Cloudy with chance of ... sidewalks, insects, ready to crawl

 We continue to get rain, although it slacked off a little in the past week. For us it means more clouds and slightly cooler weather. When there's no sun, we have no hot water since we have only solar-heated water. Showering isn't such a problem except when you don't feel well -- a hot shower is really nice when you're about to get sick. The problem is,  illnesses often occur when it rains a lot and the weather is slightly cooler. Lots of people are not well in our area at the moment, myself included, but I don't think it's Covid. Certainly hope not. There's coughing, but not dry coughing. No fevers that I know of.  Anyway, dishes are the big hot water issue at the moment for me. I'm lazy and really don't want to  boil water for dishes after cooking, but the extra effort removes the cooking oil, grease and butter from dishes, pans and metal chopsticks. (I wonder if there's a way we could inject boiling water and dish soap into our bodies to remove the unhealthy stuff that clogs our veins and arteries. We should look into that.)
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 We're doing our best to be ecologically responsible, such as using metal chopsticks and re-useable cloth grocery bags, and recycling plastic bottles, We've been recycling cardboard as well as plastic, which means giving all the items to a lady on a bicycle who comes by our house once or twice a week. I also walk everywhere, but that's more a function of safety than anything else. But it's not really that safe to walk since motorbikes and now cars ride on sidewalks, and motorbikes and cars always cut turns so they're driving into oncoming traffic. This means that when you cross the street in a striped zone and look to make sure oncoming traffic doesn't speed up to hit or threaten you, a car or bike will rip around a corner and possibly hit your blindside because it's shortcutting across the wrong lane on a turn. Happens all the time. I've been hit twice -- not hard -- in the past two months by this illegal but routine motorist technique. Then the motorists will glare at you when they're wrong because you made them either slow down or swerve to avoid having an accident, thereby damaging their bikes. The motorbike issue also exists in the park, which I thought was for pedestrians. I don't care when I'm alone because I use a walking stick due to back and safety issues, but I worry about my daughter Joanna, who wrongly assumes people will do the right thing and slow down when they see pedestrians. 
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The bikes and cars on the sidewalk were especially worrisome for me when I picked up our daughter Joanna from school  every day. She would come bounding out of school and face danger from bikes riding right up to the school stairs, and from cars riding down the sidewalk. The bikes and cars aggressively honked their horns at us (often from behind) as we walked home on the sidewalk. That particular issue is moot now. I took Joanna out of the school. I won't address the reasons. For now, I'm providing instruction. When I can get her off video, she shows real signs of being able to read. She knows lots of sight words (am, are, see, I, my, etc.). I've found some wonderful sites online where you can download books, and I resumed paying crazy prices to get books shipped here from the U.S. to Vietnam. We're taking photos of snails, red ants, stink bugs, lizards, spiders and butterflies on our walks. She's got a remarkable eye for spotting little critters.
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Our son Elijah is extremely close to crawling, getting up on his haunches and rocking back and forth. He's got two bottom teeth, produced with much anguish. He's also learned to lead with his left, knocking off my glasses twice and popping out lenses both times. Fun guy!
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Hope all U.S. citizens vote on Tuesday if you haven't voted already. We have CNN on every waking hour, even if we're not home or in the room ... hate waiting for the TV to "warm up." The results of this election could have a real impact on our family. 

Voting from Vietnam; ballot sent by Fed-Ex; masks and rain

 I sent in my absentee ballot Tuesday, Oct. 13,  by Fed-Ex to the Greene County Board of Elections. In other words, I voted. Some on the side I voted against might say I was playing with fire, but I didn't have a real choice in the matter. I didn't have to wait in a horrendous line to vote, but it cost me about $50 to mail in the ballot from Vietnam to Ohio, a price I'll  gladly pay to vote for a change that is so desperately needed in the United States. There were some minor issues along the way, but like I've said before, the lady I've worked with at the Greene County Board of Elections is fantastic. Hopefully, my ballot arrives and the paperwork is in order and most importantly, my vote counts.  I'm a little worried this election could drag on and end up being decided by the Supreme Court. But I have no understanding of presidential or executive law, obviously, so we'll just see what happens. Actually, I wanted to come to the U.S. to vote, renew my driver's license and get my eyes checked. But with Covid, I would have real difficulties getting back into Vietnam to be with my wife and two children. And the situation in the U.S. is far from optimal when it comes to fighting Covid. Some folks don't wear masks, like the President of the United States, for example.  Social distancing is a sometimes occurrence. I'm embarrassed to say I was almost starting to feel sorry for the president when he got coronavirus. But the man lacks any humility regarding the virus now that he has "immunity" and he most definitely shows no empathy for the more than 215,000 Americans who have died from the virus. The president was dancing to "YMCA" at one of his rallies, and CNN's Don Lemon said after airing the dancing video that the president was dancing on the graves of 215,000 dead Americans. 

• • •

The virus is almost an afterthought here in Bien Hoa, -- out of sight, out of mind, I guess --  and the cases in Da Nang appear to have been contained. Nonetheless, most people still wear masks, myself included. Sometimes I'll forget, but many coffee shops and other businesses have extra masks for those in need. I will say this: If a case is diagnosed, the affected go into quarantine immediately for 14 days and the contact tracing is thorough and extensive. I grimace when I hear people in the U.S. resisting masks, social distancing, quarantines and lockdowns. I recently heard a doctor on CNN say that even in the Middle Ages people had quarantines.

• • •

We're in the midst of an intense rainy season bolstered by an ongoing series of typhoons moving west from the Pacific Ocean. Central Vietnam has been especially hit hard with flooding and dozens of deaths reported. We've had daily rain, which is a little unusual in October, but the temperatures have been down due to overcast skies, even if the humidity has been up. With all the traffic and industry here, the air seems even worse and masks may be beneficial, virus or no virus.

• • •

Digger World is in full force here, with drilling and pounding at the hotel behind us. It looks like they're gutting the building. And the guy across the street pounds metal much of the day since he had to quit working for health reasons. That's what they do in digger world. Build things up and knock 'em down, and pound metal. I'm on the go so much with our kids Joanna and Elijah that the noise isn't a huge issue. The guy across the street is a nice man, and told us he does the work because he's bored. No worries.

• • •

Joanna keeps a running tally of the snails, butterflies, bees, lizards, and centipedes that we see on the walk to school each day. The 7-minute trip to school has become a 20-minute nature walk. Love it.  Elijah rolled from belly to back for the first time on Wednesday, and he's starting to flirt with crawling, getting a knee up to test his limits. He's not left-handed like Joanna, but he delivers a mean right hand ... still. He knocked off my glasses again, popping out one of the lenses. He smiled afterwards. Even when teething, he smiles.  He's a happy guy, and that makes us happy.