All posts by Mike

Riding away from FRUNOBULAX

Personal stuff, Tues/Thurs 7:45am ride

Frank Zappa was ahead of his time. WAY ahead of his time. Sure, he did a few dumb things like name one of his kids “Moon Unit.” But he had a sense of the political and the absurd, and once wrote the song “Cheepnis”, an homage to the great sci-fi “B” monster flicks of the time.

The suits & the hats & the tie’s too wide
And too short for the scientist man
The chemistry lady with the roll-away mind, yeah
While the monster just ate Japan

Ladies and gentlemen,
The monster, Which the peasants in this area call FRUNOBULAX
(Apparently a very large poodle dog)
Has just been seen approaching The Power Plant
Bullets can’t stop it
Rockets can’t stop it
We may have to use NUCLEAR FORCE!
…
The National Guard has formed up at the base of the mountain
And is attempting to lure the enormous poodle towards the cave
Where they hope to destroy it with napalm
…
C’mon! Everybody! Hurry! Let’s go!
Somebody get the distilled water! Get the canned goods!
Get the toilet paper! You know we need it!

This is hitting a bit too close to home for comfort. I still don’t know what to make of the new Corona Virus. How many of us in our 60s remember the measles or chicken-pox “parties” when we were kids, where our parents would try and intentionally expose us to them so we could get them over with while young and when they were safer? I was wondering why I’ve thought maybe we should all try and get this nasty thing and get it over with… maybe that’s where such thoughts come from.

We know that the new Corona Virus kills people. We still don’t have a great handle on how many, because we don’t know how many cases are out there that either we don’t know about or have been diagnosed incorrectly. When the true number is likely much higher than the measured number, it can greatly magnify the stated risk of death and serious complications. An example- if you have 100 people diagnosed with the virus, and 2 deaths, you have a 2% fatality rate. But if you are under-reporting the number who actually have it, let’s say it’s actually 400, then your fatality rate is .5%. Hugely different.

So today’s ride, this morning’s ride up Kings, through the Park, that was my escape from FRUNOBULAX. It may be short term; this thing seems like it’s catching up to everybody eventually. In the meantime we’re closing borders and shutting down concerts and Disneyland even.

I’m going to keep trying to out-ride it. It’s the only thing I can do.

Signs of the Apocalypse? Skipped two rides, empty planes, and now Tom Hanks?

Personal stuff

Sunday. Really thought I’d get to ride Sunday. I had to fly to Oklahoma City for a bicycle dealer meeting (yes, Oklahoma), and originally no way to ride before flying, with a 9am flight out of SFO. Chose the early flight because it was a nicer plane (787 instead of a Barbie Jet) and it was a couple hundred dollars cheaper. Good reasons, right? But Saturday night I’m looking things over and notice two things. First, I can do an SDC (same day change) at no charge to the later flight, because I have status on United, and second, well, the 787 was arriving from Taiwan. And I’m thinking, Asia, Corona Virus, would I rather get on a plane that was previously just a short hop away from the center of the Corona Virus, or one that came in from Reno? As an added bonus, the Barbie Jet flight leaves around noon, so I can get in a quick morning ride!

So I wake up at 7am, start to get dressed to ride and my wife says “Did you forget it’s daylight saving time today?” Oh. Crap. As it turned out, I could have gotten a ride in because my flight was delayed an hour or so, but even if you knew early enough that it would be an hour late, things can change to leaving on-time without much notice. And in fact things did ping-pong around a bit, at one point my flight being two hours late but in the end just under an hour.

The flight out seemed relatively normal, probably two-thirds full. SFO was definitely quieter than usual though. I was through security in maybe three minutes? And the Oklahoma airport? More on that later.

This was a very quick trip; in one day, out the next. When I checked in at the hotel, I asked the desk what time I needed to hail a ride for a 6:30pm flight. She told me 3:30. That traffic is really heavy that time of day. And I’m thinking, really? There’s nothing out here. 21 mile ride from the airport passing through something that looked like the stretch of 80 between Dixon and Sacramento. Yeah, right. When the meeting was over on Monday, I called for a ride at 4:30 and could have done 5pm or later. What passes for “traffic” in Oklahoma is a bit of a joke for someone from the Bay Area.

But the flight back was creepy. I knew things were amiss when I cleared upgrades for First Class on both flights. Not unusual for the flight from Okalahoma City to Houston; that wouldn’t be what we’d call an elite-heavy route. But Houston-SFO? That surprised me. That’s a very heavily-traveled route by well-off business flyers. But not too many flyers in general that night; both flights were less than 1/3rd full. And there was this feeling that the world was being rolled up behind me.

I would not, right now, get on a plane going anywhere. At least not anywhere that I didn’t mind getting stranded for a while. This Corona Virus thing is seeming to get out of hand very quickly. And yesterday the news was all about the National Guard creating a “containment zone” around New Rochelle, and then today we got the US not allowing anyone to enter the US who had been in Europe, cancellation of the NBA season, and finally, Tom Hanks and his wife have the virus. Tom Hanks. Mr. America. The everyman. Today’s Jimmy Stewart. I think Tom Hanks coming through this intact will be a very good sign to the country, as corny as that sounds. But if he doesn’t? If he became a statistic on the wrong side? It sounds equally absurd, but those feeling a bit frazzled around the edges might lose their grip entirely. Things could get really bad.

Boy do I need to ride tomorrow morning.