A POSSIBLY FINAL GLOBAL OPPORTUNITY

Well, Jeff Bezos and his Blue Origin crew safely returned. However, they only went up, then back, and did not make a global tour.

Dr. Anthony Fauci and Senator Rand Paul sparred again today. Never seen Fauci so authoritative.

Senator Paul is an ophthalmologist, but he keeps pushing the Republican party line with no real proof.

Still scheduled to board the Island Princess next year on January 19 for a penultimate 111-day global cruise. This would be my first ship-only around the world adventure.

My travel partner and I need to be in Okinawa next Fall for an important gathering, so we thought, what about a final and ultimate world journey beginning in October of 2022? We could then work in another stop in Dubai to better see that country, a Christmas River Cruise in Europe, the Expo 2023 in Buenos Aires, and back home through North America.

Here is a first draft that will be adjusted, for Buenos Aires is not yet included, I've always wanted to return to Mauritius, and there will be other sites to consider. We plan to include more than a few 3-Star Michelin and Best 100 Pellegrino restaurants, If we pay for the Tokyo-Okinawa roundtrip, that would mean two more stops around the world. Some of these locations are here because long journeys only land in certain airports. These all fly during the daytime to enjoy the party. We hate overnight flights. The Crystal river cruise departs from Basel.

Finally, home....

I ate two food items yesterday I have been avoiding for a year and a half. I stayed away from desserts and many carbohydrates during my campaign to lose weight. Well, I'm low enough now, so had both ice cream and musubi:

I picked up a Haagen Dazs. In case you missed it, this was an ume musubi located on the right side of this photo just above.

I also had a big celebration, and might someday tell you why:

IN CASE YOU FORGOT, THE FIRST TOKYO SUMMER OLYMPICS EVENT WILL BE SHOWN ON NBCSC (210/1210 on Spectrum in Hawaii) at 8PM EDT (2PM in Hawaii), with Japan against Australia in softball, followed by the USA vs Italy in this same game. The last champion was Japan in 2008, and they beat the favored USA. Softball games continue, then into soccer, where, eventually, the USA women's soccer team plays Sweden at 8:30 AM EDT (2:30AM in Hawaii) Wednesday morning!!!!

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A NEXT COVID SUBVARIANT?

By now most know that the Omicron BA.5 subvariant has become the dominant infectious agent, now accounting for more than 80% of all COVID-19 cases. Very few are aware that a new one, BA.4.6, is sneaking in and steadily rising, now accounting for 13% of sequenced samples . However, as BA.4.6 has emerged from BA.4, while there is uncertainty, the scientific sense is that the latest bivalent booster targeting BA.4 and BA.5 should also be effective for this next threat. One concern is that Evusheld--the only monoclonal antibody authorized for COVID prevention in immunocompromised individuals--is not effective against BA.4.6. Here is a reference as to what this means. A series of two injections is involved. Evusheld was developed by British-Swedish company AstraZeneca, and is a t ixagevimab co-packaged with cilgavimab . More recently, Los Angeles County reported on subvariant BA.2.75.2 . which Tony Fauci termed suspicious and troublesome. This strain has also been spreading in

Part 3: OUR NEXT AROUND THE WORLD ODYSSEY

Before I get into my third, and final, part of this cruise series, let me start with some more newsworthy topics. Thursday was my pandemic day for years. Thus, every so often I return to bring you up to date on the latest developments. All these subvariants derived from that Omicron variant, and each quickly became dominant, with slightly different symptoms. One of these will shock you. There has been a significant decline in the lost of taste and smell. From two-thirds of early patients to now only 10-20% show these symptoms. JN.1, now the dominant subvariant, results in mostly mild symptoms. However, once JN.1 infects some, there seem to be longer-lasting symptoms. Clearly, the latest booster helps prevent contracting Covid. A competing subvariant, BA.2.86, also known as Pirola , a month ago made a run, but JN.1 prevailed. No variant in particular, but research has shown that some of you will begin to lose hair for several months. This is caused by stress more than anythi

HONOLULU TO SEATTLE

The story of the day is Hurricane Milton, now a Category 4 at 145 MPH, with a track that has moved further south and the eye projected to make landfall just south of Sarasota. Good news for Tampa, which is 73 miles north. Milton will crash into Florida as a Category 4, and is huge, so a lot of problems can still be expected in Tampa Bay with storm surge. If the eye had crossed into the state just north of Tampa, the damage would have been catastrophic. Milton is a fast-moving storm, currently at 17 MPH, so as bad as the rainfall will be over Florida, again, a blessing. The eye will make landfall around 10PM EDT today, and will move into the Atlantic Ocean north of Palm Bay Thursday morning. My first trip to Seattle was in June of 1962 just after I graduated from Stanford University. Caught a bus. Was called the Century 21 Exposition . Also the Seattle World's Fair. 10 million joined me on a six-month run. My first. These are held every five years, and there have only been

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