That was a biggie

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Monumental weather today.
Over 100mm of rain, winds gusting to 120kph, just absolute carnage.

Biggest storm this century for the Mother City, allegedly.

I’m finding it hard to disagree.

Floods everywhere, trees down – one killing a motorist just around the corner from us – branches all over the place. It’s going to take a while to clear up.
School went ahead for us, but plenty didn’t. And everyone has the day off tomorrow…

…which seems weird, given that today was horrific and dangerous, and tomorrow is just going to be wholly unpleasant. But I doubt that many students will be complaining.

There was a 1½ hour period this morning where nothing could land at Cape Town airport:

Imagine leaving Johannesburg, and then – 4 hours later – ending up in… Johannesburg.

Heartbreakingly awful. Thoughts and prayers.

Locally, there is plenty of damage, with trees down all over the neighbourhood. With the polyphagous shot hole borer beetle epidemic having weakened many of the oak trees around the area, the winds were just too much for a lot of them, and the results are pretty devastating.

If the forecast is correct (and it’s been unerringly accurate today), then we’re just in for about 20mm of rain tomorrow, which is still a lot, unless you’ve had 110mm the previous day, in which case you feel like grabbing your swimsuit and then heading to the beach.

Hopefully, with less wind and less rain, there will be an opportunity to start the clear up: not least for me in our garden. Although, maybe I actually quite like our new rim-flow pool.

Tomorrow

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Today hasn’t been that bad.

But tomorrow looks rather ominous.

The South African Weather Service (SAWS) has issued an Orange Level 8 weather warning for disruptive rainfall in the Western Cape.

Level 8 indicates “Severe” impact, and yes, Mother Nature is throwing everything at us all at once: big waves, big winds, and a lot of rain.

The Garden Route was hit by an Orange Level 8 last week, and… well…

It didn’t end well.

While many schools in the Winelands are closed tomorrow, ours in Cape Town go ahead unless we hear differently overnight.

We’re as ready as we can be. 

I have an umbrella.

Let’s see what happens.

Just Dorset things

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We all like to live in nice houses. Or churches.

And we all differ in what special touches we apply to our houses to make them stand out from the crowd.

I’m not sure we’d all go for this sort of thing, though:

Dorset is weird.

Oh. Hang on.

Apparently, it’s not for interior design. It’s an annual community occasion:

She said: “What happens is we get these poo fountains shooting up in the street and in people’s houses. It’s becoming an annual event.”

“People need to take notice of this because we’ve got more housing coming along and Dorset Council has made this a development area.”

Like the church fete or some Morris dancing. Everyone can join in. Candy floss, ice cream vans, a coconut shy and some poo fountains. Lovely.

All the fun of the fair.
Yeah. Dorset is weird.

Bring out the horse paste!

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Here we go again!

A couple of points here. And they’re important ones.

Firstly, while Hantavirus is an RNA virus, and there is some evidence that Ivermectin blocks some viral proteins from entering the host cell nucleus, Hantavirus replicates outside the host cell nucleus, so Ivermectin would have precisely zero effect on that process.

Well done.

Secondly, Mary Talley Bowden was reprimanded by the Texas Medical Board after she prescribed er… Ivermectin to a patient infected with Covid. A patient who she didn’t have permission to treat.

I honestly can’t think why she’s suddenly trying to be controversial again now, aside from the fact that her book: Dangerous Misinformation: The Virus, the Treatments, and the Lies, “a memoir about her COVID-19 work and clashes with medical institutions”, comes out – gosh – it comes out this month.

Grifters gonna grift.

Meanwhile: SO MUCH more evidence that someone screwed the pooch when that boat got to St Helena and the couple of weeks that followed. Ah Jesus.

Tristan

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I’ve wanted to go to Tristan da Cunha ever since I arrived in Cape Town. It’s definitely safer than some mid-Atlantic islands. However, as someone that doesn’t handle the sea too well, the several day boat journey (from just up the road) is a really big obstacle.

Still, the place looks absolutely amazing – like nowhere else on earth – and the community’s lifestyle and relationship with the sea is fascinating.

Here’s an NPR… docu-site? – I’m really not sure what to call this sort of content – all about life on the island and the people who live there.

Link: Tristan da Cunha – the world’s most remote inhabited island.

It’s easy reading, and offers a lovely introduction to the place, with some amazing photos and videos.