I Know, I Know

I said I wasn't gonna go out again until after my upcoming spine surgery recovery BUT I needed dental floss and cupcakes...dammit!

Jen and I hit CVS first where, despite copious signage blaring out that masks are REQUIRED, there was a man, walking directly at me with a naked face. Naturally, I dove to the side in an attempt to get six+ feet of distance between us.

Next we stopped at the bakery where everyone was masked up BUT social distancing was a half-assed dealio. Again there was a person walking straight toward me – I had to totally hotfoot it to get out of her path. She stopped, threw some words at me and moved on. Was she pissed that I chose to protect myself? Dunno. Jen said the woman laughed and said "You didn't need to run away."

Oh yes, honey, I did. I may not be the queen of immunocompromised kingdom but I'm, sure as fuck, up there in the goddamn throne room. PLUS, I have no idea how careful this oblivious and hypersensitive twat AND her family may or may not be. So, six feet back, bitch!

Eventually, impatience from waiting in what felt like a long line, (because of the distancing), overcame most of the customers and there was a surge to the counter. That was it for me, I set down my purchases and went out to the car.

Fuck this shit – I didn't need cake that badly!

Jen stayed, keeping as much space between her and the pastry-mad shoppers, and got me a slice of carrot cake. YES, Jen is angelic and I don't deserve her. I'm well aware, thenkyewveddymuch!

Know what else I saw as I tried to get out of the bakery plague-free? One of the bakers brought out a tray of goodies to slide into one of the display cases. He was wearing a mask BUT it was only covering his mouth –NOT his nose. FFS mon ami, this ain't rocket science – in order to protect others (as much as possible) the damn mask goes OVER the nose, mouth AND chin. Sheesh!
 
Ya know, this is Massachusetts. Our Governor, while Republican, is not a complete dimwit BUT, despite 290 new cases and 17 deaths on July 3rd alone, the state's entering phase three tomorrow. The NYTimes Coronavirus Map and Case Count page shows a rise in cases here.

Of course it does. Humans – give us an inch of room and we'll grab that up to an acre+ in minutes.

Fer instance, on June 18th, Michigan was one of just three states on track to contain the plague. And then yesterday, a bunch of I'm-gonna-live-forever COVIDiots went full metal death cult at a Fourth of July party.

Between this and my experiences in the pharmacy and Fratelli's, all I can say is – we're not, as a species, bright enough to survive.

Always and inevitably, everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
~ Carlo M. Cipolla

Eeyore City

The Amazing Bob hated July 4th – the fireworks triggered his parting gift from Viet Nam – PTSD. He always spent the day in his study, listening to Louis Armstrong, reading and writing poetry.

Seems appropriate, I suppose, that on this day, four years ago at 6:15 PM, TAB died.

Normally, I get the fuck outta town – chase some distraction action – so I don’t dissolve into sobbing puddles of gloomy melancholia. Last year, Ten and I motored up to Cindy and Giovanni’s magical piece of paradise in upstate Vermont. The previous year, Jen, Oni and I were gallery hopping in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The first anniversary was spent museuming in the Berkshires.

This year? Ten’s out West and Plague45 makes travel dangerously, stupidly ill-advised. What’s a grieving widow to do? Jen and I drove down to Nantasket where I’d hoped to capture some brill dawn color and light BUT no dice. The day’s weather is mirroring my mood – deeply overcast, a little rainy and grey.

I’ll get through today – I seem to have made a habit of this survival shit.

But Wait, There's More!

There’s a new version of the virus in town and it spreads three to NINE times faster than the old plague.

The new version seems to multiply faster in the upper respiratory tract -- the nose, sinuses and throat -- which would explain why it passes around more easily, the researchers said.

But tests on 1,000 hospitalized coronavirus patients in Britain showed those infected with the new version did not fare any worse than those who caught the original strain.
~~~
"The increase in G614 frequency often continues well after stay-at-home orders are in place and past the subsequent two-week incubation period," they added. (source)

What does this mean for the vaccine? Is all the research and testing done to date unusable? The science folks are looking into all that.

"There are potential consequences for the vaccines. We are actively investigating those possible consequences," Montefiore said.

Joy.

And in insane Republican Governor news:

The Baker-Polito Administration today announced that on July 6, Phase III of the Commonwealth’s reopening plan will begin and updates on gatherings will be in effect. For the City of Boston, Phase III and the gatherings order will take effect on Monday, July 13.
~~~
The following businesses will be eligible to reopen in Step One of Phase III, subject to industry-specific rules concerning capacity and operations:

• Movie theaters and outdoor performance venues;
• Museums, cultural and historical sites;
• Fitness centers and health clubs;
• Certain indoor recreational activities with low potential for contact;
• Professional sports teams, under the authority of league-wide rules, may hold games without spectators (source)

Yeah…NO. Here in Massachusetts, there were 261 new Trump Plague cases on Wednesday and 28 fresh deaths. On Tuesday, June 30th there were 114 new cases – no one died of Plague45 that day though.

We’re certainly doing better than in mid-April (on 4/15 there were 1,755 new cases and 151 deaths) BUT is Massachusetts doing well enough that I can safely go to the Y? The MFA? Is it safe to catch a matinee of The Invisible Man?

I’m not betting on it and I’m not gonna chance it. Especially not after seeing all those vids and news reports of fit throwing, entitled, brain dead Barbies. I live in VERY blue Mass BUT there are self obsessed, dimwitted bozos and twats everywhere.

I saw that Texas Governor Greg Abbott FINALLY came around and has mandated masks. Will Texans don the cloth coverings after all this time of played down virus severity and lukewarm safety suggestions? Some will, some won’t. Abbott’s attempting to shut the barn door on the bull that stampeded out four months ago. Yur a little late to the Prevent the Spread Party, Greg!

I have friends and relatives in Texas – I hope they’re all staying home.

Nebraska’s idiot Governor Pete (masks? We don’t need no fucking masks!) Ricketts, an obvious Treasonweasel sycophant, has threatened to withhold federal coronavirus aid to localities that do impose mask mandates. Yeah, that boy’s half a planet away from being AOK in la cabeza.

How do these fecal beaned toads get elected?

Not Yet Friday Funnies

It’s like this, I was up most of the night coughing. Yeah, big fun. All I’m in the mood for this morning is good news – stories where bad actors are stomped.

One of these welcome tales is of Permit Karen in Montclair, New Jersey. (emphasis by me)

Susan, aka "Permit Karen,” came onto our property three times within thirty minutes to demand to know if we had the proper permit to install a stone patio in our backyard, on the other side of the fence of her yard. When asked if a permit was required by law, she said she didn’t know, but insisted we answer her questions and submit to her demands, or she would call the police to force us to stop improving our home. (A permit is not required in Montclair for a stone patio this size. This fact was known to us through our own independent research, our contractor and later verified when building and safety arrived at our home to investigate her complaint.) When challenged about her flawed legal conclusions, assumption of right, her lack of agency over our home and our eventual demand that she leave our property immediately, Susan decided to call the police and make a false report of assault. (source) 

So Twatzilla decides that a black couple (they’re lawyers – Karen’s fucked) should answer to her and get her permission to put in a nice stone patio IN THEIR OWN BACKYARD. When he wouldn’t submit to her bizarre demands, she called the cops and LIED, saying that the husband "pushed her" off their property.

How’d this play out? The rest of the neighbors all came out in support of the black couple. Later there was a small-ish protest march AND Twatzilla got scolded by at least one neighbor for not wearing a mask.

No one was brutalized or died as a result of this idiot woman’s entitled-ass hissy fit.

“I tie this to times right after slavery and Jim Crow and apartheid in South Africa,” Fareed (one of the harassed and threatened homeowners) said. “This concept of ‘Where are your papers?' Prove your legitimacy to me. ... So her coming and demanding our papers, demanding our permits, is just a complete iteration. It’s a badge of the institution of slavery.” (source) 

Thank the little baby Bast for cell phone video/cameras and awesome, stand up neighbors! Also, if Karen's got any friends, one of em ought to clue her in that it's 2020 now, not 1920. Ya know, word to the decidedly UNwise and shit.

An aside: I saw a meme suggesting that the epithet Karen should be replaced with Ivanka. Works for me!

Another funny – apparently Vanilla Ice (does anyone remember this no talent, clown-ass idiot) is going to do a concert in Texas on the fourth of July. Why? I suppose his 23 fans won’t have trouble with social distancing unless the show’s held, more appropriately, in a gas station shit house.

Also, TBogg and friends skewer the astoundingly dimwitted, pearl clutching, over the top drama mama-ing trumper, Scott Adams. You might know him from the badly drawn but, on rare occasion, amusing comic strip Dilbert. Yep, the boy’s a delusional bin-brain who should probably be checked daily to make sure he’s not flushed himself down the toilet (thus damaging a perfectly nice piece of porcelain).

As long as I’m stuck inside, I may as well have some derisive laughs at the stupid fucks who put 45 and his band of obscenely callous and corrupt Republi/Fascists in office. Ya know?

Just What I Needed

We’ve made it halfway through this wretchedly banjaxed year. Will we survive the next six months? Who knows?

Now that I’m due for even more slice and dice, I’ll be staying inside ‘cept for my early morning walkies with Jen. Yes Massachusetts is doing/has done well in battling the Trump Plague but I’m taking no bloody chances. No more trips to the grocery, pharmacy OR even my beloved Fratellis.

I emailed with the fabulous Doc Coumans yesterday and YES, that IS a second rat bastardly tumor just two vertebra south of the one that’s putting the squeeze on my spinal cord. The only reason NOT to DQ that sucker now, now, NOW rather than later is this one’s not proved to be a fast grower…YET.

I could opt for a waiting/watching approach which’d make next month’s incision relatively tiny and the recovery process, presumably, less painful. Sounds lovely, no? Yes BUT this second fucker’s gonna have to come out someday anyway – maybe not ’til next summer, maybe sooner. Only Floyd  (yes, I named him) really knows.

The good Doc has left the decision (to snatch Floyd now or later) in my hands.

Here’s the big neon thing – this coming November I’ll be back to dealing with the assholian tumors in ma tête and Bast knows what that’ll involve. Also, who knows what the plague’s gonna look like in the next year and how MGHLand will be effected. Will we be dancing the apocalypse boogie by then or what?

I need to get ahead of these monster hell blobs now. Strike while the meningiomas are hot and surgery is easy to come by…and shit. Yes, I’m opting for the, potentially, more painful route BUT you can’t win if you don’t play and I’m gonna win. Goddammit.

I’ll email Coumans with my decision this morning.

Meanwhile, it’s Wednesday here in Valhalla. Takeout grub and teevee night. Jen and I just discovered a new cool show – The Order.

Out to avenge his mother's death, a college student pledges a secret order and lands in a war between werewolves and practitioners of dark magic. (source)

Less than intellectually challenging? Oh, fuck yeah, but it’s fun, creepy, engaging escapism.

Just What I Needed – The Cars

Spine Fun

My fabola spine guy, Doc Jean-Valery Coumans

It's the questions we can't answer that teach us the most. They teach us how to think. If you give a man an answer, all he gains is a little fact. But give him a question and he'll look for his own answers.
~ Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear

I met my ace back cutter yesterday morning. I’m on the schedge now for first berth Friday morning, August 7th. My understanding, from our convo, is that the incision will be half the size of my last spine fry up – 4” (more of less) versus 8." This means less post op screaming pain.

Stands to reason AND I motherfucking HOPE.

This is ducky as all hell BUT I just noticed, located two vertebra down from the soon to be gone, chubbed up rat bastard, another dastardly meningioma. If I’m IDing this blob correctly, should it come out now as well? Wouldn’t it save time and effort to snip that fucker out now versus, possibly, next year?

Yes, if this is a thing, my incision will be longer, recovery harder and more painful but, SHEESH, been there/done that – I can visit that hellscape again. I’d just like to get as many of these little monsters outta me bod as I can – sooner the better.

I wish I’d noticed blob #2 while in the office yesterday BUT I can always email the office today. This is why I like looking at my actual films. I can see the weasel-fucking tumors, get a good sense of my internal geography, ask a zillion questions and gain understanding.

Grokking the landscape, knowing the sitch is calming. Despite the fact that I rarely achieve it, calm is cool. I like calm.

All That Randomness

It’s Monday. I survived the anniversary of The Amazing Bob’ first death. Yes, the weekend was a down and teary one BUT I’m on the other side. Today I meet my back surgeon to talk about my blooming thoracic tumor garden and, later this week – on July 4th, is the fourth anniversary of TAB’s final way too fucking early and I’m-TOTALLY-NOT-cool-with-this demise.

I’m buckled up. I’m ready. I’m keeping in mind that I gotta just experience my emotions in real time – feel what I feel. Stuffing them down, putting on a “happy” face is self destructive and stupid. Why? The unpretty fee-fees are gonna come out anyway. Better to be aware of them, have the rage, excruciating pain and do my ugly crying here at home rather than in line at Trader Joe’s, eh?
~~~
I only mention it but, shouldn’t Russia offering Afghan militants bounties to off U.S. soldiers be bigger news? 45 has known SINCE March and has done nothing but kiss Putin’s ass. No increased sanctions, no slap on the wrist, nada. First the Incompetent in Chief denied being briefed. This morning I read that the Maybellined Treasonweasel shit-tweeted that he wasn’t told because the intel wasn’t deemed credible. 

Yeah sure, Spanky. What’s lightyears away from credible is YOU. Everyone knows, your renfields and dimmest fanbois excepted, that if your mouth is open, you’re lying.
 ~~~

The moment that an artist takes notice of what other people want, and tries to supply the demand, he ceases to be an artist, and becomes a dull or an amusing craftsman, an honest or a dishonest tradesman. He has no further claim to be considered as an artist.
~ Oscar Wilde

The best part about being an “amusing artisan” is that you can, to one degree or another, support yourself with your art. That’s something I’ve never really attempted.

Why not?

A) My shit’s quirky and doesn’t have wide appeal – I know that. Dunno that I’m an “artist” but I’m def not an “amusing artisan.”
B) I didn’t have start up cash, a cabbage cushion from which rent, wine and cookie bills could be paid.
C) I suck gigantic Bantha wang at self-promotion.
D) I NEEDED a regular health insurance providing gig...duh.

~~~

The Broken Column – Frida Kahlo

For some there is no music
No lights
No fire
No untamed madness that breathes life
There is work
Anguish
Frustration
Rage
Despair
A dullness that rings like wooden thunder
~ Henry Rollins

I got no music but I have lights, (camera, action) fire and untamed madness so, ya know, I’m good.

Alright, I have angst, frustrations and red hot anger too but I’m not so big on the despair front. Warum? Despair’s a non-starter. Despair is a pool of warm, thick molasses that swamps you in gloom. Despair doesn’t move the ball downfield and I’m headed for the motherfucking goalposts, mes amis.

I WILL survive this next spine slice up and I WILL motherfucking  thrive. Fuck man, if Frida Kahlo can paint through her pain so, the fuck, can I!

Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it.
~ W. Somerset Maugham

Right on, Bill!

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

I have been mostly dull lately. Like a butter knife. And hoping to find, when called upon, something more in my arsenal than a butter knife. Unless my opponent is actually butter. Then that would be fine. Room temperature butter.
~ Bill Callahan, Letters to Emma Bowlcut

I have become the world’s most boring person. It’s TRUE. All I do is have neurosurgeries, take walks, do PT exercises, read, paint and spend WAY too much time on Twitter and Shoutyface. Christ almighty, I’m considering watching teevee just to add some excitement to my life.

Sometimes, the Brightest Smile,
Has the Dullest Story.
~ Somya Kedia

Yes…well…this is true but the opposite isn’t something to lay money on either. Ya know, a scowl doesn't mean there's an interesting tale in the wings. Honestly, take Prez Russian Doormat, (PLEASE!) – that freeze dried, rat excrement, pizza brain is nothing but sneers and glowering frowny faces. I doubt he’s got even one interesting, engaging, let alone selfless anecdote in his tiny, corrupt bean.

Eternity is not the inexhaustible sum of all the centuries, quite the contrary —it must surely be this absence of time. Absolute calm (which can be more than a little dull!).
~ José Eduardo Agualusa, Nação Crioula

I’d take calm with a fat side of dullness right now. I meet my spine surgeon tomorrow at noon. Just in time too. My upper back and neck have begun screeching at me at top volume: “HEY TWATZILLA, get these tumors removed STAT – we’re in some motherfucking pain! Dig?”

When will my surgery go down? //shrugs// Hopefully I'll find out tomorrow though, with all the Plague related juggling, I expect it'll take a few days to fit me and my wonk-ass bod into the OR schedge.

THIS on top of the daily, horror show news. I feel damn lucky to live in Massachusetts where masks are required attire for shop entree. I keep reading and seeing these clips on Twitter of insanely twat-ish people who refuse to consider the health of their fellow humans. Nope, it’s ALL fucking about them and their delicate convenience.

side note: YES, I'm deaf so I can't hear the Karens and Brads whinge on with their I'M-the-REAL-victim wankage. There's no closed captioning either BUT the body language tells me everything I need to know.

I don’t wish Plague45 on them – that their lungs become enflamed and fluid filled and their breathing becomes a total fucking challenge. I don’t thrill to the idea of their liver and kidneys crapping out OR them descending into septic shock. IF these self obsessed dimwits DO contract Trump’s Disease and survive, I would hope they’re not riddled with heart and blood vessel damage. Having said that, after witnessing the tantrums, I really don’t give a good goddamn whether these guppy brained imbeciles contract their Dear Leader’s hoax virus or not.

Thoughts and prayers, assholes. Thoughts and prayers.

Down here on the Neck, I don’t often see masked bikers, runners or walkers.Though this is in no way a rural area, it’s pretty easy to stay 6+ feet apart.

In conclusion, like I said, zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!