BrianW

That cell made it to the coast and exploded with some intense lightning.

A nice 70 here on Pt Judith.

CT was one of 3 states where the invasive box tree moth was recently discovered. They attack only boxwood species and have already wiped out most of the boxwood in Europe. Let's hope they can contain it. CONNECTICUT — State scientists have issued a warning on a species of invasive moth just discovered to have made its way to Connecticut. The box tree moth is native to East Asia and has become a serious invasive pest in Europe, according to officials at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven. Working with the Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service/Plant Protection and Quarantine, CAES is reporting that the moth hitched a ride to a retail nursery in Connecticut from Ontario, Canada. https://patch.com/connecticut/ridgefield/scientists-issue-warning-new-bug-species-found-ct

Some special dew points during that event. Numerous stations in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois and elsewhere reported record dew point temperatures above 80 °F (27 °C) with a peak at 90 °F (32 °C) with an air temperature of 104 °F (40 °C) making for a 148 °F (64 °C) heat index reported from at least one station in Wisconsin (Appleton)[5] at 5:00 pm local time on the afternoon of 14 July 1995, a probable record for the Western Hemisphere; this added to the heat to cause heat indices above 130 °F (54 °C) in Iowa and southern Wisconsin on several days of the heat wave as the sun bore down from a cloudless sky and evaporated even more water seven days in a row. Dewpoint records are not as widely kept as those of temperature, however, the dew points during the heat wave were at or near national and continental records.

The Mr Cool units are great and even Costco sells them now. I have solar and converted my house to use 2 hyper heat mini splits as my main source of heat and cooling year round 2 years ago. I monitor my electricity consumption including the mini splits and its mind blowing how little power they use. One of my mini splits has a 42 seer cooling rating. Most residential central air units are 16 seer and portable/window units are usually 10 or less. I just compared specs and my mini split is 9 times more efficient than most portable ac units. If I had to pay for the electricity they cost me around 20$ a month to run both in the summer. I leave them on basically 24/7 as mini splits are designed to run continuously at low speed. All the New England states have some great state rebate incentives on mini splits. They are usually around $1500+ per unit. If you have hot water heat and no ducts they are great. You also get efficient heat from them as well. Americans are so far behind on efficient heating cooling. In Asia and parts of Europe 80% of homes are using them.

Portable ac's are one of the most inefficient ways to cool a space. The high volume exhaust going out the window puts your house in negative pressure and pulls warm humid air in from every crack in your house. To those using one make sure the window is as airtight as possible. A better option is to drill a 6 inch hole in the wall somewhere and use a dryer vent to the outside.

Turned out to be a pretty nice day here in Old Lyme with full sun since this morning.

I was just looking at my solar panel data. 18 straight days of pretty much full sun here. The last 3 months have been really sunny with record solar production as well.

Record heat in the tri-state! Here's a round-up of today's high temps: ☀️Central Park: 89 ☀️JFK: 94* ☀️LaGuardia: 88 ☀️Newark: 96 ☀️Islip: 90 ☀️Bridgeport: 87* *JFK tied the record high of 94, while Bridgeport broke their previous record of 85.

That looks like green ash that is infected with Emerald Ash Borer. It has heavy woodpecker damage to the bark and thats usually a tell tale sign. I bet when you take some bark off you will see the tunnels everywhere from the larvae the killed the tree.

They make inverter window ac's now.. They are variable capacity just like mini splits. Your old window units just turn on and off drawing like 1000 watts. They are often way oversized for a small bedroom. Inverter units can vary its cooling output from 200-1000 watts. Inverter units are 9 times quite and use around half the electricity. https://www.amazon.com/Midea-Inverter-Conditioner-Flexibility-Installation/dp/B08677DCKN

Those portable AC's are terribly inefficient. Your way better of with a window unit. Consumer reports tested some and found you get like half the rated cooling capacity. A 12k unit might only deliver like 7k btus. In New England with some if the highest electricity prices I would never run one. While a window AC uses outside air to cool the coils on the outdoor part of the unit, a portable AC uses conditioned air from the room it’s sitting in to cool the mechanicals. That creates negative pressure that causes warm, unconditioned air from nearby rooms or the outdoors to flow into the room you’re trying to keep cool.

The thc liquid used in these products has rapid bioavailabilty. It hits you within minutes as opposed to hours with edibles. Over 75% or the THC is absorbed within minutes. Regular edibles take an hour or two and the bioavailability is low. I made a few drinks this weekend and it was amazing. Hits you just as quick as and IPA with way less harm to the body and zero hangover.

I just picked up some of these packets of liquid thc last weekend in Massachusetts. You just pour them into any drink like a seltzer. Edibles can take an hour or 2 to hit you but these take 5 mins. Its a great zero calorie beer alternative.

I think there is definitely some truth to it. I'm in my 30's and the only people I know that had bad side effects were people that had covid last year. Out of like 30 of my friends/family in my age group almost all of them had no side effects. The 3 that did had covid last year. I have heard the same thing from other people.

Trader Joe's is one of the first stores to drop mask requirement for fully vaccinated customers after CDC mask update. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/shopping/2021/05/14/trader-joes-masks-not-required-fully-vaccinated-after-cdc-guidelines/5093425001/

We are so short staffed at my company and so many people are putting in for time off this summer they are offering to buyout our vacation days at twice what they are worth. Crazy.

Down in Fairfield County CT automation to eliminate cashiers and other low skill jobs is like full steam ahead. Walmarts here have 1 person now watching 16 self checkout registers. At the McDonald's in Stamford you order from screens now. A couple automat style restaurants have gone in were they just need 2 cooks and zero cashiers or waitstaff. Scan your card an open a door to get your meal. The big one though is the first Amazon Fresh Grocery store going on that has like no actual employees. Fill your cart and walk out the store. Supposedly the prices are going to be rock bottom there and their goal is to undercut Walmart by like 20%.

I just posted about that right before you did. Here's a good article on the shortage and talks about the average age in Massachusetts. Its going to be ugly in 5 years. Over the next five years, 65 percent of the jobs available in the skilled crafts and trades won’t have people to fill them,” said Sarah Turner, president of Boston’s North Bennett Street School, which has been turning out craftspeople since 1881. https://www.boston25news.com/news/shortage-tradespeople-will-raise-costs-wait-times-home-projects/FVVETFTNBNF4TGTRQPMBEAHLSE/

I was talking to some coworkers who have done a bunch of commercial work up in Massachusetts. They said the majority of the electricians up there are like 55+. They have been on jobs where like half the guys looked like they were 70. They said the pay around Boston is sky high and like $75+/hr and that's motivating a ton of guys to keep working. I looked up some stats on Massachusetts and the shortage is bad there and only going to get worse. The average age of plumbers, electricians, hvac is over 55 there. The amount of guys retiring far exceeds those coming in. At current rates in 5 years its expected 65 percent of the jobs available in the skilled trades won’t have people to fill them.

It's going to get much worse. My boss said in CT something like 500 electricians retire every year but only 150-200 new guys come in. Its been like that for a long time and it's going to take like a decade or more to reverse those numbers.

The incentives are crazy out there right now for those in licensed skilled trades. Companies are offering some interesting stuff. This ad for a E-2 electrician in CT will give you the company truck after 5 years employment. BENEFITS: FULL TIME OPPORTUNITY, $10K SIGNING BONUS, $40+ PER HOUR WITH UP TO 10-15 HOURS OVERTIME EVERY WEEK, COMPANY VEHICLE PROVIDED, OVERTIME, 3 WEEKS PTO, 401K, MEDICAL, VISION AND DENTAL BENEFITS, KEEP COMPANY VEHICLE AFTER 5 YEARS OF EMPLOYMENT

There have been a couple of tudies recently done and published on how long antibodies last. They are finding people who had covid still show high levels of antibodies 10-12 months later. I was also reading that during the first SARS outbreak in 2002 they still found antibodies 17 years later and they were cross reactive to sars-cov-2. Next, we showed that patients (n = 23) who recovered from SARS (the disease associated with SARS-CoV infection) possess long-lasting memory T cells that are reactive to the N protein of SARS-CoV 17 years after the outbreak of SARS in 2003; these T cells displayed robust cross-reactivity to the N protein of SARS-CoV-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2550-z Maintenance of neutralizing antibodies over ten months in convalescent SARS‐CoV‐2 afflicted patients https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tbed.14130 Public Health Watch: Military Study Suggests SARS-CoV-2 Immunity May Last Up to 1 Year in Some https://www.contagionlive.com/view/public-health-watch-military-study-suggests-sars-cov-2-immunity-may-last-up-to-1-year-in-some Here is the study from the above article. SARS-CoV-2 antibodies remain detectable 12 months after infection and antibody magnitude is associated with age and COVID-19 severity https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.27.21256207v1