heebie-geebie

Last night:

Here's Rocket, the 10.5 year old dictator Yorkie dog. It's around 5pm and he does not care that Mom is in the bed, recovering from surgery. He and Rutledge the Corgi, are ready to eat.

See that insistent stance? The laser gaze? It was accompanied by hissing which was followed by menacing groans. Eventually there was endless barking until I finally succombed and headed for the kitchen.

Feeling much better this morning, but really really tired.

It was a fast, violent illness. The active phase lasted about four hours for both me and Michael, leaving us weak, nauseated, and utterly exhausted afterward. During those four hours, I actually wished that I would die - and it seemed plausible that I might. Once the active phase was over, it gradually dawned on me that (a) I wasn't going to die, and (b) that was a good thing.

acceberskoorb is the most fabulous person in the whole world. She came over with takeout sushi for Alex, fed both kids, played with them, and helped with their bedtimes. Man, we are lucky to have the friends we do.

I am really tired this morning. Colin did an unusual amount of overnight nursing. I'm guessing that I was dehydrated and not making as much milk as usual, so he had to nurse a lot more.

Puzzle of "November 4": The Light of the Setting Sun.

Puzzle of "November 5": Kites of Sumpango.

I got some comments about the relative risks of H1N1. A few people said that I was missing the point: while we shouldn't stop being worried about meningitis because HIV kills more people, the chart is really saying that we shouldn't get disproportionately worried about meningitis when HIV is killing more people. We shouldn't be disproportionately allocating resources from big problems to small problems.

I disagree.

First, resources. Prevention is cheap. It would be one thing if we were talking about whether to empty a family's bank account to irradiate Mom's breast cancer or bypass Dad's heart but this isn't that kind of situation. Flu shots are $30 over the counter, $20 with insurance, and sometimes free. If flu/H1N1 vaccine production caused shortages of polio or meningitis vaccine that would be a problem, but it isn't. There are more shots than people who want them. The only shortage right now is a shortage of the H1N1 vaccine itself, and that's only because they caught the strain too late to incorporate it into the trivalent seasonal vaccine that you already got. Some areas of health care may be zero sum games, but flu prevention is not one of them.

Second, actions. Not a zero sum game either. Washing my hands, covering my mouth when I cough, and getting vaccinated shouldn't and isn't going to stop me from doing other things I also ought to be doing. Heart disease and car accidents kill more people than influenza, but I don't end up eating a Big Mac or driving drunk because I've "lost" effort resources by getting vaccinated. It's a false choice to pretend that paying attention to one means neglecting the others.

Third, general concern. It's true that we give disproportionate attention to new unknown risks than old well-known risks, as we should. It's is an effective, naturally selected survival strategy. Cavemen talked more about the new tiger in the bushes than droughts and plagues because people needed to know about the new tiger whereas everyone had figured out what they were going to do, drought-and-plague-wise. Modern people started talking about the nine people found strangled in La Crescenta even though hundreds of people died in car accidents during the same time because we'd settled on a strategy for car accidents while the Hillside Strangler was a new thing. I'm not advocating complacency, but there are good reasons to spend disproportionate attention on relatively new and unknown risks instead of old and well-established risks.

Of course we shouldn't pretend that H1N1 is going to kill us all, but there seem to be far fewer people thinking this than people who think people are thinking this. (I'm not helping either, since now I'm alarmed about people who are alarmed about people who are alarmed about H1N1 killing us all.) It's true that there are some irresponsible news sources trying to attract eyeballs and sell fishwrap, but the consensus opinion is that H1N1 really sucks, it is dominating this year's flu season in some areas, it causes more fatalities in young and old people, and you can reduce your chances of spreading it to your high-risk friends if you get vaccinated and keep your well-washed hands out of your eyes nose and mouth. So do that, OK?

Thanks to robzip for sharing this brilliant work of (real) advertising, straight outta Cullman, Alabama:



"My wife's boyfriend broke my jaw with a fencepost."
The making of commercial is even better, trust me. Check it out right here.

Well. Today is the day of random weeping. Maybe it's some kind of emotional rebound response to the events of the past week or even the past year. As long as I don't think, listen to music, watch TV, read or do anything that involves being conscious I'm fine. Otherwise I've got tears running down my face. Hmm. That's not true though because I've woken up crying, presumably over something I dreamed but don't remember.

It will pass. Just a little brain chemistry cathartic storm.

( TMI )

I had just dropped Alex off at school this morning when Michael called and said that he'd been throwing up. I picked him up and brought him home. Felt totally fine through my 10am meeting and 11am research subject and then started to feel ill. Threw up comprehensively. Came home and crawled into bed, feeling incredibly queasy, and discovered that Michael had thrown up an additional six times.

Since then, nausea and a couple of false alarms but no more vomiting for me. Michael is asleep. Nia (our nanny) has to leave now; she's managed to get Colin down for a nap and Alex ensconced in front of a video. But soon Colin will wake up and Alex will need something and I will have to be functional.

Posted a pathetic plea to Facebook for someone to come over later and get dinner for Alex and play with the kids.

Gods help me.

melvin_udall has officially banned me from his journal:

http://melvin-udall.livejournal.com/770032.html

*sigh*

First, reality_hammer bans me, then this. Now I'll never get the chance to convert them to communism make either of them loyal Democrats. :(

Our old, orange friend John Boehner made a special appearance at Michele Bachmann's freak show yesterday and showed his fellow wingnuts just how much the Constitution means to him... by quoting the Declaration of Independence:


Nice work there, chief.

P.S. And then there's this idiot.

Hat-tip Dave Neiwert...

No sooner was the identity of the Fort Hood shooter — Nadal Malik Hasan — released a few hours ago than the wingnuts sprang into predictable action: A jihadi embarking on a murderous terrorism spree!

Pam "Atlas Barks" Geller immediately proclaimed it "an obvious act terrorism" and ran a big, all-cap headline declaring: "IT'S THE JIHAD STUPID." Elsewhere in the right blogosphere, people like the folks at Hot Air jumped all over the "news" that Hasan was a convert to Islam.

Then, Fox News' Shepard Smith interviewed Hasan's cousin, and we found out that the "terrorism" angle was a pile of tripe:

• Hasan was American born and educated, but raised Muslim. He was not a convert.

• He had never previously been deployed to Iraq or anywhere overseas, for that matter. (So much for the theories he suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.)

• He had been awarded the National Defense Service Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and the Army Service Ribbon.

• He was reportedly abused regularly by his colleagues for being Muslim — called a "raghead" and other such terms — and had been seeking to get out of the military because the environment had become so hostile.

Another interview (on just before this one) that Smith had with a former colleague of Hasan's indicated that Hasan was prone to making outrageous remarks about Muslims "defending themselves," particularly in reference to last summer's shooting of two military recruiters in Arkansas by a Muslim convert. There are also reports that he had recently been the victim of a hate crime: His car was vandalized, with the word "Allah" scratched into the paint, and he was reportedly extremely upset by it.

It's obviously a terribly complicated and tragic story, and we'd all be well-advised to reserve speculation (and anti-Muslim fervor) as the actual, hard facts continue to emerge.

And no, it's not the Jihad, stupid.

Now that I'm over the exhaustion of pollworking, and over the bout of IBS I've been de-spooned by for the past week-and-a-half, I'm playing catchup with GoodBook (and puzzle). So this is Tuesday's Puzzle, today! More later.

Spiralling Eggward. PS watergal, fish are involved.*g*

Texas Polygamist found GUILTY in SEX ASSAULT ON A CHILD.

One down, 10 more to go. Assholes. Not in my state, brother. The State has amassed a ton of evidence and the FLDS has just been stupid - they keep thinking they're in Utah with all of their relatives. HA HA, SUCKERS.

Can I just put this out here? I loathe "girl-geared" products. Pink tools! Yay, I couldn't even BEGIN to know how to drill a hole without my cutie patootie pink drill! It's pink because I'm a lady, and that's a lady color! Blech. I also loathe the cutification of words, too. I know some of y'all are into it, and that's fine, just know that it makes me crazy. "Prezzie." "Hubby." It's a PRESENT. And that is your HUSBAND. Oh, I'm sorry, that's your mother? Well, she looks like a man. Especially with that full beard. And penis.

I'm losing my mind today, in other words. OH MY GOD. I have rewritten this freaking prologue and Chpt. 1 so many times I just want to spit and stomp on it. BAH. If only my laptop was pink with gamboling kittens on it, it would be so much easier. Sigh. Math is hard. (MY BRAIN IS FRIED. I'm just not going to make sense to the vast majority of you, it can't be helped.)

I had the worst glass of wine on Halloween. Like, pour yourself a glass of rubbing alcohol, top it off with some formaldehyde and cherry juice. I took one sip, ACTUALLY POINTED OFF IN THE DISTANCE SO SOMEONE WOULD LOOK AWAY, and dumped my wine out on the grass, then FAKED LIKE I CHUGGED IT. That happened. In real life. My life is a living sitcom, is what I'm saying. Next up: a very special episode when my daughter gets her period! Or is that when my son brings a homeless man home on Christmas so we all can Learn Something About Compassion? If I was writing that episode, we'd kill him, roll him for whatever change he'd collected, then have a good laugh about how life can be sticky at times. Like our hands.

I got off on a tangent there. I meant to add that I've not been able to drink any wine since. And that makes me sad because I like a glass of vino with dinner. And breakfast, but it's only for the anti-oxidants.

SAVE ME. From myself, true. Nonetheless, I don't wanna look at this same document any more today, BAH.

Oh yeah! I do get to tape another audition tomorrow, and I plan on having Christopher Walken do a schpiel about how the Deer Hunter is actually "hilarious." [It's for an outdoor product store.]

the greater part of all the mischief in the world arises from the fact that men do not sufficiently understand their own aims - Goethe



I'm so excited to bake cookies and bring them to the record store and play Cranium! Also, this weekend looks promising.

"Why don't you care about..." is an bogus argument that bugs me. Here's how it usually works:

Me: "I'd like to stop American prisoners from being waterboarded."
Them: "Four American prisoners have been documented as being waterboarded. Why don't you care about the 800 prisoners in Guantanamo?"
Me: "OK, I'd like to stop the Guantanamo prisoners from being held in extrajudicial detention."
Them: "There are only 800 prisoners. Why don't you care about the tens of thousands of Americans wrongfully incarcerated by crooked judges on bad evidence?"
Me: "OK, I'd like to review our court systems to prevent miscarriages of justice."
Them: "There are far worse miscarriages of justice going on in other countries. Why don't you care about the prisoners of China, North Korea, or Iran?"

You can play this maddening shell game forever. For every bad thing you can name there's always a bad thing that's even worse, unless of course the problem becomes so big that it becomes difficult to consider solving. "Why don't you care about..." is a wet blanket that I'm getting very tired of.

For example I've seen this infographic in a few places contrasting H1N1 to various other causes of death. The facts and figures that the graph presents are not an argument, but it's most often presented as evidence that shouldn't worry about influenza generally or H1N1 specifically because the ~5800 deaths (H1N1 so far) or 36,000 deaths (influenza generally) are not very many compared to even bigger killers like HIV, cancer, and heart disease.



So what? It's not like we shouldn't get vaccinated against H1N1 just because regular influenza killed more people last year, any more than we should avoid the regular vaccine just because hepatitis killed more people last year, any more than we should avoid the hepatitis vaccine because meningitis killed more people last year, any more than we should avoid the meningitis vaccine because HIV killed more people last year, any more than we should avoid wearing condoms and washing needles because heart disease killed more people last year. It's the same stupid wet blanket "why don't you care about..." shell game. The only conclusion to be drawn from the above chart is "we should take reasonable and prudent measures to avoid the many things in this world that can kill you".

Not to mention it's a gross oversimplification. H1N1 might not kill you but it really sucks. Rattlesnakes, herpes, breaking your arm, or guinea worm might not kill you either but those things really suck too. One should not identify and avoid the one thing in the world that sucks the most, but take reasonable precautions to avoid things that suck.

My house was built on land that was formerly owned by a paper mill company and as such was heavily planted with the scruffy pine trees which grow well here in the FL Panhandle. The trees aren't pretty and in tropical storm or hurricane winds or even a big thunderstorm, they sway and snap and branches go flying. My yard is littered with debris every time it rains.

Today twenty-seven tall, skinny pines are coming down to make room for more attractive, substantial trees that are less likely to wind up poking out of the roof of my home. I'm amazed at how efficiently the crew is getting this done. Having the skill set and the correct tools makes all the difference. Once they're done cutting down and hauling off the trees to be milled into lumbar the stump grinder guys will do their part. We'll still have several adolescent oak trees and the tulip poplar we planted out front and now the way is clear for putting in the big, gnarly olive tree we love.
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Recovery from surgery is progressing along nicely. I'm sore and swollen but grateful that I don't have to go anywhere or do anything but get well. Ellie went home yesterday so now it's me and the doggeroos hanging out together, mostly in the bedroom. They think it's great. I managed to get myself in and out of the compression garment of doom and have a soak in the whirlpool tub. Ah BLISS. I had been showering in the garment because for the first week it's difficult to get back on once you take it off. It starts under the bust line and goes to mid calf. Zippers and hook and eye closures on both sides of the front from the top to the mid thigh and crotchless but not in any kind of sexy way. I am smoothly unmoving for at least a couple more weeks.

Aren't you glad you have me to tell you about this stuff?
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I am one much loved and well taken care of woman. Jeff, the world's best son in law, just called and is bringing me a BBQ'd chicken from Kinfolks. Yum!

File under "Shattered Glass Houses"...


Paraphrasing:

"Prejean demanded more than a million dollars during her settlement negotiations with Miss California USA Pageant officials. That is, until the lawyer for the Pageant showed Carrie an extremely graphic home video of her 'handiwork.' TMZ obtained the video months ago but decided not to post it because it was so racy. Let's just say, Carrie has a promising solo career.

"We're told it took about 15 seconds for Carrie to jettison her demand and essentially walk away with nothing."

It never ends with these people, does it?

Milestones I could do without: baby's first injury involving blood.

He fell over and bit the inside of his lip with his brand-new teeth, so it's not a serious injury. But blood is never fun to see.

( Comments Welcome )