More Bad Covid News

Two studies in Germany have found heart damage in Covid-19 patients months after recovery(The video at the top has nothing to do with the article.). This echoes a British study that found what seems to be permanent lung damage in asymptomatic carriers. So, the patients are taking organ damage, and the people with no symptoms are doing the same. Be careful out there. This thing is far more dangerous than the media is reporting. If people with no symptoms are taking organ damage, this is something I don't want to catch.

In last my internet provider series blog, I mentioned a disconnection problem I was having soon after I turned on my computer. My internet connection would last so many seconds, and then I'd have to reconnect after which it was fine. I updated the last blog about that with the news that the problem was the USB network card I was using. I replaced it with a TP-Link one, the same brand as the travel router I use, and now it works fine. I can now turn the computer on and be online just like I did with DSL. The speeds are decent, but I probably will end up getting a signal booster that would make it faster as well as give me better phone coverage indoors.

Have a great weekend.

End of the Narrative

A week and a half after the protests started in Minneapolis, it occurred to me that I hadn't seen any proof that race or racism had anything to do with the George Floyd killing. I mentally went through the facts instead of the emotions, and everything pointed away from racism and toward ordinary police brutality. As brutal as the video was, it didn't show racism. Racism is in the mind and heart. The video didn't show those. It only showed physical actions.

The chain of evidence leading away from racism and toward police brutality now has a bombshell link. According to this article, Derek Chauvin has been married to a Hmong refugee woman for ten years. After the killing she filed for divorce, but they're still presently married. If Chauvin was a racist, why would he marry a foreign-born, brown-skinned, minority woman? Oh, he's not a racist. The George Floyd death was about something else, perhaps a personal feud from when Chauvin and Floyd worked security in the same building.

The false racism narrative is over. It's time to put people who are committing criminal acts in jail and restore law and order.

Have a great weekend.

Asymptomatic Trouble

I went to Walmart to get some medium(painting supply) that costs around $3 instead of $11 elsewhere online.What I found instead is that supply chain disruptions are affecting more than just food supplies.

While I was there I shopped for some house shoes and found empty pegs where regular shoes should be.

I saw things like this all over the store, some worse and some better. Sometimes it would be an empty section like the shoes. Sometimes it would be empty spots where a specific product used to be. Rubbing alcohol hasn't been available since March. There are empty food spots. Toilet paper and paper towels and such have entire sections of emptiness. It makes me wonder how long it's going to last.

Trouble in Coronatown

A new report came out this week, but I doubt you saw it on the news. Asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 carriers are taking lung damage. I assume they're taking other organ damage as well, but the study focused on the lungs. So, all those "strong, healthy people" who shrug off the virus, don't even know they have it and don't seem affected are actually taking what seems to be permanent organ damage. We won't know for sure how lasting the damage is until a future time when later tests can be compared to current ones.

In other bad news, 60% of infected people don't develop antibodies, and 14% of the people who do lose them within a few weeks to perhaps a few months, which means people can get the virus more than once and take damage each time. Between these two findings, it looks like young, healthy people will be dying also, just at a later date than weaker, older people. Since antibodies are so quickly ineffective, don't expect a vaccine based on them to be any more effective than temporary. Some of this info is in this video. Profanity caution in the 11th minute. He's quoting an account from a Covid patient in which the patient says something naughty. Other than that it's clean.

I guess the media will be withholding the bad news until later, perhaps until after the election or when younger people start dropping. Hmm, what about the protesters, rioters and police attackers? The problem is slowly solving itself.

Have a great weekend.

Internet Problem Solution? Part 4

A couple of months ago I started what turned out to be a series about my internet problems. I have Windstream, and they only offer 1.5Mbps top speed. Where I live. During a routine search for wireless internet I found a Sprint plan that offers 100GB of data for $60/month. Soon afterward, YouTube recommended a video that led me to Visible, a cell phone company owned by Verizon that offers unlimited, $25/month 4G LTE data with no throttling to 2G. There's no data cap. It's truly unlimited. The closest to a throttle is a 5Mbps cap for people who use their phones as mobile hotspots, which is why I want it. Even throttled, 5Mbps is 3.3 times faster than Windstream's top speed. Where I live. However, the throttle seems to be for people in cities where high network traffic is a problem. People outside a city, like me, are reporting not being throttled. After more than a month of usage, I'm not being throttled.

At first I used a combination of Windstream and Visible, switching back and forth because I didn't have a wifi router that could bridge my home network to the internet through Visible alone. I could connect with my PC but not my other devices. Visible allows one device to be connected to the phone at a time. I got a router. Everything runs through that now. I've been using Visible only for over a week now. It would have been longer, but Verizon did some network maintenance for a week, and I ended up using Windstream for over a week then. Plus, I knew I would have to reset my smart devices to the new network, and that's a big pain. I dragged my feet on that.

When I first set up my Visible phone as a hotspot, I had it in the window nearest my PC. A 1.59GB software update that normally takes three to four hours took 48 minutes. It was amazing, but the speed in that window was inconsistent. I was getting mostly in the 4Mbps to 6Mbps range with lower speeds and spikes to around 10 to 12. I took my phone to other windows but could only get the same number of bars. I started looking at signal boosters. As part of that, I had to download a couple of apps. One tells me which cell phone band I'm on, band 13. The other tells me signal strength. I tested the signal outside, looking for a spot where a booster might go. It was disappointing. On a whim I tested the windows nearest my PC. I discovered that if I moved the phone to different places in the windows the signal strength changed. I found this one spot in this one window where the signal went from OK to Good. The first speed test was 28.4Mbps. Wow!

Sadly, I don't get that speed during normal usage. What I do get varies by time of the evening. The later it is the faster it is. One night late I downloaded a software package and was getting a range of 18MBps to 22Mbps with spikes up to 24 and dips down to just under 16. Mostly, it was 18 to 22. Last night earlier in the evening, I had a software update that was downloading at around 9Mbps and below with instances of 11 or so. It was the same one that took 48 minutes in the original window but only took about 30 or less this time. I could get faster, more reliable speeds by getting a $100+ signal booster. I might do that after the next stimulus plan, especially if I replace my current cell phone with a Visible one. My current cell phone plan costs $15/month. Switching would cost an extra $10/month and give me unlimited data with no caps. A booster would give me a good signal to take advantage of that. I usually get a poor signal away from a window.

If I got a signal booster, I think I would be getting around 40Mbps. That assumes I only get three bars. I could get 5. People near towers report speeds of 37Mbps to 78Mbps. The booster would likely be in a spot that gets two bars. Boosters typically raise the signal strength by at least one bar. It depends on local conditions. There's a hill between me and the tower. I'm estimating at least one more bar. However, I'd have to buy a booster to know for sure. The booster antenna is far larger than a cell phone antenna.

So, going from 1.5Mbps Windstream to 10Mbps to 22MBps 4G LTE is totally doable. Pages load faster. I didn't realize how slowly pages were loading until now. Downloads are faster. I can count it in minutes instead of hours. The whole internet experience is better, and I actually save time not waiting on pages to load.

However, it's not perfect. DSL is always on. Cell data isn't. DSL speed is consistent. Cell data isn't. But. These are minor inconveniences compared to the benefits. Speed is way better. Visible costs $25/month. Windstream costs about $98/month. Something that happens when I first turn on the computer is that it'll connect to the internet and then lose connection. I reconnect manually, and it's fine after that. Sometimes it works right away without a reconnect. Sometimes the reconnect happens later in the evening. Sometimes I never have to reconnect. Once reconnected, it's very much like having DSL as far as begin always on. I don't have to wait to establish a cellular connection for every site. It's so seamless I forget it's a cellular network. And I don't know for sure the reconnect problem isn't the router. It's a small travel router that I'm using in bridge mode.

The only other real "problem" is that I run my network through a cell phone, and hotspot usage burns a lot of battery even with a 5,000Mah battery. I'm used to having my smart devices always on, but I'm thinking about turning the hotspot off when I'm sleeping in order to save battery life. I have to charge it every day to day and a half. I wouldn't care about the battery, but I have a Moto G7 Power with a non-removable one. To replace it, I'd have to buy a special kit. The process isn't rocket science, but that step where I'd have to microwave a bean bag thingy to place on the phone to loosen the glue inside kind of bothers me. I may end up doing that anyway just for the convenience.

One note about data usage. Visible is truly unlimited, but it's supposed to be cell phone data not home internet data, although they claim they don't care if phones are used as hotspots. Nevertheless, I'm being careful not to abuse the data privilege, especially since it's not throttled to 5Mbps like it's supposed to be. :) The phone I got from them is used for internet only. I still have my regular cell phone. What I'm thinking about doing is upgrading my phone to a Visible phone and using each phone as my internet connection two weeks out of the month. The reasoning behind that is that regardless of what Visible, which is owned by Verizon, says they're tracking high data users. The standard trigger for problem users is 60GB/month. My estimated monthly data usage falls between 40GB to 60GB. I use at least a GB a day or more, not counting software updates. If I split that between two phones, it would be really hard to hit that trigger. I could use up to 120GB and not worry about it.

This is probably the last blog in this series. Despite the battery quirk and the reconnect quirk, it's so wonderful to have a decent internet speed at home first time.

Have a great weekend.

UPDATE: July 31, 2020
The disconnection problem turned out to be an old, 2.4GHz USB network card I was using that I bought in 2015 but never actually needed until now. Since I've replaced it with a new, 5GHz capable USB card, I don't get disconnected soon after I turn the computer on any more. It connects automatically and stays connected just like DSL.I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but the new USB network card and the travel router I'm using are both TP-Link products. They work well together.

Safety First and the Crazy Ones

Florida sheriff says he may deputize gun owners against protesters. This is mostly a feel good story, although his opponents seem to be grandstanding. I read some of the comments when this story first came out yesterday. Anecdotally, having armed opposition in place prevents rioting. One comment said the bad guys came into town, saw the guns and immediately left. Good job. Another comment said that even with a small number of armed citizens a protest started peacefully and stayed peaceful. Good job. Protesting peacefully is good. Rioters need to be met with guns.

This next story comes from the insanity file. Alabama college students are throwing "Covid parties" where they invite infected people and gamble on who gets sick first. Have they lost their minds? Pretty much. From its DNA, we know the SARS-CoV-2 virus has an added furin cleavage site, which is why it's able to attack not just one organ like the lungs but also the heart, the kidneys, the liver, the intestines, blood vessels, etc. Even healthy, recovered people are having lasting damage from Covid-19. Getting it on purpose is insane.

Today's blog is short. This week wasn't very exciting. I replaced part of a wall in the bathroom. A water leak had damaged the wall and caused mold. It was tiring work. I hope to finish up on the ceiling next week.

Have a great weekend and a happy Fourth of July!