Captivity - Day 38 The silence of jackhammers

Up early, it seems to be a combination of gray and brown, but moreso gray with a chance of  brown at some point, eventually. People are looking out their windows, expectantly, waiting for any sign of weather. It is true: there's a lot of weather out there.

Did you do anything special over the weekend?
Me either.
But we were thinking about it, so we get 10 points.
You know life has taken a bad direction when you're looking forward to a trip to McDonald's. I'd gladly pour a Wendy's frosty over my head for the chance to stand outside a Wendy's, perhaps a citizen, pretending he's driving a car. Anything that will get me closer to the pickup window. If they think I'm a few cans short of a 6 pack, maybe they'll let me up front of the line.


We're all thrilled about the shelter-in-place order from 49 states. They voted to contain California.


Lost in the PANIC over The Flying AIDS is homeschooling.
If Mom and Dad had to work outside, homeschooling was a bitch. If they worked from home, homeschooling was a bitch. Some kids' entire interaction with their parents is "When is dinner" or "Yo, bitch - where's dinner." And that's with Dad.

So, with a large jar of peanut butter and 2 spoons, off they went to 'school.' Homeschooling hopefully produces a child with critical thinking skills, much the opposite of public schools. They also get medical weed to smoke in the back yard. When their parents go back to work, the house will turn into a life size Jackson Pollock.


Wife wanted to be outside in the worst way, and she was. The dog and I had to pull her back in, while she was holding onto the door knob. Even a couple of HSN boxes would make her day, but alas, nothing showed up. She tried to chew through the metal door. She wanted to check out shoe sales, but we reminded her no stores were open (because of Idiot Governor). We may pack the car til nobody can see us in the car, and take a long trip. To Wendy's.


Who says you have to shave? Bathe?


Virus studies said there was virtually no way the Flying AIDS made it out of a lab. Last week, it was possible it escaped from a lab. At the beginning, it might've escaped from a lab.  At this point they're throwing darts at a board with the thrower blindfolded, in a dark room.



Businesses throughout the country are hammering their own Idiot Governors to be allowed to open. Kinda sad. Thus far, Idiot Governor has done nothing. Maybe he thought of it intensely, who knows? Perhaps the toothpick lobby finally got to him.

We're Going to Need Something Else to PANIC About

Making the worst of a horrible situation

Talking to friends, I realized what kind of shape we're in: financially, without hope, and looking for some tiny bit of... something... to make life tolerable.
In a nod to positivity, we've said the following:

• The car overheated. It only cost $250 to fix!!!
• The dog got sick. The vet bill was only $375 WITH blood work!
• I opened the curtain and there was only 95% cloud coverage. There was even a tiny spot on the sidewalk that looked like it might start drying...
• I put my frozen dinner in the microwave. Yes, it came out black, but I finally figured out how to set the power level!
• Only 4 of my friends died of coronavirus!
• My retirement account only lost 25% during the Great Coronavirus Panic of 2020!
• the dog only got half of the thanksgiving turkey!

It's kinda sad when this is what we're excited about.

Although it does speak to the resilience of the human spirit...

Please comment with yours.

• Things that are certain in life: death, taxes, and rain on the night the trash has to go out and/or when the bins have to come back. I kid you not.

We continue with news of The Great Coronavirus PANIC of 2020
Today's report is brought to you by Mrs lefty, woman on the street:
It's really dead out there.
Thank you, Mrs lefty.

A brief call to several local businesses had entire malls closed and entire malls open. Restaurants were open, but I wasn't allowed to go outside to visit them. Every website had the same disclaimer:

UPDATE ON COVID-19

We apologize for coronavirus and for being a business and for being open, because our families have to eat too. We want you to know we have taken every precaution to keep our customers and employees safe. If an employee feels sick or has vomited up his intestines, he can get a note from his doctor and miss work that day. He won't be paid, though.

We have engaged the services of the best cleaners in the entire state. They show up in a nuclear green pretty serious-looking truck. They all wear hazmat suits and carry bottles that have 'Coronavirus Eradicator' written on them, in crayon.

I'm not kidding... they all say something to this effect. Ok, they don't say nuclear green - that was.... what's that thing called? Poetic license.

Wait, we have a bulletin from Mrs lefty:
Mrs lefty, I understand you were out checking on your mother in law today.
Yes, lefty, I was.
And how was she.
Well, lefty, she was in a panic.
Why is that?
She didn't have any bottled water.
A quick check on her yesterday revealed 6 one gallon jugs of water under the sink.
Exactly, lefty, but that's not enough for her. She drinks water, you know.
6 gallons?
No, but she wants to have it there just in case.
Good thing she doesn't need any toilet paper.
Heh heh heh, lefty. Back to you in the studio...



All of the past and current democratic primary candidates released a statement, blaming President Trump for the virus.

They were going to blame Hillary Clinton, but changed their plans when they started to disappear, one at a time. The coroner reported that they all committed suicide while handcuffed, shooting themselves twice in the back of the head, then hiding the gun.

• Know who's suffering the worst from The Virus?
• Hypochondriacs - the people who always think they're sick. They're feeling left out (and sick, of course) and are jamming emergency rooms across the country.
• The National Guard has been mobilized, and have been authorized to shoot these people

Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-Uranus) is pleading with the president to mobilize the military to fight coronavirus. Do you want to explain it to him or should I?

In an attempt to stop a Hawaiian lava flow, the army bombed it in 1935.
WTF is wrong with us? We also bombed the Moon. There are other options... we don't have to bomb everything we see.

• Everybody could use a little more cash. Since I don't make anything from blogging, I do what I can. I stand out on a corner, selling toilet paper and hand sanitizer. Mrs lefty ho's me out and calls me 'her main bitch,' whatever that means. She said if I do over $5,500, I get my own corner. If I do under $5,500, I take a beatin'.

A spokesman for Hollywood said that they are losing $20 billion, more or less, each weekend. As a result, Meryl Streep, Robert DeNiro, and Rob Reiner have released a statement, blaming Trump personally for the virus.



Things are pretty good at the lefty mansion.
Mrs lefty lets me out every 6-8 weeks (whether I want to or not).
But now that she's keeping me indoors because of the Flying AIDS, I suddenly want to go out. Why is that?  Maybe if I get her to tell me we're going out, I will calm down and go back to sleep in the basement.

• What do you have when you find an open pie container, with most of the pie hollowed out but not the crust, and a spoon in the middle?
• Kids

Israel takes step toward monitoring phones of virus patients.
Monitoring? We call that spying when the CIA/FBI/NSA does it.
Now is the time to watch carefully. See what goes on with restrictions and official reactions. Don't let it bog you down - just notice it.
Israel has some technology - they also use it to spy on us.

In his address, Netanyahu acknowledged the technology had never been used on civilians. But he said the unprecedented health threat posed by the virus justified its use. 

In the US, this would be largely the same, except it would be 'for the children.'




Today I identify as  Dolly Parton



List of Free Software and Services During Coronavirus Outbreak

• Creepiest headline: What is a smart diaper and how does it work

In case you slipped and clicked the MS Edge browser icon...it's also sending serious data back to MS. Win 10 wasn't enough...

• Apple bans COVID-19 games.
• what an odd little company

Next time you complain about your period, remember MRKH Syndrome: the girl that was born without a vagina. Not kidding and not giggling.

• Data of millions of eBay and Amazon shoppers exposed
• Haven't we had enough of this? It's the same cause every time..

If you've got a few million to burn, check out McClaren's ELVA - it has no windshield.   For that price, it should sexually gratify you too.

• Now that we're all working from home, let me give you my first tip
• turn off... ummmm... anything you might be watching... when the boss calls.

Please use birth control - you don't want your kids to be known as coronavirus babies

Bra Burning Had A Lot of Support

• Work has its own way of doing things. The other day I got notice that my request was completed. (Last October)

Let me say something nice about the dog: she comes when called.

Let me say something that was observed: ripping apart all sorts of stuffed animals was bound to have an effect. Her output is very.... colorful.

Dear lefty:

• Sam Suck, from Surrey, Saskatoon, South America, asks when we're going to feature stories on right handed people.
• Dear Suck: you were dropped on your head a lot as a baby, weren't you...

The final, egregious insult to the tv-watching public was just observed: there is a dental commercial in the UK with a spokeslady I like to moon over.  The other day I saw the same commercial in the US and the hottie spoke American.  This is not acceptable. They think we don't know. Although the British accent sounded smarter and more trustworthy.

• After doing the Science and proving that I cannot fly, I decided to stop trying. Even inadvertently. Ever helpful and safety-conscious, Wife went out and salted the ice. This morning we have ice with a lot of holes in it, like Jerry Seinfeld's comedy.

SNOW ALERT!!!!
It's that time again... I think they call it winter.
You know what that means.....PANIC!
There are two storms forecast for the weekend. Last time they forecast a dusting, then 3-6, and we got a dusting.

People were lined up at the supermarket before it opened. It's only a matter of time til the governor tells the National Guard to stop their research on medical marijuana and warm up. Shovels fly off the shelves, ice salt cannot be found, nor can thousand dollar snowblowers. A gallon of milk will go for $27.50 on the White Market and bread will be way beyond your means. Heaven knows you won't find anything in the stores. Except bologna and head cheese, which always seem to be in stock. That's because they're the same bologna and head cheese that were there when the store opened.

• She was watching a movie so old, John Wayne had no rug.

It might be time to leave when your IT department gives you the password password1.

• In the What Could Possibly Go Wrong department, Divers got to swim with one of the biggest great white sharks off Hawaii.

Millions of Oklahoma government files were exposed by a wide-open server. Patients with AIDS and FBI information (1986-2016) were available to anyone for about a week. The server was listed with a site that shows vulnerable servers and open devices connected to the net.

The FBI said not to worry, it was only 3 terabytes of data.

I'm kidding - they said nothing.

• Why you should clear your browser history.

A baby was found dead in a Phoenix Amazon distribution center.

They really need to go easier on their packages.

• Has your email address been stolen? Check at haveibeenpwned.com

Del Rio, Texas, got hit with ransomware attack, taking them offline and back to the ancient times of pen and pad (without the little i in front of it). No word on whether they got everything back together. All it takes to get back up is a good backup and a competent IT staff. I'll guess they weren't doing backups because 'they're not important' and 'we don't have the budget'.

Dear lefty:

• My cousin wanna know if youz coming downa shoor onna weekend.
• Horseradish.

A Microsoft partner portal exposed every support request filed worldwide. How do you measure something so large? Must be half the internet.

• Two people were killed at an Alabama IHOP the other week. Apparently Waffle House was closed.

My Eyebrows Are Giving Me Hell

I was in a mall yesterday and noticed an Eyebrow Design Studio kiosk in the middle of the aisle.

Eyebrow design. I had hoped that 2017 was Year of the Eyebrow and we'd never hear or see anything about it again. My wife, who spends as much time in malls as me, seemed to know all about it. I guess eyebrows are the natural progression from breast implants to push-up bras to blue hair to Brazilian waxes and anal bleaching. It's a weird world, but generally fun to live in.

I know, deep down, that there had to be some sort of Eyebrow Control Station somewhere, so why not the mall?  They were closely located to the perfume wagon with the obnoxious foreign fellow, spraying everyone walking by, then asking if they want to try the perfume (Eau de Skunk toilet water). On the other side was the soda machine. Like antiques and vintage guitars, if you have to ask how much it is, you can't afford it. There were no prices on the soda bottles, but they did have a slot for your debit card. And if you need a debit card to buy a bottle of soda....

Although I suspect the eyebrow place catered strictly to women, I allowed as how my eyebrow control is relegated to genetics. This doesn't stop my coworker from making rude comments about them. As she's female, they're even funnier, regardless of my having to go to the bathroom and cry for a half hour or so, or take some time off. This is a known entity to H/R and you are allowed time to get over this, provided you come back with a psychologist's note.

I spent some time observing this operation, by which I mean staring with my mouth open as I walked by. The Main Eyebrow Design Expert was standing on the customer's lap, studiously doing something in her expert way, involving what looked like an impossibly long string of dental floss.  I don't know about you, but I don't want to make the connection between eyebrows and dental floss any more than eyebrows and what looked like a combination pneumatic jackhammer  and weed whacker. Small wonder the mall businesses change so rapidly between our visits.

We were pretty excited to discover a Cinnabon in the mall. You know Cinnabon, right? Impossibly good cinnamon buns with some white, sugary substance akin to icing all over the top. It's an orgasm for your mouth. Then there's the Mochalotta Chill, which is a chocolate coffee drink; perfect to wash down your bon. New was a variation on the Mochalotta - an icy drink. My head was ready to explode. I decided against a bun because I'm trying to cut down, but my wife took my job and did the Bad Influence Thing, ordering a bun. I had no choice, Your Honor. We ate it at home, with glazed eyes and satiated sighs.

Because it was New Years Day, I checked the mall's website to determine their hours. It said normal hours. Because she's a wife, my wife demanded we call too, as the site was obviously wrong. Do you think women are born with this, or does it come with the wedding band? In any case, the phone agreed with the website's hours, and off we went. The secret here is that we left about 4pm, after a brief 'getting ready period' that went about an hour. I live in terror that if, heaven forbid, there's a fire, she simply won't make it out of the building. Speaking of buildings, the mall closed at 9pm.

Much to the wife's surprise, the humongous mall consisted largely of cell phone and shoe stores. In case you're still trying to guess, it's the shoe stores that caused the most glee, in spite of her cell phone, which has a whole gaggle of gremlins in it, that have messed up her contacts so badly that wrong names and photos come up for the contact, plus it refers to Jim Smith as Jim Jones. Back to the shoe stores, it was a great day for looking at shoes. Up one aisle and down the next. Up the next aisle and down another next aisle. These stores are larger than football stadiums, as if I've ever been in a football stadium.

I think I identified one of my wife's issues as we walked down the aisles:
Got that.
Got that.
Got something similar to that.
Got one almost like that, but in a different color.
Wouldn't wear that if they paid me.
DAMMIT- I knew they wouldn't have that in my size.

Praying for the sweet release of death, I thought we could get out of the store at that point. Proving that thinking positive is a waste of time, she discovered the Closeout section. Did you know that women's shoes go to size 15-16? Why that's ... uhhh... size 27 in men's. Must be like wearing an alligator on both feet. And in about 15 minutes, I'm going to get a nastygram from one of my readers who wears a size 16 due to a congenital deformity and I will have to stop blogging out of shame.

When she decided to try 'just a few on,' I asked if she wanted me to adopt a lisp and play Male Shoe Store Employee. She laughed and said no, as she handed me six boxes to shoes to carry over to the bench to try on. I got to hand her the shoes one by one, then she asked me how they looked. What is the correct answer here - I don't know but I can say with absolute certainty that "the shoes make you look fat" is NOT the correct answer. I discovered that agreeing with her assessment was the safest option. I should have known that because it's generally the correct answer (for dealing with me also). We escaped with only minor damage, yet great savings.

Then we went to the next shoe store. And the next shoe store. She kept feeling guilty because we had to get to the far end of the mall to visit the guitar store, which was my only stop. The far end of the mall was approximately six nautical miles in the other direction, whether taking a ship, taxi, kids' ride, or heaven forbid, walking. She wanted to get moving out of guilt. Ok, guilt and fairness, as I never get to go places I'd like to visit for one reason or the other. We noticed there were stores that never bothered to open. That's weird.  What is even weirder is that some stores started closing around 6pm. Yet according to the website and phone call, as you remember, the hours were 10-9.

We got the car and drove the six nautical miles, through the frozen tundra and piles of snow that the 30% of precipitation brought us the previous day. As we saw the entrance, Wife said they look like... and I said NO. They are OPEN. They will be OPEN even if I have to use this car to make the store a drive through.

And quick as that, the store was closed. Who knows if it ever opened... certainly not mall management.

Bring the band on down behind me, boys....
For those of you playing along at home, pre-Christmas, we attempted to visit quite a number of guitar stores quite a number of times. We failed each and every time, for reasons no one can understand or articulate.

Due to the most interesting timing, or for the sake of entertainment of some larger agency of which we're completely unaware (some call it God, some call it The Universe, and some call it That Thing That Fucks With Me), anyway... I don't get presents. I don't get them at xmas and I don't get them for my birthday, as something always pops up at the last moment to divert funds from me. Even when I've been assigned a few dollars, something will require it before I get a chance to use it. Last year it was the dog's oncology bills. I try to take it with a grain of salt, even though I greatly prefer sugar. I'd rather have a well dog anyway, even if that doesn't explain why my presents came up missing most times before Marshall got sick. Can you say Obamacare and health expenses in general? I knew you could.

I mention this not for sympathy, but for background information.
As we saw no lights on at the guitar store, I yelled NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
It's not just one event.. it's a whole compendium of them lately. After a whole mess of crap, it's hard to not take it personally. As if I were important enough in the scheme of things to be someone's entertainment.

I'm feeling kinda like Charlie Brown ("I got a rock").
I asked my dear partner who she was. Without hesitation it was Lucy. Because she's loud and in charge.

Apparently she gets good deals on shoes too.

• If you found yourself spending money at a Forever 21 store last year, you should know they got hacked, via a data stealer on their Point of Sale devices (formerly known as Cash Registers). Reacting with frightening speed, they announced the breach after being infected for 7 months, which they didn't know. How did they uncover the malware? A third party told them.
• Yes, of course their important data is encrypted to prevent theft. Only the encryption "was not always on."    Bzzzt: Crap Alert.
• Customers were notified in November, after 7 months.
• The statements from Forever 21 were all ludicrous and full of imaginary visions and soothing terms. Yes, the malware ran from April to November, but in some locations, it was only running for a few days or several weeks.
• In most cases, the malware was "only" able to collect credit card numbers, expiration dates and internal verification codes, but cardholder names were also compromised in some instances.  Bzzt: this press release was put out by the PR department, not the IT department.
• Oddly enough, in 2008, nearly 99,000 Forever 21 cards may have been compromised in a series of hacks.
• Before you giggle at Forever 21 customers, Brooks Brothers, Buckle, and Eddie Bauer had cyber intrusions in 2016 and 2017.
• Your best and safest option is to disguise yourself as someone else and pay cash for everything you purchase. And purchase everything in second hand stores, just in case; which are less likely to have facial recognition systems.

Parts of the northeast coastal states were confused by weather the other day. Forecasters predicted a snowstorm with 5-8" total accumulation. Because snow was forecast, no one expected it to happen. Everyone was caught with their shovels down.

Fun Stuff happens with a black dog in white snow. When he comes in, he looks like the Abominable Snow Span.

• I didn't notice for a while, but we're having a serious Gravity Day in the house. Everything my wife picked up, threw itself at the floor, taking a few other things with it. When she left the kitchen, a loaf of bread did a water slide to the floor. Then some dressing left a shelf, taking a bag of cereal with it. 
• I didn't notice this happening until she made a few loud remarks on the subject. Then my vitamins fell off their perch. Then a few other things took a header off a table.
• There is no cure for gravity (that sounds deep, doesn't it?). You just have to wait til it falls off.

Speaking of snow, the forecast calls for a high of 42 degrees late this week. With that kind of weather, I need to make sure my body is bikini-ready. Meanwhile, it will be really weird, slipping on ice in June.

So.. speaking of snow, we're on our way out of the house to do a few errands and get some barbecue. OOPS, it's 4am and the wife starts talking to me as if I'm awake and waiting for her missive: "Well, so much for barbecue - we're getting rain, sleet, and more snow." I have suggested that we hold a telethon to purchase a climate. This time it's even weirder... the South is getting it too.

Speaking of snow and sleet, the PANIC has started. Schools are letting out early today and some are already closed tomorrow. This alone should indicate we'll get no precipitation at all. The stores are no doubt jammed so badly that you can't get down an aisle. This is to be expected, as it's Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) here. Bloody idiots.

Now we face a different problem... we haven't shopped in a while and are actually out of SODA. The plan was to go today. Now if we go today, we'll run into the Bloody Idiots and we won't find bread or milk in the city. If they'd stop being idiots, our life would be much easier, but that simply ain't gonna happen. If we stand too close to the idiots, people might think we ARE idiots. It's almost, but not quite, worth it to stay home, without soda.

• Speaking of staying home, I've probably mentioned that I'm working on my agoraphobia certificate. That's the disorder where you don't leave the house. I don't get out much at all, except the odd trip for barbecue or to visit a guitar store (that will invariably be closed or not have a thing for me). Psychologically I've come up with Coincident Agoraphobia, where it just looks like agoraphobia, but I can leave whenever I like, and Stupophobia, where I don't leave the house because of the idiots on the other side of the door.
• Thanks for tuning into another fascinating episode of Dr lefty, Amateur Psychologist (and part-time Gynecologist).

So this Intel chip Spectre and Meltdown vulnerabilities have been found to brick some PCs with AMD chips, sometimes completely screwing up the pc because there's no back-out point set. And if your antivirus company hasn't set a particular bit (or you have an illegal copy), you won't get any future Microsoft updates. This is going to get worse, both due to future discoveries, and the solutions that introduce different problems. Fortunately you have my bright, sunny outlook on the subject.

• Did you know that the border of the US extends 100 miles from the coast? Customs and Border Patrol can stop you, in spite of the 4th Amendment, which is obviously dead in this case. The government has legalized a brief search for immigration status, but not an invasive search (which happens anyway). If you're a victim, contact the ACLU. This is the kind of thing it is necessary to know and strongly protest. Why is it there? 9-11 was a tremendous excuse for expansion of infrastructure.
• If you're in New York City or Philadelphia, you're on the border, so watch out.

Everybody PANIC !

or - Institutionally reinforced stupidity, incompetence, and massive fail


Once again, forecasters have called for snow in Philly.
And once again, the denizens of the area do not disappoint.

It's been a few days since we got word there will be a major storm up the east coast at the end of the week. The Forecasting Folks are saying that since all the methods of forecasting show snow, it's a certainty. Forecasts go up to two feet in places.

So the wife calls me at work, asking if I could pick up a few things for dinner.
You know what's coming, right?

I figured that since I work early, I could get to the store before the dinner rush started.
The joke, as we know by now, was on me.
I should have known by the extreme lack of parking spots, forcing me to leave the car in the next shopping center. By the time I made it to Giant, there were four carts left. Uh-oh.

You see, Philly goes into a MAD PANIC when they hear the word snow. If a quarter of an inch of snow were forecast, schools would close (in fact, schools did close once on the mention of snow - that didn't occur). Food staples would be wrenched from shelves. Snowblowers would go out of stock. Salt would be impossible to find. Girl Scout cookies, if you could find them, would actually cost MORE, if you can imagine it. Parents pull their pets off the streets and throw their kids out. Dash off to the station to get snow tires or chains put on. Making arrangements to watch the kids when school closes. Buying new gloves, because you can't find the ones you used last time. And recalling the words of your parents when you were young - "Don't forget to wear your rubbers."

There are cities that get REAL snow. You know, a foot at a time, then a foot the next day. The streets get cleaned and people go to work, no big deal.  In Philly, no matter how much notice is provided, the cleanup crew never seems to have had enough notice. It's always a surprise.  Then there's not enough salt. Then not enough staff. And in Philly proper, no streets get cleared anyway. Trash isn't collected for two weeks, which is actually an improvement. No able-bodied children exist to shovel, even though they could make a killing (they're inside, watching the Kardashians and taking selfies).

Entering the store, I looked over in horror to discover that every checkout lane had at least six carts in a line. This is in contrast to weekends, when there are only three lanes open (because it's a surprise that people shop on weekends).

The bread section runs half the length of the store. Huge blocks were emptied of their contents. Oddly enough, the aisles were full of food and empty of shoppers. All the people and carts were waiting in line. And by the time I got to the line, with six items, there was barely room for people to get in lines.

I got in the express lane, which is usually expressly closed. Of course the sociopath two carts up had a cart FULL of goodies, because rules and signs do not apply to her. I think they should have shaved her head and thrown her out of the store but apparently the manager does not feel this way. She probably drives a BMW and cuts us off at every light.

Speaking of Giant, the name should ideally not reflect the size of the cashiers. Or the one with the dead animal on his head, who was completely bald last week.


They (whoever They are) tell me to accentuate the positive, so here I go: last year, when I approached the automatic door, it wouldn't open. This year, it does.

Typhoid lefty and the Amazing Weather Event

The new job is going well. No, really, it's going decently. I have very few complaints, with the exception of the heat.  It's traditionally women who complain about the temperature being too cold, so I thought they were responsible for the eighty-degree temps in our humongous office.  Where I work is a bit of a cliche, so I asked if we had to fill out a form 8753 in order to get the temperature down below roasting. Even the women were complaining.

Speaking of women, I work near three women or so, who have apparently been sick off and on for months.  I told them if I got typhoid, it would be their fault. Little did I realize that they had been playing Pass the Germs for way longer than I have been there.

Sure enough, my throat began to feel icky. This was followed, in short order, by my head ringing and being in a vise.  It is difficult to concentrate on your job when you're desperately attempting to fail at falling off your chair.  This all happened in one day.  So I chose to stay at work and irradiate the rest of my coworkers who had not yet become sick.  I'm a giver.

You'll be surprised to learn that I don't get sick like normal people. Being a man, I had to ask my wife if I had a temperature, which she verified. The joke is somewhat on me because whenever I ask if I have a temp, my wife tells me yes. Why we do Fever Theater<tm>, I'm not sure. One day when I'm well, I am going to ask her to feel my forehead, just for fun. And then maybe I'll tell her that's not where my forehead is.  I figured the smart thing to do, aside from consuming copious amounts of ibuprofen, would be to take some Nyquil equivalent to help me sleep. It kept waking me up at hourly intervals, like a seriously snoring spouse with a chainsaw.

By the next morning, I was on our Natural Cocktail: zinc, echinacea and vitamin C. You start taking this the moment you feel sick and it will either help you to ward it off or shorten its duration.  If you don't have trouble swallowing pills, you will when you see echinacea.  It looks kinda like a clear capsule of oregano, only it's the size of a small football (deflated, of course).  And it's a good thing I dumped all this crap down my throat because the relatively simple act of sitting on the couch made my skin hurt. When the phone rang, my head exploded.  When my wife spoke, the hair follicles on my arm contracted and sent pain shooting to my brain (what was left of it).  Even innocent email checking rendered my eyebrows non-functional. My nose does not run but my stomach does: right to the fridge. When I get sick, my appetite goes through the roof. Keep your hands and feet away from my mouth.

SNOW

We're about to get a noreaster, whatever that means. It means PANIC. It means clean out the stores of milk and bread in mass PANIC. Depending on who you listen to, we're getting two or three snow storms. This includes between one and twelve inches of snow, depending on which attractive weather woman you prefer to watch. At least this time they came right out and admitted that there was no way to accurately predict the amount of snowfall, instead offering four different scenarios. This happened on three different networks, as if they were colluding.

The news is calling this the storm of the century. This indicates that total snowfall will be somewhere in the area of an inch to an inch and a half.  Mind you, the news also features shots at grocery stores, where the shelves are literally picked clean. You'd think they weren't going to get out to the store for three weeks. They're now calling it Snowmageddon.  This is why I get my news online.

The real mess is going to happen tomorrow, so naturally my wife asked me to stop at the store and pick a few things up. She is the one who goes shopping, so it's a crapshoot when I have to enter that dark place.  Let's start with walking in: most people have no trouble - not me.  I walk up to the door and it won't open. I strongly suspect it is refusing on purpose, perhaps on principle.  I'd have the store manager come out and explain it to me but as it is, he's busy plowing the lot (or one of his cashiers).

In front of me at the deli counter is an old lady who is apparently feeding a small battleship's complement.  She requires a pound and a half of swiss but it has to be in three packages for some unknown reason. Then some turkey.  No, that's not thick enough. Then a half a pound of ham. That's too thick. I held on well, managing not to strangle her with her own turkey pastrami and half an hour later, it was my turn. Mind you, they didn't have what my wife sent me to purchase. It's friggin' cheese - what's so difficult?

Just to make things more interesting, the Deli Lady wound up in front of me at the cashier. It turned out she had a husband, who kinda popped up when the bags were in the cart. I have no idea where he was the whole time; perhaps he was off trying to convince them to sell him three gallons of milk, but in seven plastic containers.

Once outside of the store, I tried carrying the packages to the car. Fortunately for me, it remained in the place where I parked it.  My wife's creamer took a leap right out of the bag, while I had four plastic bags on me. When I got home, the creamer, which obviously had something against me, had once again removed itself from its confines. This was made more amusing by the fact that I keep confusing the trunk release with the gas release. This won't be a serious problem until I start filling up the trunk with gasoline.

The cherry on top of the ice cream sundae has to be the mayor of Philthydelphia's press conference. It's fun to watch because we like to laugh (we're outside of Philly). He emphasized that they're serious about snow removal.  If so, this would be the first time.  There will be 375 people and 800 pieces of equipment deployed.  Two days later, people will be wondering why there's snow all over the place, as if they had no idea it was going to snow.  Furthermore, do not throw snow back in the street - it's disrespectful. Disrespectful is promising to clear the streets and failing completely.  It would be a fair bet that it's been snowing here for longer than there has been a city of Philadelphia, yet they have consistenly failed to do an even passable job of cleaning up. There are actually cities all over the country that manage to clean up way more snow way more frequently.  Driving in Philly is a nightmare with no snow.

I have to go now. The dog is doing us a favor, protecting us from the last bag of Cheese Jax (by eating them).  After it gets done snowing, the Abominable Snow Span will grace the freshly-washed blanket on the couch, which was washed yesterday because he was out in the rain and mud.

Happy Belated Birthday

to Graham Chapman, of Monty Python fame, who would have been seventy-two yesterday.


Urinus Interruptus

So I'm minding my own business, in the bathroom, when the door opens.  Of course the door opens - it's the cat, mortified by my human desire to eliminate alone and with the door closed.  I suspect this need of ours for solitude somehow offends felines, who are smart enough to figure out bi-fold doors.  We thought we had outsmarted him (and the dog) by installing the door backwards but this took only a day to figure out.  For both of them.


The Car is Back!

After only three weeks and a day, our beloved car is back from the collision shop, fully repaired.  For those of you keeping score, it's deer zero, us one, insurance four thousand, rental car seven hundred.  It's most fortunate that I'm independently wealthy.

The wife is beyond joyous; she loves her car.  I'm happy to not be paying for a rental, even if the seats were nicer.

Let me say something nice here about State Farm: they've been great and fast.  No crap, no fuss, it's done.  All insurance should work this way (take notice, health insurance).


A Word from the AntiSports

I don't usually bother but I came across this little factlet on the radio the other day: hockey is about to start again, after the lockout.  Philly is the city with the least amount of ticket refund requests, at two-hundred.

Seriously, Philly, you are a huge, dirty city of enablers.  You put up with crappy team performance and greedy millionaires.  What do you do?  You line up to pay them some more.  You deserve what you get.  You pay an egregious amount to simply park at football games, not to mention the now standard TSA-style groping.



In closing, I urge caution on the forced national panic about guns.  There is obviously an agenda here.