ON TO SAKATA

It is Friday in Japan, so this must still be Thursday in the USA. I've bypassed anything linked to Covid for weeks because it is not newsworthy enough these days. However, thought I'd touch on it today. First, though, a few other topics:

It is becoming clear what new Speaker Mike Johnson and his Republican House will be doing, for they are now cherry-picking topics to support their priorities, while insisting that the budget be balanced with cuts to the IRS now, and social programs later, to pay for necessary expenditures. Both the White House and the Senate scoff at this tactic. Read the details.

If you've lost track of Donald Trump's assorted indictments and court trials, here is a summary.
As I erroneously indicated that the U.S. ended daylight savings time this past weekend, here is the correct information. When you go to bed this coming Saturday night, the nation at 2AM falls back one hour on Sunday, November 5, meaning you will have an extra hour to sleep. Even though most Americans prefer keeping the "summer" schedule forever, legislation to skip the twice a year time conversion is stalled in both sides of Congress.

From Worldometer:

Covid cases in the last 7 days/million population.

#1 Niue 1233
#2 Lithuania 945
#3 New Zealand 479
#15 USA 134

Covid cases during the past week.

World 149,570
#1 USA 44,734
#2 Brazil 31,593
#3 Russia 25,983
However, many countries just don't report anymore.

Japan is one of those countries where Covid has disappeared from the media. The Japan Times has a list of relevant articles, and the most recdent one was on October 27, entitled, Tokyo promotes awareness of children's Covid-19 aftereffects. However, in most indoor venues, more than half are still wearing masks.

So what remains relevant about Covid today.? Well, you can still get infected, and if you do, Pfizer is now charging $1400/series. However, your medical plan should cover it.

About our cruise, we took a cab from our ship to the Aomori Prefecture's iconic building, a pyramidal tourist center.

The tourist center had a nice Japanese restaurant at the top, from where you can see our ship.

I had a beef dish with cold beer and hot sake.

A truly wonderful meal, except that we would have eaten something maybe better for free on the ship, We then decided to walk back to the Diamond Princess. Huge mistake because one was in a wheel chair and other can't see well. There were half a dozen series of stairs, and one portion under repair which was treacherous. First photo of fall colors.

We got back to ship and met for early evening cocktails, Tried a blended gin martini, which was best consumed with a spoon. However, unlike a margarita, the ice seem to have totally neutralized the taste of the gin.