Since When Do Rats Need a Vacation

 This morning wasn't that eventful.

Just more scam calls and texts. Indeed sure does love to send them. Their scams are so easy to read through — it's a wonder how anyone gets caught. I'm not worried. There are 11 other job applications I can work through. I just need to wait.

I haven't found a new song for the website yet but I did find some rather nice options for a radio station. This might actually be fun if done right.

Then came the news.

A cruise ship gone bad. A cluster of hantavirus cases has been reported aboard the MV Hondius — seven cases so far, three of them fatal, with illness characterized by fever, rapid progression to pneumonia, and acute respiratory distress. There's no specific treatment beyond managing symptoms.

To me this just sounds like the plague decided to skip the middleman and go straight to the point. Since when do rats need a vacation? And who was touching them?

The virus is typically spread through contact with infected rodents' urine, feces, or saliva — which means someone was trying to become the rodent whisperer.

A few hours later I found out the ship departed from Cape Verde heading toward Spain's Canary Islands. Guess where I'm not visiting in the future. The Canary Islands themselves actually refused to let the ship dock — but Spain's central government overruled them. So the infected are heading there regardless. I don't understand everything about quarantine but I feel like this could have been handled on the ship. Someone could have sent supplies via helicopter and called it a day.

Imagine paying $16,000 to $25,000 per person for a trip and ending up with an incurable disease.

I already don't like cruises — but this takes the cake. People just had to bring back the thanos or rat viruses as it's made of different strains.