Things are bad, or are they?

This year we experienced a pandemic, the first since 1918 the experts say. People were told to stay inside their homes, avoid getting too close to others, and wear masks when having to travel outside. A lot of authorities saw fit to impose measures not everyone felt comfortable with. Restaurants, pubs, bars closed. Then most businesses shut down. The economy ground to a standstill. But this plague kept marching on, new cases and sadly new deaths. People failed to understand, they had the 1918 Spanish Flu in mind. Given how COVID-19 can spread, how deadly it is in some cases, how effective the countermeasures were they should have been looking at 1665 London, the year of the Great Plague.

People then tried quarantines, social isolation, sterilized money, even wore masks. All for nought. Some religions refused to comply with the emergency regulations. Members of those groups were hit hard, some even were accused of deliberately spreading the infection.

Today the urban areas in the US worst-hit by COVID-19 aren't much better than 1665. Human waste runs through the streets of San Francisco because the politicians thought it was better to let homeless people live anywhere they wished than look after public health. Rats run amok in Los Angeles, typhus has taken hold. It's only a matter of time before Yersinia pestis makes an unfortunate appearance there.

So Pestilence is openly among us.

There have been riots. It started as most riots do, someone was killed and people wanted justice. But some wanted beer, televisions, fire, and chaos. They broke into buildings and systematically stripped them clean. Carloads of incendiaries rolled up to supply the crowd with firebombs. They took, they attacked, they burned, and they wanted more.

Famine is here as well.

Russia has openly seized land from Ukraine. North Korea is still making threats to the South and to others. China has just eliminated human rights protections in Hong Kong and has been openly aggressive to countries bordering the South China Sea as well as Taiwan. New weapons are being made on all sides.

War rides over the horizon.

So what about Death? Is the fourth horseman going to make his appearance too? What happens to all of us then?

Nothing. I have his ring.

Relax folks and have a good day.

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Thoughts from the Back Porch

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Porchside Musings.

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