Steve Wong, Times-News correspondent
For nearly a year, the world has been stymied by COVID-19 in nearly every way possible, including the enjoyment of live music.
Live music, especially on the community level with local musicians performing at local venues for local people, has been hit hard. There is always the fear that as you sit in a crowded bar that someone will breathe out contaminated droplets that you could breathe in and be stricken with the disease that has infected more than 95 million people, killing more than 2 million worldwide.
A year ago, on any given weekend (Thursday-Sunday) there were between 40 and 50 live music opportunities within the readership of this newspaper. This week, there are only 15, presented by only nine venues.
dr. richard besser was on. he said, it is very serious. there is no treatment. of course prevention is to avoid the bite. 60% will, 60% of those infected will continue to have some sort of like neurological symptoms, even five years down the road. if you can at all try to prevent the bite. of course, this, this comes from birds. and mosquitoes bite the bird and pass it along to us generously. it seems these birds have all kinds of bad things, right? you talk about bird flu. it all goes back to the birds. what is going on? feed the bird. who said that? feed the birds from mary poppins. we learned today that wildfires have destroyed more areas this year than at any other time in the past ten years. there are 63 major fires burning in a dozen states this morning forcing hundreds of folks out of their homes and out of harm s way. abc s neal karlinsky has their story. reporter: on sunlight drive
goats. reporter: paula calucci is more worried about her animals than her house. they re our babies. we worked really hard. everything that we worked for is this. reporter: on sunlight drive, the desperate waiting game has no end in sight. this is three days now. i know, i know. it just keeps getting worse, not better. reporter: firefighters are worried about a forecast for extreme heat setting them back all over again. neal karlinsky, abc news, washington. let s take a look at the weather today. the searing heat shifts to the northwest. severe storms, oklahoma to michigan. kentucky showers, north texas, along the gulf coast. dryer in the northeast except for some morning showers in northern new england. a big cooldown in the midwest. 60s, dakotas, twin cities. 90s in the west. 80s in the great lakes. and northeast. elvis presley s ex-wife priscilla and daughter lisa marie made a surprise visit to