The First Rule of Blogging

The first rule of blogging is that there are no rules about blogging.  Blogs don’t have to be long, or short, or funny, or serious, or, as I recently discovered, about what you were going to make one about.

I’ve been assembling one in my mind for several days.  It was going to be all about man’s inhumanity to man, and how, even in the holiday period, people still seem to go out of their way to screw someone else over for lazy or selfish reasons.  Then I got THE FLU.  Now I understand what SavortheFolly was talking about on her site, hot flashes, cold spells, weak, can’t concentrate…..

I originally started this blog over a week ago and got as far as concentrate, above and then did or didn’t do something, and lost the 800/900 words that followed.  I couldn’t post that little bit without the hook and punchline, and I couldn’t figure out how to get it back.  Not terribly technically savvy at the best of times, the flu just made things exponentially worse.  I did learn that the first rule of blogging is really, “Learn to run the platform, so that s**t like that doesn’t happen again.”

I mentioned to the wife that I was unusually weak, and couldn’t concentrate enough to do the Inhumanity one, and she said, just do one about getting the flu.  A spark of genius, but I was in no condition for it to be mine.

First of all, the wife is in charge of getting colds and flu at our house.  She already suffers from fibromyalgia, which can render her weak and sore.  If some guy in Hong Kong sneezes, she’s in bed for two weeks.  I don’t get sick!  If she passes something on to me, I have a little k’choo, and twelve hours later I’m as normal as I ever am.  I lost two consecutive days of work, forty years ago.  She’s never seen me SICK since.

I can’t talk logic to an emotional wife.  It’s just the flu.  I don’t normally get it this bad, but I’ll be over it in two weeks.  Yeah, right!  She drags me off to the clinic, where she finds that she has a bacterial cold, for which the doctor gives her medication.  I, on the other hand, have a case of viral flu, for which they can and will do nothing.  Take a week off and call us if you die.

My dad used to say, about bad infections like this, that there would be a couple of days when you were afraid that you were going to die, followed by a couple more, where you were afraid you wouldn’t.  This is now officially a zombie blog, because I’m pretty sure I died and came back to life.

I have a much more accurately empathetic understanding of what the wife goes through 4 or 5 times a winter.  I couldn’t believe the lethargy and sleepiness.  If the house was on fire and I didn’t have to reach too far for a phone, I’d have to call someone to come and drag me out of my chair and rescue me.  Just getting up to go pee was a five-minute project.

The aches and pains meant that I wasn’t sleeping well, at a time when I needed more sleep than usual to combat the infection.  When I needed to sleep, I NEEDED TO SLEEP.  I could be reading a newspaper, or trying to have a conversation with someone, and suddenly just have to lie on the couch for a nap.  I would be wrestling Morpheus and dead to the world before my head hit the cushion.  Could be twenty minutes, could be two or three hours.

One of the strange symptoms of this flu was hypersensitivity on parts of my body.  One of my cats reached over to touch my side, to get my attention.  No claws, just petting me as I might pet him, and I thought that he had beat me with a leather belt.

I’d gained about ten pounds since I retired two years ago.  The only plus I see to this flu attack, is that I have no interest in food and too little strength to chase down even a couple of pieces of toast.  I could stand to lose some more, and what I’ve lost will probably come back, but two weeks of flu have lost me ten pounds of weight.

As I told the wife, it’s been another week and I feel better.  Like the guy in the  Benylin TV ad, I’m not better, but I feel better.  I’ve finally woke up both the hamsters in my head and got them facing in the same direction on that little wheel.  This morning I had two coherent thoughts in a row.

What a whiny little personal rant this has been.  If you don’t get colds and flu, you are now congratulating yourself.  If you do get them this bad, at least you are reassured that others also get them as bad, support in discomfort.

Thanx for reading, and I hope to have something a little more intellectual and less depressing in a couple more days.

Beauty vs Brains

Obviously, that title doesn’t refer to me.  If a Mama bear got a good look at me, she’d abandon her cub. And, even if I could get both the hamsters in my head on the little wheel at the same time, I’d still only be able to outwit a clothespin, one of the push-on type, those spring-clip ones are wily.

Damn!  Did I just date myself?  Just lost the young crowd.  What’s a clothespin Dad?  My tablet can’t find it.

Maybe it’s a function of growing up poor.  I just have no ego when it comes to dressing to go out.  Wifely translation; You’re just a grubby old man that I’m ashamed to be seen with in public.  Clean and neat, I can see, but not Dressing Up, to go to the supermarket, or pharmacy.  A polo shirt, a pair of black jeans and a pair of boots – I’m ready to go.

Conversation with wife;

Her; You’re not going out in that, are you?

Me; Damned right I am!

Her; What if we run into (pick one, or all A. The President B. The Pope C. The Queen of England D. Somebody else who I don’t give a shit about their opinion about how I dress.)

Me; If they say something shitty about my clothes, I’ll tell them to go F**k themselves.

This means we don’t leave the house for a week, because she is convinced that a priest is lurking just around the corner of the garage, waiting to jump out, point at me and laugh.

If you don’t want me to wear this shirt, don’t hang it up in the closet.  I/we have a pile of secondary shirts which never leave the house.  I suffer from congenital body tremors which are increasing with age, especially in the right arm and hand.  I drop more food on myself than I used to.  I wear those special shirts just to eat in.  The good ones I wear in rotation.

Across the street from our favorite grocery store, is a lovely little specialty shop named Eurofoods.  It is what it says.  Imported food from all over Europe, specializing in Polish.  Just as you enter the store, there is a 50 foot long deli counter, stretching from front to back.  Pre-cooked stuff like cabbage rolls and soup, all kinds of wieners and wursts, hams and luncheon meats for slicing, schnitzel, pork roasts, stew meat, ground beef and dozens of kinds of cheeses.

Protocol has been that, as you enter, you stand in line until one of the clerks looks you in the eye, and says, “May I help you?”  Then you proceed down the counter.  Apparently there were those who didn’t feel that they should have to stand in line and just marched over to the section of the counter which contained whatever they wanted, and started giving directions to the clerk who was already serving someone else.  Some customers objected – strongly.  I heard that there were a couple of “spirited discussions.”

The owner decided to put in one of those number-ticket spitters, to prevent further problems.  Since about the first of October, there have been signs saying, “As of November 7/2011, you will be required to take a ticket to receive service at the deli counter.”  There is an outer door and an inner door, and there is one of these signs on each of them  Now, had it been me, I would have placed this infernal device at the left end of the counter, immediately adjacent to the door.  It sits, instead, at the middle of the counter.  On the counter, by the door, is an 8 1/2 by 11 sign, big, black block letters, “Take a number”, and three large red arrows.  Ten or twelve feet further down is another, identical sign, pointing to the Bingo machine.

I had told the wife about the new system but she doesn’t get out a lot.  A recent visit was the first time she’d seen the new system in action.  I stood her in line, walked 20/25 feet down the counter, took a number, and walked back to join her.  Then I expressed my opinion about how silly it was to put the machine in the center, and make you walk all the way down, and then, all the way back, to stand in line.  Suddenly, the woman two places ahead of us, got out of line, walked down and got a ticket, and walked back, and stood in the same spot she just left.

I was all for letting the law of survival of the fittest prevail.  The clerk would have called out, Number 43, and I would have stepped forward and said, “That’s me.”  I don’t know what got into the wife that day.  Usually she is quiet and non-confrontational.  Perhaps it was the way this woman swaggered back into line.  Maybe it was the aura of entitlement that she gave off.  Even then the wife wasn’t loud or nasty, she just firmly stated, My number’s ahead of you.–But I vas here first.–My number’s ahead of you.–But I have stood in line.–My number’s ahead of you.  So she left her coveted spot and went to stand behind the man who came in behind me, and took a number.

And then the bitching started.  I have trouble taking information out of ambient noise, but I got things like Rude people, Have no respect, D’ey’re just pushy.  Well! that got my dandruff up.  In a loud clear voice, which carried out to the loading dock I said, “Dear me!  I am really sorry that you didn’t bother to read the signs and obey the rules.  I feel so badly that I may cry.  Oh, boo hoo.”  Suddenly it got much quieter.

Perhaps one of the things that helped set the wife off, was the level of dress on the pseudo-contessa, that went with the swagger and entitlement.  A pair of shoes worth a week of my wages, a dress that would have paid to feed a family in India for six months, a fur-trimmed, wool stole with a cameo holding it together, a silver necklace with amber.  If the watch on the left wrist wasn’t a lady’s Rolex, it was trying hard to convince us it was, the right wrist had silver bracelets and bangles, gold and silver rings on about 11 fingers, two pair of diamond(?) ear-studs.  Her coiffure was immaculate, not a hair out of place.  Her make-up looked like a professional had been paid to apply it and, if it was the same salon operator, she had a retirement fund going, just doing the nails.  All this gorgeousness to pick up pickled pig’s knuckles and sauerkraut at a Polish market?  Get thee behind me Satan, and next time, take a number.

After all this drama had played itself out, and peace and tranquility had returned to our little corner market, the old man in front of me, who is now next in line, walked over to the machine and took a number.  The clerk said Number 43.  I stepped forward with a smile on my face and never looked back at the train wreck.