Pandemic, Week 86 (Boo!)

For once, it truly was infrastructure week, as the House finally passed the $1.2 trillion bill which had languished for months, and sent it to President Biden for signature. While world leaders (minus China and Russia) met in Glasgow for the COP26 Climate Summit and announced updated NDCs and Long-Term Strategies, and pledged to reduce methane emissions by 30 percent and halt or reverse deforestation by 2030, thousands of activists gathered to protest those leaders' lack of urgency. Meanwhile republican Glen Youngkin won the Virginia governor's race, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments regarding the Texas abortion law, which effectively puts bounties on individuals that aid a woman in receiving the medical procedure and the Atlanta Braves won the World Series beating the Houston Astros.

This weeks the world reached 250.3 million COVID cases and 5.2 million deaths, of which the US accounted for 47.3 million cases and 775,000 deaths. 194 million (67 percent) Americans have received at least one dose of the vaccine and 194 million (58 percent) are fully vaccinated. On Tuesday, the CDC signed off on the recommendations for children age 5-11 to receive the vaccine. 

We started the week off with Halloween, where for the first time, both of our children celebrated completely independently from us. Nora met up with their friends for a dual ghost-murderer costume (we didn't get it either) that we failed to photographically document. Fortunately, Owen gathered with his friends at Adam's house where we happened to be having cocktails, allowing us to snag a couple pics of him before they headed out for whatever 15-year olds do on Halloween, and we went to Steve & Megan's for a movie.

It was an odd week. The kids were off of school both on Tuesday for Election Day – even though no elections occurred in the District – and Friday for the end of the quarter. Allen's second Science paper was published and so he spent much of the week doing press, particularly with CBC (because they love him in Canada!).  Meanwhile, Elaine had her last day in the Office of Enforcement at EBSA, while preparing for her first day temporarily heading the new Offie of Research and Analysis in EBSA. But in the end, we managed to meet up for dinner with Billy, have the Sodermans over, and somewhere in there, Allen got in a couple of naps.

(To see this week's pictures, click here.)