Category: Disaster

PCRF communiqué

Date: October 14, 2023

A Humanitarian Catastrophe Unfolds in Gaza – An Appeal to the International Community

A catastrophe of unprecedented proportions is unfolding in what many refer to as “the most densely populated territory on earth”…the Gaza Strip.  Over the course of the last week, Gaza has plunged into a deep trail of destruction and unimaginable human suffering. The non-stop Israeli military bombardment of the civilian population in Gaza has now claimed over 1800 innocent lives, one-third of whom are children.  Over 500,000 people have been displaced and are seeking shelter in UN schools that have reached capacity. The IDF ordered one million people to evacuate northern Gaza for the south within 24 hours (as of yesterday, October 13th) in anticipation of an Israeli ground invasion.  This is being done without guarantees of safety or return to their homes, and what international legal experts say amounts to the forced transfer of inhabitants in violation of international law.

Essential resources like electricity, water, and food have been deliberately cut off, pushing the civilian population to the brink of desperation. The deliberate severing of vital services such as electricity, water, and food has magnified the suffering of Gaza’s people. Hospitals are overwhelmed and unable to provide adequate medical care due to the lack of medical supplies, electricity, and clean water. Emergency medical aid is being denied entry, ambulances are being bombed and vehicles carrying aid are being targeted by airstrikes. The urgent intervention of the international community is critical now more than ever.

In the face of this grave humanitarian crisis, it is imperative that the international community responds with unprecedented urgency and determination. The situation demands decisive, immediate action to alleviate the immense suffering of the over 2 million people trapped in a 140 sq. mile territory, roughly twice the size of Washington, D.C.

PCRF joins other humanitarian organizations and people of goodwill in calling on the international community to provide immediate humanitarian aid, intensify diplomatic efforts for an immediate ceasefire, ensure accountability for violations of international law, and actively support Gaza’s reconstruction. Silence in the face of such tragedy is complicity, and the time to act is now.

For any inquiries, please contact: Steve@pcrf.net

To Donate to PCRF’s Gaza Relief Efforts,  go to our website at www.pcrf.net

The Palestine Children’s Relief Fund (“PCRF”) is a 501(c)(3) Federal Tax-Exempt U.S. Organization that provides free medical care to thousands of injured and ill children annually who lack local access to care within the local healthcare system in Palestine and other countries in the Middle East.

I’ve donated to PCRF twice, once a couple of years back and once in the last week. My donations were miniscule but I made them.

If you would prefer to donate in North America to try to stop this mess, here’s an interesting alternative.

Not awake yet

Mary is not fully conscious, still in hospital and has a long recovery in front of her.

1355 words yesterday.

Paul came over and I clipped his toenails and Jeff ‘fixed’ his current phone and needs the passcode for the old one, so I imagine I’ll be running over to his place and getting that info.

I have completely paid off my credit card for Keith’s IKEA bed-desk. The last time I saw him I told him I forgave his debt.

My head is full of thoughts I do not wish to share….

 

I don’t want to talk or think about my life right now

I got a bracing email from Ruth which set me on the right path.

64 words yesterday, at least I’ve cracked open Part III.

Drove over to Peggy’s to drop off the pie plates and didn’t realize it was Sunday so walked into the middle of the aftermath of a church service at her house. One person greeted me, I dropped the pie plates off and booked it.

Visit with Alex had hiccups – so GGma call for example – but was otherwise very pleasant. Quite hot yesterday, air not great but at least I could walk to Timmy Ho’s with Alex and Jeff. Jeff continues to be a pillar of strength.

I hope everyone has a good day. I’m a sad remnant of myself, or at least that’s how it feels. On Wednesday the sun comes out and the air gets better.

Just for Yuks I Funko Popped myself:

Allegra Sloman as a Funko Pop. I'm holding a succulent in a plant pot and a very small guitar.

I’m holding a succulent and a very small guitar, if anyone cares.

Peggy is threatening tourtiere

OH GOD will I survive?  She’s from northern Quebec, of course she knows how to make a tourtiere of note.

She is also threatening the last of the strawberry rhubarb pie. Jeff, reading this, is wiping off drool. I await delivery with high hopes.

Jeff and I were witnesses to some of Paul’s paperwork. I thank Lois and Ruth for stickhandling this, it never would have happened without them.

The ukulele reappeared. It was exactly where I left it, in the music room. If I had lost it I would be sad, but when Mike called I told him and he just laughed and laughed when I explained I lost something in my house and he said…. that’s my every day for months.

So…. heard from Mike. He nearly died yesterday, he went kayaking in Pitt Lake. The inflatable kayak burst and a rain storm came up and HE JUST BARELY MADE IT BACK TO SHORE, his arms were still shaking occasionally when he called me. He watched a satellite video just to ensure that he hadn’t been dreaming about how fast the storm blew up and nope, it happened like he said. Anyway, he sounded quite chipper, the way you always do when you avoid death by drowning by inches.

Buster’s leg wound from the surgery is healing nicely but he’s a long way from having the cone off. He completely freaked out when Lois and Paul came over yesterday for the document signing, it was rough for him. It’s possible he was confused over the car sound and couldn’t figure out who was coming and going with the Echo coming and going but me not being in it. Lois will return the car today and fly home, and she will be missed.

The battery on the laptop now discharges to 50 percent when left fully charged but unplugged overnight. I wish you could easily replace the batteries in these fuckers. I’ve pinged a repair shop for help; should be about 150 to 200 dollars.

May I be conducted to hell

with ‘certain parties’ as my escort.

That was without a doubt (music aside) the most bland and unobjectionable spring festival service I’ve ever been to. There were many mitigating factors so I won’t linger but A. bless her came up to me afterward and said there was entiiiiirely too much God in that service and I could not but agree. Of course if you’re going to suck up to the three remaining and three closeted theists in the group, Easter’s the time to pull da bunny fum da sack. The bunny in this case being a fantastical holy-ish trinity of Reb Jeshua, Ramadan and the seder. I remind myself of mitigating factors and turn to

HOW I GOTS MISTOOK FOR A MAN TODAY while wearing a dress

and earrings that matched my

tights that matched my

decorative scarf in pretty colours that my mother made, and I haven’t worn all those things together in likely a decade at this point, probably church the last time too…. L. greeted me most sweetly and kindly but I was somewhat reserved as I had just put my mask on and my – you know – social anxiety spikes when I’m indoors and masked however ecstatic I am to see various people.

I digress to think about what happens to middle aged women wearing face masks. Bigots don’t want people wearing face masks because they want to be able to ‘clock’ you. You are assigned a gender at birth and wherever you migrate on your gender journey, most people want to believe they can tell and understand when presenting and presumed gender at birth don’t line up. But that doesn’t actually have any bearing on the reason I was mistook for a man…. I be somewhat digressing again, the thing, the evil thing I do for effect.

So I sing tenor now among other things (I recently checked my vocal range and …) and Keith got asked if he was the one providing the harmony. LOLOLOL I was literally as gender presenting as I can physically manage at this point and MY VOICE gave me away as a man, hiding behind a mask I MEAN LITERALLY folks for those who understand …. .

& I don’t mean to boast, but this life of mine gives me the most perfect moments of clarity and solidarity. I’ve been gender non-conforming all my life. I have no problem with my assigned whatever-as-normative, but I keep having little moments like that, and it pleases me. It’s not just the autism that makes me gender divergent; there’s something in me, neither brain nor frame, that makes me other than ‘woman’. Not 100%. Sure, able to do the madonna thing, co nursing your children how hard core. But I am not 100% woman, and I was like that before having Keith literally

And then I fucked it up totally by going off in a classic autistic meltdown with C. May I be conducted to hell. Which was where we came in. But somehow, you know,

—- SCROLL DOWN

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I DIGRESS

Peggy was there and fled as someone else arrived, but I don’t know if the two events were connected so she just might have felt like walking home. I’m going to call her. Maybe she just got sick of the service. As far as I could tell they were still getting people drifting in at half time, including a previously called minister.  (Love what she’s done with her hair.) Rob W was there and sat next to me during the service. In case anyone in the audio radiance thinks there’s anything between us, he told me I was too fat when I approached him after Paul and I broke up and I’ve only gotten fatter since, and I’ve reached the age when perfect isolation from romantic relationships is accompanied by nearly perfect peace. Had a few words with Rose, Marilyn, collected a hug from John, and it was all good. Even with me being a complete ass I still feel better, and Keith bless him dragged me out in good time AND I mailed a letter on the way home. Cast your bread upon the waters (it was a letter to the landlord asking if she had any vacancies this summer), and may Christ and his sanctified angels come to your aid in terms of finding food for delivery in this town today….. I reject McDonalds on this Holy Sunday.

Garage sale?

I will try to help out as I can with the housing situation with the kids but good god. My mind is just whirling. And it could be me and Jeff in a minute, so it’s really making me into a VAST vat of STEW. (Keith whomped up some of his thyme flavoured stew yesterday. My only contribution was washing the spuds. I tried the Beyond Meat burger but texturally it just doesn’t do it, I prefer it in chili.)

But I can’t DO anything. Not at the moment. I must find other things to do than stew. I did talk to Paul about a garage sale and he seemed glad of the offer of help.

Oreo shoulder surfed on me yesterday THREE TIMES. Purring ferociously the entire time. She did it long enough that Paul took a picture but I haven’t received it yet because I had to text it to Katie using Paul’s phone and she’s a little thrawn at the moment.

Alex has bright dyed red hair now. He loves it.

The last of the laundry is dry but not put away – this last load was almost entirely mismatched socks LOL. I can stop buy socks if I have enough of them, and pretty soon I will.

Leftover palak paneer for breakfast; cooked pork chomps, taters, broccoli, mushrooms and carrots for supper last night. Should be some sign of my mental state coming home yesterday that I didn’t think to consult with Jeff, who had already eaten… Today marinated ginger tofu with beansprouts and rice vermicelli in some kind sauce. And I got to eat that half melon.

Only 1 top score in Lumosity (again, tanking scores…) and the only writing yesterday was social media and an attempt to make a poem out of a several years old and quite expired to do list.

Trans Day of Visibility today. There’s a rally at Grandview Park at 3:30.

Ukraine update

Putin and Xi have finished their meeting and sadly, China’s ‘suggestions’ for ‘peace’ are basically Russian eating Ukraine and shitting out grain shipments and rooting around for Black Sea oil while jacking off to dreams of Romanov imperial splendour, opulence and supremacy.

The Kyiv Independent reports:

Statistics agency: Ukraine‘s GDP down 31.4% in 4th quarter of 2022. Ukraine‘s GDP fell by 31.4% year-on-year in the fourth quarter of 2022, compared to a 30.8% drop in the third quarter, according to the State Statistics Service.

464 children – have been killed by Russia in Ukraine.

934 – injured to varying degrees of severity.

150,000 – were kidnapped and moved to Russia. – Source unknown but it matches everything else I’ve seen.

PLEASE NOTE 11000 CHILDREN HAVE DIED IN THE YEMEN CONFLICT. (In other words brown children are getting killed too; it’s just that Ukraine was twice the land of my foremothers and I feel a connection.) I wasn’t able to figure out which proportion of the 52000 civilians killed in the Tigray conflict (Eritrea) have been children. And of course there’s more than one way to run a genocide; China sterilizing Uyghur women at the rate of 250/100000 <—- insanely high for a country with a PLUMMETING BIRTH RATE, and budgeting enough money to sterilize one third of the women of Uyghur origin in a single municipality in a single year is also horrific. It’s easier to prevent kids than waste them I guess. Source, Vox.

Maxim Tucker reports:

In some battles, like Vuhledar and Bakhmut, the Russians have a 1:1 ratio of killed to wounded, Nato says. Ukraine’s medevac procedures have helped it achieve 1:9, KIA to WIA according to statistics it shared with Nato. Half of those rescued will be able to return to active duty.

Jesus Christ on a rubber crutch, I’m glad I’m not a Russian medic. This is Putin treating his troops with the ultimate disrespect. Medevac must be a joke to them. Ukraine at least treats every combatant as precious and the difference in how their commanders treat them must be VERY OBVIOUS to the guys taking fire.

Wagner Group is apparently having to release half of the soldiers they have left because they fulfilled their contracts and managed to survive the meat-grinder. So on top of everything else, Russia’s going to have another call up, and they’ll probably be sending reform school teens and the worst scum of the Russian prison system. Good thing the first thing you hear from the Ukrainians is how to surrender without getting killed…

Pray for us sinners

Keith and I are on deck to look after Ryker today since Suzanne is ill. I didn’t get any calls or emails yesterday saying she’s coming so I’ll be heading out in an hour.

I am looking forward to it but I know I’m going to be a wreck when I get home har de har.

Keith and Paul had a successful expotition. Janice is driving Paul back in a couple of days and then visiting for a few days, and Keith as mentioned is back and prepping for a day full of Ryker hopefully by being completely unconscious at the moment (it’s 4:51 am). I’ll be asking Katie for his routine and feeding schedule when I get over there.

19207 words.

I’m blowing hot and cold on taking the laptop. I think I’ll take the new uke. Of course that will drive Keith nuts but oh well.

One of my dearest dears on twitter is an MSU grad and the shooting took place in her old dorm (3 dead, shooter unalived himself) and so I woke up to twitter this morning this dear woman who is a therapist herself needing therapy herself and literally not knowing who to call after a white night. She doesn’t think she can work today…..

addendum to Ohio derailment dive

Jesus Iced Christ. Story of how Norfolk Southern, A COMPANY WITH A MARKET CAPITALIZATION OF 55 BILLION DOLLARS US, has sent a cheque for $25000 (less than 5 bucks per resident) to help out the citizens of East Palestine FLEE THE FUCKING TOWN they DESTROYED with an airborne toxic event of vinyl chloride and phosphene gas subsequent to a derailment that the railway unions have been predicting for the best part of a decade. I wanna go medieval on the leaders of the company.

Today’s evaluation of Norfolk Southern:

Market Summary > Norfolk Southern Corp

55.26 billion

 USD
Market capitalization
From google search on the question WHAT IS THE MARKET CAP OF NORFOLK SOUTHERN

Bathtub dive into the 2023 Ohio train derailment

The wikipedia article: Is Here.

Most of these other links will degrade over time but the above-noted, although it may get renamed, is the anchor point.

 

A list of the class action suits already in the works: Is here.

Reporter arrested for doing his job, story here.

Why those chemicals are so deadly and why we need to break our plastics addiction: story here.

Snapshot of air quality currently (please note there’s no air quality index monitor right in the city, as shown.) Click on it to embiggen it.

East Palestine OH AQI Feb 12

 

Earthquakes

There have been not one but two immense and terrifying earthquakes in Turkey, a 7.8 and a 7.4 in relatively rapid succession, centred in Gaziantep. There used to be a Roman fort there; the before and after pictures are horrifying; this massive building which has survived 1700 years lost all of the towers and it just looks like a pile of rubble rolling down the hill it’s set atop. First death toll is over 1000 people and it will go higher.

Syria too is affected, about 300 reported dead. All these numbers will go higher.

Aerial shots of the affected areas are heart-stopping and horrifying.

As always if you want to help, donate to Red Crescent or find a local who’s Turkish and plugged in back home and ask for their advice.

Didn’t go to church yesterday. Made some phone calls. We had leftovers for lunch (the last of the stew soup that Keith made) a fruit smoothie for a snack and chicken sammies with poutine for supper.

Thinkn about coffee.

 

god this is hard

Well I committed an emotional mistake in front of my grandson tonight and I’ll be lucky if I haven’t scarred him for life. Anyway I decided to show him video of what his mum looked like when she was Riker’s age and there is actually video of her, she didn’t get completely eaten by second baby syndrome and not have any pictures. He got to see John when he was slender and hirsute, and then there was Kaitlyn as a toddler and then Grandma Caspell. I backed out of that and then we watched Keith jump out of an aircraft in a tandem jump – had a video taken as a souvenir, and that was awesome, although thanks to the swipe of the passing breeze across his brow his expression was not always as dignified as he might have preferred in retrospect.

He got to see how red and enormous his mother’s infantile hemangioma was – and how it completely vanished. I had a hemangioma when I was born too.

Then I found the video, before in the brilliant sunshine taking off from Lake Weslemkoon, and after, of the crash at Buttonville Airport that nearly took the lives of Paul, Wally Solotow, me and both the kids – Katie in utero.

Hearing my own voice as Paul took video of the crashed aircraft at the darkened side of the runway, calmly saying that Keith took no permanent harm and that if he was experiencing discomfort he’d be crying, put me in no stable state of mind. I’m fine and I’ll be fine since I have a minor child in the house but I IMMEDIATELY changed the name of the file so I never have to watch it again without a goddamned content warning. Bugger me but that was awful. Of course I knew then that Paul was taking video, but the great river of time had released me from that memory, and now I was watching the lopsided aircraft in the terrible light and there it was in realtime.

I ordered mickey d’s for supper for Alex and then forgot to order Jeff’s burger.

8520 words

didn’t get the wordle this morning

sigh