice.
Reaction from a heretical bandana-denier friend who received the email:
I wish you had respected our personal choices over the last two years.
One of the knocks against the mostly-pretty-awesome Vision Jet from Cirrus is high levels of interior noise. The fuselage is composite rather than aluminum and this is typically a recipe for high levels of cabin noise. Sticking the engine directly over the heads of the back seat passengers also doesn’t help.
I recently had the chance to make some measurements in an SF50-G2 using a mid-grade sound level meter.
At FL200 (20,000′) and 301 knots true airspeed (219 indicated), cabin noise was 81-85 dBA depending on the position within the cabin and, especially, whether measured at the inboard or outboard ear. Closer to the fuselage, the sound was quite a bit louder.
At FL310 and 310 knots true airspeed (190 indicated), cabin noise was 80-82 dBA.
For reference, the Pilatus PC-12 turboprop measures 83-90 dBA inside. Small business jets and the Piaggio Avanti turboprop are in the 70s. The elites enjoy cabins in the high 60s dBA, e.g., in a Gulfstream.
Because the Vision Jet doesn’t vibrate like a piston- or turboprop-powered plane, it is very comfortable inside, especially with noise-canceling headsets. A passenger who didn’t want to wear a headset might reasonably use an earplug only in the ear away from the center of the plane.
A paywalled article from the UK Independent is available at MSN: “Tube ‘low risk’ for catching Covid, study finds”. The authors followed people who rode London’s mass transit system and compared them to those who didn’t, testing the study and control groups periodically for COVID-19? Not exactly.
The joint study by Leeds University, the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) and Manchester University found that the risk of commuters contracting the virus on underground train carriages – previously feared to be a “super spreader” environment – was “likely to be quite low”.
A team of science and engineering researchers built a computer-generated simulator based on a Tube-like carriage to demonstrate how the virus might spread from passenger to passenger.
The Transmission of Virus in Carriages model (TVC) simulated the risk of catching the virus from airborne particles, when standing two metres from other passengers, and after touching contaminated surfaces.
Using the tool to track the journey of the virus, researchers found that there was a “small chance of transmission” from ”touching a contaminated surface” and that this could be mitigated by frequent handwashing and passengers avoiding touching their face – validating the government’s “hands, face, space” messaging from 2020.
The government-funded and government-employed researchers validated the government’s action…
A key measure of inflation climbed to a near-40-year high last month. Economists are hopeful that America will reach the peak of the pandemic-era price increases in the early months of 2021. Here’s to hoping.
The consumer price index rose 7.5% in the 12 months ending January, not adjusted for seasonal swings, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Thursday. It was the steepest annual price increase since February 1982 and worse than economists had forecast.
(Note that these are “pandemic-era” increases, not “Biden-era”.)
Which economists are “hopeful”? The article itself cites only an economist who suggests that the price increases will be persistent.
“There will be plenty of persistence from soaring house prices pushing shelter costs this year,” said Sal Guatieri, senior economist at BMO, in a note to clients.
How does it feel on the ground? (“on the swamp”?) Across from our beloved Abacoa neighborhood is Alton, a newer development. The Italian restaurant inside Alton is Lynora’s and, through 2021, they were famous for $2 meatballs on Mondays (example). For 2022, the meatballs are $3 each (an annual inflation rate of 50%).
What about the new houses in Alton? You used to buy one pre-construction or at least pre-completion, thus enabling the selection of colors, styles, finishes, and options. The result would be paying a June 2021 price and moving into a December 2021 house. Inflation is now so high that this approach to business has become untenable. Starting in 2022, the developer will no longer sell any house until it is complete and therefore it is no longer possible for a buyer to customize anything.
What does a house with in Alton look like? Here’s one for $3 million (5,000 square feet, helpful alligator ramp from the “lake”):
Despite the stratospheric-by-2020-standards prices, this neighborhood is actually inferior to Abacoa in many ways. People don’t like the public schools as much (though both neighborhoods are served by the same Palm Beach County system). There is much less green space in Alton. There are fewer trees and they’re scrawny so there is precious little shade. There is so little space between houses that your single family home’s living room probably ends in the neighbor’s bathroom. Why are people willing to pay so much? There is a significant premium for new construction in Florida, where people believe sic transit gloria mundi when it comes to developer-built housing exposed to sun and humidity. (As Dan Quayle is famous for pointing out, Latin is more commonly spoken here due to the proximity to Latin America.)
The U.S. is a great place to be on welfare. Except for France, we spend the largest percentage of our GDP on government handouts such as free housing, health care, food, and smartphone (Washington Post). Marijuana is legal in a lot of states (and “essential” so it will be available through any COVID-19 shutdowns), booze is cheap, and Medicaid will buy you a suitcase full of opioids.
The U.S. is also a great place to be rich. There is no limit to corporate executive pay. After the shareholders have been thoroughly mined, there are plenty of swank neighborhoods in which to hang out with other rich people. At least until 2020, there was a huge supply of low-wage service workers to meet the needs and wants of those in the rich enclaves. Unlike Europe, we have no massive value-added tax to discourage consumption. (Depending on the state, rich people are much more exposed to family court predators than in Europe; see Real World Divorce.)
There is a slavery zone in the middle, though, where an American earns too much to get subsidized housing, health care, food, etc., but not enough to have a spending power or material standard of living substantially higher than what someone on welfare enjoys (quantified by state). He/she/ze/they will pay a crushing array of taxes as well in order to support the comparable material lifestyles of those who don’t work at all.
American slaves seem to be prevented by economics from reproducing. From $50,000 per year to nearly $200,000 per year, fertility is lower than for those on welfare and for the elites. A chart from 2019:
At the end of last year, there were about 411,000 fewer homes on the market that were considered affordable for households earning between $75,000 and $100,000 than before the pandemic, the study found. At the end of 2019, there was one available listing that was affordable for every 24 households in this income bracket. By December 2021, the figure was one listing for every 65 households.
For households earning between $75,000 and $100,000, five of the top six metro areas with the fewest affordable homes for sale per household were in California, NAR found, led by the San Jose metro area. The state’s shortage of affordable housing helps explain why many people left California’s coastal cities during the pandemic and moved inland.
Is it safe to say that the future of the American middle-class slave is apartment living and a one-child max? The population keeps growing while land and roads are more or less fixed. Construction costs go up much faster than wages. A median earner in China can’t afford a single family home. As the U.S. approaches Chinese levels of population, why would we expect someone near the median here to own a single family home?
Two middle-aged ladies were in front of us at Lion Country Safari:
Biden/Harris, Black Lives Matter, and Eat More Kale plus an Imagine there’s no hunger license plate (proceeds to the Florida Association of Food Banks). The “UU” sticker likely is for “Unitarian Universalism”, a pro-Palestinian church (settler colonialism by Jews in Israel is bad; settler colonialism in North America is not so bad that any Unitarian Universalist church needs to give back its land to the nearest Native Americans).
The next day, we found the “Prius Eater” in the Costco parking lot:
On a recent trip to Denver, I rented a $550/week “full size” car from Hertz and received a 2021 Subaru Outback station wagon. As part of the Great Falling Apart of the U.S. service industry, the vehicle was delivered only 3/4 full of gasoline. The 4-cylinder engine made alarming strained noises when pushed hard enough to merge onto I-25 (even accelerating from 0 to 35 mph on a local road sounded like it was a dramatic event for the vehicle’s innards). This is not the refined 6-cylinder powerplant of our beloved Honda Odyssey.
There is a huge touch screen in the middle of the car and, as with Tesla, a lot of essential buttons are available only within the touch screen, typically at least one or two menu touches away. Apple CarPlay is slow to establish compared to how it works on the Honda Odyssey and the entire infotainment system seems slow.
The lane departure warning system is much more active than on the Honda and generates a lot of spurious warnings, e.g., when merging onto a highway from a ramp.
Who buys these cars rather than a Honda or a Toyota?
Here’s the vehicle on I-70:
Speaking of vehicles, here’s a Ford in Idaho Springs that probably doesn’t generate any complaints regarding the touch screen or lane departure warning system:
Of course, it is also possible to take a bus. Note the four mask-related signs in this photo of a single public transit vehicle (Vail Lionshead village):
