Daily Inflammation

That’s the title of a Survival Guide by Michelle Singletary, a syndicated columnist for the Washington Post who writes the award-winning column The Color of Money.  

The crisis hit my bank account when I retired but I didn’t make any significant changes.  Now a few years into it I think it’s time to start making strategic moves before we show up on one of our kid’s doorstep seeking shelter.  I read the book and my transformation has been amazing.  Following the wisdom contained in these pages has freed me from financial fear; broken the shackles of salary slavery; prompted my moving on from money mayhem.  (Good writing is such hard work!).  I want to liberate you in the same way so let me share a golden nugget of financial wisdom found in these pages.

Page 55: 
Question:  Where should I keep my emergency and “life happens” funds?
Answer:     “I suggest you keep your emergency or ‘life happens’ funds in a bank or credit union.”     Who would have thought?  I immediately opened a savings account and an amazing thing happened.  I started sleeping better because not only was my money safe but my mattress was no longer lumpy.

Thanks Michelle!  And since you are so obviously talented in the self-help genre here are a few suggestions for more subjects you can tackle for those of us in need of guidance with the more mundane situations:

• Milk in your fridge past the sell-by date? To sniff or not to sniff.
• Gas needle nearing empty, don’t panic!
• The Millennial Conundrum: Get a job or move back in with Mom and Dad? (Spoiler Alert: Move home, of course!)
• Schrödinger’s Cat Litter:  Toilet paper or flushable wipes?

Coming to a bookstore or Amazon soon, we hope!

1958 was a great year for music.  In that year David Seville gave us the magic Ting Tang words for us to use to win the hearts of our dream girls in The Witch Doctor song and Sheb Wooley’s song about the One-eyed One-Horned Flying Purple Eater zoomed to the top of the charts.   That is when music defined a generation.  My generation.  Explains a lot, right?

Fast forward to today, 2021. The songs may have been forgotten by subsequent generations but it is time to bring them back, or at least their message.  These topics, much like Zoot Suits, A-Line Skirts and Nehru Jackets, are back in style, not necessarily in a good way.   Witch doctors, those without any real medical training, roam the earth like mindless zombies encouraging people to ignore science and refuse vaccinations but offer no help in finding your true soulmate.  And instead of eating purple people we wish for a One-eyed, One-horned Flying Orange People Eater to appear and eradicate the threat presented by orange narcissists.

Would one of my friends in New Mexico please take a run out to Area 51 in Roswell and see if they can help? 

 The Covid-19 pandemic, combined with the fact there are so many ignorant people choosing not to get vaccinated, has created the need to find a safer way to meet in groups.  So services like Skype, Zoom have exited the office and made their way into the churches, mosques and synagogues of the world.  We can now gather together safely from the comfort and privacy of our own homes. 

Not only does group worship via the internet eliminate the unsanitary need for human contact and mind-numbing small talk, but also allows us to virtually join in some of the less pleasant aspects of organized religion.  For example:

• Lent:  Give up anything with confidence. Then sip that wine or door dash a cup of posh coffee from Starbucks.  Who’s gonna know?
• Easter Sunrise Service, Catch it on YouTube later and not have to rise ridiculously early. You were there!
• Yom Kippur:  Go ahead, grab a snack during Yizkor because fasting is hard (and a drag).
• The Hajj:  It’s a long way to Mecca and only a small number of people will be allowed in this year. No need to delay your Pilgrimage when a 360° Virtual Tour can be viewed on your mobile device.  You are there!

So from now on the answer to the questions “Are you fasting this year?”  “Are you attending the Easter Sunrise Service”  “Are you giving up anything for Lent”  “Are you making the Pilgrimage this year?” will all be the same:   “YOU BETCHA!”

Yesterday the citizens of California rejected hate and lies and voted for truth and science as Governor Gavin Newsome won by a landslide.
You know, I’ll bet there are some idiotic adolescent crybabies out there that will claim voter fraud.  If the last 4 years have taught us anything it is that stupidity is an abyss with no bottom.

When I began the Daily Inflammation Posting it was as a pressure release valve, a safe place to vent, rant and rave; my own site where my friends and stalkers can go and be subjected to my mindless noodling only if they CHOOSE to do so. 

But today, for one day only, I CHOOSE to be kind and express only love and empathy regardless of whether you like or loathe me; are black, white, red, brown or yellow; are a libertarian, independent, democrat or republican, (especially if you are a lost soulless republican), even to you I send unlimited love and infinite good wishes.  Today, verily I say unto you, spread only love and joy, be fruitful and multiply, lend a helping hand to those in need, and first, do no harm.  

But if thou art a naysayer and believe my avowed purpose to be disingenuous, I say to ye of little faith, pucker thy withered and diseased lips and apply them directly upon my posterior region.**

**(See?  The old mean Fred would have used the word “ass.”)

It was quite painful for me to walk but I suffered in silence as one would expect from a Ninja Warrior type such as myself.   At least I thought I was silent but Linda did not agree, so I reluctantly heeded her “advice” and let her take me to the Urgent Care clinic.  An x-ray found I have the plantar calcaneal thing on my heel.  You may know it by its more common name, a bone spur.  Did I mention it hurt like H-E-double toothpicks!

It got me thinking about how impressive it was that the donald faked a condition as painful as bone spurs to dodge the draft.  He could have gone with something simple and easier to believe like mental deficiency or incontinence.  That is courage!”

I can believe it, the quote was from her.
The singer and actor-fitness enthusiast (is that really a thing?),  met on the set of Spears’ “Slumber Party” music video in 2016.  Ironically the term “Slumber Party” is an apt description of every Britney Spears concert and appearance since 2016…and maybe a year or ten before then.

But everyone deserves a chance at true happiness and finding one’s soulmate is not easy.  (We all can’t be as lucky as me…lucky as I…whatever?)

Best of everything, Britney and Sam!  If you are ever in the Wilsonville area you are welcome to stay here unless, of course, Amal & George or Michelle & Barack are in town.

Today is a day to remember and honor those that died.  In that spirit can we try to be civil to our fellow Americans for one day and not lay the blame for our many problems on a single political party or ethnic group. After all, are you really sure that everything you think is 100% true and there is no room in a free society for differences in opinion?
If that describes you then you are a scared, weak, pathetic excuse for a human and quite possibly an idiot.  Of that I am 100% sure.

Uh oh…

About 500 BC Confucius had life figured out, “Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”
(That is a translation as modern historians believe he spoke Chinese).

In 1845 Henry David Thoreau moved to the shore of Walden Pond.  Two years later he wrote this very clear insight into coping with a complex world, 
“Our Life is Frittered Away by Detail. Simplify, Simplify, Simplify!

In 1964 Tevya the Milkman sang “If I Were a Rich Man” to adoring crowds on Broadway, explaining that when posed questions on life’s most puzzling mysteries, “It won’t make one bit of difference if I answer right or wrong.  When you’re rich they think you really know!”

Then on January 20, 2016 a rich sociopath with deep ties to Russia and lacking even a shred or empathy for his people rose to power and brought the lesson full circle.
He pretended it was complicated to instill fear, misrepresented his non-existent intellect and misinterpreted the mantra in keeping with his diminished intelligence as Simply Lie, Simply Lie, Simply lie!

It is that simple.

“The world always seems a little brighter when you’ve just created something that wasn’t there before.”   Neil Gaiman, English Author.
It is rumored he uttered the quote while staring into a porcelain bowl in the men’s room at Royal Albert Hall, after which he flushed and expressed the hope to again brighten the world the following day.