We stayed home over spring break, though Mike took a day off at the end so we could do some day trips. With the pandemic, and only me vaccinated with my first shot, it didn’t seem wise to travel. One big event over spring break was that Mike got his first shot! Vaccine distribution was moving quite fast now, and opened to all 16+ in our area just one week after I got my first shot. Mike got his first shot in Mountain View and we made a day of it, visiting a bookstore and getting tacos to eat in the park after he got his shot. Meanwhile, most of my nieces and nephews were getting theirs this week too. So a whole generation of my family got their shots the second week of April. A couple of my nephews-in-law were reluctant, and my niece contacted us for more information. Mike and I texted them a bunch of evidence for the shot being quite safe, and far less risky than getting the virus itself, which ultimately convinced the nephews-in-law that it was a good idea, so they got vaccinated a few weeks later as well. One of the big, thought-provoking aspects of the pandemic was getting a look at where and how people get their information, and how they form their opinions, and how they decide what to do. The pandemic generated a flood of writing and discussion in the media and online, and only a subset of this was accurate, relevant, and up to date. There was a lot of inaccurate stuff out there, as well as stuff simplified to the point of error and then amplified. There were misunderstandings and misinformation, and then deliberate fabrications and conspiracy theories. All of these were constantly swirling together into a vortex, a cacophony of conflicting messages, which was difficult for a lot of people to process. I heard from several nieces that ‘it was hard to know what was true.’ And that’s just in the media. People would listen to a little of this cacophony, then talk to their friends, family and coworkers. From their social network, they’d get an additional layer of personal stories, opinions, and incorrect or correct beliefs, and they’d draw all this together and begin to form opinions. We could see how people drew together into consensus clusters, in which some opinions were socially encouraged and nurtured and became the ‘accepted’ strains of thought (correct or not), while other opinions were socially discouraged and either went silent or were worn away (accurate or not). And once a consensus cluster was formed, it gradually solidified and became less permeable to new or conflicting information. I struggle with how wildly different the opinions in different consensus clusters can be. How can people come to such radically different opinions? I grappled with how those differences reflected the different sources of information people were using, which were overlaid on a thick layer of differing educational, historical, socio-economic, and political backgrounds of the people involved. On our end, we are getting our information straight from the twitter accounts and articles of epidemiologists, which are an up to date, succinct, and accurate portrayal of what we know about the virus at any given point in time. This helps us cut through the mountains of crap generated by all the people who don’t know what they were talking about. My family knows that we do this, and I’m glad that they are comfortable approaching us for insight into what is going on. That’s a role we’ve played in my family for many years, and I’m glad we are able to do that for them. We took several day trips over spring break. We went to the forest of Nisene Marks above Aptos one day for a day hike. We hadn’t been able to do this hike over winter break because we’d gotten too late a start, combined with the fact that the soles were coming off my boots and the trail was muddy and had several fords in it. So it was a personal vindication to do it RIGHT this time: I got new hiking boots that week, and we got up super early so we could get over the coastal range and get a parking spot deep in the forest so we could do a deep hike. It was a beautiful hike – everything was wet and green – and we made it to a beautiful waterfall and had a picnic. We hiked back out in the early afternoon, then went to the coast to read books while overlooking the ocean while we waited for Mentone to open. Then we had an early dinner at Mentone, David Kinch’s new pizza place in Aptos, and it was delicious as always! On another day we went to Baylands in Palo Alto. We have not done this as a family since Lela was very small. The trails are windswept, but the birding is very good, and it’s good to see what our own bay coastline looks like. Afterwards we went into Palo Alto for ice cream at Salt and Straw. Another event that happened over spring break was that Lela attended an origami conference over Zoom. She attended several lectures, joined discussion groups, and got to hear talks by some of the big names in the origami world. She had a great time! This is one case where the pandemic was actually helpful, as she could attend this conference from home over zoom, instead of having to go up to San Francisco in person, which would have limited her ability to participate. Lela also took Ellie to Homestead High School to show her around. They got boba tea afterwards and had a nice sisters’ day out. Ellie, meanwhile, got her braces off! Her teeth look great and she was VERY happy to get them off. With that, all our kids are currently out of braces! This also means that we can all eat popcorn now, so we made sure to watch movies and make popcorn for everyone over spring break. We also had Jake over to play with Owen. Jake did not come back to school I nperson, as his Mom is undergoing treatment for breast cancer, so she is immunocompromised. In domestic news, I picked two more corners of Lela’s garden nook to improve: the back left corner between the gate fence and the property fence, and the corner under Lela’s window, which can’t be seen from her bedroom but is part of the view from the hanging chair. I took pictures of the two corners, then made multiple trips to the garden supply store to get pots of different shapes and sizes. For the nook under her window, I focused on blue, which is Lela’s favorite color, and blue makes a strong, appealing contrast with the browns and greys of the fence, wood chips, and walkway. (Green would also make a nice contrast, but the plants already bring a lot of green so it’s nice to add an additional color). I planted shade-loving plants in these pots: coleus and ferns. My next project was to run irrigation to them. I started with the three pots under her window, as there was a larger ¾”line running right next to them. So I pierced the main line and ran smaller irrigation lines to each pot. This worked well and allowed those pots to be on the main timer. A larger project was to run irrigation to the rest of the nook – a more daunting project, because I’d have to splice my way into the main line and lay another main line to the nook. We talked to the gardener / landscaper who had redone the landscaping for the previous owners and he thought there was enough water pressure to service the nook. He indicated approximately where one of the big lines was -- outside the fence across the walkway from the office window. So I followed the existing ¼ inch tubing backwards, and dug exploratory holes until I found the ¾ inch line. Then I got a T-joint, and gathered all my courage, and CUT the main irrigation line and spliced that T-joint in. I ran the new ¾ inch line in a small trench that I dug to reach to the fence by the nook, then I ran the new line under the fence to the nook. I ran the line on the ground around perimeter of the fence, then straight up the back fence to service the vertical planters up there – the pockets, the hanging plant, and the planters on top of the fence. Then I ran ¼” lines from this new line to each of the plants. I was VERY proud of this work. The next nook project was to put up Lela’s shade sail. In the summer her nook gets BLASTED with sun in the middle of the day, making it too uncomfortable to use. So she needed some shade. I’d figured out the geometry of how to do this last fall, and ordered a shade that would work (returning all those that wouldn’t) but hadn’t gotten around to it before the winter rainy season. But now, in April, I wanted it up so that she could use the nook all through the nice weather from spring through fall. I was a little anxious about the shade sail, though, because it really is a SAIL, which means that even moderate winds could make it billow, and that might exert surprisingly strong forces on the sail itself, the ropes, the attachment points, and whatever part of the house I drilled into. I didn’t want the ropes to break and lash around; I didn’t want to rip the screws out of the house; and I didn’t want to pull any wood off the house (like the facing). I also didn’t want the screws to rust and create unattractive brown streaks. So I did a lot of research on this: on the forces involved, the kind of steel I should use and what size would be big enough, and what part of the house to drill into. I ended up ordering marine grade (316) screws and pad eyes, and drilling into the beams supporting the roof (and not the facing in front of the gutter, which could be ripped off with sufficient force). Then I used thick bungee cords to mount the sail. I was leery of the bungie cords, because if they broke in a wind they could REALLY hurt somebody, and if they slipped out of someone’s hand while the shade was being mounted or removed they could also hurt someone – nothing like a flying hook. On the other hand, the elastic of the bungee cord was super-useful in getting proper tension in the sail. So I decided to use the strongest, safest bungee cords I could find: I got heavy duty ones meant for lashing down cargos on vehicles, and got some with carabiners instead of open hooks. I also got everyone on board with the idea of removing the sail if we were likely to have even moderate winds. And with that, I installed the shade sail and it worked great – it shaded the nook from the sun and made it useable all day. And the shade plants we’d planted in the nook LOVED it and exploded. The coleus went nuts and took over. In other news, we got cat leashes so we could walk the cats in the backyard! We were still figuring out how to manage the cats with the big patio door. I love living with the patio door open, but we also didn’t want to lose the cats. The original plan had been to gradually turn the cats into indoor-outdoor cats (though my preference would have been for indoor only), but I was also very leery of the cats getting hurt or lost outside. Our compromise for that spring and summer was to let them outside on leashes, so they could have the fun of exploring and start getting them used to being outdoors, but not release them. And when we wanted to open the patio door we’d put the cats in the laundry room. Not a perfect compromise, but it did let us enjoy the patio door and also keep the cats safe. The cats were not quite sure what to make of the leashes. I got them tight vests that covered their entire rib cage, with a hole for the front legs and a metal ring between the shoulder blades for the leash. The vests were designed to prevent the cats from backing out of them. As long as the cats didn’t pull straight backwards on the leash, and step back through the vest like someone taking off a T-shirt, they should be pretty secure. I started by just leaving these ‘vests’ in their sleeping quarters for several nights so they could get used to the smell. Then I tried putting one on Gizmo. The ‘vest’ was stiff and tight and Gizmo flopped and rolled in an attempt to get it off. He was unsure what to make of it, but at least he wasn’t terrified. Once he started walking, he had a strange posture with his spine bent downwards and his hind legs bent, probably because the vest kept the front part of his spine very straight and inflexible. But he wasn’t super distressed. Then we took him outside for the first time! This was a hit – he really enjoyed it, exploring different nooks, sniffing everywhere, going under plants, chasing (but not catching) lizards. When we tried Cricket next, she also enjoyed it, and was alert and interested, though she was a bit more hesitant than Gizmo. So we started walking the cats as the weather got nicer, and they really enjoyed it. It was definitely enriching for them. I also worked on training them to come back to the house at the sound of the bell, all as part of their outdoor training. I am still not sure if they will become indoor outdoor cats (I’m writing in January 2022 and we haven’t let them out yet) but they enjoyed being in the backyard on leashes. My thumb had also pretty well healed by this point, and I didn’t lose the tip of it like I’d feared. So I was able to take off the bandage and get my full functionality back. Meanwhile, up at the farm on that Wednesday, we came across a BIG feather spot in the cow pasture. We talked to Lisa about it, and she said that it looked like it was a mountain lion – it had killed the turkey then taken the body over the six foot fence, across the dirt road, and then down into the creek bed. Nothing else was big enough to both kill a turkey and take it over a 6 foot fence. She said she’d heard something the night before – it was just a dozen yards from her house – and then the next morning when she got out the cows were huddled at one side of the pasture, staring across the pasture to the spot where the feathers led up and over the fence. So they had probably seen the whole thing, including the mountain lion making its getaway. Owen and I explored the scene, then when our chores were done we went across the road to look down into the creek, but we didn’t see anything. There was no carcass and no more feathers, which was itself interesting. We also looked UP, into the trees, just in case the lion was up there. But nothing. Mountain lions are never far away from the farm – in 2019 the dogs that Fish & Game brought in to hunt for the mountain lion that had clawed a 6 year old child had revealed that the trail just above the farm was basically a mountain lion highway. So they’re close, even though we never see them. It’s just that that Wednesday they were even closer than usual!