According to highly paid professionals who are quoted ad nauseam saying painfully obvious things that we already know, we do not have to panic over Covid 19.  Not yet, anyway.  And, if we eventually choose to panic and freak out sometime later, how do we most colourfully manifest that hysteria?  What insanity-de-jour is best for you and your family?

Answer: hoard toilet paper. Then hide in a closet.  Stay home.  Don’t talk to anyone closer than a meter away in distance….and, if that meter-rule is broken, run.  Run like hell.  Return to the closet and wait 14 – 28 days (the incubation period is changing) and then, well, spend a lot of time cleaning that wretched closet afterwards.

According to the same ‘experts’, we will all eventually get Covid-19 anyway.  50% is the low estimate and 70% is the high.  Half the population will eventually contract the Coronavirus. 

“So, if that is true, why is panic not an appropriate response?”

Answer: C-19 is NOT Ebola.  It is not a flu but it is very flu-like.  Seems like it is really just a really bad ‘cold’.  It is highly contagious and it carries a higher-than-normal fatality factor but that is primarily aimed at the elderly and those with respiratory problems. C-19 is bad but, gee, it is not THAT bad and anyway, you are gonna get it whether you take precautions or not.  If not this year, then next.

“Geez, Dave, you seem pretty cool about all this.  You feeling invincible?”

On the contrary.  I am reading the tea leaves and listening to professionals.  And, they say, I am very likely gonna ‘get it’.  I hope I do not get it this year (so much to do) and I really hope I am one of the 50% who doesn’t get it at all.  But, like, I have had dozens of flus and colds and even a few ‘real diseases’ like Chicken Pox and it’s offspring, Shingles.  I’ve been sick before.  I’ll get sick again.  It’s the way of things.  Put bluntly, Covid will eventually get me but I will suffer through it and carry on.

“So, why write?”

Because I can get sick, get better and then carry on as I have if – and only if – there is a world in which to carry on in.  If the world has shut down, then it is the shut-down that will cause me more problems.  The disease is a novel bummer, the world shutting down is a major problem – and more than just a small surprise.  Our response to Covid-19 is showing up to be more disruptive than if the disease simply tore through the population taking it’s toll as those diseases are wont to do.

“You saying you are not taking precautions?” 

No.  Not saying that.  Altho, to be fair, I am not taking many precautions.  Within a block of a hospital, I will don a hazmat suit but, generally speaking, I am carrying on as normal.  AND I am saying that precautions won’t help.  Not in the long run, anyway.  Experts say we will all get it eventually.  We simply have to deal with this as if it was the flu.

“So, your blog today is, “Don’t worry.  Be happy?”

Yeah……kinda weird coming from me, don’t you think?  But, you see, Sal and I are going home tomorrow.  I simply cannot help feeling happy about that.  In fact, I am hoping to find love in this time of Covid-19.  These are now the best of times.

There are approximately 250 people in our area.  But there is rarely ever EXACTLY a predictable number because folks move around and, further, we are all spread all over our district/neighbourhood (about 250 square miles over several islands).  Most of us just move to the local town and back but that social mobility counts when you are ‘monitoring’ the latest disease.  Costco is at another town forty miles away and so that trip exposes us all a bit more, I suppose.  But, basically, one would think that those living ‘remote’ would seem to have an advantage……

…..but we do not.  “WHY NOT!”  Well, a lot of folks living remote go south to Mexico or other foreign destinations for the winter.  I would estimate that at least ten are gone for the whole of the winter and maybe 25 leave for two weeks or even three.  In fact, two of our young people just came back from Japan and Mexico.  Gasp!

And some in the community want them to self-isolate.  I am ambivalent.  They do NOT exhibit symptoms.  They were NOT in ‘infected’ areas and our local doctor said that they do not have to quarantine.  But, of course, fear/concern is not logic or science based….it is fear based and the knee-jerk thinking there is simple: “Let them sit it out til we are all safe.”

The problem with that kind of simple thinking, of course, is that ‘they’ have already been all through the system from airplanes to airports, from being picked up to greeting friends and, worst of the worst, living with a parent who is very ‘active’ all through the community.  If they have C-19, the bug is out of the bag.  If they do not, the community is over reacting.  What are ya gonna do?

And what are you gonna do about the dozens of friends and visitors that come every summer?

And therein lies the fallacy that living OTG makes you safe.  I honestly think that, with the exception of the urban zombies and the roving bands of killers that we all expect to emerge at any moment, OTG is only a bit less vulnerable to your basic earth-shattering events.  In truth, we are more vulnerable to ‘physical harm’ from falling off ladders to tool-use accidents, from drowning to catastrophic fires and earthquakes – because we do not have any real big-scale ‘accident response infrastructure’.  OTG living is physical and being active and working hard physically results in injuries.  That is just the way of OTG life.

In other words, we are not MORE safe, we are likely generally a bit LESS safe.

And a disease is a very, very hard threat to combat.  Just ask the CDC.  Sal was in the hospital and contracted the normal flu from there.  I shopped at Save-On and Costco this past month…and many of the staff and patrons did NOT look the picture of health to me.  Buy gas at the station and you likely pick up the gas pump bare-handed…..push the store doors open to get inside, shop from shelves, gather fruits and veggies from bins and open coolers with bare hands.  If the bug is out there, it will find you.

Merkel is estimating 75% of Germany will eventually get the C-19 virus.  Other countries are saying similar.  And very little of that will happen because of people kissing.  The means of transmission required to impact that many people will not be by way of loose lips.

It’s here.  It’ll get you or it’ll get someone you know.  The only consolation is that the disease is NOT Ebola or the Plague.  It is just a nasty, nasty flu.  The biggest concern for me is that once a flu is ‘in the general population’, it keeps coming back.  We’re gonna be revisited by Covid-19 for a long time, I think.  And that is a bummer of threatening proportions.

“Hi.  I am coming down-island to do a shop…I thought I’d call ahead to see if you are busy?”

“Like it’s Xmas!  It’s crazy!”

Friend J and I decide to go anyway.  If this virus thing gets anymore crazy, then no one is going anywhere.  We feel we have to shop while we still can.  So, off we go…around noon on Thursday.  We stop at the organic butcher on our way down.  “Hey, that virus thing, eh?  Heard Vancouver Island got their first case this morning. You guys affected?  Like a run on porkchops or something.”  “Nah.  But the news is wrong.  Little 10 year old exchange student from Japan just came down with it.  He was in a local class all last week.  They say the whole class is being tested!”

I drove to within a few blocks of Costco.  Traffic was jammed.  No one going anywhere.  Pulled a few (illegal) driving tricks and managed to get into the parking lot (if you have a 4×4, you should use it, right?) but, of course, it was jammed.  Found a spot and in we went.  J headed right, I went left.  “Say half an hour – give or take?  Meet you at the hot dog stand?”

I kicked it up a few rpms and began my quest for a few family-packs of holy grails.  I do not ‘push’ my cart when I am at Costco, I drive my cart!  Further, when I kick it up few rpms, I am the fastest set of wheels in the store, bar none.  I weave, I swerve, I charge at a blocked aisle like Bull elephant in heat.  People MOVE!  The timid cling to the sides, the stupid get ‘taken out’ (carts sent careening).  And I do $500.00 worth of shopping in under twenty minutes.

After the final addition to the cart, I put ‘er in overdrive and head pell mell for the incredibly long cashier line ups that I saw earlier.  My now heavily laden cart on two wheels and screeching around the last turn, I find a minor miracle.  There is a welcoming cashier.  Empty.  Two staff coming to get my cart.  Smiling.  They, too, are in a self-imposed contest to be the fastest checker-outers and they must be leading the pack.  I am out of there three minutes later.

But I do not have toilet paper.  Nor Phyllo pastry either.  And no, they are not interchangeable.

J and I fill the car, head out and go home.  We are greeted by our wives like savage hunters carrying a Wilde beast-on-a-stick would be greeted by the village.  They are pawing and gawking at the heaps of supplies. “Toilet Paper?”

I hang my head.  Mumble something about bidets, the French, rags, finger bowls and Arabs….“WHAT did you say!?”

“Nothing, dear.  I’ll find some TP.  Don’t worry.”

It is Friday the 13th.  Only an idiot would add to the currently high virus risk by going out on F-13.  Still, when you think about it, if there is any TP out there in the urban jungle, this may be our last chance.

…….I may be crazy.  But I just may be the lunatic you’re looking for…(Billy Joel)….

For awhile now I have been thinking something is up…..or, better put; ‘about to happen’.  To be fair, I have that inclination all the time and over various things but, for the last few years, it seemed as if something LARGE was imminent.  Any sane person would call that feeling ‘creeping paranoia’ except that it did not feel personal in any way.  I just ‘felt it’.

I am not alone.

I have to also confess that the feeling (other than my usual, normal sense of paranoia) was catalyzed by Trump being elected.   “How in hell could that happen?”

And, as the last three years unfolded, that feeling was exacerbated almost daily by his almost cartoonish insanity.  The guy was like a hand grenade walking.  Something had to blow….

And, now this.  Coronavirus!

“What!?  Are you saying you foresaw Coronavirus?  You saying, you blame Trump for this?”

No.  Of course not.  Puleez.  I am saying something even stupider.  Bear with me……..

There is a ‘school of thought’ that suggests that a whole bunch of negative thinking brings about negative events.  I do not fully subscribe to that kind of pop-kharma kind of thinking but, on the other hand, there is no doubt in my mind that ‘negativity’ is some kind of self-fulfilling force.  If you have any doubt about that, consider economics – basically, the financial manifestation of our collective confidence or fear.  The economy rises and falls on fear and confidence – NOT GDP.

Put another way – the value of a company traded on the stock exchange is simply one ‘perceived’ by a gaggle of investors as seen or ‘analyzed’ in a context of economic growth or shrinkage – positive or negative.  Our collective attitude or mood MEANS something in the marketplace. Our perspective, our mood, shows up in the Consumer Confidence metrics….are people buying TVs and cars or are they NOT buying ‘durable’ items?

Now also factor into this ‘mad’ idea that, for the last while, the media/government have upped the marketing of fear.  They now sell fear.  They dine out on it.  That does not mean that the fears they are selling are not real – to some extent.  It just means that, like a car in a showroom, they are trying to sell MORE than just the vehicle.  They add to the price by selling the sizzle with the steak.  The car became NOT just a vehicle, it was a sex symbol, a lifestyle, a statement of ‘who you were’.  They sold MORE than the item – they sold an idea along with it.  And the price went up.

That cynical marketing grew out of TV and the media but went viral with the digital age and then accelerated on the fear quotient.  “Wow!  If we can scare them all to hell, we can sell the Military Industrial Complex, our political party, drugs, insurance, vacations, even camouflage crap like pants and t-shirts.  Fear is more potent than sex appeal!”

And so we have all lived under a cloud of fear for a long time.  And, like I said, it is hard to debunk REAL nut-bars like Kim Jong-il, ISIS, Fentanyl or (gasp) socialism!  No wonder all the ‘Merican gun-nuts want more guns than they can carry.  They are dumb AND terrified.  

The point: did we somehow collectively ‘manifest’ this disease?  Have we all lived for so long under this not-so-subtle cloud of fear and the marketing of it that we somehow ‘expected something like this to happen?’  Did we bring it on ourselves with HUGE thoughts of negativity born of fear and divisiveness?

“Of course not.  The bug is a bug and a bat conceived it by mating with a pig or something.  C’mon, Dave, don’t get all mystical on us now.”  

Fair enough.  That’s what I think, too.  It’s just a bug that happens now and then.  Fer sure.  Having said that, there are very few health care workers who do not believe that the patient’s attitude plays a huge part in their recovery.  Mood and feelings count HUGELY in the prognosis.   And so, if mood and attitude play a role in recovery, couldn’t mood and attitude have played a role in our recent deterioration?

Jus’ sayin’………

Irony, thy name is OTG.  Pathetic, thy name is Sally and David.  We are naming a lot of stuff right now while trapped sick and wounded in the city.  

As my readers know, I am NOT a Doomsday Prepper.  If anything, I am merely an old-man escaping something I conveniently label ‘the city’.  Maybe I am a small-time, cautious adventurer (but very limited) – goaded by my fearless partner, to be totally honest (there is no other way to explain the El Salvador trip by swamp buggy and chicken bus a couple years back).

I am also a bit of a hedonist…I like some things and I pursue them.  Yummy.  I don’t like other things and I try to avoid them. Yuck!  I got the avoidance response-thing down pat.  I am much more of a spoiled brat than a hardy, independent Mountain-man, type.  I like Netflix, for Gawd’s sake.  And Malbec.  I have even traveled once or twice with my own pillow!

Still, I did kind of take some solace and comfort in being remote.  It ‘felt’ safer, somehow.  You know….?  Zombies can’t swim…kinda thing?  Seriously….we did rationalize that anyone who wanted to come kill us or something (have their way), would be put off by the trouble of it all.  Getting to us ain’t easy.  Bad guys first have to get boats and check the weather and find a place to land…and for what?  They sure as hell do not want to carry all our crap out as booty and load it into a boat.  Hell, our booty is old!

But, living OTG almost automatically makes you better prepared than city dwellers.  We have a food shed.  Water.  Tools.  Not just a ‘bottle’ of wine but a few cases.  When TSHTF or TEOTWAWKI comes a ‘calling, we’d last a week or two longer than most of you pussies!  Ya gotta take your victories where you can.

OK.  I am also a bit smug and obnoxious.  Not to mention stupid.

The truth is: Murphy Rules.  In the long run, Murphy also takes it all.

And Murphy is here!  There we were all smug and stupid….thinking, ‘this is good’.  And then Sal had a knee op.  And that was good, too.  REAL good!  But then Coronavirus presented itself to China and Italy and all them other places but, like, we were OTG.  We were invincible!  OK, maybe not invincible but certainly exempt from ‘some of it’.  We were safe.  Safe-ish, anyway.  Poor bastards out there.  But NOT us.  We were good.

Well, not quite.  We were NOW temporarily out of the Green Zone and in the Hospital zone – NOT good.  But we could get back in a sec.  No worries, mate.  “Is that a zombie over there?” 

Then Sal was felled by the ordinary wimpy flu.  And so I carried her for seven or so days……then the bug got me.  I am too heavy for her to carry – especially with a new knee.  Worse, it seems, we only have a few rolls of toilet paper.

In the movies, this would all be called ‘foreshadowing’.  The music in the background would start to get a bit weird…..the focus would be misty…more ‘night scenes’ would be filmed.  Bottom line: things are happening all around them and our hapless heroes don’t even know that Freddy Krueger lives next door.

“Honey?  You got any toilet paper?  We seem to be out?”

“I’ll go look.  But the lights just went out.  I’ll get my cane.  And a flashlight.  Back in a second.”

As reported earlier, we OTG’ers recently pulled off a minor miracle (October 12 to February 13).  We pulled together and bought the community ‘some land’.  Twenty acres.  That purchase was NOT accomplished by an ‘association’ or society getting a grant or signing up for a mortgage.  No, this was a cash-on-the-barrel-head purchase.

The ‘overall’ challenge required $165,000.00 and we came up with that in four months.  That is totally amazing.  Remarkable in the extreme.  A miracle.

And the reason I say that is because those folks who contributed were, in the majority of cases, living at or below the official poverty line.  The average household income out here is somewhere around $30 – 40K a year.  (I am guessing)  But, of course, it was not achieved solely by way of ‘po’ folks giving up their lunch money.  We had some very generous contributors who not only ‘kicked off the campaign’, but others like them added significant chunks at just the right time to keep the momentum going.

We also had a single person living at $20K a year ‘pledge’ one third of her monthly income for as long as it took.  C’mon!  That is a bigger gift than if Warren Buffet contributed a billion dollars!

It all started with the sellers.  These people offered the property to the community for significantly less than it was worth (to loggers).  That kindness and generosity was immediately followed by another well-off couple who immediately ‘matched’ that discount with a $50,000 ‘starting contribution’.  By doing so, they acted like real community leaders, set the bar high and did not push it on others in the least.  And then seven others contributed $5,000 or more almost immediately.  There was no canvassing, no constant appeals, no marketing efforts…nothing like that…..

“Why not?”

…..First off, most everyone out here knows what’s going on most of the time, anyway.  We really do have the ‘jungle telegraph’ out here (and a monthly newsletter).  Secondly, they are all so bloody independent-minded that appeals, promotions and ‘pushing them’ would have been counter productive.  Thirdly, hundreds of others NOT EVEN LIVING OUT HERE chipped in and together made a major contribution – no ‘marketing appeal’ was going to reach them.  They were from all over.  Hell, some guy from Germany who Woofed, made a huge contribution.

This was as close to a real grass-roots effort as I have ever seen and the bulk of the credit has to go to the first few people in…that initial response was quiet, almost-anonymous, generous, self-less leadership at it’s best.

So, why write about it….now that it is done?

There is now a bit of community momentum.  We have all been invigorated by our success.  Understandably.  Even I am invigorated and you know what a cynic I am!

But, what do we do next?  Buy more land?  Develop something (like housing)?  No one yet knows.  But we are clearly NOT lacking from good leadership.  We are not lacking from vision, either.  Consensus is always a question but a victory-under-your-belt helps build consensus.  And, from what I just witnessed, we are NOT lacking support.  We are NOT lacking support even from those who don’t live here or even come here!

The only thing maybe missing is enough ‘young blood’ and even that is slowly changing.  We have more young people than before and more inquiries about ‘homesteading’ than ever.  This little ‘odd’ community OTG is doing pretty good and that, in itself, makes me happy.

Well, OK…..less grouchy.

….and yet it keeps happening.  Today it snowed!  March 7th in the temperate climes of Campbell River usually sees daffodils blooming, men-in-T-shirts and well, women in T-shirts, too (fashion is not their strong suit).  But it was below freezing last night and scheduled for below-freezing again tonight.  And Daylight Savings begins tomorrow!

Sheesh.  I half expect a plague of locusts next.

The last month has proven to be more eventful than our previous year.  And NOT in a fun way.  But, oh well, into every life a little rain must fall.  But we are currently more than just a little bit damp and fallen……(figuratively speaking).  We’ll be fine but…well, SNOW?

My standard response to anything I do not like is basically anger.  It is not a hard leap for me to make.  I kinda live at ‘grumpy’ and ‘grouchy’ is a very close second-stage.  Getting to anger is easy.  It is about Mar-sec 3 or DefCon 4 for me.  And, of course, some things prompt that response more than others.  Currently I am ‘beyond annoyed’ at what I refer to as professional/institution-speak.  That is the language used by administrators and professionals who assume you are an idiot and know nothing so they speak drivel, jargon and bureaucratize at you as if they were actually saying something. 

They have a ‘tone’ as well.  The ‘tone’ is one of ‘you mean nothing to me.  I am a professional.  You are a member of the great unwashed public and I really do not have time for this’.

“Now, ma’am, before we start, please do not speak to me in institution-speak.  It’s actually detrimental to communication, anathema to relationship and absolutely crazy-making for me.” 

“Of course, sir.  I understand.  And let me just say how much we appreciate you stepping forward with your concerns.  It is our goal at the Mindless Medical Institution (MMI) to prioritize and put forward our best efforts in this matter and further, to work with you and other stakeholders to resolve your issue going forward.”

“I don’t feel good about this already….”

“And how can I assist you today, sir?”

“Well, to get to you, I have already spoken to three other polite, professional, smiling-but-evasive and obviously powerless staff.  They are repeating all the great things stated on your website.  You know?  Mission statement stuff?  They know the jargon off by heart.  But they are not engaged in the issue one bit.  They DO nothing.  It is as if I was talking to robots.”

“Well, sir, I am here now.  How can I help you?”

“I wrote everything out.  I itemized everything.  In detail.  I wrote three times already.  Did you read it?”

“No, sir.  We are very, very busy here at the MMI providing care to our patients and others in need.  I have not had the time to read it.  Perhaps you could summarize it for me?”

“No, ma’am.  I am very busy at the Moho providing care to others and I have already taken the time – three times, actually – to basically fill your files with unread, hard, detailed information.  Please get back to me after reading it.  A summary over the phone is NOT going to do the job.”

“Thank you, sir, for your valued input today.  We will be in touch shortly. Have a nice day.”

And, once again, ‘punching people in the face’ seems to come all too readily to mind.

…..what exactly IS normal these days, anyway?  Biden, the moderate, silver haired, handsome male stereotype….?  (Damn!  That guy could host a game-show!). Is that the normal we want?  Might be.

I listened to them all but especially Biden, Sanders and Warren and, quite frankly, I liked Warren better….’cept for one thing.  She was slim.  She was old.  Her voice was higher-pitched.  She looked and sounded frail.  Her words were NOT frail but the image was just that of a ‘feisty old lady’.  NOT a power image.  NOT a strong image.  Smart.  But NOT strong. 

AND, even if she WAS strong, her image would be seen by other ‘strongmen’ as one all too easy ‘to challenge’. 

That is NOT fair.  That is not logical, either.  Not in the least bit.  In fact, it MIGHT even be a bit sexist.  (The counter to that accusation is that a thin, old and high-pitched-voiced male would be seen as weak, too).  Warren was, in my opinion, the better contender in brains and morals…but NOT the better contender in a bar-fight.

But that is NOT a reasonable way to pick a presidential candidate, is it?  But it is ‘visceral’.  It is common.  It is Joe-six-pack.  And it is the standard-of-choice for the deplorables.  It is totally unfair and likely totally wrong.

We’ll never know about Warren.  Too late to ‘go again’.  Mind you, Amy Klobachar had some cajones.  So did Kamela Harris give ‘that impression’.  But the female-female in Warren’s persona and even Tulsi Gabbard’s ‘presentation’ lacked that ‘balls’ metric.  And it seems to count.  In fact, it DOES count.

That is too bad.  First, the female-female point of view in the halls of world power would be a refreshing change and the female-acting-macho is NOT the same thing.  Honest women don’t/can’t do that.  They really should not have to.  If they try to be men-in-skirts, they are seen as either ‘weird’ or not honest.  Angela Merkle is the closest to what ‘works’ with our sexist political point of view.  She is real.  (Maybe the Queen….but, well, there is a licence given a ‘queen’).  She is female.  She is NOT a male in her thinking.  But she is definitely strong!  I think Merkle is the best example of a strong female who didn’t fake being macho in the so-doing.  Theresa May did a good job as well but got ‘stymied’ by circumstance and eventually turfed.  Hillary Clinton did everything right except ‘be human’ and so she was dumped.

“Sometimes it’s hard being a woman….”

We hold women to a higher standard.  And maybe that is a good thing.  We need higher standards.  Obviously the standard of photogenic, tall, silver-haired, well-clad, rich male lawyers is NOT doing the job and so we might TRY a better, more reasonable person that is female.  ‘Course, for that matter, why not TRY a better, more reasonable male?

Genitals really should NOT make the leader.

But, so far, it seems to play a role.  And much of that, of course, is primal.  Much of that is ‘historic’ and much of that is, it seems, influencing both the female and the male voter.  Seems females prefer males as leaders.  Well, Republican/Conservative women do, anyway.

Me? I honestly do not care the gender of the ‘dear leader’ so long as that so-called leader has integrity, ethics, intelligence, honesty and the ability to ‘appeal to the masses’.  Gimme Oprah.  Gimme Greta Thunberg.  Gimme a decent ‘guy’ like say, George Clooney or even Stephen Colbert.  I don’t care.  Hell, I’d take Robert De Niro.  If the person is good, then they are a contender in my books.

But normal?  The ‘usual’?  The latest ‘product-of-the-system’?  I dunno….the next REAL leader has to show some ‘differences’ and some ‘convention’ all at the same time.  Right now, it seems, that – when things get tough – genitals are too much of a variable in the political arena…..we can’t handle too many variables, too much choice.  So, we choose ‘strong men’.

It’s traditional.  It’s a ‘no-brainer’.  Emphasis on NO-brainer.

And that is why the deplorables chose Trump.  He was ‘different’.  He is stupid.  He is selfish.  He is insane.  And he is a lying crook.  But, for some reason, that was seen as a form of strength.  And, it is, I guess.  It is a primal form of strength – like an ox.  Like the village strong-bully type from the jungles.  He is the bull-in-chief.

I would prefer some one smarter.  Some one better.  Some one good.  I do not think I am normal.

The bad news is that it took an ambulance at 11:00 pm and four hours of testing to determine that she was just overwhelmingly ravaged by the ordinary flu (despite having a flu shot!).

She passed out last evening and was unresponsive to virtually everything for a few minutes.  And that kinda shook my confidence in our previous-but-amateur diagnosis, I am afraid.  That previous diagnosis (“It is just a flu hitting hard after surgery) was later confirmed by a doctor friend who took the trouble to stop by and check her vitals earlier yesterday.

Still, a limp person lying comatose on a moho floor is disturbing to say the least.  My confidence in it being ‘just the flu’ was shaken.  I cracked.  “Hmmmmm….it is very likely what we all think it is but if we are wrong, this is NOT the time or place to make that kind of error.  I’m gonna play it safe.  Hello?  911?”

They asked all the Covid-type questions and, surprisingly, those questions were all answered in the affirmative thus leading me to believe that MAYBE it was Covid!  But there was ONE question we could answer properly and that was, “Have you recently done any traveling?”  I said, ‘No’ because I thought they meant China, Japan, Italy or Iran…but we HAD briefly traveled to Vancouver to get the moho (in and out) so my answer was NOT quite accurate.  Still, they took her and ran every test known to science.  With the exception of the flu symptoms, she is perfect in every way.

But that is obvious to anyone who knows her.  

So, what is the upshot of all that?  Well, the surgeon was a genius.  The knee operation was a total success.  Sal healed from that remarkably well and did not aggravate her wound in the fainting episode (which the medics refer to as a ‘syncope’ incident).  The Physiotherapy was useless and detrimental to her health – not beneficial.  The facility was NOT clean and we are both convinced she got the flu from there.  The ambulance crew were very good.  The emergency team was also very good.

And I am guessing that nothing is the worse for wear from that unexpected outing except our sense of well-being….which is rapidly returning to normal.

All’s well that ends well.

I just hope this incident recedes into the past sooner rather than later.  We are much happier looking down our noses at the city than relying on it.  But, truth be told, with the exacerbating and egregiously delinquent (in my opinion) Physio department excepted, the new CR hospital did a very good job – TWO times out of three is not all bad.

Lesson to be learned.  Trust your instincts.  Both of us did NOT trust the physio lab from the get go.  We even acted on that lack of confidence to a lesser extent by doing our own ‘wiping’ of handles and equipment using alcohol wipes.  But we were NOT diligent enough about it and paid the price.  Well, Sal paid the price.

…..and I do not even know what they are.  Not really.  But, somehow, the city and it’s ways ‘get’ to us now.  And we don’t ‘like it’.  If someone asked, “What, exactly, don’t you like?” I would be hard-pressed to make a list that didn’t sound petty and selfish.

And, really?  C’mon?  Are trees and ravens and squirrels ALL that great?  I mean, ‘Seen one whale, seen ’em all!’, right?

Wrong.  Somehow the forest and the ocean delivers up a deeply real sense of calm and tranquility while, at the same time providing an even stronger sense of living life to the fullest.  It is a stimulating relaxant if that makes any sense.

But, of course, OTG is a personal choice and, while it is a good choice for those who have chosen it, it is not for everyone and some people can’t imagine living this way.  Having now lived again a few weeks amongst the parking lots, traffic lights, line-ups and sirens-in-the-night, I cannot imagine living anywhere else other than OTG, myself.

And we are not alone in those feelings.  As Sal tries to recover (hindered by a new flu) friends and neighbours call in and, after a few minutes, the conversation trends toward ‘life’ on the island, it being a paradise, us being in Hell and all that sort of thing.  It is really interesting that living OTG seems to suit all of those out there very well.  And, of course, we miss being there.  A lot.

However, just as the gap seemed to be as great as it could be, someone (a developer) is trying to market vertical living as a new concept.  A Green one, no less.  ‘Smaller footprint!’  And, I suppose it is.  We have had residential highrises a long time (started in 1925) but we have not had highrises with gardens on the roof and ‘community garden boxes’ added to the mix.  Electric bikes.  Transit.  Community trails on parklands that you can drive to in an Uber…..

(you can see where this is going, can’t you?)

Basically what they are saying is, “We intend to pave paradise and put in a parking lot but one with planters.  Keep a few trees, put ’em in a tree museum……charge you thirty bucks just to see ’em.” 

“Oh, And the Big Yellow Taxi is on your app.”

The irony is: If you do not own a cheap set of wheels and the nearest ‘wild’ trees are a long way away from your urban village, some bean-counting parent will say, “Well, it is not the real forest, kids, but it’s cheaper to pay the $30.00 than get off on a safari to find some so-called wild trees!”

We are not far off ‘putting in a tree museum’ if you count National Park fees as a harbinger of that.

Clearly, the world is moving to live in denser and denser populations that are trying to emulate hives and herds.  Animal Farms.  We are subtly designing the Matrix.

“Dave!  You exaggerate!” 

You are right.  I am.  I am casting a trend so far ahead that it is very likely the ONE scenario that won’t happen.  Having said that, I have lived in Hong Kong.  I have visited Tokyo, London, New York and dozens of other big cities.  I have watched in detail as Vancouver (and now Burnaby) have ‘sprouted’ high rise ‘town centres’.  Highrise living is proliferating faster than is the growing population.  ‘So much easier’.  ‘Better for the planet’.  ‘More efficient’.

They are also a Petri dish for pandemics, a staging ground for drugs, violence and chaos, a sinkhole of concentrated resources and they suffer from a dearth of the natural world.  It is the place to be when the complicated systems work well, perhaps, but every single one of those systems has failed multiple times, from transit breakdowns to brownouts, from traffic congestion to crowded hospitals, the list is endless…..the ability of modern man to manage growth is still very much a question mark.

To me, the vertical city is the pot of boiling water that too many frogs are jumping into.