Heart Disease is No Joke

For the past few weeks my husband and I have been watching VEEP, a TV series starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus. To us she is still "Elaine" from her days on Seinfeld, which is when we both fell in love with her. In VEEP she plays a nasty, bitter woman named Selina Myers who becomes America's first female Vice-President.

Enough set-up. In the episode I watched last night, Selina had a heart attack! She wasn't feeling well for a few minutes and complained of a back ache and feeling overheated, claiming the room was stuffy and making it hard to breathe. A doctor was summoned. After a quick exam carried out in her hotel room he diagnosed her with a myocardial ischemia, a.k.a. heart attack, involving a blocked artery requiring surgery to insert a stent.

By then, like ten minutes after she first fell ill, Selina appears to be fine and is greatly relieved it was "only a heart attack" and not the start of menopause. Next we see her being wheeled into surgery for her stent procedure, all business and barking orders at her fawning assistants as usual. Afterward she goes right home, no hospital stay at all, and never thinks about it again. There's no weeks of cardiac rehab, no diet counseling, no exercise regime, just life continuing as before, sort of like she had gone in to have her teeth cleaned.

The episode was not only ridiculous but insulting to all heart attack survivors. First of all, anyone who has a stent inserted is put on blood thinners for at least a year, no exceptions. That translates into the annoying side effect of having the slightest injury to your body cause a sizable purple bruise which hangs around for at least a week. (These days I look like a battered woman owing to my daily aspirin and Plavix.)

Secondly, according to the American Heart Association website, "Depression is 3 times more common in patients after a heart attack than in the general population, with 15% to 20% of heart attack victims qualifying for a diagnosis of major depressive disorder, and a far greater proportion experiencing increased levels of depressive symptoms." But not our Selina! She just picks up right where she left off with nary a thought to the possibility she could drop dead at any time if she doesn't properly take care of herself.

This trivialization of heart disease, which happens to be the leading cause of death for women in the United States, is demoralizing. Yeah, I know -- it's just a sitcom. Still, in the past six years this particular one has received 59 Emmy nominations and won 17 of them. Given that so many people put so much stock into this silly show, would it kill the writers to stick a little usable information into their laugh-a-minute scripts every so often?

Look But Don't Touch, or Else

A babe on stage trying to look her sexiest for the judges -- but don't even think about it!

Inappropriate sexual behavior is very big these days. Actually it's been big for years, but now what's even bigger is women (and gay men) reporting ancient, inappropriate sexual behavior they kept quiet about for years and now have chosen to jump on the Sexual Misconduct Bandwagon and ruin the life and/or career of a celebrity by telling all.

The latest to fall is Matt Lauer, who after twenty years as an anchor at NBC News and the face of The Today Show, was immediately fired after a colleague accused him of doing "something" to her "in the workplace." (Yawn.) Let's hope at least she claims he raped her (like Juanita Broaddrick claimed about Bill Clinton and nobody cared) to merit being fired; certainly a pat on the fanny should not be sufficient cause.

I wonder: Can a woman really be traumatized by a man placing his hand on her butt, especially in a crowd of people posing for a group photo? It's hard to believe, especially when so many women willingly strip down to almost nothing and strut around a stage in stiletto heels and bikinis, turning this way and that to afford us all a better look at their precious buttocks in hopes of being named Miss Universe or Mrs. World or Miss America or whatever other dumb title they seek.

Channel surfing the other night I was stopped cold by the sight of a bevy of young women who were 97% naked on a stage in front of a huge audience, proudly displaying bouncy boobs and buttocks barely contained by tiny bikinis, and wondered how this could be. Was the event taking place on another planet? Turns out it was the 2017 Miss Universe pageant being broadcast live from Planet Hollywood (how ironic) in Las Vegas.

My husband, who until then had been busy working on his computer and ignoring me and the TV, immediately perked up and begged me not to change the channel, at least not right away. What a pig he is.

Shopping in America

Hey, who wants a plaid shirt?

I recently had to spend $125 at L. L. Bean, the store that makes my town of Freeport, Maine possible. This circumstance was the result of my returning a winter coat I purchased there two years ago and which, over time, proved to be "a piece of crap."  Finally tired of the down stuffing come out of the sleeves and the zipper never working, especially in zero degrees when you need it the most, I opted to take advantage of Bean's "lifetime guarantee" that allows you to return anything for any reason, forever. But you don't get your money back, you get store credit, and only for the item's last sale price.

So I spent about an hour wandering the aisles, looking for something to buy. (It certainly wasn't going to be another down coat.) The problem was that everything offered for sale in the whole store was made in either China, Bangladesh or the Philippines, most likely by people earning ten cents an hour, and it showed: Zippers stuck. Seams were crooked. Sizes were wrong. And mostly, things were ugly.

I finally found enough other pieces of crap to use up the money. But I left wondering why, if America is supposedly the greatest country in the world, our stores are overflowing with inferior merchandise made in other countries.

What's Your Problem?

It's always something.

It's a fact of life that whatever petty thing is your worst problem at the moment seems like your worst problem, even though it might not be. For example, exactly two months ago today I suffered a heart attack. There's no way to know how long it took from start to finish, but I remember feeling horrible for about eight or nine hours. Then as soon as I got to the hospital and things were repaired, I felt fine. In fact, during my four days of hospitalization, my biggest complaint was the food.

I have been pain-free ever since, until two days ago when I stepped on a bee hidden in my bedroom slipper and got stung in the heel of my foot. (It was worse for the bee. He died.) At first it hurt a little, but nothing to write home about, or should I say write a blog about. But then the next day it hurt more, and today it hurts a whole lot more and I can barely walk, at least not using that foot.

So, since pain is defined as a part of the body's defense mechanism that warns us to take action to prevent further tissue damage, I must conclude that my foot suffered more tissue damage than my heart. That makes me feel better. Still, all I can think about is my foot, my foot, my foot, ow, it hurts, my foot hurts, ouch.

Get Happy ASAP!

Ladies, this guy is a keeper!

Suppose you have no illnesses, in fact are the picture of health, and are quite content most of the time. You exercise regularly, eat well, have lots of friends and love your family. But maybe your closet is a mess, you leave your bed unmade and dishes in the sink, and there are piles of dirty laundry everywhere. Well guess what: Despite your good health and happy life, you might be a fucked-up loony bird in desperate need of therapy and just not know it. So says a tiny article on page three of today's Holy Grail, stating: "Excessive clutter and disorganization are often symptoms of a bigger health problem. The spectrum from cleanliness to messiness includes large numbers of people who are chronically disorganized and suffering either emotionally, physically or socially." Who knew?

The excerpt, taken from the "How to Be Happy" guide published by the New York Times, explains how de-cluttering can greatly de-stress you and thus increase your happiness. One of the easy-peasy instructions on how to release the vastly improved person currently trapped inside you is, "Keep only items that make you truly happy." (This is sort of like saying, "To be happy, be truly happy," but okay, I'll give it a try.)

Two more expert tips from the happiness guide are, "Fold things neatly" and, "Throw away papers -- all of them." Those both actually made a lot of sense to me. So I first carefully folded, and then threw away my Sunday Times-- all of it. Instantly I felt happier.

A Bad Book with Some Good Shit

Read this book if you can stand it.

Perhaps the lowest form of human interaction can be found in the comment streams on Facebook between people who have never met, will never meet, have no impact on one another's lives and thus matter not one whit. It's a dangerous minefield full of crazies, lunatics, maniacs, psychopaths and, just a guess, a lot of morbidly obese housebound fatties. Today I mistakenly entered that world, which is  akin to mistakenly stepping into a giant pile of dog shit. You don't see it coming but then there it is, and it's damned hard to get rid of.

I had ordered a book on nutrition that was recommended to me by one of my cardiac rehab nurses. Despite the title of How to Use Your Pie-Hole, a dubious choice at best, I went ahead and got it since I've been floundering like a fish out of water over whether or not to be vegan, vegetarian, or use the Mediterranean Diet, all in the hopes of avoiding a second heart attack somewhere down the line. Here are a few excerpts from the book:

"I don't want to sound like a complete fuckwad here and say that drugs are complete crap."
Chapter 34: "Where the Fuck Do I Find Real Food?"
"Chances are you are confused as fuck about what you should put in your pie-hole."
"STOP FUCKING WITH THE FOOD SYSTEM AND TEACH PEOPLE HOW TO USE THEIR MOTHERFUCKING PIE-HOLES."
"Can you honestly say the food industry doesn't confuse the fuck out of you?"
"Stop shoving useless shit down your throat."
"Don't waste your money on getting fake-ass nutrients out of a bottle."
"Punch that shit right back and get the fuck outta dodge."
"It's going to piss me the fuck off if I hear one more person talking about fats or carbs."

But the absolute worst was this: "You're going to love this next tid bit." That did it it! What kind of person thinks tidbit is two words? I also found "they'res" instead of "theirs," which was a first for me and is definitely a contender for my Top 10 Worst Grammatical Errors. Didn't the book have an editor?

So I contacted the author on her Facebook page and told her I found her constant use of foul language distractingly detrimental to my absorption of the information, which I desperately need since I had a heart attack two months ago. This caused some third party to unleash a stream of invective at me for daring to criticize the author, beginning by saying that he couldn't believe I had a heart attack in the first place since didn't you need a heart to have one, and I obviously can't possibly have one because I said what I said.

The unsolicited commenter (the author's husband?) went on and on, calling me immature, a bitch, etc. I hit Reply and said in no uncertain terms that he is a butt-licking, motherfucking asshole and he should just shut his pie-hole and crawl back under whatever rock he came from. (See what I mean?) Anyway, there's some good information to be gleaned from this piece of shit book, so if you're into gleaning you might want to check it out.

Film Review: MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS

One of them dunit. (Except for the dog and the guy with the silly mustache.)

Had I eaten a huge traditional Thanksgiving meal yesterday I would blame it on the scientific evidence that "feast-induced drowsiness may be the result of a heavy meal rich in carbohydrates, which indirectly increases the production of melatonin in the brain, and thereby promotes sleep," but since I didn't, I attribute my intermittent snoozing during the watching of Murder on the Orient Express to a boring script and lackluster performances, especially by the lead actor (and film's director) Kenneth Branagh, whose unappealing face fills the screen much of two hours, accompanied by his farcical French accent. (If you are Kenneth's wife or mommy you will love the movie.)

Based on the character created by Agatha Christie in 1934, Branagh plays the famous detective Hercule Poirot who is afflicted with OCD, but you'd never know it here. Just about the only OCD-ish thing he does is straighten men's ties and demand his eggs be boiled for exactly four minutes. Now that's a disease I could live with. (In fact, I might already have it.) Poirot is traveling aboard the luxury train, Orient Express, when a violent murder occurs. Naturally he is put in charge of uncovering which of the captive passengers was responsible.

I was eager to see this film, having adored the 1974 version starring the far more appealing Albert Finney. And the impressive cast includes Michelle Pfeiffer, Johnny Depp, Judi Dench, Penelope Cruz and Willem Dafoe, plus newer stars I didn't know but assume are recognizable to a younger audience. Despite all that talent it was a disappointing telling of a great story lacking in any palpable suspense, which is  the first thing you want in a murder mystery. In this film, by the time you find out whodunit, whocares?

On the plus side, there are many, many, almost too many, stunning aerial shots of the train snaking through snowy mountains somewhere in Europe (turns out it was filmed in Malta). And it's fun to see what it's like inside a luxury train; this one certainly looked quite grand. There might have been more good things but as I mentioned earlier I was napping on and off, which sort of does tell you something.

Conflicted Holiday Wishes

Today is Thanksgiving and I am trying to turn my back on it since it is a holiday fraught with political incorrectness. Just look what we did to the Indians, I mean native Americans! So, in protest, I am not assembling a dining-room full of white people to gorge on roasted turkey and all the rest. I feel liberated! I am my own person, at last.

Still, with 70 years of roasted turkey on Thanksgiving installed in my memory bank -- in fact, not only installed but deeply ingrained and responsible for a rut in my Third Thursday in November brain cells -- I am roasting a chicken. And while I am not making any stuffing or gravy or pies or cranberry sauce, I will be sticking some yams around the chicken. And some other vegetables, like a few Brussels sprouts and carrots and cauliflower. Who could that hurt?

After all, I have never even met an Indian and certainly wish them no harm. And we are, every one of us, creatures of habit. I understand this fact and I'm okay with it. Maybe in my next life I will have better habits.

How People Are Like Avocados

Interesting, but still trash.

One of the positive aspects of a heart attack, and I've noticed a few, is that it's a mind-altering, life-changing, eye-opening event. Afterward you see things so much more clearly, things you skated right over before. In the Live for Today Department, a heart attack cuts through the fog of complacency that most of us inhabit until something wakes us up and shakes us free.

Take, for example, the common avocado. Usually I'll just grab one, slice through the hard shell of skin and toss it in the trash along with the pit, then eat the delicious and nutritious flesh, never appreciating the amazingly well-constructed package that might have been designed by an MIT grad student. But last night, fixing some guacamole, I actually looked at the whole thing and deemed it worthy of the photo shown above. It reminded me of how often I skim along the surface of things, including people, rarely plumbing the depths to understand their inner workings.

The night of my heart attack, my husband and I were at the rented vacation home of out-of-town friends who were visiting Maine. We had spent the preceding day together and had planned a fun weekend. After a genial dinner the four of us talked around a cozy fire, then retired for the night. Only I didn't retire, I stayed up -- busy having a heart attack. By dawn it was clear that if I wasn't dead yet, I certainly wished I were. We departed hurriedly, our hosts helping me into the car while my husband scrambled to gather up our belongings. Things, for me, went from bad to worse in short order.

Those people (formerly known as "my friends") never called (or emailed or texted) to see how I was doing, despite learning that I had suffered a heart attack, undergone surgery, and spent four days in the hospital. Still haven't, by the way. That puzzled me for a long while: How can people be so mean, especially on the heels of being so nice? It also pissed me off to high Heaven since these two are church-going, God-loving Christians who frequently do foreign missionary work for the disadvantaged.

Since anger is the last thing you want coursing through your body following a heart attack, I put a lid on it. I began to understand that many people are just like avocados: They have that hard outer shell, a pit in the middle containing all the mechanics, and some nourishing good stuff in between. Sometimes, even though they look great on the outside, you come to find out that even their good stuff is rotten and you have to trash the whole thing.

Surviving Sexual Misconduct

This man is obviously a sexual predator.

The latest trend among women you never heard of in Hollywood is claiming they were sexually harassed years ago by an unattractive man in a powerful position. We never hear about all the other ones -- the hot guys who propositioned them that they happily slept with and eventually went on to marry and, not long after, divorce. Not one former starlet has come forward with an accusation against a waiter, janitor or parking-lot attendant; it's always the head of a movie studio or someone else with considerable clout who did the nasty deed, which in many cases was little more than casting an appreciative eye at a plunging neckline or asking a woman on a date in a "suggestive manner."

I heard a really good one yesterday: Some un-famous woman claimed that long ago, actor Dustin Hoffman "used explicit language" in front of her. This reminded me of when I met Hoffman almost fifty years ago in a Manhattan coffee shop, when I was a student at NYU. We were sitting elbow to elbow at the counter when I accidentally knocked over my coffee and it spilled onto him, and I recall he muttered the word "Fuck." That was pretty damned explicit if you ask me! Exactly what was he suggesting? Despite that, I apologized. We started talking and by the time our checks arrived, Dusty -- he asked me to call him that -- had invited me to his home a few blocks away. This occurred before he was famous and was still only another aspiring actor. He was too short for me, so I declined. (God knows what would have happened had he been taller.)

Since then I have had my share of unwanted advances. In fact if I had just one thin dime for every time I was the victim of today's all-inclusive definition of "sexual misconduct" I'd be writing this blog on the sun-drenched terrace of my 28-room villa in Tuscany.

Wisdom of the Aged

Last night I had a long phone call with my dear friend Gloria, who is possibly my favorite person on the planet. Just hearing her voice on the other end of the line enhances my mood a hundredfold. She is upbeat, funny and always sees the bright side of things. I've known her my whole life, as she was my mother's best friend from the time the two of them were teenagers. Since my mother died at age 62, Gloria has been the only mother I've had for the past several decades. She is 97.

Gloria lives in a charmingly decorated two-bedroom condo in a Phoenix retirement community and enjoys a full and active life. She drives herself to the gym early most mornings, "before it gets too hot," and plays Bingo and card games with friends several times a week. She also enjoys dining out with her sister and brother-in-law, both in their nineties, and relaxes most weekends with her daughter and son-in-law who live nearby.

At the urging of her son, a 70-something film writer in LA who looks like he's in his fifties, Gloria became a vegetarian about 15 years ago. She attributes her longevity and extremely good health to what she eats and more likely to what she doesn't eat. I've always been a skeptic, but since several cardiologists have recommended I switch to a vegetarian diet following my heart attack seven weeks ago, I'm moving, slowly but surely, in that direction.

I asked Gloria what she knew about dentures, since a friend of mine with a boatload of dental issues is considering that option. (I was pretty sure Gloria still had her original teeth, but you never know.) She replied that she did not have dentures but would certainly consider looking into the possibility "sometime down the road."

At 97 she still sees a long road ahead (involving possible new teeth) whereas I, at 71, see only the rest stops. So, with the hope that becoming a vegetarian will make me not only healthier but also more optimistic, I'm heightening my resolve. And best of all, I won't have to mess with a dead turkey this Thanksgiving. (That always freaked me out.)

Remembering Mary Jo Kopechne

People in high places are calling for Roy Moore to resign should he win his senate race, since "he does not meet the ethical and moral requirements of the U.S. Senate." Gee, who knew they even had any?

Call me crazy, but I would rather endure being kissed by then-comedian, now-senator, Al Franken, tongue and all -- yuk, by the way -- than be trapped inside a car and left to drown at the bottom of the ocean by Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy.

Spare Me the Details

On some mornings I wake up and walk outside for the newspaper and revel in the surrounding beauty of nature and feel happy just to be alive. On others, like when it's raining or snowing or otherwise inclement, I stay cozy and instead log on to my computer and within seconds feel embarrassed by my species. (Surely being a frog or a squirrel or a bird or just about anything else must be better.) Today I experienced both sensations simultaneously.

The short walk to the end of our driveway made me gasp at the beauty of nature. A powerful wind filled the air with fallen leaves, creating a veritable weather condition: It was leafing! Bright orange pumpkins, some half-rotted by now but still intact and inherently joyful, dotted the lawns and doorsteps of my neighbors in every direction. Impossibly fluffy clouds skittered by in a sky so blue it looked fake, like the one in The Truman Show. I rated the day an A+.

Then I opened the paper and saw, on the front page above the fold, a photo of Al Franken, former "Saturday Night Live" jester who years later became a more respectable fool in the United States Senate. Suddenly he has joined the coterie of famous men accused of "sexual misconduct," a term so loosely applied it includes anyone who ever cast an appreciative glance at a member of the opposite sex, or even of the same sex. Instantly my mood soured.

It seems that years ago Al Franken stuck his tongue in some woman's mouth and she didn't want him to. I wonder, is there any woman alive who didn't suffer that indignity? When Steven Turkowitz did that to me in the 11th grade I bit his tongue and trust me, he was sorry. (There was blood.) I didn't "report" him to anyone, but he reported me to the whole school and for weeks after boys would ask if I would bite their tongue. (I always declined.)

Anyway, don't we humans have bigger fish to fry? Like certain death for all of us, with maybe cancer or crippling diseases on the way to it, and still no power for the citizens in fully half of Puerto Rico? Do we really need a Senate investigation into whether or not Al Franken was once a moron and possibly still is? I'm going out for a walk among the pumpkins and I suggest you do the same.

Dumb Jocks

Three Stupid Guys

There are a lot of really stupid people in the world, and for them I feel truly sorry. It's hard to know the causes in many cases: Is it genetic? A birth defect? An accident that caused swelling of the brain and loss of intellectual capability? Did they not pay attention in school, or even worse, did they not even attend school and thus were denied even the basics? Lack of nutrition during the formative years? The possible causes are endless. However, none of those was the cause of the stupidity of three freshmen UCLA basketball players who, along with their whole team, were on a marketing trip to China and were caught on videotape (duh) shoplifting. Sunglasses, I think it was.

Obviously, shoplifting anywhere is dumb, unless it's for milk and you are destitute and you just gave birth but you are starving yourself and so are not producing milk and you need it for your newborn, but in a country known to pull out one's fingernails as a form of torture, it's downright moronic. Sure, times have changed, but according to the website of The International Society for Human Rights, "Torture is widely used and systematically implemented by the Chinese authorities, despite torture being officially forbidden." Nevertheless, these three bona fide college students considered shoplifting in China to be a worthy endeavor.

Fortunately President Trump was also in China last week hanging out with that country's leader and intervened on behalf of the scofflaws. (See, he's good for something after all.) Everyone knows that playing football can cause brain damage, but might the same be true of basketball? Someone should definitely look into that.

Little Things Mean A Lot

The following headline in today's Wall Street Journal caught my attention: "Think of the Harm Taxing Tuition Wavers Will Do." I wondered who or what tuition wavers could be and why they would be taxed and dived right in. But the first sentence cited "tuition waivers," and I immediately understood that the editors of the esteemed Journal (our nation's largest newspaper by circulation, first published in 1889 and winner of 40 Pulitzer prizes), now rely on Spell-check, a computer program that identifies possible misspellings in a block of text by comparing it with a database of accepted spellings, instead of paying humans with actual brains to perform the highly skilled art of copy-editing. 

If you ask me, a former newspaper copy-editor, that's pretty lame. Certainly in the scheme of horrible things, like earthquakes, mass shootings, childhood cancer and of course anything to do with Russia, typos in the newspaper are but petty annoyances. But are they? Whatever happened to excellence? Maybe Spell-check is why Donald Trump is our PUTOS.

Here Comes Winter

This year I'm just not in the mood for winter.

I had not realized this until yesterday when our first snow fell and I was pissed about it. Not being into skiing I saw little cause for celebration. Instead I flashed on Vinnie, our snow plow guy who is a major bummer even on a sunny day --  dour and sour and unhappy over God knows what. (I never ask.) I rarely see him except during blizzards, but one time I ran into him at Ace Hardware in the middle of July and he was just as gloomy. Gloomier, even.

Anyway, Vinnie shows up around now and goes from being a bit player to having a starring role in my life, which is annoying since I don't even like him. (I would much rather have Jackson Browne in a starring role.) Nevertheless there I am, staring out the front window at what was once my driveway and praying for his arrival, beginning sometime in November until you never know when in April.

Maybe this year I'm just not in the mood for Vinnie.

Gettin' Jiggy With Jefferson

He certainly did pursue everything.

Sometimes, the less you know the better you feel. I learned this truth anew on my recent visit to Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's glorious mountain-top plantation located in Virginia's stunning Piedmont Region. Our third president and one of our most popular Founding Fathers, Jefferson is famous for stating in the opening of the Declaration of Independence that, "All men are created equal." Turns out that, just like his namesake William Jefferson Clinton who came along so many years later, Tom was also a lying blankety-blank.

Wisely, I see now, I slept through pretty much every history class in high school, being averse to hearing about the repugnant violence and soul-shattering destruction caused by man's inhumanity to man. I side-stepped the subject entirely in college where I majored in Fine Art and spent almost all my time reading Shakespeare, painting, drawing, and immersing myself in the lives of artists, none of whom were busy owning, whipping, trading or selling slaves or tearing apart families, which apparently Mr. Jefferson, or should I call him "Massa Jefferson," did with abandon. Certainly I had heard whispers of those terrible truths, but never to the nauseating degree I heard them during a lengthy and almost too informative tour of the "slave quarters" at Monticello just a few days ago.

Dozens of books have been written on the subject so there's no need for me to say more, other than my conclusion that being a two-faced, lying windbag filled with empty rhetoric has been part of the job description of POTUS for many years. And compared to Jefferson, who fathered at least six children with one of his "slave girls" and no doubt dallied with several others, and who thought nothing of wrenching slave children from their mothers' arms and putting them up on the auction block, our current president, who has admitted to enjoying seeing pretty women undressing backstage at beauty pageants, is a veritable prince among men. Or at least among presidents.

The Little Speck

Suitable for framing, except for that annoying little speck.

This morning I am not happy because I have to fly. While this is not as bad as those mornings when I am scheduled for surgery since today I can have coffee, it's a close second, especially since for surgery they put you out. I would love it if you could get general anesthesia for flying. My husband tries to cheer me up by saying we have been upgraded to First Class. Big deal. All that means to me is we will have more leg room when the unspeakable happens.

Anyway, just in case, I leave you all with this great photo of three pears in a painted wooden bowl. If I make it home safely I intend to make this the subject of my next painting and title it "Three Pears in a Painted Wooden Bowl." Or maybe just "Three Pears." I will definitely paint it minus that annoying little speck on the bottom left side. Or maybe not -- maybe that makes the whole thing. What do you think?

Life in These United States

Yesterday I was a bad citizen. It was Election Day and I did not vote. Honestly, here in Maine I don't even know why people were bothering. All over town, political signs began sprouting up like crabgrass weeks ago, urging one to vote for more Medicare or less rent control, or maybe the other way around. Most intriguing were the ones asking, "Why So Shady, Shawn?" and directing you to WickedShady.com. (Turns out Shawn wanted another casino in the state, which is why he's wicked and shady.) I ignored them.

Better get started!

Harder to ignore were all the phone calls we got every night urging us to do such-and-such and get so-and-so elected. I consistently hung up on every one of them, refusing to be talked at by a robot. After all, if Donald Trump is in the White House telling the nut who runs North Korea that, "We have a nuclear submarine positioned," and also tweets about "unleashing fire and fury," does it really matter who's doing what at the grass roots level here in Maine, a state with more cows than people?

It wasn't always like this. Years ago I was a good citizen and took my responsibilities seriously. But the low caliber of those in office has cured me of that. Ditto the preponderance of random mass shootings. Or even non-mass shootings, like the one just yesterday in a local Walmart store that never made national news. A customer had an altercation with another customer and "a shot was discharged." Nobody was hurt, but as the drama was unfolding a woman entering the store heard the shot, then turned and ran back outside, only to drop dead on the street. According to an eyewitness I heard on the evening news, "that lady must have got pretty anxietied from what she saw inside." (Grammar is not all that important around these parts.)

Most days I try to pay as little attention as possible to the world and focus instead on taking my medications, eating right and keeping my head down. I suggest you all do the same.

Thinking Positive

Turns out every cloud really does have a silver lining!

The upside of my heart attack six weeks ago, which rendered me fearful (of having another one), depressed (that I had one in the first place), sad (that I can never again eat a greasy cheeseburger with pile of salty fries) and lacking an appetite (Oy, who can eat?) is that I have finally reached my goal weight. Now all those pants that haven't fit me for the past two years zip right up, no problem.

I may have lost my bravado, but I've gained a new wardrobe.

Democrats Don't Get It

Hey, did you hear the one about the crazy 26-year-old former Air Force pilot who walked into a rural church on a Sunday morning and opened fire, killing 26 innocent people and wounding at least 20 more? Here's the punchline: Democrats think guns are the problem!

I guess they've forgotten about the jet planes piloted by crazy people in 2001 that crashed into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon (3,000 dead), or the several vans driven by crazy people that plowed into crowds of unsuspecting people (8 dead in London in June, 13 dead in Barcelona in August, 8 dead last month in NYC), or the bombs exploded by crazy people at the 2013 Boston Marathon (3 dead, hundreds injured).

They must also have forgotten about all the historical murders committed by all the crazy people without guns, including Timothy McVeigh (168 dead), Jeffrey Dahmer (17 dead), Richard Speck (8 dead), Son of Sam (6 dead), Charles Manson (7 dead), Ted Bundy (30 plus dead), and Jim Jones (900 dead). Sadly that's just the tip of the iceberg: Besides Jack the Ripper stalking the streets of London in the 1880s (murdering at least 11 women with his bare hands and "a blunt object"), there have simply been too many others to mention here.

I can't help thinking guns are not the problem. Instead, might the constant consumption of poisonous foods, rampant drug use, declining health, obsession with violent and moronic entertainment, shameless sexualization of children, faulty religious beliefs, polarization of the races, lack of respect for our elders, overwhelming abuse of nature, emphasis on financial success, worship of false idols and inability to adequately treat the mentally ill have something to do with it?

Prayer is Overrated

Last Sunday a powerful storm ripped through Maine in the middle of the night and obliterated power for much of the state. I slept through the exciting part -- the gale force winds and torrential rains -- and woke up Monday morning to that eerily quiet condition commonly referred to as a "power outage," notable for the absence of humming from any and all appliances. A month ago I had a power outage of far more serious proportions for me personally in the form of a heart attack, but oddly enough the more recent one (involving my inability to check my email or make toast or watch Curb Your Enthusiasm, not to mention keep up with the latest terror attacks and political upsets) had a greater impact on both my mood and my daily life.

Exacerbating the situation was the fact that my husband was out of town for the entire event, leaving me literally alone in the dark, which around these parts begins to descend about 5:30 in the afternoon. An extra kick in the pants came from all the surrounding generators belonging to my storm-savvy neighbors, each accompanied by a relentless cacophony similar to an airplane taking off, adding up to five or six airplanes taking off. This noise went on day and night, making sleep all but impossible for those lacking generators and also lacking heat, unless you happen to have a fireplace in your bedroom which I do not. The noise also freaked out my cat, who refused to stay outside for more than a few minutes, but once back inside began meowing to go out since he has a pea brain and forgot why he was inside in the first place.

This throwback to prehistoric times lasted every minute of a full three days. Candles were lit, oil lamps were filled, tears were shed and curses were muttered. In between all that, a special prayer was dispensed to the Heavens: "Please God, turn the power on." I repeated my prayer incessantly and with gusto while shivering in the cold showers I endured to maintain the level of personal hygiene I have come to enjoy, and while emptying the fridge of rotting food that was starting to make itself known, and while struggling to make coffee with a rigged-up container and some old Chemex filters, having committed years ago to an electric coffee maker, a decision surely worth revisiting. All to no avail, since downed power lines and busted transformers apparently trumped my piddling prayers.

Finally, after hearing the plaintive quality bordering on hysteria in my voice on one of our few successful phone calls placed somewhere beyond the outage area, my husband cut short his business trip by one day to return home and help shoulder the burden of daily life without benefit of technology. Alas, Mitch was on the scene for perhaps three hours of daylight and 45 minutes of darkness when the power was restored. And the funny thing is, he hadn't even prayed for it.