Here's my take on the Coriolis effect: Hot air rises, decreasing the atmospheric pressure at ground level, and cold air sinks, increasing the atmospheric pressure at ground level. Winds trend to flow from areas of high pressure towards areas of low pressure so, in theory, the wind should always blow from the poles towards the Equator, but it almost never does. If you look down at the Earth from directly above the north Pole, the Earth is rotating counter clockwise. In the northern Hemisphere, the Coriolis effect causes the north wind to drift to the right, following the direction of rotation. In the Southern Hemisphere it's just the opposite because, looking down on the South Pole, the Earth it rotating clockwise. That's the easy part, now for the part I don't understand: The Coriolis effect is more pronounced the closer you get to the poles, and it diminishes as you approach the equator, where it is zero. This has something to do with the fact that the rotational axis goes from pole to pole and the farther away from the poles you are, the more of an angle that the rotational axis makes with you if you are standing upright. At the Equator, that angle becomes 90 degrees and, for some reason, the Coriolis effect disappears at 90 degrees.
Unfortunately, the Coriolis effect is just one of numerous factors that affect the way the wind blows. Sometimes any two of these factors work to reinforce each other, and other times they oppose each other. This is complicated by the fact that there are usually more than two factors at work at the same time, and the operation of every factor influences the operation of every other factor, and that's just for the blowing of the wind. The rising of the warm air and the sinking of the cold air, which drives the wind, is also influenced by the wind, and the wind blows in different directions and different speeds at different altitudes so, as this air is either rising of falling, it frequently runs into a different wind pattern, which changes everything. You know, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if that lone butterfly had something to do with it after all.
I don't think that those supplemental health insurance plans are worth the money, unless you're sick a lot or plan on having some catastrophic illness like cancer. At our age, something like that would probably kill us and, if it didn't, we could just pay our medical bills on the installment plan. If we die before the bills are paid off, they can get their money from our estate, if there's anything left by then. If not, then they're just shit out of luck.
If you end up in a nursing home, it's a little different. Medicare doesn't pay for long term nursing home care, and I don't think that most of the other plans do either. You need a special policy for that, and they charge old people way more then they do young people, so it's too late for us to buy one now. If you spend the rest of your life in a nursing home, they won't kick you out to die in the street when your money runs out. Medicaid pays for everything after that, but first you have to use up all your own resources. This means that there is nothing left for your heirs, but at least they don't have to pay all your old medical bills after you die.
You asked about bears before, but I forgot to answer you. There are three main species of bears in the world: black bears, brown bears, and polar bears. All the bear types fall into one of those three categories. They used to think that they were all different species, but now they don't. All the black bear types can breed with other black bear types, and all the brown bear types can breed with other brown bear types, but black bears and brown bears can't interbreed. Polar bears are in a class all by themselves. In general, black bears are the least dangerous to humans, but they can become dangerous if they get habituated to living around people and the people start taking them for granted.
We used to have lots of black bears when I first moved up here and the townships and municipalities still used open landfill dumps. They started having a limited hunting season on them just to teach them to be afraid of people. Then they closed the dumps and the bears got scarce. There are still a few around, but it's been a long time since anybody's had a problem with them. The Upper Peninsula has more bears and more space for them to live in, and their bear hunting season is longer than ours.
I tried hunting bears with hounds back in the early 70s when they were plentiful but, after four or five years, I gave it up. A bear chase can easily go 20 miles, and there are too many ways for dogs to get into trouble when they travel that far. There is no way you can keep up with them on foot, so you get into your pickup and try to get ahead of them to set up an ambush. You can easily put a hundred miles a day on your truck doing this, and you spend more time hunting for your dogs than hunting for bears. During the off season, most bear dogs will also hunt raccoons, but that's the opposite extreme. Most coons run a hundred yards or so and then climb up a tree, and I didn't enjoy shooting them that way. Some coons don't tree so easily and would rather fight the dogs. That's no fun either because the dogs get all scratched up and then you have to take them to the vet. Also coon dogs don't seem to distinguish between coons, skunks, and porcupines, and that's no fun either.
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