| march
8
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March comes in like a big wad of snot.
I'm sick. Somewhere between being too sick to do much at work but also not sick enough to sit at home in bed. Emote whatever superstition you like, but the fact is I don't get sick. I haven't been lying-in-bed-sweating-it-out-pushing-fluids-what-time-is-it sick in literally years. I get a lot of sore throats, of which I have a theory (I have many theories, and the longer a person knows me the more often they get to hear espoused). My theory (said in John Cleese priss voice) is this: I have tonsils. Most people -- many Americans -- do not. I have no adenoids, which I guess is good in some remote way. But at some point I either read or was told by some authority figure or somehow ingested the knowledge that the point of tonsils is to catch infection before it gets into the body. So if you have tonsils, you get sore throats; if you don't, you get sick in other ways. So I never totally minded sore throats -- I always thought of my tonsils as big old cranky guardians at the gate. If they weren't there, I'd be sick like everybody else seems to be -- in bed and feverish. So when I got a sore throat on Sunday/Monday I figured, well, here we go again. But then my throat tickled and it was like, oh, wait. Then at work on Monday I started feeling achey in my joints, which is a sure sign of fever, but -- according to the plastic strip thermometer which came free in a packet of N'Ice cough drops (hey, so I'm no Flo Nightingale) I didn't have a fever. And I wasn't sweating or chilly or anything. So Monday and Tuesday night I got home and into bed with various medications (I don't care what Robitussin calls it, Honey Flu Cold Medicine is nasty, nasty, nasty stuff) around 8. Gimme Alka Seltzer any time. The thing is, it wasn't a flu, so I didn't want to take that stuff. But I did. I kept going into work because god forbid I should stay home for a sick day -- I'll watch soap operas all day, which I could just do at work -- and now that the Reporter has given me two more assignments (dollar signs puncture through the sniffling) I'm rather occupied with other things. So, no sick day. But now it's Friday and I feel like I've got a bowling ball up each nostril. When I touch my nose (which feels Novocained), I can feel a little pulsing vein there. The Comtrex I bought fits all the symptoms, but get this: The day stuff only lasts four hours, and they say you can only take up to two servings per day. So, what, after eight hours I'm fucked? And the night stuff turned right off after four hours, too, so what, you can only sleep four hours? They're all set to take care of you for 12 hours a day, and after that apparently you're on your own. I hate the pharmecutical industry. Except Alka Seltzer. That stuff is magic.
The Osbournes, which was taped for me by a cable-owning co-worker (it's on VH-1 or MTV or one of them) is probably the most fabulous television show on right now. It's also probably one of the best unintentional anti-drug pieces of propaganda ever made. For reasons I've yet to comprehend (though I can totally picture the likely-doobage-influenced concept meeting), Ozzy Osbourne agreed to let cameras into his home life (shockingly enough he's married with two nearly-grown kids; according to my co-worker it isn't all roses; he once tried to kill his wife: "You have to see the Behind The Music!" by strangling her, but you wouldn't know it from the show) and turn it into a reality program. Nothing (so far as I know) is scripted, and it's just a matter of following this group of four (plus any number of assistants and guards) through their sprawling new digs in Beverly Hills. The first episode had them moving in ("There Goes The Neighborhood") and had shots of boxes piled up outside, labeled: Linens, Dishes, Dead Things. Heh. The kids are probably about 15 or 16 but still have a fair amount of baby fat, and apparently are able to get into various clubs around the city with no hassle. The boy's bedroom -- man, that place is bigger than my apartment! Sharon, the wife, seems to be the sanest in the household, but Ozzy -- man, kids, here's what your brain is like when you stop taking drugs after 20 years. Either that or he's shellshocked from the volume. Here's Ozzy scaring the cat by sneaking up behind it. Here's Ozzy crashed out on the oh-so-fancy sofa, shirtless and soft-looking (and more power to him, I s'pose) with a tattoo laced across his forearm and elbow, trying to deal with a frustrated teenager. The satellite link is confusing to him, so he pounds on it, then pours a Diet Coke while his kid takes care of it. His outfit for The Tonight Show looks like he walked through a very thick black cobweb and has to be trimmed before he goes on since it catches on everything. He kind of ... shuffles about, laughing a little too hard at Jay Leno's jokes, gaping at his own image in the replay of the performance on the TV, a bit ... out of it. If I was a big, longtime fan of his I'd be horrified. All of his oddness aside, it was a fascinating glimpse into living that kind of life -- a settled Rawk Star life -- in a home with too much space (Sharon announced that she thought the kids had lived in "24" different homes while growing up) for four people and lots of unexplained "other people" roaming around. We met the guard, but everyone else seemed to always have some other kind of assistant with them, even the kids. It was an odd mix of solitude and claustrophobia. I'm fascinated. I'm getting it taped again. Too bad it's only a half hour at a time.
I had my first "water cooler" (literally) conversation
this morning about Survivor. Two co-workers started talking about
the complete waste of space known as Sarah, and I not only knew who they
meant but heartily agreed. That girl has to go! Meanwhile, Kathy still
is in the game. But I'm not sensing she'll go the distance.
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