My Christmas Vacation

 No visit to see my parents and this is NOT something that I want to repeat as long as they are alive.  I would have been miserable if I stayed home so I would go and make the best of it.  

12/20- Left home in the afternoon and headed towards Gatlinburg.  Spent the night in Cherokee, North Carolina just outside the Great Smoky Mountain National Park.  Nice mountain scenery but I had hoped to see snow capped mountain peaks.  No such luck,  Only at 4500-5000 feet was there a dusting of snow on the ground and the road up to Klingman's Dome (6600 feet) was closed for the winter.

12/21- Ober Gatlinburg.  First time skiing in nearly 25 years and I consider it a success.  I did take lessons and was very cautious out there.  Yes, there were a couple of small spills but I did progress to the ski lifts and Beginner slopes by the end of the day.  From there, it was a longer than expected drive to Atlanta to catch my flight to Cancun the next morning.  It required a plane flight but I've checked off a bucket list item to go skiing and body surfing on back to back days.  I hope to do Maggie Valley/Charleston sometime soon.  The ski resort was located at about 3300 feet elevation so the snow was not real but for Tennessee, I'm not going to complain.  

12/22- Arrived in plenty of time.  This was my first international flight on my own so I was a bit apprehensive.  I did have to show my passport to get my boarding pass and to board the flight itself as well as fill out a Mexican immigration form but it was pretty much painless.  I took a private taxi to my hotel and actually had a decent conversation with my driver in Spanish.  While a sharp cold front was headed for the East Coast in the US, I arrived to find 80 degree temps with palm trees lining the streets.  Cancun is below the Tropic of Cancer but didn't feel quite as tropical as Puerto Rico.  The impending cold front did affect Cancun a bit and brought the temps down to 74 by Christmas Day.  My hotel was on the 5th floor with a full ocean view.

12/23 and 24- Though the sand here is not quite as white as the Emerald Coast, the water is the most beautiful shade of blue that I have ever seen so I've got to give the edge to Cancun.  As far as food, I dined outside and mostly stuck to my hotel.  As far as the surf, I have mixed reviews.  The waves were pretty high at 3-4 feet but I had to be careful of the shore break.  That is, most waves broke and crashed almost directly on the sand.  That meant steep drops and short rides.  It was fun but some of the waves were too big.  A steep drop off directly onto wet sand?  Yes, that can be dangerous.  Lifeguards were vigilant.  I knew what I was doing out there so I was fine and knew which waves not to catch on the board.  Even still, one wave in particular left me with a mildly sore lower back but that did NOT put a damper on the trip.  

12/25- The day dawned cloudy so I ventured away from the hotel to get some real Mexican food and a souvenir t-shirt.  There is an upscale shopping area just a couple kilometers from where I was staying.  Many Americans from border towns come into Mexico for cheap food and dental work but in Cancun, prices are about on par with what you'd find in the USA, maybe even a bit higher.  Oh well, this was meant to be a luxurious vacation.  By the afternoon, I was back in the surf.  Temps had dropped to the low-mid 70s and with a strong wind, it was a tad chilly but I didn't complain with a water temp that remained near 80.  When the sun was out around high noon, that's when the water looks its most beautiful blue.  

12/26- I was able to steal a couple more hours in the surf before catching my flight back.  This one was delayed by more than 2 hours and Cancun is not the most interesting airport either so I wish I had stayed longer at the beach.  Still, I could not risk a SNAFU with immigration or security.  I did have to fill out a health questionnaire.  It was almost midnight by the time I got through Customs.  Needless to say, I was quite tired the next day back in America

Final Thought:

An excellent trip and I may be back someday but I am a variety seeker so if/when I return to a non-border town in Mexico, it will likely be Puerto Vallarta.  That's on the Pacific side in the state of Jalisco several hours north of Acapulco.  I've considered Cabo but the big negative there is that most of the beaches are not safe for swimming and those that are have little to no surf.      

Lactoferrin for Sensitivity

 I have a glimmer of hope:

On the promise of increased immunity against COVID, I ordered a bottle of Lactoferrin ahead of my Cancun flight.  As for Christmas, once again, my parents have decided that it is best that I do NOT come home.  Just like Thanksgiving, if I must be alone, I will go somewhere and have some fun.  Miami is the only spot in the continental US where it will likely be warm enough to swim without a wetsuit and I just went to South Florida last month.  Given possible vaccine requirements, now is my best chance to travel internationally.  

Latest Medical Episode:

I got a can of Mountain Dew with my lunch last week.  I know it's not good for me but for the last time, an odd can every once in a while SHOULD NOT hurt me.  This time, I could feel the trouble starting after just a few sips so I just dumped the rest of the can.  I took just a trace of Probiotics and was immediately BETTER.  BUT, the full pill left me worse off than I was before.  Anyone who reads this blog knows that this is nothing new for me.  Now, given my reaction to pills, just imagine how badly I could react to a vaccine!  I am REALLY worried about a de-facto requirement and I believe the media is over-hyping the threat to scare the public into accepting it.  

Lactoferrin Effective:

As I understand it, Lactoferrin stores and sequesters Iron by raising Ferritin levels, which plays a role in combating fungal growth.  This means that I may not have to mess with the Probiotics.  I've been instructed in a health group to keep Ferritin levels as low as possible.  I may have to disagree.  Excess Iron is bad and I know now that it played a major role in my extreme fast oxidation and need for mega doses of adrenal suppressants.  Fortunately, regular blood donations can protect against that.  The payoff that I did not expect is that Lactoferrin may eliminate the sensitivity.  As with any effective treatment, I got an initial negative response that was followed by an insatiable NEED.  This need will diminish with 7-10 days and it will become just like the other pills in which I can get by without it for 5 days.  

Test Results;

This past weekend, I did everything wrong with the diet.  I took advantage of an unseasonably warm day to go swimming in Pensacola on Saturday (73 degrees with a 69 water temp).  I found it tolerable but the conditions were a bit choppy so I only caught a few really good waves.  At any rate, I drank caffeine and alcohol the previous day.  Without Lactoferrin, I was awful.  I opened with a 2:54 lap at Montreat (8:42 pace) but after a single pill, I was all the way down to 2:25 (7:15 pace).  The moment of truth came after taking both Glutathione and Probiotics,  I only hoped to hold my form but I actually improved marginally to a 2:23 (7:09 pace).  Exactly what I wanted to see.  A small improvement but not enough to be considered significant.  Going forward, IF this holds, I will cut out the Probiotics in favor of Lactoferrin but will give blood a few times per year.  Probably no serious training until the end of the year.  Just some junk runs to prevent getting too far out of shape.

Unrelated Rants:

I've heard of a new migrant caravan starting in Honduras.  Regardless of where you stand on the immigration issue, allowing a large crowd to come in untested DURING a pandemic??  No words to describe the depth of stupidity.  I cannot even walk from San Diego to Tijuana or from El Paso to Ciudad Juarez unless it is for "essential business" and the border restrictions are even tougher in Canada.  

I've also heard that a deep forensic audit of Dominion software voting machines was done in Michigan yet the results have been sealed from the public.  Once again, just let us know the results!  If it showed that a couple small glitches only made the difference of a few hundred votes, I will accept Biden's win as legitimate.  If the result is not revealed, it leads me to believe that there is something that they don't want us to know about.  I will remain suspicious and that's hardly an unreasonable view.  

Final Election Analysis

 Yes, there was some degree of fraud.  Was it enough to change the outcome?  I remain uncertain but suspicious that it did.  I'm going to say possible but bordering on probable.  After a bit more analysis from David Leip's Atlas, I have found several curious results.

Let's start with evidence against Trump:

He's 38 EV short of 270.  Even if he legitimately won Georgia and Arizona, which were decided by about a quarter of 1 percent, he's still 11 votes short.  Even Wisconsin would not be enough.  He'd need to flip PA, which was decided by nearly a full percentage point or 80K votes.  That's pretty steep.  Still, Georgia, Pennsylvania plus any other state would put him over the top.  

I looked at the county by county votes in the swing states.  I did not find any rural counties that flipped massively to Biden after a big Trump win in 2016.  That would be too easy to spot.  Biden did in fact pick up a couple of counties that were close Trump wins in 2016.  

Curious Findings:

Let's start with the Hispanic vote:

Trump gained massive ground in Miami Dade and the Rio Grande valley in Texas.  Biden under-performed Clinton by 13 in Miami and in some cases 30+ in south Texas.  The reasons for that are understandable.  Socialism doesn't sell among Cubans and Venezuelans because they've personally seen the damage that it does.  

In south Texas, I believe the reason is increased support for border control during a pandemic. What kind of fool would support caravans of migrants pouring in while COVID cases are spiking?  It remains to be seen whether or not this trend continues in 2024.  As is the case in many other suburban areas, Trump lost significant ground in formerly deep red areas surrounding Houston and Dallas.  He will need those votes to keep Texas red.

However, those gains among Hispanics did NOT carry over to New Mexico and Arizona.  Again, Hispanics are not a monolith but I still find it curious the he did so much better in Texas but worse in crucial Arizona

Urban areas:

According to exit polls, Trump doubled Romney's share of the black vote.  I suspect it may actually be a touch higher because people may not want to admit it to pollsters in front of their significant other.  Therefore, as expected Biden under-performed both Clinton and Obama as a percentage in most major cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.  Trump consistently gained about 4-5 points in each of those counties.  HOWEVER, in cities like Milwaukee, Detroit and Atlanta, the opposite occurred.  Biden significantly outperformed Clinton while the number of votes also spiked.  In Philadelphia, I saw about what I expected.  Trump did marginally better as a percentage but was hurt by increased turnout.  The suburbs do look fishy as I will explain next.  

Suburbs:

Yes, I believe that it is true that Trump is losing educated suburban types and was also hurt by those who switched from 3rd party candidates to Biden.  However, the margins of victory by Biden as well as the turnout especially in suburban Atlanta and Philadelphia look suspicious.  I will highlight Cobb county Georgia, which is in the northwest suburbs of Atlanta and once a Republican stronghold that gave us Newt Gingrich.  Biden outperformed Obama's 2012 showing by 24 points and Clinton's by 12.  The vote total increased by 25% versus 2016.   I'm familiar with this county and have seen some changes due to migration and demographics.  Still, that much of change in just 2 short election cycles is hard to believe but not unprecedented..  

Vote counting:

In Ohio and Iowa, mail in votes were counted first.  As a result, Trump was trailing in both states until about 75% of the precincts were reported but surged ahead and neither was close at the end.  When the vote counting paused in the middle of the night, Trump was leading Michigan by 10 and Pennsylvania by 15.  I knew those margins would never hold but I remain suspicious about what happened overnight.  Obviously, mail in ballots were counted last in both states and Biden's margins were huge.  I have my suspicions that some Biden votes were illegal and Trump votes were destroyed.  Even the news media reported that the latter occurred in Georgia.  Recently, a video was uncovered in which several suitcases of ballots were uncovered after counting stopped in Georgia.  What happened there?  

Mail in ballots:

There are unconfirmed reports of ballot curing in Democratic areas.  That is, ballots are filled out incorrectly but changed by poll workers in accordance with voter intentions.  Also, in most elections, about 3% of mail in ballots are rejected due to missing or mismatched signatures.  In this election, that number dropped to just 0.03% while such ballots heavily favored Biden.  

Dominion Software:

Here's where it borders on conspiracy territory.  The CEO allegedly said to Antifa that he made effing sure that Trump would not win.  Could be fake news there but there are reports in which Biden outperformed expectations in areas where the software was used while underperforming elsewhere. There were also reports of an algorithm to change a small percentage of Trump votes to Biden.  If it's just 1 out of 50, it turns a 50/50 county to 52/48, which won't even be questioned.  If this turns out to be baseless, I will admit it and retract this paragraph but I still want to see a full audit of those machines.  After all, Republicans had to listen to the Russia conspiracy theories for 3 years.  

Conclusion:

I believe Georgia was stolen for sure and probably Arizona but I am not convinced about the other states being challenged.  In the future, Democrats are counting on maintaining 75% of the non-white vote and once that share tops 40% of the electorate, it will be virtually impossible for Republicans to win.  We will see one party rule with only token opposition.  Democrats will drift further left and continue to be re-elected in spite of American decline.  No, I don't believe the USA will turn into Venezuela, at least not anytime soon.  Still, when I retire in about 20 years, Communist China will take over as the number 1 superpower and we will see extended economic stagnation.  Not good.

More Health and COVID news

Cocoa

 

Panama

Palm Beach

After discussion with my family, we mutually made the difficult decision that I do not come home for Thanksgiving.  If I had to be alone, I was going somewhere fun and the surf was up on the Florida Atlantic coast as it usually is this time of year.  My base was Cocoa Beach just east of Orlando and about 9 hours from Birmingham.  It was nice but I prefer the vibe at Daytona.  I ended up going as far south as Palm Beach, which is where you really start to get that tropical vibe with with lush coconut palms lining most of the street.  I also made a stop at Flagler Beach between Daytona and St. Augustine as well as the Kennedy Space Center.  I ended up spending Thanksgiving Day itself in Panama City.  Quite surprisingly, I found the conditions to be NICE!  I was plenty comfortable in that water and did not need a wetsuit.  Again, this was in late November and just 4 hours south of Birmingham.  The water temperatures were as follows according to Magic Seaweed:

Cocoa-76, Palm Beach-80, Flagler-71, Panama-73.  Some people are more cold tolerant than others but to me, as long as both the air and water temp are above 70, I'm going in and I will enjoy it too.  Flagler was comparable to Rhode Island in August in terms of temperature. 

Unfortunately, my health has taken another turn for the worse.  When I'm not running much, I'm not as well in tune with my body and thus, I did not realize what was happening until it was too late.  I have become intolerant to Probiotics and as of today, the TRS is also becoming problematic.  Who knows why but the smart money is on another layer of toxins and this is just a temporary reaction.  My whole body was abnormally tight and probably because of this, I sprained my knee a little bit on a wipeout.  I was able to run after 6 days but had to be a little more cautious going after the big waves after that.  I still had fun on the trip but this did put a bit of a damper on it.  I may just take the rest of 2020 off from running and just write the year off as a loss.  There will be no races until at least April and I'm not even sure of that.  

COVID cases are allegedly spiking again.  Not sure if I buy it.  I tend to believe that the media is overhyping this to scare the public into accepting mandatory vaccination.  As for Christmas, I plan on going to see my parents despite divided opinion of other family members.  Though I enjoyed the trip, the sadness kicked in HARD after I got home.  The virus has a survival rate of 99.4-99.6 percent and experimental drugs should increase that further.  The Washington Examiner published another Hydroxychloroquine study.  Patients who take it at early onset are 84 percent LESS likely to be hospitalized yet the drug still will not be approved for treatment.  IMHO, vaccines should certainly be taken for a disease like polio which had great potential to be deadly or leave you with a permanent disability.  COVID-19 is not like that.  Given my medical history, I have good reason to fear a severe reaction to a vaccine and sincerely believe I have a greater risk of long-term complications from the vaccine than the disease itself.

Word on the street is that while the vaccine is 90-95 percent effective, it is likely to trigger mild COVID symptoms as "side effects" and we still don't know the odds of long-term complications.  Worse yet, the vaccine is NOT likely to leave you with permanent immunity.  Instead, you will need a booster shot every 12 months.  What if the virus mutates and there are more strains just like the flu?  I fear that if that's the case, it may never be fully eliminated and we may just have to live with it and accept a new normal.  

Will it be mandatory?  Probably not legally.  I won't be thrown in jail if I refuse but there will be so many restrictions that it might as well be de-facto required.  Ticketmaster has already announced that they will require vaccinations to buy their tickets.  That means no live concerts or sporting events without a vaccine.  I can live without both of those.  The Australian airline Quantas has also announced a vaccine requirement to board their planes.  I can bet pretty good money that it will be required for international travel and possibly domestic flights as well.  I am NOT willing to give that up so I'm afraid that I will have to chance it and take the shot.  I just don't want to give in so easily especially without knowledge of its long-term effects.  In the future, it may even be required to enroll in schools or even work in certain fields.  If I have to take the shot to keep my job, it's really no choice.   I do have regular contact with the public as part of my job duties and am far too young to retire.  THIS SUCKS! 

As for international travel, Mexico is my best chance.  At least for now, they do NOT require a negative test at the time of arrival or departure.  You just have to pass a temperature check.  I'm shooting for Cancun in the winter and possibly Cabo later.  If something changes and I can't go home, I will try to get a last minute ticket to Cancun.  You have to fly into Mexico.  I cannot cross into Tijuana from San Diego or Juarez from El Paso unless it is for essential business.