MIS APOLOGIAS, AND NO, I DON'T KNOW WHY I'M SAYING THAT IN SPANISH

My apologies to everyone, but the past month has been a pain on the health front and so I haven’t had the time or the inclination to think of anything for this place. I have noticed in my travails that Einstein was right; time is relative, and there’s no place in the world where time is more relative than in a doctor’s office. I realized this when I went up to the City of Sin to see a specialist in my malady. The appointment was for 12:45 and I was there; not only was I there, but I was so there that I had even managed to hit every green light between our happy little burg and the City of Sin, and when I got to where I was going, there was even an empty parking spot directly in front of the building. Yes, I was one of God’s favorites that day, but I learned how quickly the Lord can rescind His favor. My appointment was for 12:45—I got in to see my specialist at 2:10. In between the appointed time and the actual time, I sat in a profoundly uncomfortable chair contemplating the meaning of the universe and watching old episodes of Bonanza, which, now that I think about it, is an unnecessary qualification: all episodes of Bonanza are old. I also do not understand why everyone was so impressed with color television in the 1960’s; the spectrum of available colors was not at all impressive and I can tell you from personal experience that Star Trek was much better in black and white than it was in color. In black and white, Star Trek dealt with profound truths and the search for meaning in a universe filled with malevolent forces and aliens; in color, the program just looked cheesy. I suppose the novelty of having a show in color in the first place was enough to sell the program, but I am happy that The Twilight Zone went off the air before some network suit decided to ruin the show with color.

The other thing that I’ve noticed, now that my disability is public knowledge, is the large number of panhandlers and other Democrats who hit me up for spare change as I try to get from my car to the egregious mold pit wherein I labor for my daily bread. Once upon a time, I was able to avoid these nuisances, sometimes by the simple expedient of walking faster. This simple expedient, however, is no longer open to me, and the denizens of moocherdom make the morning walk in to work annoying on so many different levels because I am no longer to get away from them. I am not sure why so many of these people are offended when I tell them no, I don’t have any money, or, at least, I have no money I am willing to give to them; some actually want to pat me down and make sure that I am not evading my responsibilities towards the wretched refuse of our teeming shore, responsibilities I frankly did not know I had until I could no longer evade them. I am in favor of maintaining a social safety net so that the socially and mentally challenged, the physically disabled, the poor, the aged, and the none too bright are not thrown out into the street, there to fall victim to some sociopathic teenage predator out of A Clockwork Orange. I am not, however, in favor of my providing all of the above categories with money for coffee and cigarettes out of my own pocket. First, this is annoying in the extreme, and second, I do not make enough money to support a flourishing economic ecosystem and myself. I just don’t. Really.