Bird-dogging COVID, a five year retrospect

This follows on the last COVID update  here, 5 yrs. after polling COVID stats Jan. 2020 to May 2021.

I went to London exactly 6 yrs. ago to get my Canadian passport: my UK "settled status" as a French national wasn't in yet; if they didn't take me as EU citizen, they couldn't refuse me as Commonwealth citizen... I met my best friend in Chinatown to witness my passport pics, before I went to the consulate to renew my passport... Well Chinatown was already all set up with one-way ingress-egress in stores, social distancing & face masks! The consulate also closed for no reason given. So, everyone but uk.guv seemed to know what had started in China late Nov. early Dec 2019 had already arrived here... 

That's why I bird-dogged COVID numbers from NHS & ONS for over a year in decreasing frequency, to document online what the guv daren't say in public - posting details in the post this follows - new GIF & video tools helped me animate in two ways COVID graphs from my blogpost archive. The progress toward the vaunted "flattening of the curve" - cumulative case and death curves plateau out - is clearly not achieved as at Sept. 2020 end of my graphing: deaths flattened but cases got a second kick! 

fast GIF (full size here)

slow MP4 (full size here)

Note the glaring mistake in the graphs: dates correctly say 2020 in time axis; but they incorrectly say 2021 in each graph title... mea culpa!

Key:

• red area - NHSx cases cummulative (darker: left title date, lighter: right title date)
• blue line (hidden) - NHSx cases 
  
• purple line - ONS deaths cummulative
• yellow line - ONS deaths

The ongoing pandemic is documented in my COVID Info Portal as well as the Live Stream in my previous blog. I did find also this cracking map by @carlbaker. It inspired me in fact to have fast & slow versions of my graph videos.

original here, full size here

Exhuming my thesis, part IV

This follows on my previous post here of a series started here. Also here under Great Lakes with a different perspective. And here its pivotal role in my career. Lastly a case of "AI to the rescue", it's  listed on my blog's pinned post under 2026. 

In my initial post of this series, I wrote (caps added):

That prompted me now to look up geophysical data (aeromagnetic anomalies, Wikipedia): will it allow to GLIMPSE terranes in the subsurface below the Great Lakes, as well as earlier Archean and later Phanerozoic features such as, respectively, the Wawa Lineament and the Niagara Escarpment? Lo-and-behold, I found aeromagnetic data (NOAA) and sketch-mapped them below on my desktop GIS (Esri)!

Richard Cœur de Lion's return trip

This follows on from new maps posted on history & newmaps.

Medievalist.net posted here a rethink of the circumstances of Lionheart's return from the Third Crusade, summary here and in three-sentences:

The article presents Attila Bárány’s argument that Richard I’s capture after the Third Crusade was primarily a product of high politics, not an accident of storms, pride, or divine punishment. Richard’s secretive, indirect route home and his decision to pass through risky territories are treated as calculated responses to the political threats posed by figures like Philip Augustus and Emperor Henry VI, who could profit from his detention. Leopold V’s personal resentment is seen as a catalyst rather than a sufficient cause, with Richard’s captivity and ransom functioning as tools of imperial strategy and diplomatic theatre.

Even more maps, with a twist

In this opening view from this video here, doesn't the Grand Canyon appear inverted to you? As in the deep parts pop up instead of down!

click to enlarge