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September 22, 2022
Hi Folks,
SHEESH - yesterday was the last full day of summer! Hard to believe cause it's just gone by so fast. I've been fortunate to have done lots of fun things, and overall we've had amazingly good weather. That said it's been a very rainy week. It poured Sunday night, rained cats and dogs all day Monday, showers on Tuesday tho it was mostly dry yesterday (Wednesday). It's pouring again and quite windy at noon, plus we will have a cold front come through tomorrow (Thursday) night! By tomorrow we should have gotten well over 3", perhaps as much as 4", of rain this week. Ya know, if this was snow, we'd be into some serious plowing.
To my way of thinking, thank goodness that's not the case. There will be plenty of time for winter, and I'm still enjoying the fall riding, occasional climbing and some outside gigs. That said, read the Obs weather report below to get a good idea of what's coming up. I'll assuredly have to cover my remaining tomatoes and especially the basil Friday night and perhaps Saturday as well. Always looking on the good side, there is LOTS of water in the system now. Streams are running higher than at any time this summer and all this helps relieve drought conditions, but of course it doesn't do much for getting out on bike or cliff. It does make for good days for practicing the bass & going to the gym. So I truly have no reason to complain.
I was looking through a lot of stuff in my basement and came across a very cool poster. It's a proof for the cover Ed Webster's last guidebook, signed by many of the Valley legends. I took it to IME yesterday and got Rick's signature and am planning on getting George's soon. I thought you folks would appreciate it.
http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20220922/poster.jpg
I was fortunate to be on the amazing Miami Spice show last Saturday evening with my friend Latin jazz pianist Michael Levine. We brought up the amazing percussionist Latin Grammy winner Richard Bravo and drummer Sam Levine from Miami for the show. Honestly, it really doesn't get a whole lot better than this!
http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20220922/MiamiSpice.jpg
I'll be playing a duo jazz show at the Majestic on Friday 9/23 with legendary saxophonist Don Davis. Then on Saturday I will be at BLUE on Congress St in Portland with the Bradley Jazz Collective. This will be the last of our shows with acclaimed pianist Jed Wilson. After 8 years Jed is moving on to other things and we will be reconstituting the Collective this fall. We have at least 1 very cool show in the works for this fall so stay tuned.
I thought all the bugs were gone until I decided to sit outside for a while yesterday around 1:30 and eat my lunch. There were a bunch of mosquitoes and some tiny biting bugs that were very annoying! Go figure... I gotta hope these will all be done for once we have a hard freeze, which will be sooner than later.
SOME LOCAL/NATIONAL PANDEMIC STATISTICS AND THOUGHTS:
I watched an interview on WMUR last night with NH State epidemiologist Dr Chan:
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Chan said that since May, about 100 New Hampshire hospital patients have tested positive for COVID-19 each day, and about one person has died each day of COVID-19.
"In any given flu season, we typically see between 40 to 60 people dying from flu every year," Chan said. "With COVID-19, where we are right now with a steady state, we're still seeing about one person per day dying from COVID-19."
Chan said that means that even in the summer months, COVID-19 is killing people at a higher rate than the flu does in the winter. COVID-19 cases are expected to increase in the fall.
https://www.wmur.com/article/epidemiologist-covid-19-cases-new-hampshire-92122/41321476
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To my mind these are striking numbers. Especially when you still hear people asserting that Covid is no worse than the Flu. You do the math...
New Hampshire:
? New death(s) reported over past 5 days - ONCE AGAIN DATA IS NOT AVAILABLE!!!
1,597 Active cases
24 Current hospitalizations being treated for COVID
2,688 Total deaths due to COVID-19
United States:
Confirmed: 95,876,620
Deaths: 1,055,216 (up yet another 3,000)
Global:
Confirmed: 613,610,087 (up 3 MILLION)
Deaths: 6,532,052
The Johns Hopkins COVID-19 tracking map:
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/us-map
I find JHU's Daily COVID-19 Data in Motion report to be very informative. It shares critical data on COVID-19 from the last 24 hours in a short 1 minute animated video format.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/covid-19-daily-video
OUR ONLY WAY OUT IS IF YOU GET VACCINATED, WHERE RECOMMENDED PLEASE STILL WEAR A MASK, WASH YOUR HANDS!
The trails are still in generally good shape. Both east and west side are both good. Be aware that the East side like Pillar To Pond is lower, the roots and bridges are slick. There are also some muddy sections on the West. When I rode at Cranmore on Sunday there even were a few slightly muddy bits on downhill trails like Stembogen - YIKES!! FWIW they are only open Saturday and Sunday right now and will be closing altogether pretty soon. That means that getting to some of the Hurricane Zone climbs like Twister will require a bit more effort in the "earn your turns" department.
Up on one of the Mount Washington Valley's finest crags and want to know what that climb you're looking at is? Or maybe you're on your way up from Boston and want to check out the Ice Report for your upcoming weekend plans. Or more likely, you're at work just want to daydream about your next adventure. Well if you have a smart phone handy, you can get to NEClimbs from anywhere you have cell service. While it doesn't offer every single feature of the site and it's not an "app", in mobile form, it does do a whole lot and is very useful. Here is the live link to the mobile version of NEClimbs:
http://www.neclimbs.com/mobile
Check it out and if you have issues on your specific phone, please feel free to let me know.
Join us and LIKE us on Facebook. I'll try and post interesting pix every Thursday and the latest Ice Report in the season, tho certainly not the whole Report. Here's where you can check it out:
http://www.facebook.com/NEClimbs/
Remember - climb hard, ride the steep stuff, stay safe and above all BE NICE,
Al Hospers
The White Mountain Report
North Conway, New Hampshire
| Consider what you want to do in relation to what you are capable of doing. Climbing is, above all, a matter of integrity. |
| Gaston Rebuffat |
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