Looking back in time, my  posting on 28February2020  summarized my return from Thailand: The fearsome factor was that Thailand had the second-most cases of   covid-19   when I left Honolulu on February 12.  Today, it is #9.  No new cases appeared after I arrived in that country.  No one is known to have died. (Interestingly enough, today  Thailand  is #33 in total cases and #143 in cases/million population.) But on  11 March2020 the World Health Organizaton declared the coronavirus to be a global pandemic .   This was the first time that a pandemic was caused by a coronavirus. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1200 points, the worst since 2008.  The eleven year bull market came to an end. China and Italy were locked down. Tom Hanks posted on Instagram that he and his wife Rita Wilson had contracted this virus.  They were in Australia. Two Utah Jazz players tested positive and the NBA canceled the rest of the season. While thousands of schools would shut down by the end of week,

This was a good year.  Avoided COVID.  Am at the best  Body Mass Index  in at least the past quarter century.  I've never been, as such, fat.  Well, maybe when I was around 1 year old.  But to the present. I saw 146.8 pounds on the scale a couple days ago.  My BMI is thus 23.0, just above average in the optimal green category. My weight before the pandemic was 165, or a BMI of 25.8, in the overweight category. Through a strict vegetable and little solid carbohydrate diet, with few snacks and almost no dessert, my weight dropped to 154, a BMI of 24.1, which placed me just in the optimal category. I just returned from a  five-week trip , including a 21-day Regent Seven Seas Explorer cruise, and saw 155.4 pounds, a BMI of 24.3, still barely in the optimal category.  But the amazing thing is that I thought I had gained at least 6 pounds, for I ate and drank a lot.  Too much. The solution, I determined, was a lot of sleep . True, we remain in COVID Pandemic status.  However, the bivalen

                      From  Worldometer  (new  COVID-19 deaths yesterday):     DAY     USA    WORLD      Brazil      India      South Africa June     9     1093     4732         1185        246       82 July    22      1205     7128         1293      1120     572 Aug    12      1504     6556        1242        835     130 Sept     9      1208      6222       1136       1168       82 Oct     21      1225      6849         571        703       85 Nov    25       2304    12025        620        518      118 Dec     30       3880    14748       1224       299      465 Jan      14       4142      15512        1151        189      712 Feb      3       4005    14265       1209       107      398 Mar      2       1989     9490        1726       110      194 April     6        906    11787         4211       631       37 May     4        853     13667        3025      3786     59   June    1        287    10637         2346      3205      95  July    7         251      8440        1595        8