The Funny Papers

Nick Anderson, Ann Telnaes, Macleod, Jesse Duquette, Michael de Adder, Dave Whamond, Pedro X Molina, Max Espinoza, Rick McKee, Daniel Boris, Jack Ohman,

Not Today ...

I have some kind of bug that's knocking me out a little so I will be taking the day off from the blog-o-sphere.
Back soon.
But first back to bed.

A Tale of Two Sickies

People are different; people are very different. Even after twenty-two years together, Carlos and I still have some definite differences, like in the way we manage being sick … hence a tale of two sickies.

I get sick and I want to be quiet, and to be left alone, and to sleep. A eek ago, when  I came home early, feeling sick, I crawled into bed, hoping to sleep a few hours and be left alone. Carlos decided that MaxGoldberg, on that new Kidney Diet, needed to eat, so just as I doze off, he comes into the room and starts searching for Max on the bed, pushing my leg and Calling, ‘Max.’ Nudging my arm and calling, ‘Max.’  Pushing me in the head and calling, ‘Max.’

So much for sleep.

Carlos, on the other hand, is like a child, and refuses to sleep. He’s now been sick about five days and if my Mary Tyler Moore Timeline™ is correct—three days coming, three days with you, and three days going—he should be on the downside this morning. Except he isn’t because, rather than sleep, he played solitaire on the computer; rather than sleep he organized his music on the iPad; rather than sleep he watched TCV.

So much for getting better.

Other differences? Carlos will tell you that he is sicker than anyone else. He told me so, that this cold is harder on him than it was on me. I say, but I took three days off work, curled up in bed, sleeping. No, his is worse. You know, because it’s his cold.

I am the patient who likes to be left alone—oh, sure Carlos make some delicious soup for me—and left to my own devices. I close the shades, pull the blankets over my head and sleep; at night, I swear by Nyquil because it knocks me out and gives me the most hallucinogenic dreams I can remember. I use cough drops, and Tylenol and cold drinks in the daytime and hot tea before bed.

Carlos drinks hot tea with lemon and turmeric—his miracle cure, which so far the only miracle I see is that I can scrub it out of a teacup that’s been left  on the counter yellowing for days. And he is needy; where’s that blanket he likes? Just a little more hot tea please. Have you seen my slippers—there were by his feet. Is there aspirin? Robbie Toosin; for those of you playing the Ricky Ricardo Board Game, that’s Robitussin. Oh, and as many of you also know, where’s the Bic Boppa Rue; Vic’s Vapor Rub. He will never , ever, take Nyquil because he says it’s addicting, even though I tell him he can get a good night’s sleep.

But the main difference? I shut up. I rest, drink plenty of fluids, and stick to myself. Carlos talks, and talks, and talks, and then apologizes for talking, and for being sick and, yes, for breathing because his throat is so raspy.

I also use humor, because laughter is the best medicine. When Carlos asks if he can get me anything, I reply, ‘You can get lost.’ When he says his throat is so sore he can barely speak, I fall to the floor and say, ‘Thank you Jesus! Silence at last!’

I don’t know about him, but it makes me feel better.

Every Sunday Carlos makes pancakes because Carlos loves pancakes. I like pancakes because Carlos loves making them, and it’s become a regularity around these parts. This past Sunday, he started making pancakes, and then called me to the kitchen, where I found him holding himself up on the counter and saying:

“Could you finish the coffee, please. I took on too much work this morning.”

I finish the coffee, though in my head, I’m thinking, he could have skipped the pancakes, he knows I don’t care, and I hear him say ….

“But I wanted to make pancakes for you.”

I let that go, because the pancakes are for him; he is the sweets person, though, yes, I enjoy a weekly pancake. Then, as we eat, he apologizes for being sick, and being sicker than anyone else, and says he cannot eat the pancakes because his throat hurts too much and he needs to go back to bed.

“Then go back to bed.”

He does; after sipping his coffee to completion; after letting the dog in ; after setting the fans; after cleaning the litter box; after checking his phone; after commenting on the new blooms on his rose bush.

By this time, my eyes have rolled so far back into my head I can see behind me.

We’re different, the two sickies. I am Great Garbo, swathed in blankets and turbans and asking to be left alone. He is Needy McNeedlston, apologetic, and sicker than anyone else ever has been, and defiant about not letting a cold beat him so he won’t even get into bed because it’s daylight.

But, after twenty-two years, things have changed because this morning he asked me a question I’ve been waiting to hear for decades:

‘Do we have Nyquil?’

I may spike his coffee and tea with it all day and let him sleep and let me have some peace.

I’m a good husband.

The End Is Near Because I'm ....

What a week it’s been. Who knew a little Spring head cold would take me down? But it did. It all started a week ago Friday when I could not get warm, and was shivering as I went to bed. I bundled up, rolled myself into a ball, and tried to sleep. The next day I felt much better, but then Sunday I worked—we had an annual Mother’s Day event in town and I offered to be there—and I was feeling the cold again;  but I hate being that whiny bitch who volunteers to help and then plays the suddenly sick card to get out of it, so I soldiered on, and on through part of the day Monday until I could no longer deal with the sore throat and the cough and the phlegm and the headache, and went home early.

I took off Tuesday and slept most of the day, and spoke with my doctor after Carlos asked if it was COVID; my doctor assured me it was my first head cold in two-plus years of masking and social distancing and it hit me hard. I felt better, while feeling worse, that it was “just” a cold. Still, while I trust the doc, I did take two rapid COVID tests and was negative in mood and attitude and COVID. I took Wednesday off, and then was still sick Thursday. Friday’s I don’t work, so I was bed-ridden again, and then finally today I began feeling human once more.

I kept thinking of an old Mary Tyler Moore episode where she got a bad cold before a special event, and kept muttering that the head cold was “three days coming, three days with you, and three days going.” I just finished my third day going and am finally feeling like my old self.

Thanks for all the positive thoughts and advice and jokes … Yorkshire, who chided me for not so much standing with Ukraine, but lying down for it.

Oy, What A week!

I am slowly feeling better ... and this was not COVID ... but I think I'll take the weekend to rest up some more before even attempting to anything lifelike or bloglike.

Under The Weather ... Back Soon

Laura Ingraham Solves Unemployment

Yes, I know, it’s Fox News, and it’s Laura Ingraham, of the GOP-Is-It-A-Nazi-Salute Ingraham, one of the most hate-filled human beings on the plants. But recently she was discussing unemployment, and people on unemployment and what could be done to move those people back to work and, well, it went like this:

Ingraham:

“What if we just cut off the unemployment? Hunger is a pretty powerful thing. I don’t mean physical hunger, because people who truly are in need, need help, but [not] people who can work but refuse to work.”

Jon Taffer:

“I have friends in the military who trains military dogs Laura, and they only feed a military dog at night, because a hungry dog is an obedient dog. Well, if we are not causing people to be hungry to work, then we are providing them with all the meals they need sitting at home.”

Yes, they think the way to move people off the unemployment rolls is to starve them.

In America, we will see to it that you starve if you don’t need to be on unemployment. But then who gets to decide who needs unemployment? The Eva Brauns Laura Ingraham of the world? The self-entitled rich bitches who look down upon those people on unemployment and suggest we deny them food?

Or we let Jon Taffer, who I have never heard of but a quick Google search describes him as a “television personality” who thinks we should treat the unemployed like dogs until they learn to be obedient.

There are only so many ways to tell these two morally bankrupt, uncaring, rightwingnuts off, but the best and easiest is:

Fuck you.

The Funny Papers

Steve Sack, Bill Bramhall, Clay Bennett, Michael de Adder, Ken Catalino, Rick McKee, Matt Wuerker, Hajo de Reijgerfbedit, Marc Murphy, Ed Hall, Darrin Bell, Nick Anderson, Ted Littleford, Jack Ohman, Mike Luckovich

Thanks

Thanks for all the well wishes yesterday.

I don't have IT; what I have is the residual effects of the shingles I had a few years back. Shingles affects the nerves and since my shingles were around my eyes, I still get massive headaches and cannot tolerate the light.

I'm like a vampire that way, and so that was me yesterday; I woke up at dawn with the sun burning into my retinas and then made my way to the guest room to sleep in the dark.

Carlos was nice enough to keep all the shades down and curtains drawn so that when I woke up I wouldn't scream like a howler monkey.

The upside is that, right after the shingles, I would get these nerve headaches about once a month and then they kind of tapered off; it's been probably a year since I had one.

The down side is that they hurt like a motherf%ker.

But it lasts just a day and so I opened my casket this morning and was able to meet the sun!

Not Today...

Hw;efr Qassbrkyu,n Ymsl

Yes, it happened.

Carlos gave his cold.

I'm delirious. He doesn't even know I'm on the computer.

I OD'd on a lethal combination of Nyquil and Bick Boppa Rue last night and dreamed I was playing beach volleyball on a sandy hillside inside a yacht, owned by Sharon Osbourne, that was cruising the Puget Sound toward the Pacific ... thankfully she wasn't seen in the dream.

Pray for me ...

.

Bobservations

Carlos is sick. I think it’s the Moron-a-virus. I kid; or do I?

See, when Carlos gets sick, no one has ever been as sick, and he hopes and hopes and prays that I “don’t get this because it’s really bad.” And then, if I do get it, and I complain about it, he says, “It’s not that bad.”

I will give him credit because he’s moved to the guest room while he’s hacking and sniffling and sneezing—so I don’t “get it”—and I’m enjoying the luxury of king-sized sleeping. But then he’s also upset because none of the cats sleep with him. Um, they want the king-sized luxury, too, you know.

This morning, as he moaned in that scratchy deep voice that would be so sexy if it weren’t for the phlegm and the coughing fits, I told him he should pray that he gets well quickly, and he said:

“God can suck my dick.”

Someone won’t be getting better any time soon, I think.

After leaders of the Nevada Culinary Workers Union alleged online bullying by Bernie Sander’s  supporters over the union’s disagreement with his health care plan, Bernie said this:

“Harassment of all forms is unacceptable to me, and we urge supporters of all campaigns not to engage in bullying or ugly personal attacks. Our campaign is building a multi-generational, multi-racial movement of love, compassion, and justice. We can certainly disagree on issues, but we must do it in a respectful manner.”

See what he does there? He accepts zero responsibility for his rabid supporters.

Hey Bernie? Tell’ em to knock it the fuck off because otherwise, you look like you condone it. And you don’t, do you?

Brad Parscale, _____’s campaign manager, Tweeted, and then deleted, a photo of Air Force One at the Daytona 500 with the caption:

“@realDonaldTrump won the #Daytona500 before the race even started.”

Twitterers took about a nanosecond to point out that the photo was from President George W. Bush’s visit to the NASCAR race in 2004.

Here’s the deal—and one or both of these things could be true—wither the _____ campaign is run by a gaggle of lying stupid asshats, or the _____campaign thinks its supporters are stupid enough to believe whatever they say.

Cardinal Valasio De Paolis—the Vatican official appointed by the pope to lead the Legion of Christ, a disgraced religious order and to clean up its history of child rape—has been called out Yolanda Martínez, whose son had been asexually assaulted by a Legion of Christ priest to report the settlement offer the church came up with to compensate her son for his rape.

Cardinal De Paolis had offered the Martínez’ family about $16,000, but only if her son would recant his testimony that the priest had repeatedly raped him when he was a 12-year-old student at the order’s youth seminary.

He gets the money for being raped if he says he lied about being raped.

The Catholic Church.

In great LGBTQ+ ally news, two of my favorite actors, Ruth Wilson and Matt 'My Husband In My head' Bomer, are set to star in the film The Book of Ruth, based on the life of Ruth Coker Burks—center—the self-described “straight church lady” who provided end-of-life care, and oftentimes funerals, to nearly 1,000 gay men with AIDS whose families had abandoned them.

You can read her story HERE

Several #GOPCoward lawmakers expressed concern over _____’s comments on the sentencing of longtime ally Roger Stone.

Really? What they say to their Glorious Leader?

Miss Lindsey: “I don’t think he should be commenting on cases in the system. I don’t think that’s appropriate.”

Susan Collins: “The president should not have gotten involved.”

My favorite is Senator Lisa Murkowski, the #GOPCoward from Alaska who was asked if she believed _____ learned any lessons from his impeachment: “Well, there haven’t been very strong indicators this week that he has.”

And yet they still kiss his ring, though in the case of Miss Lindsey, it’s the ass he’s kissing.

These three #GOPCowards are exactly why this party needs to go. They say he does bad things; they say he doesn’t do the right things; they say he’s wrong, but when it’s time to stand against him, suddenly they lose their voices.

Vote.Them.All.Out.

The other night, bored, I began flipping through channels, not really paying attention. But then … Irish accent; man, I’m a sucker for an accent. And so, I stopped, and discovered Eoin—pronounced Owen—Macken, on s showed called Stumptown.

He’s an actor, director, author and model, and has an honors degree in Psychology; smart, sexy, scraggly bed hair, soulful eyes, dimples and an accent.

Sign.Me.Up.

Tuesday Thought #1

Just A Thought

Random Musings

This is me today. This has been me for the last four days. This had better not be me much longer or, well, I dunno, it had just better not be me much longer.

Okay, so the Oscar nominations were announced this morning and, well, after seeing the list, I suggest they just go ahead and change the name of the show to The Whites Only Party.

Last year Ava DuVernay — black and female — was snubbed as director of Selma, as was black actor David Oyelowo, so brilliant as MLK in that film. The year before that the amazing performance of Michael B. Jordan in Fruitvale Station — if you haven’t seen it, I urge you to do so — was completely overlooked.

And now this year … there are no nominations for actors of color this year, and not one of the eight Best Picture nominees have any major roles for minority actors — unless you count The Revenant, a film that featured performances by some Native American actors, and was directed by Mexican director Alejandro Iñárritu.

But where was Straight Out of Compton, which was widely praised as a brilliant film when it was released, as was  Beasts of No Nation, not to mention Idris Elba in that film; and where was Creed, and Michael B. Jordan — though the academy recognized Sylvester Stallone for his “acting” in that film. No Samuel L. Jackson for The Hateful Eight? No Will Smith for Concussion?

Okay, so Smith’s performance received mixed reviews, but then so did Jennifer Lawrence’s in Joy and yet she’s nominated … again.

Just sayin’.

#OscarsSoWhite

So, South Carolina’s governor, Nikki Haley gave the GOP response to the State of the Union and she’s not scoring any points at all … with her own party.

Haley surprised me by taking the GOP to task for laying all of the problems in this country at the feet of the president and saying Republicans had to share some of the blame.

Say.What?

And then she went after [t]Rump, pleading with voters not to pay attention to the “loudest voices.”

Say.WTF?

And naturally, [t]Rump supporters are already jumpi9ng on Haley with some saying [t]Rump should deport her.

Infighting is fun, but I will, for today, give props to Haley for speaking her mind.

I think every job, everywhere, needs to be Spellchecked. Or maybe there’s something else going on in this garage … ?

And speaking of GOP asshats, Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan was on CNN this week criticizing Obama for absolutely everything from terrorism to healthcare to the second season of True Detective to the economy.

When Jake Tapper pointed out that, under Obama, we have seen 68 consecutive months of economic growth, Ryan actually said that we should not compare the economy to where it was yesterday, but where it should be tomorrow, and since it’s not there yet, it’s Obama’s fault.

Jake seriously had to contain the eye roll over that one.

Paul Ryan is a dick.

Just sayin’.

So, while I was sick — and took one day off this week to rest … which hasn’t helped — I saw a little movie called Walter, about a ticket-taker at the local cinema who believes he is the son of God and has agreed to decide the eternal fate of everyone he comes into contact with.

It was an odd film, but the star was one Andrew J. West, who is giving me Hot Gay Nerd as well as Young Anthony Perkins from Psycho.

Do I go for crazy all the time, or just when I’m congested?

And what’s the deal with Sean Penn vacationing with — okay interviewing — El Chapo, the drug lord who crawled like a rat out of prison last year?

Shouldn’t he be arrested for aiding and abetting since he went to visit El Chapo and to interview him for Rolling Stone?

And should Rolling Stone be held accountable, too?

Is it just me, or does it look like Harry Potter, er, Daniel Radcliffe, used the 24-Hour Fitness gym at Hogwarts to a great effect?

Poor Kentucky.

It appears now that Republican Governor Matt Bevin will have to force the state to pay over a million dollars in legal fees for fighting that state’s marriage equality battle in court.

I feel so bad for … no I don’t, this is great!