Sunny Sunday Selfie

It's that time of year when we either have thunderous downpours of rain, or we have endless warm and toasty sunshine. During one of our recent stints of sunshine, Evan found and claimed his favorite sun puddle. He even agreed to snap a selfie in that beloved sun puddle.

Evan and all of us here wish you a sunny Sunday!

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Doodle of the Day

Today's doodle is yet another bit of concept art for some stories I'm writing. This one is a recreation of one that I scribbled up last year.

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Tidbit of the Day

Today's tidbit regarding COVID-19 and our pets is a continuation of the information we shared yesterday. In yesterday's post, we mentioned how the new coronavirus is largely spread from person to person. In the few cases where animals have been found to have COVID-19, it's been deduced that they most likely acquired it from a human rather than them spreading it to a human. In other words, cases have come to demonstrate that animals are more likely to get COVID-19 from us than we are to get it from them.

For today, we're giving a couple factoids to further explain how humans are not terribly likely to get COVID-19 from animals. First, it's obvious that far, far more humans have contracted COVID-19 than animals have. Obviously, one reason why humans are not terribly likely to get the novel coronavirus from animals is simply because animals are far less likely to have it in the first place. 

Why else are animals less likely to transfer COVID-19 to humans, though? While everyone should obviously practice proper hygiene and wash their hands regularly to err on the side of caution, animals do not contain ideal means of transmitting the virus. Why is this? This is because soft, porous surfaces are more likely to trap a viral particle rather than easily allow it to be transferred to another surface, such as a human's hand. In other words, porous surfaces are permeable and therefore a viral particle can more easily sink into or get stuck in a porous surface. Hard, non-porous surfaces, on the other hand, far more easily allow the virus to be transferred to a surface such as a hand. What kinds of surfaces are porous and therefore less likely to allow for COVID-19 transmission? Such surfaces would include fur, leashes, and collars, as well as clothing and other cloth materials, carpets and rugs, cardboard, paper, and so on and so forth. Hard, non-porous surfaces that are more ideal for transferring viral particles include doorknobs and handles, certain doors and tables, and items such as cell phones, keyboards and computers, remote controls, and so on and so forth. Therefore, our furbabies do not offer surfaces that best transfer pathogenic particles.

All in all, people should not be fearing animals during this pandemic. Animals should not be abandoned or seen as dangerous during this time of COVID-19. They are they not ideal transmitters of the virus, for more reasons than one. What's more, proper hygiene can help prevent spread of the disease overall.