How do I not remember this?
The Grenfell Tower fire occurred in London on June 14, 2017. The fire broke out on the fourth floor, rapidly spread, and burned for 60 hours. There were 72 casualties and more than 70 people were injured.
I have no idea why I don’t remember this. 2017 wasn’t that long ago, and surely this received some sort of international coverage, right?
Structural fires are terrifying to me, so this is like nightmare fuel. Granted, there were several circumstances and mistakes that came together to make this an especially dangerous situation that could have been much less catastrophic, but it’s still pretty horrifying.
Timeline
Want to plan for the next quadrillion+ years?
Here ya go!
The fact that Chernobyl won’t be safe for another 20,000 years is wild.
So, uh…
Alberta’s Premier resigned.
Because that’s apparently a thing they can do.
I’m fine with it. Was not a Jason Kenney fan, especially when it came to his handling of COVID. But now I guess the conservatives have to elect a new top dude, and there’s every chance he’ll be even more wacko than Kenney.
‘Berta: Canada’s Texas.
YEEEEEEEHAWWWWWWWW!
Burfday
One year closer to death, awwwwwwwwwwwwww yeah!
Also, I had a migraine tonight, because HAPPY BIRTHDAY, YOU LOSER
That’s all. Screw all of this.
*Kanye West voice* POOP!!! POOP!!!
This is both hilarious and kinda terrifying.
I feel like if I had been on this cruise I would have volunteered to help with the stinky stuff. ‘Cause I could deal with it a lot better than most could, haha.
(Also, title reference)
20 Years
Can you believe it’s been 20 years since September 11, 2001? I can’t decide if it seems like it’s been longer than that or shorter than that, but COVID has warped all sense of time to me, so who even knows.
I was in 8th grade when that happened. We spent that whole day (whole week, actually) not doing anything in school except watching the news. It was wild.
Anyway. Just putting the passage of time into perspective.
Remember
Remember when people actually cared?
For like…six months?
I don’t feel like this virus is going anywhere anytime soon, but I think people will get more and more polarized by it and the government’s response to it.
(Edit from late 2023: LOL YUP)
Hyatt Regency
Hey, look what happened 40 years ago today.
As I’ve said here many times, structural collapse is absolutely terrifying to me, probably on par with fire as something that would be horrible to experience.
But I also find it fascinating. I actually learned about this skywalk collapse incident from an English class I took; someone had referenced it in a story and I had to go check it out because it seemed equal parts horrifying and interesting.
Anyway. With the whole Florida Surfside collapse thing, I like how CNN mentioned this somewhat similar tragedy that happened 40 years ago now.
Ha, this is fun
Steer through the Suez Canal like a boss!
Can my elite simulated trucker skillz apply to ships?
Edit: if you panic and overcorrect enough times, it all balances out!
GOOD JOB
Heyyyyyyy Alberta is doing a really good job keeping COVID cases down. I guess stricter lockdown rules work. WHO WOULD HAVE GUESSED?!?!?!?
They’ll probably re-open things too soon again, though, ‘cause that’s what happened last time.
Edit from April: okay, yeah, we done screwed up. We’re in a serious wave three now.
The United States is in a Freefall
That is an absolutely terrifying curve. Remember when we thought that “second wave” curve in July was bad? This is so much steeper.
What a time for the dilapidated pumpkin we call “President” (at least for now) to go silent, eh?
It’s like the perfect storm has led the US to where it is now. A huge political divide in the country that crested in the form of that ridiculous election, a pandemic that seems to be deepening that divide, a frightening number of people who don’t believe in science, a frightening number of people who won’t accept the mildest inconvenience in order to possibly save many, many lives, and leadership that’s done nothing to try to ease the strain of the pandemic and that as gone radio silent as the pandemic is crashing through the country.
Like…this is horrifying to watch from outside the US. How are y’all doing down there in the US? Please stay safe. Please wear a mask. Please stay the hell away from other people.
I miss you guys and I hope you’re all okay.
And it goes on
I’d say this election is absolute madness, but it actually is fitting in quite well with the theme of 2020.
Which, I guess, is the theme “absolute madness.”
But anyway. Every time I see an update on the election from a Canadian news source, you can tell the reporter is trying to hide their exasperation and disbelief over the whole situation. I’m sure it’s the same sort of thing in the States.
And while it’s frustrating that the outcome is taking so long, it’s understandable (with COVID) and I’m glad that the remaining states seem to be trying their best to be as accurate and sure as possible so that Trump will have less ammunition to use against them if he loses.
(Not like that will stop him from going after people, though.)
Ugh.
Edit: I love this. The joy.
There’s freaking celebrations in the streets. I don’t remember such widespread joy at the changing of Presidents in the past. Like…did people rejoice in the streets when Bush (the second one) was finally out of office? I don’t think they did.
Edit 2: Hahahaha.
COVID PARTY 2020
Six-digit daily case counts in the States? Yeah, sure, why the hell not.
That is absolutely terrifying, America. I feel like it’s right on the verge of being past anyone’s control and the only way it’s going to slow down is by just chewing through the whole US population.
But Canada isn’t doing all that much better. Here’s our second peak going strong:
Alberta, specifically, has really dropped the ball. We were in new daily case numbers between 100 and 200 for the longest time, then things jumped up to the 500s a few weeks ago. Yesterday? 800 cases. Today? 1,441 cases. People keep gathering and are apparently not staying home when they’re exhibiting COVID symptoms.
Why is everyone so freaking stupid and selfish, I don’t understand.
Like, I get the whole “pandemic fatigue” thing, but holy hell. If people just calmed their tits for like TWO MONTHS and isolated as much as they could, we could probably cut this thing down significantly.
Why is that such a hard concept?
UGH I AM SO FRUSTRATED WITH THIS WHOLE WORLD RIGHT NOW.
Huh.
I want to know if this countdown was manually modified as COVID developed or if it had been left alone and happened to coincide with all of this nonsense. Because if it was left alone…wow. Good predicting.
I don’t know if humanity will be ravaged by COVID, but it’s definitely messing us up.
But I guess we’ll have to wait another month or so to see if we get ravaged.
HERE WE FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOO
Election 2020. Let’s do this shit.
- I love how as soon as I turned on the TV and saw that little electoral college tally thing that CTV news has on the bottom of the screen, I had immediate PTSD flashbacks to watching the 2016 election and that feeling of increasing dread as the red side of the tally thing encroached upon 270.
- Edit: I knew this would be a super close election. No one else I talked to seemed to believe that (hell, all the political experts said it wouldn’t be close), but I had a feeling.
- Edit 2: CTV just did a little two-minute recap on the progression of COVID in the States and it made me want to cry.
- Edit 3: One of the CTV commentators just said “what in the actual hell?” when referring to how close the election is so far. Same, bro.
- Edit 4: Florida, I SWEAR TO GOD…EVERY ELECTION, man.
- Edit 5: I love how all of the Canadian news anchors and commentators really tried to start out the night being as impartial as possible, but every single one of them is now displaying obvious dread and disappointment with every state that gets declared for Trump.
- Edit 6: how can such a large proportion of the US population have enough faith in that orange dumpster fire to vote for him?
- Edit 7: Yaaaaay, we won’t know who won this freaking election for at least a few days. That’s great for world anxiety levels. Who needs COVID for that, right?
UGH.
Wave goodbye to any sense of normality this year
So we are definitely in the “second wave” of COVID up here. It’s a bit scary because Canada was doing quite well as a country through July and August, but cases are spiking again nonetheless.
I guess the comforting thing (if you want to call it that) is that the second wave seems to be happening in almost every country that appeared to have the virus under control, so at least we’re not an outlier as far as that pattern goes. I mean, it could be worse, right?
(That, of course, is the US)
Canada did really well squelching the first wave. I hope people take this second wave just as seriously.
Edit: okay, just for funsies, Canada has had a total of about 197,000 cases and about 9,800 deaths. That’s about 0.52% and 0.026% of the Canadian population, respectively. The United States has had a total of about 8.1 million cases and about 219,000 deaths. That’s about 2.5% and of the population and 0.067% of the population, respectively. I’d say that’s a decent difference, especially in the percentage of cases.
More C-C-C-COVID
Today, Alberta led the Canadian provinces and territories in new active cases of COVID-19. How many new cases did Alberta have?
121.
That’s a good sign, I think. I mean, the province leading in new active cases sucks (especially since it’s only the fourth most populous province in the country), but the fact that it’s leading with such a relatively “small” number is good.
Yay?
COVID Rankings
So here’s an interesting ranking of US states and Canadian provinces/territories. Want to see how your state/province/territory is doing with COVID compared to all the others? Take a look. Alberta’s not doing too great compared to the other provinces/territories, but is doing pretty well compared to most states.
Edit from November: yes, this thing keeps updating and I didn’t take any screenshots of it when I originally posted it, so there have been some changes. However, in general, the provinces/territories are still doing quite good compared the states.
Anyway, check it out. It’s interesting
OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT
Soooooooooooooooooooooooooo…
Remember my dream the other day? Remember how there was an explosion in Beirut in that dream?
It was the explosion in Beirut. The one that actually happened yesterday.
Like…I didn’t even make the connection until today. I read “explosion in Beirut” as a news story title on CNN yesterday and really thought nothing of it. You hear “explosion in Beirut” and you think, like, a car exploded or something.
It wasn’t until I saw a video of the explosion today – and saw how massive it was – that I connected the explosion in my dream to the actual explosion.
It is the same explosion. I’m not even kidding.
Like, this video?
That is what I saw in the dream. Almost exactly. Same angle, same intensity of explosion, everything.
That is creepy as fuck.
If there’s a similar explosion in France at some point soon, the end of the world is coming, yo.
Quaker
This is super interesting.
I was one year old when this happened, so I obviously don’t remember it, and I don’t think I’ve ever read or heard too much of the details, either. I think the most fascinating part of this is how calm everyone seemed to be in the stadium. Maybe Californians have a different response to earthquakes than most people because of where they’re located, but it seems like if this had happened anywhere else, it would have been chaos.
Coronavirus Madness
Take a look at these two different graphs of daily cases of COVID-19.
Which one is the US? Which one is Canada? I’ll give you one guess.
Even with the population difference, Canada is seeing much smaller rates than the US. And we’re flattening a lot more. Will we spike again? Probably. But I don’t think we’ll spike to the extent the US currently is.
Hell, that isn’t even the second wave in the US. It’s still the first wave. It just picked up a lot of momentum.
That’s terrifying. Are you all terrified down there?
It’d be funny if there weren’t PEOPLE DYING
Edit from December: *sobbing noises*
Mount St. Helens
Today is the 40th anniversary of the famous Mount St. Helens eruption that covered a good section of the Pacific Northwest in some degree of ash (according to Wiki, 11 states and two Canadian provinces got ashed).
I wasn’t alive yet, but my dad was in Moscow starting his job at the U of I and he remembers how crazy it all was with the ash that Moscow got.
Here’s a quick vid on the eruption with some footage:
Here’s a longer documentary!
Open
I ran 10 miles today!
In completely unrelated news, Alberta published its “here’s how we’re going to re-open the province” plan. Let’s see what we’ve got.
Comments:
May 14 sounds awful soon for some of the “Phase 1” items. Farmers’ markets? Hairstylists/barbers? Daycares and summer camps (even with limited occupancy)? That seems…frightening. Hopefully enough people share my same sentiment so that these places won’t be overrun by peeps. Or maybe they’ll push it back.
Also, movie theaters in stage 2? And schools, even with restrictions? Oofs.
And I might just be missing it, but I don’t see anything on there about universities. Who knows when that nonsense will reopen.
I’m glad there are no set times on stages 2 and 3, at least. I think Alberta has done a really good job of dealing with all of this; I just hope they remain as cautious and health-focused as things start opening up and the economy starts chugging again.
We don’t want to have to do all this again in a few months.
Good Lord, United States
This is scary. Compare this to a pic of this website that I took back on March 26 (almost exactly a month ago).
Too bad I didn’t have Canada on that first screenshot. We’ve shot up quite a bit, too, but not nearly to the extent that the United States has.
And some states still want to start opening things back up soon, huh?
Eigenblogger 