This is Day 262 of 15 Days to Flatten the Curve, and it’s Day 22 of the 21-day WuFlu Curfew.
Deb and I are fine.
We have a handful of friends and associates who have tested positive for coronavirus. Some are experiencing symptoms, others are not. For the second straight day we received word that a friend recently died with the virus. These are reminders that we’re all dealing with a real thing here.
As we’ve said all along, there’s a difference between acknowledging that WuFlu is real and living in fear of it. There’s a difference between vulnerable folks taking precautions and an over-reaching State mandating that businesses and all citizens, even healthy ones, comply with a strict code of conduct.
We’re being rational. We take certain precautions and eschew others. We refuse to be fearful.
Yes, Ohio’s governor extended our 21-day curfew, this time for another 23 days. It’s now scheduled to be lifted on January 2nd — and that, of course, confirms his obsession with thoroughly crushing all of our traditions, our holiday celebrations.
And what did he say today?
“[This is] absolutely a crucial time. What each of us does in the next 21 days will set us on the path — good or bad — for the next year.”
Now where have we heard that before?
Oh, right — from the same guy, at the same podium, at every damned presser he’s held since March. It’s embarrassing. He’s an embarrassment. It’s no wonder that smart people have tuned him out.
Every statement is a panic-fanning replay of the last. Everything is of the utmost significance, according to this governor — which tells a thinking person that nothing is any more important than anything else, because not everything can possibly be “crucial.”
Richard Michael DeWine is writing his legacy in half-truths and outright lies, detachment and impotence. What a way to be remembered.
Here at home, Ernie continues to draw our attention, especially on an unseasonably balmy day like this one. The list is endless, but the tasks in front of us aren’t difficult. Each time we finish something and step back, satisfaction is high.
I began the day with a little upholstery repair on the co-pilot’s seat. Its rear skirt had been torn off, maybe by a dog or possibly by the curb-side slide when it was being brought in.
I still had the skirt, made of an imitation-leather fabric. I trimmed off and evened up the torn edge, applied a couple of lengths of Gorilla Tape on the hidden side to reinforce it, then ran a strip of double-sided carpet tape underneath the top edge and stuck it back in place. The result is as perfect as it needs to be.
Something else I’d noticed, particularly in the dash area, was evidence of screws that were overtightened and cracked the trim in places. One glaring example was the trio of defroster vents near the windshield — several screws had been torqued down so hard that pieces were broken off and missing.
The vents themselves functioned just fine. They weren’t loose and didn’t rattle. But while driving down the road, the busted bits were right there in front of us, and we found that annoying.
Because these parts probably hadn’t been produced in a dozen years or more, short of going through an RV salvage yard I wasn’t optimistic about finding replacements. But all it took was a little Internet sleuthing to discover a dealer in Indiana that still had four of them — new old stock, exactly what we needed, and not expensive.
Pulling the old and fitting the new took me all of 15 minutes this afternoon. I made good use of that Robertson square-drive screwdriver I picked up, cinching the 18 screws down by hand just tight enough.
Simple pleasures often come to me by way of cheap fixes.
Take care of yourselves, Patriots. Stay free.
#WiseUp #LibertyOrDeath #OhioAgainstDeWine