sat mar 7
Will somebody please tell me when the Chiquita banana lady went rogue?
mon mar 16
It is the middle of March, and I haven’t blogged a word. I’ve been doing a lot of programming, and it seems that blogging and programming just don’t go together.
But today, I took the day off, because most of what I’ve been working on .. works. And I wanted to savor the feeling.
I’m getting to the point where I need to launch an actual, physical ping pong ball across the table. (I know that sounds pretty basic, but there’s been … a lot of prep involved.) This morning’s project was to see what I could do on a zero dollar budget, using parts on-hand:
wed mar 18
I had to have a tooth pulled last year because it kept getting infected, and they told me that the one on the other side wasn’t much better. So I wasn’t too surprised when it started hurting the other day. “Keep it as clean as you can,” I told myself. Sooner or later, I’m gonna lose it.
Well keeping it clean didn’t keep it from getting quite a bit worse last week, and I couldn’t help noticing a few other “issues” during the same time frame: A little more than a bit of IBS. A rash on the wrist. A sore spot on my tongue. Maybe even a touch of fever …. Naturally, I got to thinking … what if it’s corona virus? Wow! Wouldn’t that be cool! First on my block!
But that’s impossible. I live a hermit’s life in my basement. My circle of friends is small.
On the other hand, I touch my face a lot, and I rode a motorcycle all the way around the country in August.
We just got word that the dentist has closed for the duration, so ‘just a sore tooth’ doesn’t sound much better than CV.
But really. What if it’s that bad? What if worst comes to worst?
I have to admit: I’m excited to find out, and a part of me has been rooting for the virus.
What, you say? That’s sick!
I know. It is. I agree. I’m not real excited about 200 million deaths either, but as long as it’s on the table, then let’s look for a silver lining:
Social security is suddenly solvent.
There’ll be plenty of affordable housing.
We’ll get a big break on global warming.
And maybe the anti-vax-ers will pipe down.
Hmmm. Not much of a silver lining, is it?
Between Trump, global warming, and all the cans we’ve been kicking down the road, maybe the CV is just the reset that we, as a society, need.
I’m not a religious man, but the timing is mighty suspicious.
Sat mar 21.
I was walking my daily walk when a woman walking her dog walked by, and her dog walked over to sniff my butt.
“Good boy!” I told him, and I shook his paw.
What is the world coming to when it’s better to shake your neighbor’s dog’s paw than to shake your neighbor’s hand.
This being the end of the world and all, I stumbled upon a ‘toilet paper calculator’ in a respectable publication and, being somewhat of a potty humorist myself, I ran the numbers. The average American, it turns out, goes through 2 rolls per week. Results may vary. I happen to know exactly how much TP I go through, and it’s less than a tenth of two rolls per week.
At least on paper.
fri mar 27.
Wow. The CV has changed the world overnight.
I’m hearing a lot about trying not to catch it, and about how awful or how mild it is once you’ve got it, but nobody is talking about the survivors. Immune and non-carriers.
In nice round numbers, let’s assume 0.1% of us are gonna die. That’s 300,000 people.
So we fast forward to the steepest part of ‘the curve,’ at about 50,000 deaths. At that point, there will be 50 million field-immunized, healthy people out there, raring to get back to work. I predict civil disobedience.
tue mar 31
It’s always interesting, at the end of the month, to look back and see what was on my mind a few weeks ago. And to see how much that’s changed.
Mary has kept it going at work and is taking more ‘time off.’ So far so good.
My own life is barely changed. Still working on the same projects. Still holing up in the shop.
People used to poke fun at me for wearing dark socks with shorts. Until Kobe started doing it.
People used to poke fun at me for social distancing, and now everyone’s doing it.
For my next trick: I’m going to stay alive. Do it.
The weather says it’s spring but somehow, Spring isn’t in the air.