On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

This I believe: Doug Ford's crew are actively working to make people die and become disabled. Hence this:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ont-ltc-masks-1.6622221

What the actual HELL!!!

This might be useful to us all.

https://biblioottawalibrary.ca/en/blogs/are-you-ready-read-between-lines-0

(As for my choice of icon for this posting, I am feeling a thematic connection to that particular TV series as well as a nostalgic frame of mind at the moment.)

1. Ottawa author Kate Heartfield gets to hold forth on the Big Idea of The Embroidered Book by way of Athena Scalzi:

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2022/05/24/the-big-idea-kate-heartfield/

2. Dylan Reid at Spacing Media notes the contents of the "Rain" issue of Spacing now arriving in newsstands and mailboxes across Canada (and, I hope, elsewhere, too):

http://spacing.ca/national/2022/05/24/new-issue-rain/

3. Canadian national security is under threat in a way some of us never stopped worrying about, and others grew up never understanding until now:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/national-security-us-fox-news-threat-report-1.6459660

4. The process of recovery is underway, and it's complicated.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/storm-damage-ice-tornado-power-grid-ottawa-1.6463247

5. The Ottawa Titans have started their first baseball season.

https://apt613.ca/the-ottawa-titans-play-home-stadium-for-the-first-time-may-24-2022/

6. How to get help as needed during the Derecho-blackout of 2022:

https://ottawastart.com/ottawa-power-outage-where-to-recharge-get-a-shower-and-eat/

7. Fascist infiltrator in (New) Conservatives gets shown the exit door:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conservative-party-resigns-racist-email-1.6463136

At least right now at this moment.

I'm looking at some of the horror stories from across the States via Twitter. Genuine, non-fiction horror stories. I don't know now what I can do to help you. If we jointly figure out that there's a useful thing I can do, I'll try to do that thing.

*looking around for ways to be useful*

Apologies to Matthew Good.

I can't imagine it's good to be him today watching the news from the west coast of Turtle Island. Not having the lyrics of "Last Parade" from the album Vancouver thrown in his face by the news headlines like this.

That smoke will be over Ottawa tomorrow night probably...?

Filed by Garrett M. Graff with Politico:

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/05/07/experts-knew-pandemic-was-coming-what-they-fear-next-238686

Call it stuff that civil defense planners, science fiction writers and citizens in general need to take interest in.

I am remembering "All Good Things", the wrap-up of The Next Generation's branch of Star Trek. Specifcally, one of the "guest" starships in that episode, the hospital ship USS Pasteur as captained in an alternative future by Beverly Crusher Picard.

Well, hospital ships are a real thing in some few real-worlds wet navies. The USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort are in US service and have been for some decades. Since I was in grade school, I think.

Anyway. It's occurred to at least one naval affairs blogger that maybe more hospital ships would be a good thing for the USN to have at hand in case of future crises, domestic and overseas. Whether new-built or refitted from private hands. I would agree re: Canadian purposes as well, if we get through this current mess reasonably intact enough. If we don't need them at home, there's UN/WHO operations that could be supported, right?

But again, we have to get through this mess without being annexed by "Trumpistan" or being remade into a province of Xi Jinping's or Putin's regimes. Or bankrupted and whatever else our nightmares can dream up.

And on to whatever's next between now and the end of the first season of Picard...

Related note: https://cdrsalamander.blogspot.com/2020/03/cruise-ships-and-usnr-covid-19-public.html

...by the New Conservatives in the next year or so and if DT-45 doesn't get away with going Full Reich Mk. IV on the USA's population and Constitution, I suspect we'll be able to handle a lot of what COVID-19 (AKA SARS 2.0?) throws at Canada.

I'd really like to see Canada take on full EU membership, sign onto the Schengen Agreement and so on, though. I think that might make us a bit safer geo-politically, even in a pandemic scenario.

Yes, the "pipe dream" argument against EU membership's been deployed before.

Anyway, back to reading Charlie Stross' curated debate on COVID-19. Which may end up disabusing me of a few hopeful and nightmarish fantasies.

Further useful reading over at ProPublica: https://www.propublica.org/article/i-lived-through-sars-and-reported-on-ebola-these-are-the-questions-we-should-be-asking-about-coronavirus

- I went to a Planning Primer at City Hall last night. Seemed like a good idea for various reasons, and I hope to do a write-up later on today, possibly for Spacing Ottawa. More as that develops. I'm filing my attendance under "research and networking" in my job search activity diary. After all, I can't afford to spend the next 4-8 years getting a doctorate in urban planning, so I need to fill my knowledge gaps however I can.

- siderea posted some thoughts on household planning for possible pandemics. Details here if you think that might be useful. "Siderea" tends towards the careful and thoughtful, so their opinions might be of some use to you.

- I've been trying to check the Public Service Commission website's available listings (Living in Ottawa, I have to include this in the search), and this is the message I got this morning:

"Secure Connection Failed

The connection to the server was reset while the page was loading.

The page you are trying to view cannot be shown because the authenticity of the received data could not be verified.
Please contact the website owners to inform them of this problem."

I'm wondering if this is a browser-version-specific issue. Here's the link:

http://emploisfp-psjobs.cfp-psc.gc.ca/

...is that City Hall is lifting the state of emergency triggered by the spring flooding 49 days ago.

Details here:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-flood-state-emergency-1.5172046

What about Gatineau across the river from us?

Nothing on that topic. But I have to bookmark this site:

https://ici.radio-canada.ca/ottawa-gatineau/