Author: papa

Pigs in Paris and other interesting wildlife in times of Coronavirus.

Brig | Soren | Reidar Enjoy. love papa.

Brig, Soren and Reidar-

Really inspiring book I just read. It is in your kindle library. We can invent so many new life forms. The author thinks we are a inflection point in history of life (3.8 billion years), comparable to when we evolved from asexual replication to sexual replication.

There are so many opportunities for discovery and to add value to the world. Embrace science and genetic discovery.

The entire world came together 50 years ago to save three men. The same devotion and innovation can be achieved with respect to the Coronavirus threat.

Apollo 13 reminds Us of Hard Things Worth Doing

Brig, Soren and Reidar- Do you remember watching the movie together? Wc can again, it is inspiring.

Commander Jim Loveland writes in WSJ, inspiring words.

American history shows we are capable of ingenuity, devotion and great courage.

As the coronavirus pandemic unfolds, Americans can take comfort in our history of facing difficult times with courage and emerging stronger on the other side of struggle. The Apollo 13 mission, launched 50 years ago Saturday, reminds us of Americans’ characteristic resilience and ingenuity.

On April 11, 1970, Apollo 13 lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It was supposed to be the third mission to land men on the moon, after Apollo 11 and 12 the previous year. Thirteen was no less daring than its predecessors, but the launch wasn’t front-page news. By 1970, space travel was no longer a novelty and few Americans tuned in for the launch. At that time, no one could have imagined that the mission would become one of the most harrowing odysseys in American history.

When things went wrong on the Apollo 13 mission, it captured the world’s attention. News of the oxygen-tank explosion and crippled service module jolted the public awake to the drama unfolding 200,000 miles from Earth. Americans were reminded that space exploration is high-risk work demanding exceptional technical competence and bravery.

Fortunately, the flight engineers at Mission Control in Houston and the astronauts hurtling toward the moon understood the complex dangers space holds. The rescue mission wasn’t solely the product of improvisation, but of an innovative and cooperative workforce ready to take on any challenge.

For four vexing days, the Apollo 13 flight crew endured bitter conditions. The astronauts powered down all nonessential systems, which caused cabin temperatures to drop near freezing. Some food became inedible. Drinking water was rationed to ensure the cramped lunar module would operate longer than planned. The ground crew worked for 87 hours straight to come up with possible solutions. At one point, the crew flew through space with only the sun as a guide, a reminder of the original meaning of “astronaut,” which is derived from the Greek for “star” and “sailor.”

Benefiting from extensive planning and rigorous training and testing, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration overcame the obstacles of insufficient oxygen, water and power. Apollo 13 splashed down in the South Pacific, its lunar module ingeniously repurposed as a lifeboat. No one familiar with the perils of the mission can look at duct tape, plastic bags and cardboard the same ever again.

On this golden anniversary of NASA’s most successful failure, the nation honors the physical and intellectual courage of the astronauts, as well as the diligence and ingenuity of the ground crew that kept Americans alive aboard a crippled spacecraft hundreds of thousands of miles from home. Apollo 13 revealed more than technical talent. It reminded the world of America’s frontier spirit. In the face of seemingly impossible odds, Americans didn’t let fear paralyze us. Instead we joined together, working calmly and efficiently to find a solution.

America has an ambitious future in space exploration. NASA’s Artemis program is working to land the first woman and the next man on the moon by 2024, which in turn will help prepare for humanity’s next giant leap to Mars. Artemis will require state-of-the-art technology and push the boundaries of human knowledge like never before. It will also demand the same courage, ingenuity and devotion Americans showed in Apollo 13. We, as a nation, must continue to do hard things. That’s how we soar into the heavens and progress as a civilization.

Mr. Lovell was commander of Apollo 13. Mr. Bridenstine is administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

“Glowing” rabbits. You could even read your book at night cuddling with your bunny.

Gene editing is just getting started. Just imagine what we can do with Crisper and Bioblocks.

Demand for milk has dropped so much during the Coronavirus lockdown that Farmers are dumping Milk back into the ground. Cannot store fresh milk indefinitely, nor Oil, or Electricity which have negative prices. At least milk you can dump onto the ground for ZERO cost, and not pay a negative price.

It is incredible how finely tuned the economy is when left to voluntary actions of buyers and sellers.

Farmers Dump Milk, Break Eggs as Coronavirus Restaurant Closings Destroy Demand

Producers are throttling back as the virus erases sales to restaurants, hotels and cafeterias; ‘It was heart-wrenching’

ByJesse Newman and Jacob BungeApril 9, 2020 9:42 am ET

It was still dark outside at four o’clock on a recent morning when a tanker truck poured 6,000 gallons of milk into a manure pit on Nancy Mueller’s Wisconsin dairy farm.

The milk, collected from Mueller Dairy Farm’s 1,000 cows, should have been hauled to dairy processors across the state for bottling or to be turned into cheese. But the coronavirus pandemic is disrupting all that, closing restaurants and schools that buy the nation’s dairy products—and forcing hard choices for farmers like Mrs. Mueller.

“It was heart-wrenching,” she said.

Farmers and food companies across the country are throttling back production as the virus creates chaos in the agricultural supply chain, erasing sales to restaurants, hotels and cafeterias despite grocery stores rushing to restock shelves. American producers stuck with vast quantities of food they cannot sell are dumping milk, throwing out chicken-hatching eggs and rendering pork bellies into lard instead of bacon.Bread and ButterFarms and food companies have becomeincreasingly dependent on restaurants.Share of U.S. food expendituresSource: USDANote: Includes taxes and tips for all purchases%FoodawayfromhomeFood athome2000’05’10’1544464850525456

In part, that is because they can’t easily shift products bound for restaurants into the appropriate sizes, packages and labels necessary for sale at supermarkets. Few in the agricultural industry expect grocery store demand to offset the restaurant market’s steep decline.

Farms are plowing under hundreds of acres of vegetables in prime U.S. growing regions like Arizona and Florida. Chicken companies are shrinking their flocks, to curb supplies that could weigh on prices for months to come.

Mississippi-based Sanderson Farms Inc., which last week said demand from its restaurant customers was down 60% to 65%, has begun breaking eggs rather than hatch them and raise the chicks for slaughter. Other poultry companies are taking similar steps, meat-industry officials said.

“When you have panic in the marketplace, weird things happen,” said Tanner Ehmke, who researches agricultural markets for farm lender CoBank.Down on the FarmPrices for agricultural goods have fallen asrestaurant closures sap demand.Change in price year-to-dateSources: USDA (chicken breasts, pork belly); FactSet(milk futures)*Southern states, weighted average price†May contract%Chicken breasts*Pork bellyMilk futures†Feb. ’20MarchApril-75-50-2502550

In the dairy industry, restaurant closures and other disruptions have left producers with at least 10% more milk than can be used, according to industry estimates. Dairy groups say the milk glut could grow as supplies increase to a seasonal peak in the spring, and shelter-in-place orders stretch on across the country. In response, cooperatives that sell milk from farmers to processors are asking their members to dump milk, cull their herds or stop milking cows early in an effort to curb production.

Because milk is perishable—and cows produce more each day—dairy farmers have few alternatives, Mr. Ehmke said.

“Consumers have changed how they eat, and it’s rippling back right to the farm gate,” said Dennis Rodenbaugh, executive vice president at Dairy Farmers of America, the largest U.S. dairy cooperative, which markets Mrs. Mueller’s milk.

As much as 7% of all milk produced in the U.S. last week was dumped, Mr. Rodenbaugh said, and he anticipates that percentage will continue to increase. Asking members to dump their milk is a last resort, he said. But butter makers are hard pressed to turn the small, single-serve packets they produce for restaurants into larger blocks for grocery stores, and cheese makers can’t easily convert their 10-pound bags of bulk shredded cheese destined for pizza chains into the zippered, 8-ounce bags shoppers are accustomed to, Mr. Rodenbaugh said.

With supplies piling up, the cooperative could be forced to curb production at some of its own cheese plants, he said.

Bob Wills, founder of Clock Shadow Creamery, a specialty cheese factory in downtown Milwaukee, said that when the city’s restaurants closed, sales for the creamery’s chèvre and ricotta cheeses tumbled 95% in a day. The creamery has stopped production and laid off all but one employee, though Mr. Wills said he has been able to absorb the milk from all but one supplier at a second cheese plant he operates that serves retail customers

Howard Bohl, who milks 450 cows in east-central Wisconsin, said he sent about 20 cows to slaughter last week. Jim Ostrom, chief executive of Milk Source, which operates dairy farms in Michigan, Wisconsin and Missouri, said the firm dumped roughly 10 tankers holding about 60,000 gallons of milk in all into its manure pits, and he anticipates it will be asked to dispose of more this week.

Dairy Farmers of America says its members will still be paid for dumped milk, though checks to all members will be reduced as the cooperative markets less milk overall. The prospect of smaller checks is frightening for many farmers who in recent years have watched nearby dairies close their milking parlors at an alarming rate following a decadeslong decline in milk consumption, low prices and trade disputes.

Earlier in the week, two major dairy industry groups sent a “milk crisis plan” to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, urging the agency to take quick action to support the dairy industry through measures like paying farms that cut production and purchasing significant volumes of dairy for use in the nation’s feeding program

In the poultry market, supermarket shelf-clearing initially juiced prices—lifting boneless, skinless chicken breast prices by 31% over the first three weeks of March, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But as restaurant dining rooms sit closed, breast prices dropped by one-fourth in the past two weeks.

Joe Sanderson, chief executive of Sanderson Farms, said, “Given this environment, we have too many big-bird food-service chickens.” While some of its restaurant-bound chickens are being processed for sale in supermarkets instead, the company expects to reduce overall production by about 5% in the months ahead.

Executives at Sanderson have contemplated euthanizing chickens and burying them on farms rather than feed them, process them and sell their meat at potentially unprofitable prices, Mr. Sanderson said, though right now the company isn’t taking that step.

Meat companies’ efforts to raise fewer birds aren’t likely to cause chicken shortages at grocery stores, said Ben Bienvenu, a food and agribusiness analyst at Stephens Inc., because processors are running extra shifts at separate plants that supply chicken to supermarkets.

Falling demand for bacon, made from pork bellies, is prompting some pork-processing plants to turn excess pork belly supplies into lower-value products like lard, said Steve Meyer, an economist with Kerns & Associates, an agricultural risk management firm.

Bacon, more than other pork products, relies on restaurant-industry sales. With pork demand flagging as national chains like McDonald’s Corp. and Denny’s Corp. serve fewer breakfasts, prices for pork bellies have collapsed to a record low. As a result, some major processors are attempting to find other uses for them, such as sausage, or are converting them into lard because it is less costly.

Mr. Meyer said the situation shows pork producers’ heavy reliance on bacon. “You live by the belly, you die by the belly.”

—Kirk Maltais contributed to this article.

3% of people can achieve extraordinary things… The other 97% nothing.

Brig, Soren and Reidar. You have the opportunity to achieve extraordinary things. Be Brave.

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

Marcus Aurelius

Same ethos as Socrates…

Don’t get frightened by not knowing things. I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about different things, but I’m not absolutely sure of anything. There are many things I don’t know anything about. It doesn’t frighten me.

Richard Feynman

Brig, Soren and Reidar- Be Not Afraid. Love Papa.

Honeybadgers don’t give a sh*t. No Fear, they are badass. Enjoy the video.

These are the brilliant words of the Pope when visiting Soviet Union the first time, and in the words of this prisoner. Brig, Soren and Reidar, you will also be free soon. Be Not Afraid.

A Hostage’s Guide to Isolation

What I learned about survival as a Taliban prisoner.

By Jere van DykApril 7, 2020 1:14 pm ET

I spent 45 days in Pakistan as a hostage of the Taliban in 2008. A college friend recently sent a note asking if I had any suggestions as to how people can physically and mentally cope with their coronavirus-induced confinement. Here’s what I told him:

Be calm. Try not to be afraid.

Set a regimen. Get up early. Use that time to pray, meditate or exercise.

Don’t eat too much. It will make you listless. Try not to sleep during the day. It’s a form of escape. Don’t live in the dark. Natural light is best. We lived in darkness. I was always seeking the light.

Keep your mind active and, as best you can, positive. Read only good books. I know one hostage who read the Quran. He isn’t religious but it comforted him. I studied Pashtu in the afternoons for maybe an hour with my main jailer. It made my brain work hard and I felt good afterward, and it gave him power and made him feel good and smart and it brought him closer to me, I felt, bettering my chances to stay alive.

In captivity everything becomes primal. A hierarchy develops. You become territorial, no matter how small your corner. The same, I believe, would happen in a home, even in a loving family. Don’t seek power; give it to others if necessary. Be humble. Seek to get along with everyone, because everyone is afraid, and when people are afraid they can become irrational. If you can’t go to the store and there’s not enough food, give some of yours to others. It will draw you closer, and you will feel strong.

Try to accomplish something: reading part of a book, learning new words, even of a foreign language, doing more push-ups, playing the piano, whatever it is, every day. Write letters. They are more intimate than emails, and you’ll feel good. I know of a hostage who wrote a letter to his parents before he died. We all have two lives, he wrote. The second one begins when you realize that you only have one.

Help one another and you will find warmth. I know of a hostage who became the leader in a large cell of men from different counties, because he helped others, in part by quiet strength.

Keep a journal. It helps you free yourself and become relaxed. It is a form of therapy. You will find that you are stronger than you think. Shakespeare wrote that “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” Try to think like this.

Stay away from the computer as much as you can. I liked being away from the tyranny of emails. It gave me a sense of freedom.

John McCain said there were no atheists in the Hanoi Hilton. They found comfort in prayer. So did I, and others. It gave us strength. I know a hostage, who, in the midst of a hard moment, forgave his captors. “I had no choice,” he said. He knew that if didn’t, he would suffer in deeper ways.

I know another hostage who wanted mainly to talk about mock executions. It was the fear of pain that bothered him most. Above all, don’t be afraid. It will help you stay healthy.

In the end you will be closer than before. You will become stronger for having gone through this, and it will make you feel quietly proud and, most important, grateful.

Mr. van Dyk is author, most recently, of “The Trade: My Journey Into the Labyrinth of Political Kidnapping.”

Coronavirus will change our society in dramatic ways. We are living in a historical period, where decades of change happen in a few weeks.

Brig/Soren/Reidar : Watch the changes carefully and you can learn so much.