The “Lost” Months

NB – I have no intention to turn this post into a rant, but I will be expressing some observations rather pointedly, observations I believe are borne out by the public record.  Regardless, this will be one of the most personal postings I’ve ever made here, so if that is of no interest to you I am fine with that. 

Finally, it is worth noting that I ascribe to the Mollie Hemingway aphorism, “My spiritual gift is that I do not care what you think about anything.”

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Those faithful 300 readers of this blog have assuredly noticed my long absences from these pages over the past 5+ months, and I wanted to give you a bit of the back story on that.

Our timeline trajectory was in great part established by the birth of our new grandson, Li’l T, in early March.  The trauma surrounding that blessing was one which lingered for a long time.  He was in deep distress and retrieved from the womb by emergency surgery, emerging limp, blue, the umbilicus wrapped around his throat five times, and his respiratory system fully engorged with bodily waste.  Th neonatal specialists in Labor and Delivery had a couple dozen seconds to bring him to life, which they did.  Li’l T proceeded to spend ten days in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit while Mrs. Barn and I did what we could to support, encourage, and assist his mom and dad with excellent home cooking (her) and projects around the house (me).

Since coming home Li’l T has made steady progress, even beginning to flourish.  As near as anyone can tell he is a healthy, bright, developing little boy who is still on the small side but growing steadily.

In the five months since then we have been traveling and spending extended time with our family, doing whatever we could to help the little guy out.  While there, I frankly had near-zero interest in the blog so my presence here was scarce.

Meanwhile I did shoehorn in a couple of SAPFM presentations, but other than preparing for them until this week I have spent only a few dozen hours in the shop since the beginning of March.

Once our routine settled with Li’l T came the unrelated news that Mrs. Barn’s sister’s husband was in the later stages of terminal pancreatic cancer, which eventually took his body in May.  The logistics of the funeral arrangements in Kalifornistan were daunting, but right after the Fourth of July we winged our way west.  The trip was to be a short whirlwind, I think 4-1/2 days in total.  A couple days on the ground with all of Mrs. Barn’s siblings, the military interment one day, the worship celebration at church the next day, one more day for family time then a flight back home.  The trip was expected to be so fast I did not even take my laptop, only my Kindle.  It turned out to be a life saver.

The day we were scheduled to fly home I had a little sore throat and tested positive for the bioweapon plague.  We rescheduled our flight and hunkered down in the hotel.  In a little over 24 hours from that point I digressed from having a scratchy throat (never did have a sustained fever, severe headaches or the wracking cough) to being gravely ill in critical condition with bacterial pneumonia, hypoxia, dehydration, and disorientation so extreme I could not find the bathroom in the hotel room.  Mrs. Barn and her sister got me to the ER ASAP the next morning, and I was admitted for what turned out to be almost two weeks.

I found out later that when I first arrived in the ER the plan was to intubate me as soon as I could get into a room.  Fortunately, it took several hours to get me a room and by that time the antibiotics and high flow oxygen had revived me to the point where I was fully aware and engaged even if I did not feel particularly sparkly.  What followed was 13 days of conscientious and competent care with a remarkably successful outcome.

In my last 48 hours in the hospital I was overhearing conversations between the nurses and doctors that over the past 30 months this hospital was concentrating on being a Front Line Covid Critical Care facility (they literally dedicated over half of the hospital to this undertaking) I was only THE SECOND PATIENT out of hundreds(?)/thousands(?) to make the recovery I did.  From near-100% intubation candidate on Day 1 to being released on Day 13 with no external oxygen needs after Day 10.  When the doctors and nurses asked me to what I attributed this recovery I replied simply, “In addition to your care I had an Army of Saints raising me up in prayer from coast-to-coast.”  That is what I truly believe.

After release from the hospital we stayed at a nearby motel for six more days, “just to make sure.”  The flight home was entirely uneventful, we arrived back in Shangri-La last Sunday afternoon.  I have been slowly and carefully easing my way back into gentle activity including a few hours in the shop every day, mostly sitting and organizing and cleaning.

Since the beginning of this historical episode thirty months ago I have never doubted, not even for one moment, the risk that this engineered organism posed for some cohort of humanity, particularly for those with multiple co-morbidities, the worst of which were extreme age, compromised pulmonary systems, and obesity.  Any of you who corresponded with me privately know this to be true.   It has killed millions, disrupted and destroyed the lives of hundreds of millions, and destroyed ten$ of trillion$ of human flourishing due primarily to the unrestrained totalitarian impulses of political “leaders” and public health “experts.”

What I have doubted was virtually every “official” pronouncement regarding the nature, genesis, source, and response to covid.  As time unfolds it becomes increasing clear to me that my doubts have been more than well-deserved as the posture of the “experts” rnged from outright deception and untruths, ass-covering, blame shifting, and leveraging benefits.  As an informed, critical-thinking person I can only wonder about how differently the trajectory of this history might have been had Fauci obeyed the explicit directive from President Obama to discontinue gain-of-function research.  Instead, using nefarious subterfuges Fauci outsourced the projects to the Chinese Communist Party Peoples’ Liberation Army bioweapons program at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  Who could’ve seen a problem with that?

I cannot say that before thirty months ago I ever wonder about the nature of a theoretical chimera formed by merging Josef Mengele and Josef Stalin.  Now, I no longer have to wonder.  Watching the “establishment” medical bureaucrats especially choose a path of explicitly discrediting, defaming, and destroying any honest scholars or even common citizens who disagreed with them, I’m thinking there should be a special residential wing underneath Leavenworth Prison.

So now you know a bit about my recent “lost” months.