Well, this is not good:
BRUSSELS — The European Union is set to advise member states that they should reintroduce travel restrictions for visitors from the United States, three E.U. officials said on Sunday, as coronavirus infections and hospitalizations have surged in the U.S. in recent weeks.
Starting Monday, the officials said, the United States will be removed from a “safe list” of countries whose residents can travel to the 27-nation bloc without additional restrictions, such as quarantine and testing requirements. The suggested restrictions, made by the European Council, will not be mandatory for member countries, and it will remain up to those countries to decide whether or not to impose them.
Not mandatory. So there’s a chance that…France, say, might decide to allow only vaccinated Americans in. So the lights aren’t out on our trip yet. But they’re growing dim.
Feeling smug about only booking places with generous cancellation policies. But very blue about missing beaujolais nouveau season in France. All fingers crossed.
I’m not here to whine, because holy shit New Orleans:
A slow-moving Hurricane Ida has left all of Orleans Parish customers without power due to “catastrophic transmission damage,” according to Entergy New Orleans.
The intense storm had caused all eight transmission lines into the New Orleans area to go down, spokesman Brandon Scardigli said in an emailed statement. That created a load imbalance that knocked all power generation in the region offline, Scardigli said.
A million people without power in not just one city, but an entire region. This is gonna get ugly. I’m not a big fan of nostalgia, but I’m recalling the aftermath of Katrina, and not just what happened, but how ugly and discordant the national discussion around it was: Sure it’s terrible what’s happening there, but they had the chance to leave and they didn’t, so? :::shrug::: But we’ve grown so much and learned so much since then, right? I’m sure it’ll be much better this time.
A steamy, oppressively hot weekend that ended with a banger of a thunderstorm. Alan was off fishing all weekend, and said his experience was the same, only a little cooler. He had to shelter from a huge one under some trees (yeah, I know) and actually bail his drift boat, because it was coming in so fast. We’ve had at least half a dozen, maybe 10, of these storms this summer. The most recent one before this was…Friday, I believe. A short one that cooled things off by maybe a degree or two until the sun came out and heated all that rainfall into steam. A friend and I stopped at a free techno show for a bit; the artist, an EDM musician, if turntables count as instruments, was launching his own weed brand and announced a pop-up show at the last minute. He threw free samples to the crowd and I marveled at our changing world.
However, I also marveled at the lack of masks, the close quarters (although still outside) and the flying sweat droplets. So we didn’t stay long. I’m booking a test on Wednesday, anyway.
The last storm broke the back of the heat, at least. Cooler today, then mid to high 70s the rest of the week. Ahh.
While we welcome Monday, let’s keep a good thought for Louisiana — the good parts, anyway.