Birdsong and bread making

1.5 million cases worldwide, and over 95,000 deaths.  The US has over 460,000 cases...more than the next three countries combined.

Our president is still mendacious and corrupt, and making it worse at a breathtaking clip.

John Prine died. 

People I know have been sick, and people I know have lost people they know and love.  It hasn't hit me that close yet.  I'm hoping for the best, and staying home.

I woke up at about 4 am.  I eventually went back to bed, but I stepped outside to listen to the dawn chorus of birds.  It was loud, like we live in a rain forest loud.  I read an article that said that birds seem louder because there's less people noise to muffle them.  The article also said that seismographers could measure the difference and detect things they usually couldn't because there's that much less traffic and trains and so on.

It was a beautiful day, windy and warm, the sun sparkling on the lake.  I saw very few people, as I was out at mid-morning.  One of my neighbors was telling everyone who wasn't wearing a mask that we should have one on.  She walked up to me to tell me this.  Not that close, but still.  I'm saying that if a piece of cotton cloth is effective, then staying a good ten or twenty feet back should be even more effective.  Or both, as you wish.  I wear a mask when I have to go somewhere I really can't avoid coming close to people...the post office, restaurants (for take-out, nobody is doing dining-in any more)...but I'd rather get up at 5 am to avoid all humans rather than wear one just to go outside.

Oh, who am I kidding?  I'd just stay home and sit on my back porch, but my dog would not allow it.  I asked my husband if he wanted to go for a walk with me and she started barking at me.  It's like having a furry toddler.  Unless you are prepared to go IMMEDIATELY, do NOT say the "w" word....

I made sourdough starter and gave some out to my neighbors, by way of a folding table in my front yard.  Lots of people have apparently taken up bread baking; it is no longer possible to buy yeast or find plain all-purpose flour.  I got a five pound bag of organic whole wheat bread flour and counted myself fortunate.  I plan to try it all out on some bread tomorrow. 

Life, as they say, goes on.  One way or another.