JOURNAL ARCHIVE: - posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 4:20 PM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Wednesday 10 December 2014 - http://hvom.blogspot.com/2014/12/contagion.html
Contagion
For the past few days I have contemplated a discrepancy in a sort of daily journal I maintain. Beginning 01 October 2013 I began capturing a series of digital images of the environment outside my apartment windows. I don't have a routine for the time of day and I do it only at some point during the day when I remember it. I started doing mainly because in the heat of summer I like to go back and look at the images of those same places covered in snow.
What has been on my mind again but more recently is the day 01 January 2014. That day is missing from my collection. I went through the three months before that day and that day is the only one missing.
Anyone following my blog might remember that I described how the last days of 2013 I was sick with some kind of respiratory illness. That was notable to me because I have recorded that as only the 3rd time in the past 11 years I have been sick with a respiratory illness and in my life that is the only kind of illness I have ever known so when I think of myself as being sick then the illness popularly referred to as 'a cold' or 'the flu' is the illness afflicting me. I don't really know the difference between a "cold" and influenza other than I tend to think the latter has the same symptoms only more intense. In the last few days of 2013 I suspect I had only a cold, whatever is the basis for that description. I didn't have a thermometer so I didn't ever measure for a fever and I don't recall if I felt as though I had a fever.
I look back at my blog and see gaps in my posting and that is consistent with my sickness.
So I have been thinking that I simply forgot to capture digital images on that day because I had been sick. I don't recall that day very well now without anything to jog my memory and I didn't make a post that day.
What I have been wondering about lately is if I died - literally died - that day. Again.
So my theory about Kerry Burgess 2005 becomes Kerry Burgess 2014.
And then I wondered: Well, I would have found the body.
And then I considered that there is a crew out there to collect my corpse.
My physical body literally dies and there is a crew out there who knows that and they come in to steal my pants from my closet or just as easily to collect my corpse for disposal.
And then suddenly I materialize again at some point and have no conscious awareness anything even usual even happened to me. I just simply exist again.
In recent days I have been wondering if something similar happened to all those people who were tested for Ebola as I read in recent months in the news. Maybe they died too. Maybe they returned too. Maybe there are crews out there who knew the people to watch and they collected their corpses too.
Maybe they were tested negative for Ebola because they returned after dying and when they materialized or whatever they were still afflicted with the symptoms.
And that makes perfect sense. They would know they had been sick. They would have to feel sick after they materialized. But they had died from it and then reappeared but without the actual disease.
And I think about that crew is managing the news about it and there was something else I was going to note here but I forget now.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 10 December 2014 excerpt ends]
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: - posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 6:06 PM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Friday 10 October 2014 - http://hvom.blogspot.com/2014/10/patient-zero.html
Patient Zero
Only the third time in the past 11 years I have been sick with some kind of respiratory illness. I thought I changed my earlier blog post to indicate 11 years instead of 8 years but I didn't seem to.
I have only been sick only three times since at least the year 2003. Might have been the year 2002 the last time. Definitely not after 2003 except for the three occurrences I have tracked the dates for. The second time was just after I considered moving into an apartment named West Point and traveled there to view it. For this third time I think of it as just a cold. I don't really know the difference between a cold and the flu. I just think the flu has stronger symptoms than a cold. I didn't measure my body temperature. I was out of it for a few days. At one point I seemed to have to get up every hour to go to the bathroom because I had drank so much bottled water thinking that would help.
I remember that incident very well. I remember because I have been especially aware of sickness since I worked at Microsoft and so I was keeping track of it after I was in the VA hospital.
And so in December 2014 [ correction: December 2013 ] I remember especially well because of a comment a woman made to me when uncharacteristically I went to the supermarket late in the day on Christmas Eve. I remember thinking about it when I started feeling bad the next day. At first I thought the air quality was just bad. I was coughing and I thought the reason was the so-called ridiculously resilient ridge of High Pressure causing stagnant air and wood smoke pollution.
I haven't written about it because something just seems wrong. Something about my so-called time-traveler effect I cannot figure out. I also can't remember what the hell the light fixtures are supposed to be about. Sometimes rarely my cryptic method of recording my observations backfires and I can't remember what the hell it was I was noting.
Doesn't matter. I have established that just because I document something here in this theoretical time-traveler journal that doesn't cause anything to happen in the future.
Look at how their supposed facts are changing. Supposedly that infant in Africa got sick and died at precisely the same time I got sick for only the third time in at least 11 years.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 10 October 2014 excerpt ends]
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: - posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 09:01 AM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Friday 28 August 2015 - http://hvom.blogspot.com/2015/08/minds-eye.html
So that was actually the day before Christmas Eve when "uncharacteristically I went to the supermarket".
Makes more sense anyway; I doubt that store was even open for business that time of day on Christmas Eve. I wrote before in my blog I was there late in the day Christmas Eve and then I referenced that again several times without stopping to really consider what I had written.
I wonder if that was the day I switched back to my old-time favorite brand of Coors beer. Can't recall. But that is certainly a detail my vast trove of register receipts would reveal.
I try to avoid supermarkets around holidays so I do not recall their business hours on Christmas which I vaguely recall the notices they post but I ignore those because as a habit I avoid shopping around those times.
I have also noted from my receipts that I was over there again on the 28th so as I have written here my symptoms must not have been too overwhelmingly bad.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 28 August 2015 excerpt ends]
DSC00874.jpg
DSC00863.jpg
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061594/releaseinfo
IMDb
The Double Man (1967)
Release Info
USA 3 April 1968 (Portland, Oregon)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061594/fullcredits
IMDb
The Double Man (1967)
Full Cast & Crew
Yul Brynner ... Dan Slater / Kalmar
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: - posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 10:09 AM Pacific Time somewhere near Seattle Washington USA Thursday 02 January 2014 - http://hvom.blogspot.com/2014/01/bad-news-bears-2005.html
Bad News Bears (2005)
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: From: Kerry Burgess
To: Kerry Burgess
Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 5:55:42 PM
Kerry Burgess wrote:
I have this sense of dread I can't explain. But there is something........I can't put my finger on it, something, something, something, what is it? I had the strongest feeling this morning that I don't know who I am. Then it just clicked back. It just turned off. I think it was something someone on tv said while they were listening to me. I find myself thinking about that part in that 1998 Star Trek movie where Data realizes he is missing some memory chips. And I heard someone just the other day saying something similar. I keep my headphones on to block out stuff like that, but......what am I missing? What other clues are there that I've missed? Are people telling me this all to help? Do I need help?
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 16 May 2006 excerpt ends ]
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0408524/quotes
IMDb
Bad News Bears (2005)
Quotes
Mike Engelberg: [Buttermaker falls down drunk] Is he dead?
Prem Lahiri: No, he is drunk.
Tanner Boyle: Screw this, man, I'm takin' his wallet.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0408524/releaseinfo
IMDb
Bad News Bears (2005)
Release Info
USA 22 July 2005
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: 9/18/2006 2:29 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_force
Delta Force operators are granted an enormous amount of flexibility and autonomy, as with their Navy counterpart, DEVGRU. They reportedly do not maintain any general uniformed presence and civilian clothing is the norm on or off duty while at Ft. Bragg. This is done to conceal the identities of these "secret soldiers". Uniforms are rarely worn, if at all, with any markings, names, or branch names on them. Hair styles and facial hair are allowed to grow to civilian standards in order for the force to be able to blend in and not be immediately recognized as military personnel.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 18 September 2006 excerpt ends]
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: 9/18/2006 2:29 PM
Some details are good to reveal to encourage recruitment, but other details are dangerous to reveal. Only the operational commanders of this group have the authority to decide where the line should be drawn as to revealing details about the group.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 18 September 2006 excerpt ends]
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0408524/taglines
IMDb
Bad News Bears (2005)
Taglines
The bases are Loaded... So is the coach.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 02 January 2014 excerpt ends ]
JOURNAL ARCHIVE: 11/3/2006 4:52 PM
The woman taking the x-ray’s was laughing too.
[JOURNAL ARCHIVE 03 November 2006 excerpt ends]
From 10/2/1959 ( premiere US TV series "The Twilight Zone"::series premiere episode "Where Is Everybody?" ) To 7/22/2005 is 16730 days
From 11/2/1965 ( my birth date in Antlers Oklahoma USA and my birthdate as the known official United States Marshal Kerry Wayne Burgess and active duty United States Marine Corps officer ) To 8/23/2011 is 16730 days
[ See also: http://hvom.blogspot.com/2016/05/she-said-ive-had-it-comin-to-me.html ]
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/23/news/la-pn-quake-shakes-east-coast-20110823
Los Angeles Times
Magnitude 5.9 quake shakes East Coast
August 23, 2011 By Ken Dilanian and Richard Simon
A powerful earthquake rattled Washington, D.C., today, prompting evacuations of the Capitol, the Pentagon and many other area office buildings.
Authorities said the quake had a magnitude of 5.9 and the epicenter was near Fredericksburg, Va. Early reports said the quake was felt up and down the East Coast.
That appears to be the largest quake on record for this area. Before today, the largest occurred last July, a 3.6 quake that hit near Rockville, Md., according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The North Anna nuclear power plant is located near the quake’s epicenter in central Virginia, northwest ofRichmond.
Two reactors at North Anna shut down automatically and the plant lost off-site power, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, CNN reports. Diesel generators are providing power in what is being called "an unusual event," the least serious designation.
The quake shook theNew York Stock Exchange and early reports suggest it was felt as far north as Toronto. It was felt by reporters in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass. President Obama is on vacation there -- he was golfing Tuesday afternoon.
On Capitol Hill, alarms sounded, lights flashed and staffers were ordered to evacuate office buildings.
"I'm feeling homesick,'' Jeffrey Solsby, a congressional staffer and native Angeleno, said from the parking lot outside his House office building. He described the evacuation as orderly.
He saw sections of plaster that had cracked in stairwells.
"I could see dust stirred along the train tracks that run through southwest Washington," Solsby added.
"Considering it feels exactly like Southern California, I suppose you call call this East Coast earthquake weather."
"A couple of people were in door frames," Solsby said. "But the first instinct was surprise because you just really don't expect earthquakes in this araa ... but I'll tell you having lived through Sept. 11 here ... knowing it is an earthquake, it takes away the uncertainty of Sept. 11 that was so prevalent.''
Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) tweeted: "My DC staff describes remarkable shaking of the Rayburn Bldg.''
Seismologist Lucy Jones of the U.S. Geological Survey told CNN that the quake was, "Not completely unprecedented, but it's one of the largest that we've had there."
“I would think that leaking gas and the risk of fires would be very significant,” Jones said.
http://www.tv.com/shows/the-twilight-zone/where-is-everybody-12585/trivia/
tv.com
The Twilight Zone Season 1 Episode 1
Where is Everybody?
Aired Unknown Oct 02, 1959 on CBS
Quotes
Reporter #2: What happened to him toward the end, General, before he pushed that button or whatever it was?
http://www.oocities.org/elzj78/bsgminiseries.html
BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: Miniseries (2003)
Leoben: People have a right to defend themselves, I just supply the means.
Adama: You don't look too good.
[ See also: http://hvom.blogspot.com/2016/04/your-god-becomes-displeased-with-you-all.html ]
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/ebola-6-months/guinea/en/
World Health Organization
Ground zero in Guinea: the outbreak smoulders – undetected – for more than 3 months
A retrospective on the first cases of the outbreak
Ebola at 6 months
On 26 December 2013, a 2-year-old boy in the remote Guinean village of Meliandou fell ill with a mysterious illness characterized by fever, black stools, and vomiting. He died 2 days later. Retrospective case-finding by WHO would later identify that child as West Africa’s first case of Ebola virus disease. The circumstances surrounding his illness were ominous.
The forest background
During the country’s long years of civil unrest, natural resources were exploited by mining and timber companies. The ecology in the densely-forested area changed. Fruit bats, which are thought by most scientists to be the natural reservoir of the virus, moved closer to human settlements.
Hunters, who depend on bushmeat for their food security and survival, almost certainly slaughtered infected wild animals – most likely monkeys, forest antelope, or squirrels. (WHO investigations into the origins of previous Ebola outbreaks have often found dead primates and other wild animals in jungles and forests). The wives of the hunters prepared the meat for family meals.
Though no one knew it at the time, the Ebola virus had found a new home in a highly vulnerable population.
Meliandou is located in what is today designated as the outbreak’s “hot zone”: a triangle-shaped forested area where the borders of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone converge. All three countries were deeply impoverished, and their health infrastructures severely damaged, during years of civil unrest.
Poverty is pervasive. Large numbers of people do not have steady, salaried employment. Their quest to find work contributes to fluid population movements across extremely porous borders – a dream situation for a highly contagious virus.
Following the young boy’s death, the mysterious disease continued to smoulder undetected, causing several chains of deadly transmission.
Unclear beginnings
Later – in May this year – after the causative agent had been identified, a retrospective WHO investigation of that earliest event, headed by the Organization’s senior Ebola expert, Dr Pierre Formenty, traced the first 14 cases in great detail.
As Dr Formenty observed, these first cases yielded no strong or convincing hints, either from clinical features of the illness or the pattern of its transmission, of just what the causative agent might be, especially in a country with so much background noise from multiple other killer diseases.
But it was deadly, for sure: all 14 patients died, most within days after symptom onset. High-risk exposures were apparent (caring for a sick relative, preparing a body for burial, or delivering a baby) but again yielded no decisive clues. Alarm bells might have gone off had any doctor or health official in the country ever seen a case of Ebola. No one had. No alarm bells rang for the government or, for that matter, for the international public health community either.
As Dr Formenty noted, no one unfamiliar with the Ebola virus could have guessed so early on that this might be the cause. The WHO investigation also revealed a feature that would become a major driving force as the outbreaks in Guinea and elsewhere evolved: the very rapid movement of people from villages to Guinea’s capital and across the border into Sierra Leone. In an ominous hint of what would come, one of these first cases died in Sierra Leone.
The villagers were frightened and baffled. Their doctors were, too. The area is notorious for outbreaks of cholera and many other infectious diseases. Though cases of malaria have dropped in recent years, that disease remains the country’s most persistent and prevalent killer. Health authorities were on high alert but the causative agent still eluded them, camouflaged by early symptoms that mimic those of many other endemic diseases. Meanwhile the outbreak continued to spread, its causative agent still hidden.
Virus on the move
Further retrospective investigations by WHO revealed how the earliest Meliandou cluster of cases ignited spread of the virus to other places. Chains of transmission that began with the illness and death of two midwives put more villages in crisis mode.
Cases began to appear at a hospital in Gueckedou – a city in the same hot zone. At that hospital, the initial suspicions of the attending physicians focused on cholera. Of the nine patient samples tested for cholera, seven came back positive. It didn’t look exactly like cholera, but the tests used were sensitive and specific, and – once again – Ebola eluded detection.
As the investigation continued, links began to emerge between mysterious deaths in different locations. The dots of hotspots were becoming connected. Some single pathogen was likely at work, but which one?
Fortunately, staff from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) were already in the country, responding to a serious malaria outbreak. Later, MSF doctors would quickly shift gears to manage clinical care for the swelling number of Ebola patients.
By early March, Guinea’s health officials, MSF staff and WHO knew something strange and very worrisome was going on, but no one knew exactly what. More than three months after that end-December death, Ebola was nowhere on the radar screen of suspects for mysterious deaths in West Africa.
Deeply worried, MSF sent a report in mid-March to one of its most experienced and intuitive disease detectives at its office in Geneva. That expert immediately suspected a haemorrhagic fever, possibly caused by the Marburg virus (the largest-ever outbreak occurred in Angola in 2004–2005), or even Ebola – an unheard event for this part of the world.
Diagnosis
The Ministry of Health sent samples to the Institut Pasteur in Paris. The first news was shocking: the causative agent was indeed the Ebola virus. Who could ever have guessed that such a notorious disease, previously confined to Central Africa and Gabon, would crop up in another distant part of the continent? The news from subsequent virological analyses was even worse: this was Ebola Zaire, the most lethal in the family of five distinct Ebola species.
WHO published the official notification of Ebola on its website on 23 March. By that time, WHO had already shipped supplies of personal protective equipment to Conakry and activated its state-of-the-art centre for real-time outbreak tracking and response. The first medical teams, under the WHO Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN) umbrella, were on the ground by 25 March.
Relentless spread
In the meantime, the virus had continued its relentless spread. The bad news got even worse as the virus successfully marched into Conakry and the first cases – which multiplied quickly – were confirmed there on 27 March. In Conakry and elsewhere, new cases hit like sparks from a fire landing on dry grass.
The brushfire had begun. By that time, flare-ups, as new transmission chains were ignited, could no longer be stamped out, even as foreign medical teams from the WHO GOARN umbrella and other partners continued to pour in.
The pattern that followed was heart-breaking as the all-out national and international response escalated and pressure to stop the virus became increasingly intense. On at least three occasions, prospects for nationwide control looked good and the countdown for a case-free 21-day incubation period began.
Breaths were held as Guinea looked ready to enter the second 21-day Ebola-free period required before WHO can declare the end of an Ebola outbreak. On each occasion, vigilance eased and the sense of emergency lapsed as local health officials assumed the outbreak was over.
The country never made it. As the deadline approached, cases suddenly flared up again in previously controlled villages and cities. In other instances, the virus marched on to infect previously untouched areas.
A regional challenge
Some observers have speculated that these tragic up-and-down cycles of apparent control followed by flare-ups demonstrate just how strong this Ebola Zaire virus has become. More likely, these events represent re-introductions of the virus into Guinea – with its notoriously porous borders – from the large outbreaks in neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone.
This more realistic explanation strongly suggests that control in Guinea will not be feasible until the Ebola caseload in its neighbours goes down. On current trends, the prospects that this will happen anytime in the near future are distinctly not good at all.
The fear factor
Today, one of the biggest barriers to control is violence from an impoverished, terrified and shattered population that does not understand what hit it and fights back the only way it can.
Last week, health workers in several parts of the country were viciously attacked by angry mobs, forcing some medical teams to flee for their lives. One team hid in the bush for more than a day. Others saw their vehicles vandalized and their medicines and equipment collected and publicly burned, as though such acts might work as a “cleansing” ritual.
- posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 3:43 PM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Friday 20 May 2016
