Thomas journals

Summary after travel to Costa Rica in December 2021: peaceful third-world country, for peaceful country living.  Costs seemed same as Portugal, but infrastructure worse, with more obvious poverty.   Costa Rica impromptu visit 8-14December2021: tropical except for higher-altitude coffee-growing areas; capital San José is not pleasant, though not threatening either; secure, friendly feeling, though poverty is obvious and widespread, unclean.  Infrastructure is minimal.  Expats are not obvious at all.  Tourism is important.  Coffee is important.  Little public transport, inter-city transportation only by car, small roads.  Costs, a bit less than Portugal.  Summary: place for retiring to your tropical paradise on beach or mountain or gated community, or coffee farm. 

We spend the month of October in Portugal, and learned a few things that were not quite clear in the guidebooks.  I share them here:   Discounts:  Most subways, trains, museums, offer senior (65+) discount up to 50% -- sometimes requiring i.d. (drivers license okay); or Student or Child discounts as well. SIMcards for phones: evidently only Vodafone maintains an official shop at the Lisbon airport: I bought 2 cards @20euros each, providing 100minutes of talk and 5gb data in Europe, for 30 days...perfect timing for us!  Lycamobile offers cheaper deals on Portugal-only cards: they have card-tables set up at busy metro stations (if I had known, I would have bought their deal). Duty-Free On Arrival:  Lisbon airport duty-free sells within the arrival area (contrary to internet statements), so you can wait and buy duty-free in the Lisbon airport, where it’s cheaper than the US.  In any case, the customs officials seemed quite loose though watchful.  And in-Europe passengers were mixed with n

 After reading Paul Krugman' s newsletter recently about technology and productivity gains, I had some thoughts about the topic. He repeats his skepticism about cryptocurrency -- and I agree with his skepticism -- then muses on past predictions about the wonders of technology.  One powerful example is the film 2001: A Space Odyssey.  Even twenty years after the promised date, none of the fantastic futuristic features have actually happened, except for widespread video calls.   He even includes a link to a list of 100 innovations predicted by futuris t Herman Kahn in 1967, of which only one-fourth have been realized.   I have long considered the futuristic promises, and the changes that effect modern life, ever since sitting through GE's Wonderful World of Tomorrow at the 1965 World's Fair.  My impressionable 11-year-old mind soaked it in, considering what sort of changes really change the way we live, noting that the major seismic shifts took place a hundred years ago, wi

  My assessment:  TB & Measles are much more communicable, and coronavirus is like the flu, but coronavirus is randomly more deadly than any of them.  Also, coronavirus, if allowed to fester, may well mutate into even more deadly forms.  Thus we have a public-health incentive to vaccinate and prevent its spread.  And just like grandma said, fresh air is important! Following quote is from a recent detailed article  in Wired magazine, by Megan Mo lteni, mostly about the curious specification of droplet vs. airborne transmission, and the 1940s era of scientific progressivism not wanting to credit miasma!  It turns out that miasma -- in the form of tiny airborne pollutants -- is really a thing. ...airborne transmission is both more complicated and less scary than once believed. SARS-CoV-2, like many respiratory diseases, is airborne, but not wildly so. It isn’t like measles, which is so contagious it infects 90 percent of susceptible people exposed to someone with the virus. And the ev

  Sat. May 1, 2021 - Jeff planned brilliantly so that we left before rush hour (thanks, Tori, for driving us) and had time in the United Lounge before leaving at 7pm for a late night flight. Going to the lounge felt like the old international travel days. We got to enjoy watching the Kentucky Derby over complimentary mint juleps with Medina Spirit winning. Then two movies later, we were in San Francisco. Alas, no shuttle to the Hilton Garden Inn Burlingame, so we got a taxi and collapsed with a bit of jet lag.  Sun. May 2 - Our cute convertible Mini Cooper was delivered to the hotel by a Turo participant, and after resolving an issue with the top-down machinery, we were on our way south to visit a former teaching colleague and friend, Meg Porter. We stayed at the Continental Inn - clean and comfy, but dated and in a questionable area with homeless shouting at night, near the boardwalk amusement park of days gone by. Brunched at Crow’s Nest with a fab view of a waterway filled wit