Pam wanted to treat her niece to a trip to Kobe Restaurant. Her niece had never had Hibachi.We had a reservation for 8PM and arrived a few minutes late. The inner layer to my 3 layer mask had disappeared and we had to rig up one of those blue hospital masks as the inner layer that I would use.
When we arrived that place was packed to capacity. We all had our masks on s we walked through the restaurant following another family of four. Only the dad wore a mask in that family. Very few people wore masks although the entire restaurant staff wore masks. Plexiglass dividers were set up between families. Of course an airborne virus can make its way around plexiglass, but at least there was 6 feet of distance between families.
I scanned the crowded room looking for anyone coughing or sneezing. Air would be sucked up into an overhead vent above each table so perhaps we were not swapping air with others. I had to wonder what happened to the air once it was sucked up and what air was them pumped back into the space. Suddenly I am always thinking like a ventilation engineer. This was my first time experiencing hibachi. Any time I stopped eating my mask went back up. I actually found myself trying to breath very shallow as well.
The chef cooks the food at a large grill in the center of the table. He juggled some eggs with his spatulas and quickly made some fried rice and noodles. I had ordered some shrimp and scallops and those were the last things cooked since they are quickly flash cooked in a huge plume of fire. I used the time he cooked to try and sketch as quickly as he prepared the food. The mountain of food on the plate was more than any human could consume in one sitting. I ate the seafood and barely touched the rice and noodles. The left overs should last for several more days. The food was delicious but it was exhausting being on high alert the entire time we were there.
The Delta variant accounts for over 60% of the COVID-19 cases in the country and in Florida, the Delta variant accounts for 13.4 percent of new COVID cases, according to the CDC. Less than half of Florida residents have been fully vaccinated, so I have to wonder how many of the people pressed into that restaurant had gotten the jab. Medical expert are warning about how the Delta variant is now infecting the young. Children below age 12, are not yet eligible for vaccination in the united States making them vulnerable to infection. At least 335 children, ages 17 and younger, have died from Covid-19, according to the latest data from the CDC. Increasing cases among children, including severe ones, are expected as the Delta variant spreads.
Florida’s numbers doubled since July 10, 2021. Florida’s numbers are also twice the case numbers of California an Texas which have higher populations. Central Florida also saw a dramatic increase in cases over the last week. The numbers are triple what was reported three weeks ago. Delta is far more transmissible that previous variants of COVID-19 allowing it to infect crowds quickly.