That would explain that "look".

The park were I go to photograph water birds is a nearly one mile long man-made river with waterfalls, rapids, ponds, paths and bridges that was built in a large concrete flood control channel. The over population of turtles got so bad it seemed the banks were lined with them and duckings, goslings and shorebird babies seldom lived to grow up. They thinned out the turtles, so now you only see a very few scattered here and there. On my last trip, I rode my mobility scooter the whole length of the park and didn't see any turtles.

As President Trump is not an MD and most especially not a Virologist he was following the advice of the government and other "experts", like F***i and the CDC among others.
They were the ones who didn't quite figure out what to do.

Then there is the nature of the American People. We don't like being told what to do by"experts" or politicians. We don't like to be restricted in our movements and we are probably the most mobile nation on Earth. We are constantly on the move for work, shopping, just for fun and more Americans both numerically and % wise move addresses per year than anyone else. Not only that, but we also like to congregate for meeting, movies, sports etc. etc.
All of which tends to negate the anti-C***D measures if people were following them in the first place. Hell we even had door to door sales people coming around during C***D - we put a sign on our front door stating we would not be answering the door.

As to our large numbers of deaths during C***D, well take all the above and combine it with our nearly 340million (#3 behind China and India) population and our nearly 100% coverage of statistics and it is no wonder our reported deaths were so high.* China I am at least 99% certain did not give accurate numbers just for politics sake and India has many millions of people living in small villages and city slums who seldom interact with the government or report deaths, they just have a family service and bury them. Many people still believe that the dead should just be dropped in one of the sacred rivers so even if the government came by to check on the deaths from C***D there are no graves, just a body that drifted away on the river and was eaten by water life. So their numbers were probably even less accurate than China.

And then there are parts of Africa, parts of Asia & remote areas of So America etc. etc. etc. I saw articles of entire villages in Africa being a ghost town, no one to count the dead and when the government checked they just dug trenches with a bulldozer, dropped all the bodies in, burned the buildings to hopefully k**l the v***s and moved on down the road to check the next village. I saw similar things in Vietnam during the Tet Offensive, bulldozers and back hoes digging large holes in the cemetery next to our base and then trucks of bodies in piles pulling in and soldiers tossing them in until the hole was full, and a dozer pushed dirt over them then dug the next hole. That happened several times a day for a couple of weeks. So if you tell me it didn't happen in many places during C***D I will call you ignorant if I am in a nice mood and a liar if I am in a bad mood.

*Remember all the reports that many places deliberately over counted C***D deaths for benefits and aid? Someone comes into the ER/Trauma Center/Morgue dead from a traffic accident, heart attack etc. etc. and they also had C***D = just put them on the C***d death list. It was a lot less work for the severely over worked medical staffs. Who were already running to another in the endless line of patients or bodies coming in. No string of lab tests to determine the cause of death, no need for an autopsy etc. etc. just put another name on the C***D list. Reportedly that happened in a lot of places around the world. Too over worked to test and make accurate records.

Nice shot, but only one duckling?

The geese are fun to watch. There were a couple of lakes and refuges near my home town that were migration rest stops and they would feed on the deliberately poorly harvested crops nearby (they paid the farmers to do that). At the height of the migrations you measured geese by the acre.

As to the walking on water, I a have done it many, many times, the water just has to be cold enough for a while before you attempt it.

Pretty soon we may have UHH members and posters who don't even use or own a camera - they will just do AI.

Let's see, My oldest son is 5'10", a Staff Sgt in the Army Reserves who volunteers for every overseas assignment that comes along*, Jump Master, Iraqi Veteran, his Reserve company does hand-to-hand training regularly and his fitness is what you would expect from someone like him. A mugger or even two would not be advised to take him on with bare hands.
So he can defend himself without a gun in some circumstances. But he prefers using a gun because that way the other guy doesn't have much chance of hurting him.

*He sees it as a way to see the world at Uncle Sam's expense, so far he has touched over 20 countries and spent time in about 12. Next month he leaves for a year stationed in Germany, but I get the impression Germany will be a base to visit other places.

Our daughter on the other hand is 5'3", 124 and a Pediatrician. Not exactly a Women's Wrestling or Boxing type and petite on top of that. She does know how to use sharp things, like scalpels since she has studied surgery. But doctors don't walk around carrying scalpels. So besides not being a good bet with even one unarmed mugger for self-defense she would need a gun. I taught her to shoot and with pistols, the bigger the hole and the louder the boom they more she liked it. If she asked I would hand her any gun I own, but for her size hands I would urge her to take a snub-nosed .38, the hammerless .32 Mag that belonged to my mother or my compact 40 S&W pocket model.

"God created mankind, Samuel Colt made them equals."

Haven't seen him.


Seriously, I have a few cousins that way back then made me wish they weren't my cousin. Esp in the age of mini skirts and then micro-mini about the time I got our of the Army. A couple of those skirts had something to do with my wife becoming my wife.

The first time our daughter saw this photo, her comment was "Miles of legs!"
And NO! I didn't buy those pants. My Mother worked at sears and was always buying me the latest "In" fashions. They were fine wool and I referred to them as "my horse blanket". But Mom and Debra liked them.

Amazon, Costco, Sam's, Walmart, Sears and others with a big online presence were booming-online. The brick and mortar stores both large and small had less traffic and lower sales.

The delivery companies were over worked, hired more drivers, rented more trucks etc. In our neighborhood there was one elderly UPS retiree with just his old company cap and a six passenger golf cart delivered small packages every day of the week for a while. He told one of the neighbors that he was making 3-4x his pension delivering small packages 6 hours a day. Because of the open work cart and his great personality, school kids who were homeschooling on Zoom would take breaks to ride their bikes with him, talk to him and help him drop off packages so he didn't have to climb in and out and walk so much. When UPS got another truck and full-time driver the kids were disappointed to not be helping anymore.

And the shut-downs were largely due to C***d's effect on workers and sales = people shopped online. The wife and I still do, easier than driving around. The UPS and FedEx drivers have our house memorized. The fast food and other restaurants also went to less human to human contact by going to electronic with kiosks and phone ahead, pickup at the door.
The kiosks couldn't catch C***d and when you drove up to pick up your app or phone order for a while the person who handed it out the window or came to your car in the pickup section of the parking lot looked like a CDC hazardous lab worker.

My hometown in Kentucky had US 60 going right through town and a Great Aunt and Uncle owned a restaurant right on US 60. They used to get a lot of out of state travelers and when hunting season started those people were always curious or shocked by the numbers of people going by with guns, esp kids of elementary school age with a rifle or shotgun tied to their bike handle bars headed out of town to hunt. Uncle Earl had a standard answer which went something like; "Oh, that is the Smith boy, don't worry, his family taught him to shoot safely. If he ever violates the safety rules he will be hunting with a slingshot." They retired just before girls started to get into traditional male things. Today if I went home for a visit I will bet anything that half those kids on bikes with guns or in the back of someone's pickup will be girls.

I worked part time, weekends and semester breaks 10 years for a friend who owned a Police Gear and Gun Shop. (he owned three, I only worked at the big one) When we started delivering Glocks to PDs going to autos I got qualified as a Glock Armorer and did t***sition training of officers from several PDs.

I taught my wife, the oldest son and daughter to shoot (younger son is special needs, mentally 5 yo-when my wife asked if I was going to teach him to shoot NO!.) All I taught Jon is, don't touch a gun, tell me, Mom, his older brother or his sister or some other adult there is a gun...

The wife did very well but isn't into guns. Our oldest son, well to him they are a tool. He did 6 yrs active army including Iraq as a Combat Engineer during the war and now approaching 20 years total with Army Reserve time, he volunteers for active duty when a chance to go see somewhere he has never been comes along. Next month he goes on 1 year active, in Germany??? I get the impression Germany will just be home base. He speaks some Turkish and some Arabic. His last two years active he retrained for Civil Affairs, took a lot of medic training and is not only airborne qualified, he is a jump master for his reserve company. Civil Affairs are part of Special Forces, they are the nice SF, they try to make friends, build schools etc. before they start shooting.

And Jasmine, our baby, the bigger the hole and the bigger the boom, the more she liked it. She is 5'3" and 124lbs, but she likes BIG BOOMS. Once she went shooting with her current boyfriend at the time and some others, I gave her a bolt action .223 with scope. She liked it, but the guys loved it and let her shoot up the .308 while they played with the .223. She is now a Pediatrician in a large LA County Hospital in an iffy area. I told her if we have r**ts etc. like they keep predicting she can have anything in my gun safe. She grinned and said "Even the .44 mag or one of the .45 autos?" I said yes and she grinned bigger.

On my RP today I found my focus point in the lower right corner = where my nose or cheek would touch the screen. i now have touch turned off. I didn't use it after playing with it to see how it worked on the first day anyway.

You forgot the 2nd and maybe more columns for the BANGs of the wife and older kids.
I was roaming the country side with a BB gun at 6 and a real gun at 9.
Once when a group of us were shooting at a moving target from 10-12 feet (milk bottle cap on a string blowing in the wind) without much luck and my Mother came out, took my Red Rider BB gun and proceeded to hit it three shots in a row. Handed it back and said I have milk and cookies when you boys are ready for a snack then went back in the house. Talk about a bunch of young male egos that looked like balloons with holes in them!!!
She did the same kind of things when we were playing baseball. She could bat and catch really well. Furthermore, she also had intimidation down to an art. She hit a grounder and the shortstop threw it to me at second base just as she was rounding 1st; "If you tag me out, No TV this weekend!" I tagged her out, no good shows on TV that weekend.