307,291

By the time you read this the U.S. reasonably may be at 17M cumulative cases.

Tuesday was the first reporting day of the week and there were 198,357 new cases reported out by Johns Hopkins. "Yet" there were 198,357, better said. For that is just a couple of hairs over the new Cases reported on Sunday and Monday, the two days of the reporting "weekend." I will be interested to see where the NYT 7-day average line is. Gonna be level-ish, sure as shootin' and that twill be goo, sure as shootin'. 

Tuesday's reported Deaths bam zoom to the moon, 3,019, only the third time ever daily Deaths have topped 3k, almost a 100% increase over Monday's number. Why did Cases increase only a couple of hairs and Deaths almost double? Deaths lag Cases by two-four weeks. 

Now to what I am eager to see.

                                                   Ooh, that's pertty. 

A little wiggle in the walk, a little wobble in the toggle. Level-ish. One iteration is an asterisk, six iterations (Dec. 4 through 15) is a trend. Oh! And there is an asterisk. Dec. 11 (Dec 5-11) is a "data anomaly." The Times explains: "Dec. 11: Texas began reporting probable cases, resulting in a one-day increase of about 44,000 cases." Yep R's and D's we got ourselves a leveling. Never expected to see a leveling of Cases in this twelve-day period. This is Dystopia December and we see a leveling?! Tremendous.

The Deaths 7-day average looks identical to yesterday's. You wouldn't expect it from just looking at it but that sucker is going to wobble down at least a little soon, when the lower numbers of Cases Dec 4-15 get digested.

The Times 14-day changes, Dec. 2-15:

+28% Cases

+17% Hospitalizations

+60% Deaths