Category Society

Press or Say…

Michael 5 Comments

I had such a variety of topics to pick this week, but to make a long story short, I had a killer phone call with an insurance company that deserves to be talked about. That’s right – an insurance company. Who  would have thought that anybody, anywhere, ever  would come away from a phone call with an insurance company and feel good about it

In general, insurance companies’ phone systems and auto-attendants are designed by the progeny of the Marquis de Sade. Everybody has gone through the drill at least once. Everybody who has insurance. You call the number and get a robotic message similar to this.

“Thank you for calling the Incredibly Misleading Insurance Company, your one stop for home, health, life, auto, renters, business, boat, builders, boat builders, long term care, after care, personal liability, personal property, and accident insurance. To continue un English, press one, para continuar en español presione dos, lietuviams stumti trečiąjį numerį, bizning o’zbekcha to’rtni bosing versiyasi uchun, moun ki pale kreyòl ayisyen peze nimewo senk lan, att höra dessa instruktioner i svensk press sex, aŭ se vi estas unu el la ĉirkaŭ tri homoj, kiuj efektive parolas Esperanton, elektu la numeron sep.”

Your make your selection and in a reasonable facsimile of the language you selected you get the following instructions

“To give you the absolute best in class service please make your selections from the following, but please listen to all options carefully because we changed this from the last time you called.
Press or say 1 to pay your bill
Press or say 2 to get your current balance due and pay your bill
Press or say 3 to hear outstanding claims and pay your bill
Press or say 4 to hear policy options and pay your bill
2 + 2 5 (3)          Press or say 5 to change add or change your policy or increase your policy limits and pay your bill
Press or say 6 to file a claim and pay the new higher premium we will assess you as soon as you press or say 6
Press or say 7 to request a copy of your policy or proof of coverage, pay the service charge for said copy and then pay your bill
Press or say 8 to hear these options again in a different order
Press or say 9 to (hehe) speak with a representative [chuckle]”

Naturally you need to speak to a representative or you would have used the website to conduct your business so you press or say 9, and you are told by the friendly cyborg:

“In order to serve you more efficiently please enter your 43 digit account number, 78 character alpha-numeric policy number, the last eight digits of your Social Security Number, your billing zip code, the number you are calling from, and the first three digits of your childhood pediatrician’s office street address.”

Surprisingly you manage to enter all the required information and the cheerful android tells you:

“In order that I transfer you to the representative to help you best, please tell me what type of assistance your need. Press or say 1 to pay your bill…”

…and on and on.

If you’re lucky, you remember that if you press 0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0 you will be immediately transferred to some unprepared service representative and you might get some satisfaction to the problem responsible for the call to begin with before they put you on “a brief hold” and you are cut off.

But today, I called my medical insurance carrier, specifically myMedicare supplement insurance carrier. And I got the following (the names are changed because I don’t want them to know I’m blabbing this all over the universe):

“Thank you for calling the We Really Do Care Insurance Company. I see you are calling from [repeats my number]. If this is [states my name], press 1, if not, press 2, en espanol, numero tres.”

I press 1.

“Thank you. How can we help you today? You can say “pay my bill,” “track a claim,” “ask a policy question,” or “speak to a representative.””

I said “Speak to a representative,” and in about 20 seconds a cheerful human voice answered. “Hi this is Friendly Frieda. The computer told me who you are but before I continue, please confirm your billing ZIP code.” I did that and in a little over 5 minutes I had all my business transacted. Whew!

That’s it. No drama. No rant. Maybe next week.

It’s time to shoot up again

Michael 4 Comments

There’s so much happening in the world, in the country in the state and I can’t do anything about it. Really, I’ve tried and the world/country/state hasn’t budged. But I can do something about me, for me, and help the world/country/etc/etc/etc at the same time. I can see it in your eyes! You know where I’m going!! Yes, you are 100% right. I’m going to get a flu shot. Much more fun than getting the flu. Trust me, I’ve had both. I was going to write a whole new post about flu shots but I’ve already done did that a dozen times or so, so I reached back to 2016 and pulled this one out. It’s still good stuff. Then after you read it, go get your flu shot. It’s about that time again!

Just Shoot Me

(From October 24, 2016, slightly edited to remove unnecessarily big words)

I’ve been shot. I suppose it was about 10 days ago now. I got my flu shot. I can probably count on one hand the number of years I didn’t get a flu shot all the way back to when I can remember doctors keeping lollipops on their desks for the good boys and girls who got their flu shots.

For years I worked in a hospital and getting a flu shot was just something you did every year. It went along with doing annual evaluations, decorating for Halloween, and renewing your parking permit. Everyone grumbled about it but everyone did it.flu

Now that I’m not working I have to remind myself to get a flu shot. And while I was busy reminding myself I thought I’d remind you. Get your flu shot.  If you are a southern hemisphere resident hold that thought for 6 months.

I never understood people who would come up with a dozen different reasons not to get a flu shot when it’s so effective at preventing the flu and when getting the flu can be so devastating. No, you won’t get the flu from the flu shot. You can’t get the flu from a flu shot any more than a zombie will eat your brains. The virus in the flu shot is dead – even more dead than an undead zombie. It can’t come back to life and infect you. What can happen is that you can get a cold or a fall allergy or a seasonal bacterial sinus or respiratory infection at the same time you get the flu shot but it’s not the flu.

You can get the flu in the same year that you get the flu shot if you don’t get it at the right time. Now is the right time. The flu shot doesn’t start working the instant the needle pierces your skin. It takes about two weeks for the vaccine to work its magic on your immune system so it is at its peak in protecting you against a live flu infection. You should schedule your shot about a month before the anticipated beginning of the flu season. If you wait too long to get a flu shot and you are exposed to the flu virus before your body can adequately prepare enough antibodies to repel an assault you can get the flu. The high dose version of the flu shot may provide effective resistance a bit sooner but should not be used as an option to timely inoculation.

You can also get the flu late in the season even if you got a flu shot if the circulating viruses mutate more quickly than expected and if your immune system is weakened by age or compromised by other diseases or conditions. For individuals with compromised immune systems the flu vaccine should be active for about six months. If you have weakened immune system and the active flu season in your area is expected to last past March or April you might consider asking your physician if you should repeat the flu shot six months after your initial vaccination.

Sorry if this post sounded too much like a public service announcement. It’s probably just a result of those years I spent in public service

A change in the air

Michael 5 Comments

Once upon a time they lived happily ever after (1)Yesterday was first day of Autumn. Or today. Today is the first full day of Autumn.  The distinction is most likely only important to whichever weather person was on air yesterday versus who is on air today. Either yesterday or today you must have noticed the difference when you woke up? The trees are now covered with bright colorful leaves, pumpkins are lining all the by-ways, there’s a smell of warm apple cider in the air, and that air is decidedly cooler than it was yesterday with decidedly fewer daylight hours. Well, maybe not quite. In truth there isn’t much difference between summer and fall if yesterday and tomorrow are the comparisons. If you’re in the Southern Hemisphere, just read this paragraph backwards. There’s not much change between the last day of Winter and the first of Spring either. Seasons just don’t change that quickly.

In truth, any change seldom happens quickly, but it happens. And it happens inexorably. Things you barely notice from day to day add up so over time the change becomes monumental. Take yourself for example. You likely are not noticeably different than you were yesterday, maybe not from last week, perhaps even barely noticeably different from last year. But compared to five years ago, ten years, twenty years…the change is remarkable.

Something that rarely changes is our desire not to change. Almost everybody prefers the familiarity of now to the point they would choose a future to be no different than the now. Except now. Our “now” is taking a great toll on us. It is a hard now that we’d gladly change for calmer times. Unfortunately, those calmer times may come with their own set of peril. To me, Eden is the fictional town of Mayfield were the Cleavers raised their two sons, a few miles from Bryant Park where Uncle Charlie helped Steve Douglass raise his three sons, which isn’t so far from the Springfield were Jim Anderson knew best how he and Margaret would raise their two daughters bookended around their only son. Springfield barely changed from week to week yet somehow, it’s unrecognizable now when Homer and Marge struggle with their brood. I’d rather live in the Springfield of the fifties, the Mayfield or Bryant Park of the sixties, than the 21st century Springfield or any other model community even if it meant living in a politically incorrect time of two genders, people advancing on merit, family values, and inter-generational respect.

So, now you’re going to ask, what about segregation, marginalization, anti-Semitism, homophobia, the Cold War, and inner-city gangs? So, now I will ask you, why are all those still going on? Last week a young man in a Pittsburgh, PA suburb shot three people at a baby shower, for his expected child by the way, over an argument of who would transport the gifts from the venue to the home. Over 4500 Asian hate crimes were reported in the first seven months of 2021. In one week in May 2021, the Anti-Defamation League found more than 17,000 tweets using variations of the phrase “Hitler was right.” Violent crimes against the marginalized group of hearing, visually, and physically challenged persons are more than double for non-challenged males and over three times as prevalent against women versus their non-challenged counterpart. Just last month, the Associated Price reported that a parent barged into his daughter’s elementary school in Northern California and punched a teacher in the face, sending him to an emergency room, over mask rules. So, I ask those who say my idyll is a paradise for only the privileged white male, how they would like to respond to these.

Ah yes, there is a change in the air. If we could only tell which way the wind will blow next.

Just suppose…

Michael 8 Comments

Hang on kids, the ride is about to leave the station!  I wouldn’t have to rant so much and so often if humans, well, if Americans weren’t so gosh-darned stupid. I seriously mean that, and I mean all of them, even me sometimes (but not as often as every other single person in the country).  I warn you right now, I’ve started this three times. This is, believe it or not(!), the least offensive version I can manage. Hey, somethings are just plain offensive, and no amount of whitewash or orange hair dye can cover them.

Let’s say you own an art studio. You may not be the best artist in the world, but you know what you like, you’ve done this for a while, and you’re reasonably good at it. But you can’t be everywhere your art is, so you hire a representative to, well, to represent you. For some reason, that representative who said at his/her/its job interview that it/she/he was 385% behind you, working for you 29 hours a day 11 days a week 62 weeks a year, now decides he/she/it has his/her/its own ideas and it/she/he will do whatever she/he/it damn well, sorry, darn well  feels like and right now that is promoting its/her/his own brand of bathtub gin. Now after a couple years of not only not selling any of your art pieces, but not even knowing or bothering to learn anything about your art, it/she/he comes to you promising to be 873% behind you 59 hours a day 1112 days of the year, sign it him or her up for another 2 year stretch and you won’t regret it. And guess what? You do! Dumbass!

Now let’s say you fell out of a tree and broke your arm. Your arm is clearly broken. There’s bone sticking out and blood pouring from the hole it made in you. Your losing blood fast and you have time to make only one phone call for help before you pass out. You choices are: 911, the local EMS non-emergency number, the nice doctor who lives across the street, the kid who works at the grocery store and restocks the first aid supplies, the hospital emergency room, your insurance company, and the representative who hasn’t sold any of your paintings even though you just rehired her/it/him and gave it/him/her a raise.  So who do you turn to? Why naturally, you pick the deadbeat representative, the one who has no connection with health or medicine, even a connection as tenuous as the one who at least works with first aid supplies. Dumbass!!

Now as long as we’re supposing, let’s suppose you have a youngster, a kiddo, a small person hanging around your house who vaguely looks like you. And let’s say that child of yours is 8 or 9 years old and this young person wants to play football, so you send this young person off to play football. Why not? This young person did last year and had no problem. You bought this young person the very best equipment that credit could buy including a wonderfully decorated helmet and this young person stayed safe all season long. So this year when this young person wants to play football again you say “sure darn tootin’ you can!” and you send this young person off to play football! But… there’s always a but and some are big and dumb …but, you’ve been ready Facetokgramditter and saw that the bath tub gin swilling art representative say there’s no scientific proof that football helmets protect football players, even this your person size and age football players, and it fact it makes it harder to play football and violates the first 17 amendments to the Constitution and that goes double for anybody who ever already got hurt playing football because now those people have built up an immunity to injuries and probably won’t even need to wear seatbelts in the car on the way to the game.  So you happily send your young person off to play football with a sign to carry in front of the field that says, “No More Helmets,” “My Head Can’t Breathe,” and “Students Stand Up Against Tyranny.” Dumbass!!!

dumbassNow let’s suppose one last thing. Let’s suppose this is all a bad dream, there are no bathtub gin swilling art representatives, we let medical professionals make medical decisions, we don’t pretend to know what’s best for anybody, and we certainly don’t force kids to walk into dangerous situations just because. Did you think we can suppose that everyone cooperates like we did last 16 months ago, because last I looked, we’re about in the same boat as 16 months ago. No I don’t suppose we can. That’s why I just got my third COVID shot. Thank you. Bunch of dumbasses.

That’s it. The rant is over. See you next week.

Shoot the messenger

Michael Leave a comment

You might think from the title of this post that I’m getting ready to set on a rant about those demonstrating for or against the gripe of the week, and sometimes both, but no, those aren’t the messengers who are annoying me this week even though their messages are annoying as anything. I’m getting ready to rant about messages more than messengers, text messages, and in particular, group text messages. Although…there are messengers who initiate those group messages so, yes, let’s rant about them too.

Do you remember when email was “new” and about once a week the office manager, HR VP, sometimes the company president, would send an email around that said, “Do not ‘Reply All’ when answering group emails,” which was particularly good advice if your reply was “what a bozo move that is!” to whatever directive the email contained.

Actually, that still goes on in the companies that communicate by email. But as the world has grown faster and more impatient to the point that many are finding email to be too slow. More and more messengers are turning to text messages. Everybody carries cell phones now. Nearly everybody’s cell phones are smart phones (many smarter than their owners) so sharing documents, spreadsheets, internet links, and images are no more difficult that doing so by email. And people look at their phones. Emailers are not unaware that the “efficient business experts” have long suggested that to not be tired to one’s email, establish email hours and check inboxes at specific and limited times. Immediate email responses are things of the past. Ah, but text messages. Everybody reads texts as soon as they pop in. They could be something important like a happy hour invitation or a link to a cat video.

Although it is possible to reply to just the sender of a group text message, that takes an extra step and only the most fastidious recipient turned responder might be willing to take the extra step, Otherwise, reply all is the default and the default routinely is taken. Back in the good old days of emails, although the occasional reply all snuck through, most recipients never had to bother taking care to choose the correct reply option because they didn’t intend to reply at all. It was an age when if you didn’t have anything to say, you didn’t have to say anything. But that doesn’t work with text messages. Oh no, if you get a text, you will send a text. It’s only right they must think. And so everybody knows who among them thinks “what a bozo move that is” and what everybody else thinks at 10 or 12 second intervals even if all they think is “OK” or “Thx!” or 👍.

So don’t be a bozo, or even just move like one. Keep your group responses to yourself. Or at least only to the sender. OK? Thx! 👍. 🙂

Once upon a time they lived happily ever after

What’s your hurry?

Michael 7 Comments

[If you are reading this in your email, especially on a mobile device, the formatting may be a little wonky. It might be better in the browser. Just saying.]

Pull up a chair and don’t go anywhere. This is going to be short and sweet and I would hate for you to miss it. Short short – few words, lots of pictures. Well… three at least, maybe 4.

So now, today is August 26. We’re barely back in school, Labor Day is still 11 days away, Grandparents Day is the following Sunday, and then on October 11 we celebrate what we used to be content to call Columbus Day but now the name changes depending on who the Twitterati feel like honoring that year. The point is, there are three holidays between now and the annual fall excuse for pretend adults to get drunk while the kiddies OD on snack size chocolate bars, but those bars have been out along with décor, decorations, and orange and black barware.

You will notice the date on this actual screen shot is July 13 when there had already been enough ads released to do a comparison to find the best sales for this Halloween

Well, we’re used to Halloween candy hitting the grocery store shelves as soon as the Easter candy is put on clearance so that’s not so shocking. How about this one.

It happens every year, earlier and earlier, those dreaded three little words: Welcome back, pumpkin. Yes, it’s here and yes, that is the actual date and time it was on my scream, I mean screen.

Okay, I did say, it happens every year, so what’s to get excited about over a little pumpkin. How about a little turkey, as in Thanksgiving turkey as in…

… or should I have said as in Black Friday Eve turkey. Yes, Black Friday news is out. If you can’t read that posting date I’ll tell you it says

Thursday,19th August 2021 at 11:24am.

[Sigh]

So what else could there be on this the 26th of August, surely not, no, it can’t be. That’s four months! Is it possible?

Oh yeah, baby, it’s possible. How did I start? We’re barely back in school, Labor Day is still 11 days away.

That’s all I got. You can go now. But then, what’s your rush?

Happy Today!

Michael 4 Comments

When was the last time you woke up and said, “Today is going to be the best day in my life!”? Although there are no scientific studies to back it up, there is a pretty good chance it wasn’t today. With that in mind, here is a completely unscientific poll:

Which of the following is a wish for a special day
a.  Have a good day
b.  Good morning
c.  Happy birthday
d.  Have a great day
e.  All of the above
If you answered e. All of the above you’re likely on your way to a great day and maybe it is going to be the best day of your life!

Why can’t every day be special? Let’s rephrase that. Why, every day can be a special! It’s time to ditch the idea of “Have a nice day” as platitude and get back to really meaning it. Have a nice day and its close relative Have a good day, had appeared in print as far back as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (“”And hoom wente every man the righte way, there was namoore but ‘Fare wel, have a good day'”) and was a friendly but serious way of closing communications between air traffic controllers and pilots through the early days of jet travel. It wasn’t until the 1970s when Americans began associated the phrase with the soon to be ubiquitous smiley face that those words were stripped of their happiness and joy, when in fact, each day should be one of happiness and joy. We are allotted only so many days. And according to recent reports, Americans can expect less of them. Earlier this year, the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics reported American life expectancy dropped from 78.8 years in 2019 to 77.3 years in 2020.  It cannot all be blamed on COVID. Life expectancy in the United States has been declining since 2014.

Undoubtedly there are a variety of reasons for this decline. One thing that is rarely mentioned is that happiness and longevity go together. Ten of the 20 countries with the longest reported life expectancies are also ten of the top 20 countries ranked as the world’s happiest in the 2020 World Happiness Report conducted by the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network. It may not be the most formal research, but it appears it you want to live long, you have a better chance at it if you’re living it happily. And how do you make live a happy life. Make every day special.

Each day, over 150,000 people spend their last day on earth. It is estimated that only about 2/3 of those people die of age-related complications and one can make the argument that 1 out of every 3 people who die don’t expect it. Almost everybody who has survived a life-threatening event acknowledges the specialness of each day. To them every day of their new life is a gift. You should not have to have been threatened with the loss of future days to recognize each day’s presence as exceptional. Nor should a day need a special event for it to be special. Every day is exceptional and each day is an event in its own right.

2 + 2 5 (2)Fred Rogers knew about special days. He closed each episode of his Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood television show with “You’ve made this day a special day, by just your being you. There’s no person in the whole world like you, and I like you just the way you are.” There was no question that he meant it and that every day was special to him.  In a 2019 Los Angeles Times interview, his widow Joanne said, “People invariably say, ‘Well, I can’t do that, but I sure do admire him. I would love to do it.’ Well, you can do it. I’m convinced there are lots of Fred Rogerses out there.” Fred Rogers made everyone feel special because he genuinely cared for people and was not afraid to express it.

if you search “How to make someone feel special.” on the Internet, you will find, “Bring them chocolate, write them a note, give them your full attention, surprise them with a gift.” None of the returns say, “Be honest and genuine with everyone you meet, don’t be mean, treat everyone with respect, make everyone leave feeling good about having been with you.”

To make others feel special you need only show genuine them concern and respect. We uplift each other while we can, because there is no guarantee of a tomorrow. “You’ve made this day a special day, by just your being you.” It’s time to celebrate this special day, today!

Things I think I think

Michael 5 Comments

Now that I’ve had my fill of ranting for a while here, it’s time to catch up on some thing that have been floating around in my brain and make some room up there for future ramblings.

thumbnail_IMG_0599Have you ever tried to grow a tree from an avocado pit? Let me rephrase that, have you never tried to grow a tree from an avocado pit? I think that’s required in “Things to do in your first adult kitchen 101.” I tried and sort of even succeeded. Sort of. For a while I had an actual tree. It stood about 5 feet tall but was only as big around as a school pencil. Unfortunately, not quite as sturdy. My latest experiment was “let’s grow a pineapple plant from the crown of one.” (The things we did while locked in.) A year later I have not just one, but two.  I wonder if this is how Dole got started.

I recently ranted over the increasing number of loaded guns brought to airport security. The most common excuse for such behavior was “Duh, I forgets I was packing a rod.” I found a story about another feller who forgot he was carrying a loaded weapon. This guy brought his gun not the airport but to his bathroom. As he dropped his pants to drop into the seat, the gun dropped out of his pocket into the floor and went off, sending the bullet through the bathroom floor which doubled as the bathroom ceiling to the apartment below where it met the hand of another young man, unarmed but now not unharmed. You can’t blame the gun guy. There have been alligator sightings in the area and you never know when one might pop up anywhere there is water. (My conjecture, not his explanation. He said he forgot it was in his pocket. Yeah, right.)

Service with aAre there any grandfather clock aficionado out there? I have a contemporary long case that has travelled with me now through three homes and resided in multiple places at each. The years have been kinder to the case than the movement. It is still in great shape, shapewise, but it runs late. Not slow. Late. It keeps a 60 minute hour today as good as the day it was uncrated but little by little it has developed its unique peculiarity of chiming the hour late. We’re now up to 5 minutes late. It’s not unusual for a guest when hearing the chime to comment, “Oh it’s x o’clock, no wait, I have 5 after. Your clock is slow,” and I respond, “No, it’s not slow, it’s late.” It has taken 20 years for the chime to be out of sync by 5 minutes. (Out of synch?) An optimist would note that in another 220 years, it will work its way around and be right on time.

Just two rants ago I questioned what could be more valuable than your own child in response to Consumers Union’s suggestion that until all manufacturers put warning devices to alert to unforgotten children locked in the back of hot cars, one should put something of value there that you would not likely forget. For one young father around here last week, that should have been tacos. Apparently, the good lad had a hankering for tacos. Not just any tacos, he wanted the kind available only at the local casino. There he parked his car, left his children behind just to run in and place the order, then decided he might as well wait for that order sitting in front of a slot machine instead of in front of his steering wheel. Security cameras caught his elation at hitting a jackpot about the same time they caught his kids waiting alone in the car. No word on how long the tacos were waiting.

Okay, sharp witted readers may have inferred that I implied this post might be rant-free, yet 50% was rant-like. Let’s call it rank-lite. Hey, I’m making progress!

Vaccines, Star Trek, and Fluorescent Lights

Michael 2 Comments

I promise you, this will be my last rant for a while. Even I’m getting tired of listening to myself. Fortunately, I wrote this, waited a day, read it, then re-wrote and it isn’t actually quite so abrasive as its first incarnation.

I think a new rant is justified because stupid has really taken hold of the reins and we need to get this wagon back on track. (Did you like the horse and buggy metaphor? I don’t think I’ve used that one here.) (Anyway…)

Anyway, what got me thinking was another news article, this one that a group of shoppers was mounting a boycott of a local supermarket deigning to require all employees and shoppers to wear masks beginning this Friday. This group is taking some unusual “justifications” for their actions. Not only does a mask requirement infringe upon their rights (you remember those, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of fabric-free faces), but that the CDC calling for masks in high transmission areas of the country is “proof” that the vaccine doesn’t work. Well to that I say horse hockey!

Yes, you heard me right. Horse Hockey!

First of all, considering the meteoric rise of COVID deaths and hospitalizations are near exclusively among unvaccinated individuals speaks to the effectiveness of the vaccines. And that there have been some positive cases among vaccinated individuals and the notice that it is indeed possible for vaccinated people to spread the disease is not news among those who understand immunology at least as well as they do Tic-Toc.

Not Vaccinated Section (5)Try to picture this in your mind. Vaccines do not create a force field around you. This is not like in Star Trek. “Shields up, Mr. Sulu.” Even if it was, when do you ever see an episode when the shields weren’t breached, at least even a little bit? “I’m givin’ ‘em all wee got Cap’n, but I doona know how long thar’ll hold!” No, the vaccines are more like the incessant hum of a poorly grounded fluorescent light. You (or in this case the virus) goes into the room, plans on getting comfortable, switches on the light, and after hanging out for as long as you can take, you are driven out screaming, half crazed by the sensory assault. Before you went in the room you thought you found you happy spot. So you go on in but when you turn on the light, the room responds by making it so unlivable you are driven out.

Not Vaccinated Section (4)Vaccines work like those lights. They can’t keep the virus from entering you. Viruses are out there hanging around, looking for a happy place to settle in. They see those big nostril openings and buzz on in. (Note: make sure masks cover noses.) Their presence trips the sensor that turns on the immune system which drives the little buggers out. So you see, the vaccine doesn’t keep you from getting the virus. It keeps you from getting sick from the virus. That explains why 99+% of the people in the US now sick and dying from COVID are unvaccinated. And that also explains why a vaccinated individual can test positive for COVID when they swab the inside of the nasal passages.

PowertoProtect_1080x1080_FB-IGNow, here is something un-ranty. (Un-rantish?) (Un-rantlike?) August is Vaccine Awareness Month. It was founded by National Public Health Information Coalition nearly 10 years ago so it’s not something new just to trick you into getting the COVID vaccine. Remember my older posts. The first vaccine was developed in 1784. This is not new science. Do you part. Go get your vaccines. Already did? Wear a mask!

Okay, that’s it for now. Next week I promise promise promise I’ll be happier.

Uncommon Sense

Michael 3 Comments

The past few weeks have sorely tested my patience I wish everybody would go out and invest in some self-help books that include how to recapture some common freaking sense. Let’s start.

It’s summertime in the good old U. S. of A. which means, even in the absence of global warming, it gets hot. Glass amplifies heat. An enclosed space holds heat. Things inside hot enclosed spaces cook. And that’s how Jordan Mott came up with the oven in 1490 (minus the glass – that’s a bonus). Because we know it doesn’t count unless it happened in America, we can fast forward to 1882 when Thomas Ahern worked out the details for an electric oven. Granted, he was Canadian but that’s as close as we’re going to get unless you want to count the first person who fried an egg on the hood of a car. That had to be a “real” American, and that gets us to cars, hot cars, hot car interiors on hot summer days. There have been such a spate of kids being cooked in the back seats of cars – again. The government is mandating that by 2025 all auto manufacturers to put in systems that display and sound warning messages to check the back seat for Junior and Fido when you shut off your car. If you aren’t lucky enough to have one of the cars that already have such a warning and/or until you do, they suggest you put “something of value” in the back seat so you don’t forget your kid. Duh! Is it just me or is there nothing anybody owns more valuable than their own child? That was an honest to gosh, news piece just within the last week on most major news outlets. Don’t forget your kid, put something of value in the back with them.”

While we’re on the subject of kids, in June in a small Pennsylvania airport, the TSA confiscated a loaded handgun – in a baby stroller! According to a report on TSA.gov, “The man said that when he and his girlfriend take their dogs and child for a walk that he keeps his loaded gun in the rear stroller pocket and forgot to remove it when they came to catch their flight.” I call bull-doodoo! If you’re taking a baby on a plane with a stroller you are using every cubic inch of that to add carryon volume. And where in H-E-Double Toothpicks is this guy walking that he needs to carry a loaded gun with him when he’s out with his pseudo-family? Let’s stay with guns in airports for a while, even though I ranted about this before. Also, from TSA.gov, “Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers detected twice as many firearms per million passengers screened at airport security checkpoints nationwide in 2020 compared to 2019, and at a significantly higher rate than any other year since the agency’s inception.” A total of 3,257 guns were confiscated from passengers carry them on their persons or in their carry-on bags, and about 83 percent of them were loaded. Those figures didn’t include the number of guns confiscated because they were improperly packed in checked baggage, or toy and BB guns. All while people on planes are beating each other up for taking too much of the shared armrest or [shudder] being compelled to wear a mask.

And now that the delta variant has bloomed in the US to where masking might become more routine again, I figure something in August I get to write this post all over again with a new set of “can you believe this” tales.

Patience. Please give me patience.

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