Let’s All Play Trivial Pursuit on Zoom

The coronavirus curve looked really good last night. It continues to oscillate, but if you do what math people do, more or less, and draw a line through it to approximate its basic direction, you will see that it points downward.

This is somewhat startling, because testing is ramping up. Yesterday, I read that a test of Los Angeles jails revealed 200,000 cases, generally asymptomatic. Did I read that right? That’s a lot of cases. If testing is getting better and more widespread, and the curve is still dropping, then things are even better than they seem.

Maybe one of the upward spikes was assisted by this event.

The press is still deluded. I saw an article claiming Kentucky cases had spiked two days after anti-lockdown rallies. Ridiculous. Coronavirus has an incubation period longer than two days. There is no connection. Of course, whoever wrote the article didn’t point this out. He probably didn’t know it. It’s probably some snowflaky millennial who maxed out with Algebra I and has to call his mom to change a flat tire.

It’s very unfortunate that journalists are so…I will go with “unintelligent,” since it’s not a term created in order to insult. I will steer away from harsher terms. It’s a pity there is nothing like an LSAT for journalists. It would be a First Amendment problem, but think how much better life would be while it was going through the courts.

I applied my prediction equation last night, to see how it was doing. Wonderful result. The equation’s prediction was about 47% high. The reported numbers adhered very strictly to an exponential equation for weeks, and that’s over with. A figure of +47% is still remarkably accurate, but it does indicate that the disease is petering out. Not that you need it, because official sources say the same thing.

People want to go back to work in order to save the economy, but will it work? No. I think it will be very helpful, but it won’t be anything like a true recovery. Americans have been conditioned to believe the following falsehoods:

1. COVID-19 is extremely contagious.
2. COVID-19 is a severe disease.
3. COVID-19 is very dangerous for all demographics.

Taken together, 1 and 2 are not true. Number 3 is not even close to true. The disparate impact of COVD-19 is one of its remarkable features.

Regarding contagion, either the disease is not very contagious, or it is generally extremely mild, or both. If it were contagious and severe, we would have something like a billion known cases, as we do with the flu, every year. If it’s very contagious, it is generally extremely mild, because severe cases are obvious, and we only know of about 2.7 million cases. As for severity, we know how severe it ISN’T, because we have seen 2.7 million purported cases, and something like 85% were mild or asymptomatic. That puts an upper limit on the average severity. We don’t have a lower limit, but the Los Angeles testing suggests the actual infection numbers may be very, very high, and that would prove the disease is generally barely perceptible.

As for COVID-19 being very dangerous for all demographics, we already know this isn’t true. If you’re under 50 and healthy, even if you get a symptomatic case, you’re very unlikely to get really sick or die. If you’re considerably younger, the odds are worse than those of going to Las Vegas with 20 dollars, playing roulette, and driving home in a Bentley.

Well, maybe not that much worse. But a lot worse.

There probably billions of young, healthy people who think they’re facing a high risk of severe illness if they go back to work or mingle with other people in public, when in reality, they’re much more likely to die from the flu or in a car wreck.

My guess is that this belief will continue to kill restaurants and other businesses involving gatherings for at least 6 months. And it will be hard on people like performers, ticket agents, event organizers, venue owners, mall owners, and so on. If you’re a musician, your parents were right. Get a haircut and apply at Walmart. On the plus side, touring makes a lot of money for people who are very corrosive to our morals, so maybe rappers and rock stars will be less powerful and annoying. Many famous performers don’t make much money from royalties. Imagine a future with less Lady Gaga. Nice.

Plagues really scare people. Even when they’re not plagues.

By the way, this epidemic will be the final blow to many familiar chains and businesses. It’s a big step in the direction of a future where a huge portion of the things we need have to be bought electronically. Daddy Beast likes.

Will the pandemic come back? I’ve been thinking about it. Here is my answer: no.

How can I say that? The “experts” say it will always be with us. The explanation is simple.

From now on, we are going to test like crazy. Everyone who so much as coughs will be tested. Big Sister will work hard to gather data, and what will she do when a local outbreak occurs? She will put the boot on it, fast and hard.

COVID-19 can’t just appear everywhere, all at once. It has to start in identifiable, discrete locations. We can address that, and we will. Any place where a case is detected will be locked down. Patients will be quarantined. It will be much harder for the disease to spread next time.

We will also have a vaccine pretty soon, and believe me, we will take it. The pressure will be overwhelming. Even anti-vaxxers may be forced to submit. There may be arrests for people who refuse, even though no one cares if you get a flu vaccine. The flu just isn’t glamorous. Tom Hanks didn’t get it.

I think COVID-19 will pop up here and there, and it won’t get much traction. But the news will still cause hoarding, so buy stock in Georgia Pacific. They make toilet paper. Still the only known cure.

Maybe when people realize the flu was worse, they’ll force us to be vaccinated for that, too. The implications are disturbing. Auntie Sam may be extremely powerful and personal next year.

I wonder about our current status as rights-deprived subjects. Will that continue? Leftists will argue for it, because they always do. They have always been against any civil right not protecting sexual sin, the murder of the unborn, crime, obscenity, or recreational drug use. They love gun control, restraint of free speech that isn’t obscene, the forced purchasing of insurance, over-regulation of commerce, and all sorts of other dangerous infringements.

They routinely advocate for the restriction of political speech, which is the type of speech the First Amendment was written to protect. It wasn’t written for Hugh Hefner, who surely regrets what he did in life.

It’s bizarre how they characterize themselves as proponents of freedom, because they adore government and cede their rights to it eagerly in order to obtain a false sense of security.

Leftists may not realize it, but most would be happy to live in government-financed cages, eating Soylent Green, as long as they got to sin all they wanted and didn’t have to pay for medical care.

We already have those cages. They’re called “housing projects” and “rent-controlled apartments.”

The idea that human beings love liberty is a myth. Generally, we love security, and we will debase ourselves all day every day to get it. People who really love liberty are anomalous. It’s remarkable that there are so many of us in America. It’s probably not sustainable. The pet hamster mindset tends to prevail when times get hard.

We’re looking at a scenario in which we have to balance our natural cowardice and love of security against our knowledge that we will be poor if we aren’t free. I hope the desire for a decent lifestyle will prevail, because it will tend to preserve our freedom.

If you want to be lifted above this mess, get to know God. Pray in tongues every day. Repent. Spend time with him. Let him change you. Your happiness and success depend on your relationship with God, not on what happens around you. Think about Daniel in the lions’ den. Think about Noah. Think about Jesus, walking away unseen in the midst of a crowd of friends, relatives, and neighbors who were trying to throw him off a cliff.

Think about Passover.

The fact that most Christians have lived in defeat for centuries doesn’t mean Christianity doesn’t work. Think of the horrible doctrine that held them down. You don’t have to believe that garbage.

I should talk about masks. The “experts” keep leading us in circles. They said masks didn’t help, perhaps in order to discourage sales so they could funnel them to care providers. Now they’re saying they do help, and in some places, you have to wear one or you can be kept out.

I believed the “no work” line, except that I thought a mask might help a person not to touch his face, and I thought it would reduce sprays of things like snot and droplets. Now the consensus, which seems somewhat more sound this time, is that masks are helpful. So I think I was mistaken.

I can get quality masks from my friend Mike, but I think they should go to people who really need them. Like people who are financing their retirements by selling them for a hundred bucks each.

In other news, I’m afraid I turned my reloading press into a bomb.

I was running my Hornady Lock-n-Load AP some years ago when I noticed that the plastic restraint on top of the primer tube was not reliable. It’s supposed to hold the tube and primers in place. It kept coming loose. I blamed Hornady, and I believe I was correct, but recent research suggests I can make the plastic cap work if I do little things to fix the press’s fit and finish.

Anyway, I turned on the lathe and made myself an aluminum primer tube cap. I’ll show you a photo. It’s basically a counterbored tube with two set screws to fasten it to the primer tube. I don’t use the lower screw. It’s not needed. The cap does a great job of keeping things together.

The primer tube on this press is a skinny aluminum tube, and there is a steel outer tube around it. I thought the steel tube was there to hold it up. This is true, but yesterday I learned that it’s also a shield. On very rare occasions, primers inside tubes have exploded.

The force of a primer explosion is small, but you can put 100 primers in a tube, one on top of the other. They can set each other off, and then you have a bigger explosion. How much bigger? I don’t know. Not big enough to blow a shield apart. The gas exits upward.

Problem: my cap is firmly attached to the shield, and it only has one small hole through which gas can escape. Also, it’s heavier than the stock device. What happens if the primers blow up? Will the cap’s restriction force the exploding gases to blow the shield open? I would not like that. It would be bad, and because the shield is next to a big container of powder, it could lead to even worse things.

Now I see why Hornady gives you a rubber cap to cover the top of the powder measure.

It pains me to give up my beautiful aluminum cap, but I may do it. And I’m going to wear eye protection from now on. And I’ll put a fire extinguisher in the gun room. What a pain.

I’ve had a few issues since beginning to reload again. I found a great series of videos from a guy who really knows how to set this press up. They’re a bit long-winded, but I’m going to watch all of them. You might like them, too.

Hornady provides an inadequate manual along with the press, and there is no way you can make it run using only this tiny amount of information. You need more sources.

I’m thinking that in the future, I will do my best to manufacture all of my own ammunition. I won’t do rimfire because I can’t. I may or may not exclude shotgun shells, because I don’t use many. Not sure. But I want to make my own pistol and rifle centerfire ammo. I can make exactly what I want, and in many cases it will be a lot cheaper than factory stuff. In the case of all-lead bullets, I will even be able to make the projectiles themselves, and they will cost almost nothing.

They’re going to take factory lead ammo and bullets away from us before too long, so if you want to keep shooting lead, you’ll want some bullet molds. Either than or buy bullets this year.

I probably have 30 pounds of lead. I saved some downrigger weights from my dad’s boat. It’s not hard to get free or cheap lead from other sources.

One benefit of reloading is that when people panic, factory ammo sells out faster than reloading components.

I’m hoping supplies of everything will open up during May, and then I can start laying things in. If I have to spend a couple of thousand dollars, so what? It’s important. It’s better than paying for car and home insurance. I’ll have something permanent I can keep.

I’m not one of those nuts who wants a pile of lead so he can shoot it out with the feds when the familiar substance hits the fan, but I don’t want to be an 80-year-old man who polishes his empty guns and misses the days when he could actually shoot them.

I hope to crank out maybe 200 rounds of target 10mm today, and I’ll also create an ample number of defensive rounds. I may as well accept the fact that I’ll need more 10mm brass. You have to practice with your carry gun.

I don’t know if 10mm was the best choice, because .45 ACP is very, very good, and it’s easier to shoot. I can always get a Glock in .45 if I change my mind. Maybe I should look for an alternative brand which is just as good or better. Glocks are wonderful tools, but carrying one is like marrying a homely woman who makes great pies and changes her own oil.

MORE

I don’t know where my brain was this morning. I read a story about a big number of positive COVID-19 tests in L.A. County jails, and, later, I posted what I thought I remembered. I said 200,000 inmates had tested positive.

I always write and then go back and check to see if anything I wrote was incorrect, but somehow that system failed to engage today, as did common sense. As bad as L.A. is, there is no way it could have 200,000 inmates (unless you consider all Californians inmates), let alone 200,000 who have coronavirus.

I must have been distracted. It’s amazing that I could have written something that stupid and then let it make it to the blog. Thankfully, a reader has used a comment to point the problem out.

My best guess is that I saw a story which mentioned the jail test in addition to the fact that 200,000 people go in and out of jails nationwide every week. Either that, or I need to stop drinking so much hand sanitizer.

Anyway, I hope the rest of what I wrote was reasonably lucid. I will check.