Life in the time of coronavirus

This is the picture I should have used for the previous entry, but I forgot I'd taken it: a movie theatre on 42nd Street announcing its reopening a few weeks ago.

I will not be going to the movies any time soon, maybe ever, but I am supposed to go to the theatre in a couple of weeks, a prospect that has me more than a little anxious.

Urban poetry

A typically unlovely West Side street, with a jumble of architecture and those odd beams connecting the fences. But it's hard for me to express how beautiful I found it, walking home from breakfast on a lovely spring morning.

All Covid restrictions have been lifted. Of course I'm still free to take as many precautions as I like, and it will be a long time before the world feels less dangerous to me, so not much is going to change in my life at the moment. 

Still. I just hope the millions of idiots who refuse to get vaccinated don't drag us all down with them.

Astronomy Tuesday

Jupiter's Ganymede is the largest moon in the Solar System. In this image, taken by the Juno probe last week, you can see the ridges and craters that are the geologic wear and tear of life in our universe. It makes me wonder what the Earth would look like without the camouflage of oceans and icecaps and forests and cities, if we could see it stripped to the naked rock.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS; Processing and License: Kevin M. Gill;

Sunday bird blogging

 

I will always be grateful for the sparrows and titmice and mourning doves who visited my fire escape and windowsill when I couldn't go out looking for them.

I do love mourning doves. You aren't likely to find many of them qualifying for the avian equivalent of Mensa, but there's something so reassuring about the way they just plod along, looking quite contented with their lives despite singing such a sad, sad song.

Saturday reflections

This gorgeous car reflection is so abstract you can hardly see the car.

Street photography

A woman sitting on her stoop on East 88th Street Saturday night. I will always be able to identify this picture as coming from the Late Covid Era by the fact that she's wearing a mask but it's pulled down around her chin, and that she was able to buy a six-pack of paper towels.

One thing that I missed even more than going out for breakfast was just walking around with a camera in my hand, taking pictures of whatever caught my eye. I could, and occasionally did, do this pre-vaccine, but I always felt as though I needed to have a reason -- and a good one -- to justify leaving the sanctuary of my apartment and venturing into the virus-ridden world outside. (Being so overwhelmingly busy with school was a factor too, of course.)

It's not just that I can wander around; it's that I finally have the energy to look at the world again. It's wonderful.

Astronomy Tuesday

The Necklace Nebula is only about 5000 years old, so quite a newcomer in galactic terms. Planetary nebulae like these are formed by the gases emitted by stars near the end of their lifespan -- in this case the star at the center is actually two stars, orbiting so closely they share a common atmosphere.

Image Credit: ESA, Hubble, NASA; Processing: K. Noll

Urban poetry

It isn't officially summer, but this past weekend was certainly steamy enough to qualify. When I was on the Upper East Side Saturday night, I noticed that suddenly masks were being worn pulled down below the chin. Sure, the CDC said we didn't need to wear masks outside if we're vaccinated, but most people in New York had still been wearing them. 

Then the heat and humidity arrived and suddenly we were all saying, You know, I think I'll just pull the mask down until I have to go inside.

Here's the golden light near sunset on West 43rd Street.

Sunday bird blogging

Here's a grackle, showing off those iridescent blues and greens and purples.

I've been celebrating my birthday all weekend; after last year when I barely remember having a birthday, and certainly didn't celebrate, being able to share two meals with friends -- and hugs! I've actually been hugged! -- made me tear up more than once.

Saturday reflections

 The Upper West Side, as seen in the frames of a car.

Zoom life

 

Shortly after I started school last summer, I started shopping for a desk so I could sit somewhere other than my bed for Zoom classes.

I have a small apartment, and far too much stuff in it already, but I finally found a leaning desk-bookcase combination at Crate and Barrel, and I ordered it. There were shipping delays because of the pandemic, and I waited for delivery. And waited. And waited.

The furniture eventually arrived in three separate deliveries in the middle of last semester when my life consisted of writing papers, and then writing more papers. So it wasn't actually assembled until last week, and I finally managed to figure out how to anchor the desk to the brick wall Tuesday.

So last night was the first time I zoomed into class from my brand new desk.

Fortunately on Zoom, no one can see your floor.

Astronomy Tuesday

Mars, of course.

And I love the fact that the many landers and probes have now made me familiar enough with the surface of a planet millions of miles away that I can say, Oh, that's Mars, the same way I might say, Oh, that's Central Park.

This particular image from the Utopia Planitia was taken by Viking 2 in 1976, showing that unlike many places on our home planet, Mars hasn't changed much in the past 45 years. It's not far from where the Chinese Zhurong rover landed earlier this month.

Image Credit: NASA, The Viking Project, M. Dale-Bannister (Washington University)