Hack, cough.

Remember a few weeks ago when I got the first cold I've had in years? I think it has been more than six years, and freelancing from home may be the main reason I've been lucky. Then again, there are 100+ rhinoviruses out there, and maybe when you live long enough, Nature has trouble pulling one out the file that you're not immune to. 

It was a good run, so I suffered the cold with some gratitude. Well, last weekend I was at a meeting in church, crammed into a small classroom, and one of the attendees mentioned that he was supposed to be on an airplane that very minute but because he and his wife got sick, the kids said to stay away from the grandkids. 

So he came to the meeting instead. 

Guess what?

Yep, sick again.

THANKS, TYPHOID MIKE

Of course this has turned into a busy week, workwise; it couldn't have happened last week when things were slow, no. 

It was too hot to make a frozen pizza yesterday -- the extent of my cooking abilities -- so I was dispatched to McDonald's to get eats. After all, the Grimace Era of the Mets has continued, so I wanted to show my reciprocal support. When I got home, I started pulling in the garage and -- nothing. Car stalled. Check Engine light came on. 

Well, as King Claudius says, "When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions." And he wound up dead, so there you are. 

It could be something simple, like maybe they forgot to put oil in during my oil change a couple of weeks ago. (It's been known to happen.) Or it could be the end of the line for my car. Still, I was able to kick it over and pull into the garage, that CE light taunting me as I did. I'm really glad I didn't get stuck in the McDonald's parking lot. I have AAA membership, but it's like life insurance -- you never really want to need it. 

So that's what's happening. I hope to have a better entry tomorrow or Thursday. We'll just have to see how it goes. Unless like Claudius one of the sorrows comes at me with a sharp poisoned pointy thing. Then I won't be around to blog about it. 

Ooh, I'm DYIN' AGAIN!

Apologies for not looking through comments the other day, especially about the book launch. (I have since replied as needed.) Work ran me over like a diesel train, but worse, I got a cold. 

I usually power through colds with Alka-Seltzer Plus Cold Medicine, but this is literally the worst cold I've had since I quit smoking many years ago. That one was weird. The wife of a work buddy surmised that it was so bad because all the toxins were leaving my body, which didn't and actually still doesn't make sense to me. For one thing, I was not off nicotine supplements yet, so I was still enjoying some toxins, in the form of gum or lozenges. For another, I lived with a smoker, so I was getting secondhand toxins. For a third -- shouldn't I feel better if the poison level is dropping? I felt like 100% hot garbage. How does reducing the poisons result in feeling worse? 

Well, haven't seen that chap in years, so I have had no opportunity for a follow-up consult with his wife. 

This cold started Sunday as a head cold, got a little worse, then yesterday it dropped like a rock into my chest. Well, that's not pleasant. Suddenly I felt a ton worse, and started sounding like Froggy Laughlin from the Little Rascals. In fact, I announced to the public that Froggy would be taking my calls that day, so I wouldn't scare anyone. If I start feeling better, I might upgrade to Andy Devine. 

Since that awful bout mentioned above, I've barely gotten sick at all. I do believe that one good thing that came out of the COVID fiasco was that the public got an education in handwashing, the #1 way to stop the spread of viruses. However, since another good thing that arose was deserved skepticism about our political and public health leaders, who knows if the public is bothering anymore? 

It was nice, not getting sick, but I suspect my wife picked up the cold in church -- lots of kids, you know, those cherubic little petri dishes -- and I, failing maintain proper form, managed to get it from her. She tried to protect me, but it only takes one slip and wham! Hello, virus. 

Well, if it hasn't killed me by now, I think I'll pull through. Meanwhile, I thank you for your continued patronage and concern. People who read my blog are the finest in the world, and good-looking, too! 

Where the action is.

I recently learned about an interesting section of the brain, one that gets a lot of use for a lot of people, maybe especially us Mets fans. I did not know that there was a part of the brain specifically devoted to dealing with this common issue. I am, of course, referring to the vomiting center. 

The Encyclopedia Britannica says that "Vomiting is believed to be controlled by two distinct brain centres—the vomiting centre and the chemoreceptor trigger zone—both located in the medulla oblongata."

It's a happening place.

That medulla oblongata is like the O'Hare Airport of embarrassing bodily functions, including sneezing and coughing. Since it handles digestion as well, I will assume it has a farting center or the like. It definitely has its own vomiting center, which is the gate of this airport we're looking at today. 

I guess I always thought that vomiting just kind of happened. The stomach and the senses could take care of business, and the brain's only concern was to butt out and get the body to a toilet, stat. But no, the brain's got to be in the thick of things no matter what.  

So how does this thing work to make for emesis? (Emesis is a pleasant way to say an act of vomiting.) The medulla oblongata contains that cool-sounding chemoreceptor trigger zone, and when the CTZ gets word from the blood that the stomach ought to remove its contents quickly, it telegraphs the nearby vomiting center. "Hey, VC, we got a problem," it says, and before the vomiting center can get any details it's already sending the EVAC notice to the glands and muscles involved in hurling. The vomiting center does not screw around. It takes its job seriously. 

Okay, that explains throwing up from food poisoning, drunkenness, chemotherapy, and opiates, among other things. But what about when there's no actual poison in the system? you wonder. What if you're seasick? 

That's actually a good question, and I'm glad I thought of it. The Merck Manual tells us that "The exact pathophysiology is undefined, but motion sickness occurs only when the 8th cranial nerve and cerebellar vestibular tracts are intact; those lacking a functional vestibulo-cochlear system are immune to motion sickness. Movement via any form of transportation, including ship, motor vehicle, train, plane, spacecraft, and playground or amusement park rides can cause excessive vestibular stimulation." 

So excessive vestibular stimulation is somehow involved, although how it causes the vomiting center to light up like the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center is a matter of debate. Its efficiency is, however, undeniable, especially at the fairgrounds when your child comes off the Spindizzy Heavemaster ride and lets the stew of corndog and chocolate ice cream fly on your new Jumpmans. 

The human brain is an absolutely amazing biological construction, but sometimes it seems like it's being controlled by a moron. Like a high-tech cutting-edge experimental jet being controlled by a chimpanzee using an Etch-a-Sketch. And that's not even considering the stupid things we do on purpose. On that topic I could blog every day for a year.  

Dope fiends!

I have a couple of friends who are pharmacists, and I would not like to do that job. 

Under ideal conditions, it's still difficult. There are about a million drugs you have to know about -- the names (trade and generic), the prescribable uses, the off-label uses, the side effects, the doses, the dosing, the cost, the content, the special warnings for particular populations (pregnant women, kids, diabetics, and on and on) -- and about two million drug laws you have to know about -- the rules for dispensing, your responsibilities (and career-ruining culpabilities), the permissions needed, the requirements for dealing with doctors' offices, and on and on. Then add all the health insurance variations. It might drive you to drink -- and if it does, you'd better have teenage George Bailey working for you or you'll kill some kid by accident. 

And most pharmacists work under less than ideal conditions. Once upon a time a pharmacist might be a drugstore owner, running his own respectable business, a well-regarded figure in town. Now you're far more likely to be a cog in some corporate chain. And in some neighborhoods your CVS or Walgreens will be overrun with crime (especially if your town has a Soros-funded prosecutor); but in any neighborhood you'll probably have to deal with thugs and scammers and no-account losers trying to get at the sweet, sweet opioids in your drug safe. 

Maybe you work in a nice town with a functioning judiciary and constabulary, for a pharmacy that doesn't even stock the really hot stuff (our nearest supermarket has a pharmacy that warns in LARGE LETTERS that they do not dispense opioids). Well, you still have to deal with the public. And the public can be dumb. Also rude and really bad about taking their pills. The medical journals used to complain about patient compliance, meaning patients not following the instructions on their prescriptions, but the term "compliance" was thought to be too authoritative, too patriarchical. So now they call it "adherence," and it's totally different. Now the medical journals complain about patient adherence. 

And if even THAT is not enough to make you want to sample the drugs yourself, Joe Pharmacist, you're now expected to administer shots to the rubes who roll up, because the doctors' offices can't be bothered, or because your customers would rather die than go to the doctor for a routine physical. So you're stocked with vaccines for flu and COVID and shingles and tetanus and RSV and HPV and hepatitis and freaking monkeypox and yellow fever and everything else, and now you are poking around arms, and you don't even have an MD or a heroin addiction. 

It's an important job but maybe not a fun one. You may say "It beats diggin' ditches," but few ditches are dug by hand anymore. And if they are, remember: people pay good money for gym memberships to get that kind of exercise. Of course, they don't actually show up at the gym, but they pay for it. (Is that "gym compliance"? Or "gym adherence"? I give up.)

Cold heart, hot dog.

Springtime is on my mind

Flowers blooming, all the time

Smell the roses

Smell the grass

Old man winter can kiss my ass

                            --Spinal Tap, "Springtime"

Yay, winter.

The people who dig the snow
Are usually not those who dig the snow

Yesterday was fairly nice, mostly sunny, high in the forties, so global warming will kill us before the year is out. All the snow we'd had earlier in the week had melted but for some piles here and there. 

Unfortunately that left Winter's sickly child, Mud, all over the joint. And the dog had just gotten a pro grooming for the first time in two months. 

He's a hairy beast, and we never let him go that long normally. His fuzz gets matted and clumped, and that's no good for him. We ought to brush him out daily, but none of us would like that, least of all him. We're lucky to have a great groomer who has a knack with the hairy dudes like him. 

But in December, we skipped his usual monthly groom. Why? Because it would have been close to Christmas, and a lot of people who wouldn't normally get a dog groomed by a pro do so when company is coming or when cute pictures with Santa are going to be posted. Also, they might want to board the dog for a few days, or take advantage of doggie daycare (a service our groomer also provides), and that's where the rub is. Because we were a little nervous about this new and mysterious respiratory disease that's going after the dogs. 

The disease is dangerous and disconcerting. It's similar to kennel cough, but the cause is unknown thus far. I have heard of no cases diagnosed here in New York yet. Of course, the usual warnings apply, to keep your dog away from places where lots of other dogs congregate -- like the groomer or the boarder or the dog park. Since you can expect a lot of dogs in these places around the holidays, my wife suggested we skip a month. 

So we skipped December. Izzy was not a huge mess when the time came for January's cleaning, but yeah, he was ready, all right. Off we went yesterday for his early-morning appointment.

He dealt with it with his usual combination of love and panic -- I think he loves the groomer but hates the grooming. I picked him up a few hours later and he looked and smelled awesome. Having him riding in the backseat was like having an seventy-pound air freshener. 

Aaaand then there was the mud. 

The mud was neither very deep nor very squishy, but I have one strongly enforced rule: Stay clean for ONE DAMN DAY after I drop serious lettuce on your bath. It meant keeping pup away from the muddy edge of the sidewalk. The advantage I had was that he was too exhausted from the grooming to need a lot of exercise in the afternoon. 

So he's clean; apparently disease-free; my wallet is lighter; and there are no blizzards in the forecast. If you're in the Hudson Valley and your car is musty, I will rent out the fuzzy air freshener at cheap rates. He will even leave dog hair behind to keep the odor alive. 

Act fast: It rained last night and he could get muddy at any moment.

Not dead yet.

And indeed, as posted in this cartoon I put together for Lileks.com's hearty band of Bleatniks last week, I am not dead. 

You had to be there.

Earlier this month I mentioned that I was having trouble with my right ear, something that had last come up in 2018, and at the time the doctor had no diagnosis for me. So it came back, and I got an MRI, and then waited most of the month to see the ear doc again. So, the good news: Not dead, and...

I suppose it's always good to not have a tumor. Except for the suicidal, or those suffering from another mental illness, I can't think of anyone who'd be thrilled to have one. What I have is another of what my wife calls the Irish-type illnesses, things that can ruin your life but not kill you. (Arthritis, sciatica, psoriasis, stuff like that.)

What is it? Well, it seems to be Ménière's disease, a disease of unknown origin that can cause hearing loss. It surprised me, because it also can cause extreme vertigo. I didn't think I had suffered vertigo, but then I remembered that not only have I had vertigo for unknown causes three times in my life, but I had blogged about it the last time it happened -- all the way back in... 2018. That was a banner year. 

Patients with Ménière's have a terrible time with vertigo, not just three attacks over two decades. But my doctor said the condition comes in many flavors, and it's not the same for everyone. 

Still, he's not 100% on the diagnosis. I have to go back next April. Meanwhile, I'll be grateful that it isn't worse than it is, I'll pray the vertigo does not return, and I'll watch out for the salty foods, which can exacerbate the condition. Like I said -- diseases that can ruin your life without killing you. 

Before the bomb dropped.

Soon after September 11, 2001, I was in a supermarket checkout line. I was looking at the cheerful covers of the magazines on display near the register, magazines written and printed and distributed before the attack. I was thinking that they were each a window to a more innocent world we had just left behind forever. 

Here's something funny. 

I got a couple of books out of the library, doing fact-finding research. One of the books hadn't been checked out in some time, I guess, and it looks like the last person to take it out didn't throw away the checkout slip. Maybe the reader had been using it as a bookmark, but if so, he or she got less than halfway through the book. 

There's some hard-core irony at play here. 

Due date: February 21, 2020. Ten days earlier the World Health Organization named the Wu Flu COVID-19, a name that would swiftly become burned in our minds for the rest of our lives -- lives that would also be shortened, in a great many cases. 

A couple of weeks after that due date, Italy would be the first country to initiate a national quarantine. Two days later the WHO would declare COVID-19 a pandemic. By March 21, ten thousand would be dead and the total number of cases about 250,000. And you know the rest. 

"Stuck indoors because of the cold?" Lady, you don't know the half of it. 

This definitely has a little frisson of seeing, say, a "Visit Lovely Pearl Harbor" postcard mailed December 5, 1941, or an "I 💖 NY" postcard mailed September 10, 2001 -- or a poster for the Supernova music festival put up October 1 of this year. A little less so because COVID was a slow-growing catastrophe, but similar in that government intelligence was ineffective prior to the event. Also, in the case of the vicious surprise attacks, the evil was front-loaded. In COVID's case, while I believe the virus was man-made with American funding (using shenanigans to contravene US law about gain-of-function research), I think the release of the virus was accidental. In that case, the evil was back-loaded, with the purposeful wickedness coming later. 

All this leads to a lot of finger-pointing, because there are always people who could have prevented or prepared but were stupid or evil about it. But it also leads to "if only they had known" thinking -- If only you, innocent library patron, had known in February 2020 what was coming your way! And that leads to What's coming our way now that we don't know about? thinking. And that's the worst.

Ooky.

I'm sorry I've been out to lunch -- well, more than usual. Last week was nuts, mostly workwise, but also MRI wise and dogwise (he desperately needing a bath). This week could be just as whacko, but we'll see. 

Meanwhile, we're more than a week into October, about that time that anyone who is going to decorate for Halloween has at least started doing so. Let's see how it's going.

Very festive. The garbage can is a nice touch.

Enter... what? The house? The grave? 
Message unclear.

A jolly pile. But we all know this is a 
repurposed snowman. The factory in China
threw the switch from Christmas to Halloween
and they started to come out like this.

I think I first saw the tall one in 2020, the year of the world's
stupidest pandemic, and thought it ironic that the plague doctor,
one of the scariest looks ever devised, was meant for public safety. 
Well, he's being scary again. He seems to have scared
Pumpkin Child into fainting.  

spoooooookynah

I'll see you tomorrow for Indignant Persons' Day (observed), although probably not to comment on the holiday this year. Brace yourself for -- something different! 

Little Pete.

I was thinking about Little Pete this week; I don't know why. 

He was a nice guy. Older, in his retirement. Little, as the nickname would indicate, maybe five five. Big glasses and slightly wild white hair. Loved his motorcycle. I used to see him occasionally down at the church group I sometimes attended, when my schedule permitted and he wasn't off somewhere exploring the roads of America. I didn't and don't even know his last name. Just one of those guys who was glad to see ya, and was glad to be seen. 

He got very involved in that group, as I recall, going from an occasional newbie to one of the leaders. He even chaired it at some point. I can say that I had been working in Manhattan when he was new, only seeing him on days off; when I was no longer in that job and was able to go more often, he was suddenly an important figure. It was like seeing a kid you hadn't seen in a while -- one day a toddler, next day doing long division. We seem to expect people to stay exactly as they are until we see them again, like toys we put away and then take out of the box years later. "My, how you've changed!" Well, of course, they did. So did we. 

Once again my work situation altered, and I didn't get down there much for a couple of years. The next time I saw him, he too had altered, unfortunately.

Little Pete didn't mind talking about the big black binder he was carrying. It was everything he needed to have with him for his cancer treatment. Test results, medications, appointments, insurance forms, Medicare forms, charts of diet and exercise. He was organized and determined. I don't know what he did before he retired, but if he brought that kind of organization and drive to his job, he must have been successful. He still had a smile, but it was a little more guarded, a little less likely to be seen through the glass of his spectacles. We all prayed for him, of course. 

Some months went by before I saw him again -- same place, same group, same black looseleaf binder. But I noticed, coming in late, that there was a pained look on his face, that there seemed to be a distance between himself and everyone else. They didn't want to cross to him, or know how to, and he seemed unable to connect to them, either. It was like he knew he was being ripped away from everyone, and no one knew what to do except to pretend it was not happening. He just clutched his now-thicker book tighter, like a totem that could make all this go away somehow -- a totem that he didn't believe in anymore, but one he grabbed because he had nothing left to grab. That was the last time I saw him.

Honestly, I don't know for sure what happened. I didn't know whom to ask -- so many members of that group moved away or otherwise left. I don't see any of the regulars anymore. I guess it's been ten years or so now. Maybe he had a miraculous bounce back with one of those new biologics, then moved to Florida to ride his bike all day, every day, summer to winter and back again. I hope so. 

Little Pete -- thanks for being a decent guy. I'm sorry I didn't get to become your friend. I'm sorry we're all so weird about sickness and death, like if we shy away from it, it will look us over. God bless you, wherever you are.   

Angry young meme.

 Just feeling PO'd today. Gah! Grumble! Grrr! Have some memes. 

This one is not real! That we know of.

Sanitized.

Three years ago I was driving my wife's car in Pennsylvania. I stopped to pick up some goods at Walmart. The Chinese Death Flu was riding high at the time. I realized that she had no hand sanitizer in the car, so I grabbed a bottle to keep in the vehicle. I happened to notice it on Friday when I was using her car again. 

Didn't that take me back. Especially the scent, which is strong but pleasant enough for a hand sanitizer. Lavender? I suppose. 

I remembered that trip to the Walmart, how one of the store's exits had been closed off -- which funneled all customers through the same doors and ensured us being closer together at one point at least, but whatever. Also the masks. The arrows in the aisles. The dots on the floor by the register for social distancing. The plastic sheeting everywhere. The special shopping hours. The nitrile gloves, the weird shortages. All of it. All, apparently, for nothing. 

I don't know about you, but I'm not doing it again. 

The news is panicky about a new variant. Screw that. I'm not discounting it entirely -- three friends of mine over the age of 65 just had it. For one it was his third time with COVID, and he's vaxed out the bazooty. But guess what? All of them survived, even the one with severe physical degenerative issues in a long-term care facility. 

The whole mask thing was a bust. That's not just coming from the right-wing press. We know this, and they still want to start all over with it again. Closing the schools was a literal disaster for the kids. Watch what the teachers' unions do next. One thing for sure, it means we won't be allowed to ditch any of the rules for remote voting, the ones that made it so easy to, er, fortify the 2020 election.

I played along last time because we didn't know better, and the ones who did just lied. Also, I am not the kind of guy who believes in taking stands that inconvenience innocent bystanders. Why demand to shop barefaced and force some put-upon store manager to have to deal with me? He has enough on his plate. But I'm not going through that again, not unless the plague is the real deal, wiping out healthy people in the thousands like the Spanish Flu or the Black Death. So the Wuhan labs better cook up something really hot for our next election year. 

Speaking of which, that bottle of hand sanitizer expired in April 2022, long after my patience with the federal government had. And can you guess where it was manufactured?

Communist China: The cause of -- and treatment for? -- all the world's ills. 

It's not that easy bein' meme.

Busy week in the compound, which means it's time for more memes! 

Ah, just kidding -- steal 'em all you want. 

Science and the self.

My wife and I were wondering about a friend who does actual science work in an actual lab with actual mice. I thought he might have a doctorate, but we'd never asked him and he's not the kind to brag. She said maybe not. Maybe a BS?

"You can't just let any old undergraduate go playing with the mice!" I said. 

"It doesn't take a master's degree to play with mice!" she recounted.

"No, but it has to be someone with an actual career! A bachelor's might think the mice are cute and take one home, and then what? Lab leak! Like COVID! You need someone who's really invested in his career, someone whose career, when you have to destroy it, means something!"

I have a lot of jumbled thoughts this morning connected to these things. For example:

1) Our friend is a thoroughly competent guy. He's not omnicompetent like Batman, but he knows what he knows and he acquits himself properly, be it grilling or fantasy football or judging craft beer. He does not know electrical work, for example, so he hires someone who does when a project involves that. So I have to believe he's not the type to let a disease leak from the lab. (Don't worry; he doesn't work in a virology lab anyway.)

2) Anyone who still holds to the ideal that scientists are Vulcans, purely motivated by logic and the greater good, needs to talk to our friend and others like him. The lab is run by scientists, but that doesn't help. There is still plenty of ego, squabbling, and poor administration. 

People are people, and one of the things most people are poor at is being in charge of other people. That's why teaching leadership is a huge industry in itself -- although from what I've seen, the rules of leadership taught usually veer wildly between the obvious and the chest-pounding rah-rah. I've met a few really good supervisors and have come to suspect management is a talent rather than a skill. You can build on a talent by teaching skill, but without the talent there's not that much to go on. Take a bad and tone-deaf singer, give him lots of singing lessons, and you may get a passably competent karaoke-night hero. Think of that as your average manager. 

3) And think of that when you hear about the growth of the administrative state. An organization is not improved by stuffing it to the gills with managers. Despite that, stuff away we do: 

And this is before the COVID cash started to roll in. 

I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation. 

As schools continue to release more troubled snowflakes into the world, confused by the simplest things, short on actual firm knowledge, covered in degrees and debt, large on self-esteem but no genuine self-respect, I expect we will have more regrettable incidents caused by workers with tons of managers but no actual management. 

I hope the next "lab leak" incident will be nothing worse than a common cold. That may be the best we can hope for. 

Viral holiday!

Happy Thanksgiving to all our American readers! And as I mentioned yesterday, even if you're not in America or hate America or whatever, I hope you can still find something good to be grateful for today. 

I hope no one's plans are ruined because of the Chinese Death Virus -- Year #3 of it ruining almost everything, and enabling bad actors to ruin everything else. I'm glad I'm not a Foxconn factory worker in China, where it sounds like they're going through absolute hell with months of lockdowns in the factory. I'd like to point that out to people who despair that a representative government is bad at getting things done -- here you go, here's an example of things getting done in the other kind of government. Good job, Apple! 

So I'm glad I don't live under the ChiComs. 

I'm also grateful that when it came to sickness at Thanksgiving, the worst I can remember starting the day with was a cold. I feel like I had a cold every Thanksgiving when I was a kid, and I probably did. There are more than 200 rhinoviruses that bring us the colds we enjoy, and I guess I had them all by the time I was 12. Of course, my immune system forgot about them as we went along and we had to start all over again. I just remember a lot of car drives on rainy, chilly mornings to Thanksgiving afternoons at relatives' homes, feeling pretty crappy. However, I loved my family, and I loved pie, and I apologize to my family for bringing cold viruses into their homes. 

As to the pie, I regret nothing. 

It was kinda sucky to be sick on the morning of Thanksgiving, but they'd let me nap if necessary and I would rally. Much worse was to be sick day after Thanksgiving because the turkey had salmonella or the baby that was brought over to visit had norovirus. 

Either way, it was good to have the Friday off. 

Sick or not, eating pie or not, I hope you can find some joy, maybe even some fun on this most spiritual of national holidays. We're here, we're not faced with lockdowns or enemies sieging our ports, we're not personally on fire (well, I'm not), and we're able to read wonderful blog posts. Who's got it better than us?

MS KMA.

When I was a kid, the schools were closed on Election Day. They were closed here yesterday. Unfortunately, unlike when I was a kid, I didn’t have the day off, and it was frustrating.

I have three big projects due at the end of the week, and one of them is particularly stressful. It’s for a prestigious publisher, and I did not do my best work for them last time. I may have been sick that week. But that’s not their problem. I got called out for it, and they didn’t send me work for months. I thought I had been moved to the naughty freelancer pile. 

After a nine-month freeze-out I was offered a shot at redemption. I already had a pile of work, but I was determined to restore my reputation. Pride? Certainly. Hubris? Well... Whatever it was, my deadlines turned into a title of a popular movie: Everything Everywhere All at Once.

And then Election Day fell. Which was fine, but I had to go to the polls twice (once to take my wife, because it was unclear that she knew the Secret Backroads Shortcut, and by the way there are two polling places closer to our house than the one to which we have been assigned). Leading up to the second trip, Microsoft decided it was the perfect day to update the laptop.

It is like a pesty salesman. 

Let's do the upgrade now.

I'm busy. Later.

It'd be much better to get this done right away.

Leave me alone.

How about now?

FINE Let's schedule it for tonight.

I set up the schedule to restart at nine o'clock in the evening. Around four thirty, it was time to take the Mrs, to the polls, and Izzy the Baby Dog as well since his attachment has gotten fierce since we lost Tralfaz and we haven't started alone-training again because he has been getting antibiotics and eye drops and eye ointment for blepharitis and conjunctivitis these last two weeks and don't even ask. So we loaded up the truck and we drove past two polling places to the stupid one we have to go to. 

When we got back about 5:30, I found out that Microsoft had apparently decided that it was just going to go ahead without me, since I'd been away from the computer and had probably knocked off for the day. Why wait until nine? I swear, as I woke the screen it asked, should we start now or reschedule? As I reached for the mousepad to stop it, it plunged into update world. OK! Silence is acceptance! Let's go!

Never change, Microsoft.

Eventually I got back to work, but of course I couldn't get as much done as I wanted after all that. Plus, I was hardly in a proper frame of mind. You know what it's like -- you've already gone way past frazzled and are edging up to psychotic when that last thing happens to make you Hulk out. Like, you finally get the dishes in the dishwasher and turn it on, thinking you won't be late for work if the traffic isn't as bad as usual, and then:

I'm not saying it's a suitable time to go William "D-Fens" Foster, but you know you'd start with the dishwasher and somewhere along the line take out the laptop as well. Well, I know I would under those circumstances.

Post-Halloween post.

Yesterday was exhausting, but more for work reasons than Halloween reasons. That said, I do have a short list of post-mortem thoughts on everyone's favorite holiday of mortem. 

Née $100,000 Bar

1) I was good. Well, pretty good. The only official piece of holiday candy was from the 100 Grand fun-size bar. It's still a great candy bar, the chewy caramel nicely offset by the crispy rice. I knew it was originally marketed as the $100,000 Bar, but I didn't know how far the name went back or where it came from. MeTV, where nostalgia is important, tells us that the bar was introduced in 1966. I always figured the name was part of some campaign where Nestlé spent 100 Large to develop the perfect candy bar, but I was wrong. MeTV says,  "After the success of quiz shows in the 1950s, Nestlé came up with the idea to create a candy bar based on those programs. In particular, the company was inspired by The Big Surprise, in which the grand prize was $100,000."

2) We got left with a bunch of candy. Last year in the Post-Chinese Death Virus mania we had so many trick-or-treaters that I had to run out to get more candy, just to find that the store was already stocked with only Christmas candy. I'm sure the kids didn't mind getting candy in Christmas colored wrappers, as long as they didn't think I'd been holding it since 2020. 

This year I overbought. I guess we had between 25 and 30 kiddos, and we were prepared for more than twice that number. It is impossible to estimate properly, at least in this neighborhood.

3) Izzy was pretty good about the doorbell ringing. Last year he was not the only dog in the house, and as long as Tralfaz was not freaked out he was okay to be cool as well. I worried that this year he would be nuts with the kids coming along, but not so much. However, as with Tralfaz and Nipper before him, Izzy went berserk on the lawn, trying to sniff the trails of every kid who had been walking around. 

4) But the real problem here is that Izzy has been sick. He picked up an eye infection, probably at the groomer (that was the vet's figuring). It started in one eye a week ago; we went to the vet and got antibiotics, an anti-inflammatory, and eye drops. It got worse and spread to the other eye by Saturday, so I had to drive him to an animal hospital because although our vet has Saturday hours, they were booked solid. Which ruined all my plans for Saturday, by eating a couple of hours out of the middle of the day. 

But I'm glad I did, because that vet gave him eye ointment. She said eye drops just run out of the eye anyway. Izzy doesn't like the ointment, but he'll tolerate it. He's a good little patient. Very little trouble over pills. He seems to be getting better, but the eyes still look infected. SpoooOOOooky, even.

So those are some thoughts, and if you don't like them, I have others, How was your Halloween? 

Baby name or microbe?

Ming the Merciless, Ruler of Planet Mongo, Invites You to Play a Round of ...

Baby Name or Microbe!

Based your performance on his tests for Prescription Drug or Fictional Planet, you had better really ace this one ... or you shall become Patient Zero in the Evil Testing Ward! Get out your pencil and paper!

BABY NAME or MICROBE?

1. Yersinia

2. Adamaris

3. Wahchinksapa

4. Demodex

5. Walvia

6. Neisseria

7. Helianter

8. Galido

9.  Ibtesam

10. Xalvadora

11. Ascaris

12. Klavdiya

13. Prokaryote

14. Vibrio

15. Quirtsquip

16. Nipah

17. Archaea

18. Spirilla

19. Jyotika

20. Ulises

👶🍼🦠🔬👶🍼🦠🔬

MERCILESS ANSWERS

1. Yersinia: Microbe -- genus of bacteria including Yersinia pestis, the black plague

2. Adamaris: Baby name -- girl's name, means Noble of the Sea per babynames.com (where Ming got all these baby names)

3. Wahchinksapa: Baby name -- Sioux boy's name; means wise

4. Demodex: Microbe -- a microscopic human mite 

5. Walvia: Baby name -- Native American for medicine root

6. Neisseria: Microbe -- genus of bacteria that includes Neisseria meningitidis, which causes (duh) meningitis

7. Helianter: Microbe -- a subgenera of paramecia

8. Galido: Baby name -- Spanish boy's name of unknown origin

9. Ibtesam: Baby name -- Arabic name for girls, meaning smiling

10. Xalvadora: Baby name -- Spanish for Savior (female version)

11. Ascaris: Microbe -- genus of parasite

12. Klavdiya: Baby name -- Russian for lame (girls' name -- even Ming thinks that's cruel)

13. Prokaryote: Microbe -- single-celled organism with no nucleus

14. Vibrio: Microbe -- bacteria in the family Vibrionaceae

15. Quirtsquip: Baby name -- Comanche, meaning chewing elk

16. Nipah: Microbe -- a type of zoonotic virus (from bats), which can cause encephalitis  

17. Archaea: Microbe -- a type of prokaryote

18. Spirilla: Microbe -- bacteria with a spiral shape, found in stagnant water

19. Jyotika: Baby name -- girls' name, Indian for light or flame  

20. Ulises: Baby name -- alternate Latin form of Odysseus (Ulysses); means to hate


MING CALCULATES YOUR SNIVELING SCORE:

20 -- You're either a huge fan of babies or of diseases; either way, wash your hands!

15-19 -- Ming admires your knowledge and offers you a place in his fiendish organization. He offers you a job naming new minions from among the Cave Monsters and testing evil viruses on them.

10-14 -- Ming tells you to study more and has you given a swirlie in the space toilet.

6-9 -- Ming scoffs and tells you to go back to school. He also calls you a double dumbass, which could get him a stern e-mail from HR. Then he has you given a swirlie in the space toilet.

0-5 -- Ming sends you to work in the evil biological warfare lab. You shall have to survive at least five dread diseases to apply for parole, so you had better hope the scientists are doing a poor job. The last guy who got out had permanent barbershop stripes all over him, like a stick of Fruit Stripe Gum. Mwah ah ah! 

I want my DDT.

Just before bedtime the other evening, I noticed something flittering around the kitchen light. At first I thought it was a moth, because that's what moths do. Then I realized it had those skinny legs, like a marionette flying about with its strings cut. 

GAH! Mosquito! 

Just what you want as you're about to go to sleep -- the knowledge that a bloodsucking freak is lurking.

First I tried to slap it silly by smashing my hands together, but it kept getting away and probably thought I was applauding. Fortunately it was staying near the light over the table, so I took a moment to bring in the big guns -- the flyswatter. 

I stalked my prey, my nerves as taut as a divorcee's underwire, as I neared it and -- zing! Slapped it out of the sky. 

"Where did it go?" I said. 

"I think you injured it," my wife said. "It's done for."

"Don't be silly! They're at their most dangerous when they're wounded."

It would be very satisfying if, when you wing one, a mosquito went down in a spiral of smoke and gave off a little explosion when it hit the ground, but that's not the way they work. Instead I had to deal with the uncertainty. Did it survive? Would I get stung in the night? 

The answers appear to be no. Maybe one of the dogs ate it. They'll go after anything on the floor.

All of this leaves one question in my mind: Those who hate DDT and similar bug-killers and buy completely the Rachel Carson schtick always say that in countries where malaria is a deadly menace, mosquito netting is the answer. Do African mosquitos only bite at night? They certainly bite in the daytime here. 

The test.

I've been feeling like crap. Worse than crap. Since Saturday, like day-old crap. My throat hurt. My upper palette felt like I'd been playing the Bonham drum solo from "Moby Dick" on it, and my uvula like Charles Laughton had been kicking it like the bells of Notre Dame. My breath was short. I was itchy all over. Actually, really itchy on my lower abdomen. Some kind of new creeping crud? Roving jock itch? Sounds like the worst Scotsman you could meet. "I be Jock McItch from Clan McItch, and I be roving across this abdomen."

Maybe this stream of thought will demonstrate that I was not sleeping very well, either. 

By fortune, I had been in the drugstore last week and, on a whim, picked up a box of COVID-19 tests. My wife was a little concerned that I might have the Chinese Death Virus, and suggested I take the test. Well, why not? Let's see if the Wuhan Wonders scored another goal against the Americans, shall we?

This was in the drugstore in the seasonal aisle, near the towels and swimsuits and pool toys and whatnot for travel. I doubt you're supposed to show the TSA your negative COVID test to get to your gate, so I suppose we're on the honor system. Still, it's good to know that you're not sick before you leave home. It's bad enough when you get sick at your destination and have to get home that way.

By the way, it's weird how pharmacies used to double as malt shops, but is it any weirder that now they double as baby shopping malls? You can get your meds, makeup, shampoo, milk, chocolate bars, seasonal clothing, greeting cards, toilet paper, and potato chips all in one go. 

Anyway. 

I liked taking the test, because it was like a junior chemist set. 

Better than a pregnancy test, because I didn't have to pee on anything. There was nothing in the instructions against peeing, but I didn't think it would help. On that topic, swishing the swab around my nostrils was rather like cleaning out two tiny little toilet bowls. Satisfying, but disgusting. 

Next the swab goes in the little vial, swishes around there, then the vial drips out into the test strip--exactly three drops. ("Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out.") Then wait 15 minutes. If you look before 15 minutes, you could get a false report; if you wait more than 30, ditto. So this is all very scientific. 

And at last, the results:

No Chinese Death Virus! 

So why have I been feeling so sick? Well, as it turned out, the itch on my abdomen resolved more clearly into three large welts, so I think I was bitten or stung by something poisonous -- one of nature's little bastards, like sweat bees or something -- while I was out with the dogs. I have a sensitivity, if not an outright allergy, to yellowjacket venom, and I wonder if it caused an allergic reaction that has given me allergy-like symptoms (not a closing of the throat as with anaphylaxis, but a mild version, with a sore throat). Or it could just be a damn cold. Those are going around, I hear.

So, I'm slathering up with steroid cream and calamine lotion, taking pseudoephedrine and cough drops and diphenhydramine and lots and lots of coffee, and soldiering on. What more can a man do?

Emergencies: Illness or Dumbness?

I was wondering the other day, after leaving Walmart, whether more visits to emergency rooms are caused by sickness or stupidity. Whether more come from "I'm having trouble breathing" or "Hold my beer."

It's a good question, I think. We like to pretend that all the bad things that come our way are from bad luck or karma or even the malice of others, but a lot of them surely come upon us because we are being dumdums. Just how much does stupidity account for our use of emergency medicine? With a holiday weekend upon us, it seems like a good time to have a look at this.

"How'd he get an M-80
stuck in there?"

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (and let's assume they still have some credibility on these things after Chinese Death Virus) says that of 130 million visits per year, 35 million are injury-related. (Forty percent of us were in the ER, according to this, although some people skew the numbers, either because they are very ill and go multiple times, or because they use the ER as a primary care service). It looks like the regular health emergence far outweigh the accidents.

Of course, if our friends in the health bureaucracy were to weigh in, they might say Nay Nay! That so many of those illnesses were caused by people doing stupid things, like eating fatty foods, drinking, smoking, being sedentary. not getting vaccinated, and so on. Any ER visit resulting in those things must be counted as stupidity! Why, if they were smarter about their health, they might never have to go to the ER at all! 

I guess they'd be right in a way -- eating every meal at Carl Jr.'s, for example, or drinking a handle of vodka a day would be poor choices for someone who wants to be healthy. But it's also no fun to talk about; really, it's anti-fun. Somehow it's a lot more fun to wonder how many people's last words were, "Hey, watch this!"

Just to show that the CDC is a confusing morass, however, in another section they post, "Number of emergency department visits for unintentional injuries: 97.9 million". How did we go from 35 million to 97.9? No answer. But let's leave it there. 

I guess if I wanted to dive deep enough into the stats available to the public, I might find out how many people got hurt doing any of the following:

• Not running from fireworks quickly enough
• Jumping on a rickety ol' trampoline
• Thinking they're still 16 when they're over 50
• Swinging on a rope
• Trying to jump something on a bike
• Dancing too enthusiastically
• Pretending to be a superhero for a kids' party
• Trying to do an amazing feat of dexterity of any kind (no dexterity actually being demonstrated)
• Jumping in a pool without looking to see where the water is
• Standing too close to the piñata whacker 
• Showing playfulness by trying to dance on a table or other object not intended for dance
• Attempting winter sports out of season (and vice versa)
• Playing on the kiddie jungle gym
• Trying to slide across the hood of the car like a TV cop
• Attempting a keg stand when college is waaaay in the rearview mirror
• Parkour at any age

As you can see, many of these items could be accompanied on the police report by "Alcohol was involved." So be careful out there this weekend, folks -- if you bother to read this blog, you're precious to me!