dis-ease

Consider: disease

dis-, as in lack of, not, opposite of, apart, away, asunder, in a different direction, as in two, twice, two different ways, twain, between.

ease, as in mitigate, alleviate, relieve from pain or care, render less difficult, relax one's efforts (including 1863 to 1907, a more specific sense in sailing), to content a woman sexually (slang, 1861), physical comfort, undisturbed state of the body, tranquility, peace of mind, pleasure, well-being, opportunity. Compare adagio. Cf. at ease as a military order denoting freedom from stiffness or formality.

These from the Online Etymology Dictionary. 

Put the two together.

Dis-ease.

Read the above all over again. 

No, I'm not going to walk you through it. I'm not going to sermonize on what breaking down the two word parts means separately or together, or what marrying them conjures up and gives birth to. You can do that yourself.

It's revealing, isn't it?

But, still, add to the mix not at home in the world, nor in your skin, your psyche, nor in your bones.

The etymological and existential tension (infinitely tender and fragile; unspeakably personal) between cling and let go, grasp and avert, indulge and refrain, partake and repel, pause and pirouette, explore and perish.

Why is that?

So much depends. (William Carlos Williams, "The Red Wheelbarrow")

So if you have only a thin wire,
God does not mind.
He will enter your hands
as easily as ten cents used to
bring forth a Coke. (Anne Sexton, "Small Wire") 

lottery

Luther couldn't believe his eyes. Or his ears. He checked the six Powerball numbers again and again. He checked his Powerball numbers, the five for the white balls, 1 to 69, and one red Powerball, 1 to 26. He held the play slip in one hand, and the ticket in the other. Both hands were trembling. One $2 wager. He hadn't played Powerball, or any state lottos for seven years. Seven years, three months, and five days, if anybody's counting. He hadn't bought any scratchies either, or Cash For Life, Take Five, any of that. No football parleys. He'd been "clean and sober," as his Gamblers Anonymous confederates might describe it. 15, 20, 40, 48, 52, and 16, if you must know. Power Play 10x. Luther wrote the numbers on an index card. He pulled up the website and recited the numbers on the screen. He read the matching numbers on the index card. He said those out loud too. Deep down, he knew he had these numbers memorized; they could not be pried from his consciousness, subconsciousness, or memory. Numerical amnesia would be impossible. Now his hands were shaking and he was sweating, his forehead and underarms were perspiring.

Should I call someone? Who? What would I say?

The Grand Prize times ten would be so incalculably astronomical as to be unfathomable.

Don't go there.

You should call someone, anyone. Dad. Louise, Barbara, Ethan, Evelyn, Camille, Katharine. Sponsor. Sponsee. No, not text. Of course not.

Luther began to compose a resignation letter in his head. Dear Board of Directors, Dear Chairman of the Board, Dear Suckers, Dear Fuckers. Dear Cocksuckers, Hey you, Yo, To Whom It May Concern, Dear Torquemada.

He went to his laptop and typed the numbers in a Word file. Then he went to the website again and managed to copy the winning numbers and paste them into the Word file. They still matched.

Was this flutter the AFib he was warned about nine years ago? It had never bothered him in the least all these years. Why would it. The cardiologist said, One valve or chamber was mildly "generous" in comparison to the others. He hadn't understood the doctor in the least, but he never forgot the intriguing application of generous.

He began to pace in his studio apartment. Apartment pacing was not going to work. Even though it was nearing midnight, he put his coat on and stepped into the blowing snow and frigid cold. And walked.

As he trudged up Harborview Way, he fumbled in his right pocket for the ticket. Once he located it by touch, he fingered it, rubbed it like a talisman.

Nearing the crest of the hill, Luther slid on a patch of ice under the snow and he went sprawling, spread-eagled as if he were trying to create a snow angel. As he tried to brace himself, his hands shot out from his pockets, including his right hand, which had been caressing the lottery ticket.

In the ensuing mayhem, he lost his grip on the ticket, in a nanosecond his hand opened up. Before he was barely conscious of what had just transpired, the ticket got swept up in a snowy gust. The little slip of paper with 15, 20, 40, 48, 52, 16 got swept away. Caught in an eddy of air, not visible in the night.

Luther screamed. He cried. He shouted. He wailed.

He bolted toward the snowy gust. And he fell again.

He ran toward it, and then bent to the ground. He sifted through the snow, any snow, like a gold Rush Forty Niner.

Hundreds of millions of dollars.

They found him on all fours, frozen against an embankment.

A yard to his left, in the glistening sunlight, the winning ticket fluttered, a paper butterfly, out of season, on the powdery snow.

The winning numbers that Luther had memorized were for the wrong week, the week before.
 

by any other name

Heroin.

Is the word part of the scourge? Is it a swish of the sword?

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, Heroin as a word was coined in 1898 in German as a "trademark registered by Friedrich Bayer & Co. for their morphine substitute. According to tradition the word was coined with chemical suffix -ine (2) (German -in) + Greek hērōs 'hero' (see hero (n.1)) because of the euphoric feeling the drug provides, but no evidence for this seems to have been found so far."

So what if the name were changed? No, no, no, we're not talking about the myriad demimonde, street, underworld, pop culture, and user-driven slang terms. Not that. Change the name. A new coinage. A coin of the realm of hypnotic transport and molten reverie.

Do words matter? In ancient times, identity was conferred by the very act of naming. There was a power to it. The Hebrew Bible is rife with examples of this.

What would the new word be?

Could such a word have such powers as to be salutary, salubrious, and beneficent?

And even if that were true, would such a move erase allure? Because after all, danger, menace, and perilous risk are part of the game, part of the ritual, yes?

What would that word be? The opposite of "hero"? Hardly.

As the Bard put it in Romeo and Juliet, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet.” As if to say, "Call heroin by any other name, and you get the same results."

Is it so? How would we conduct a peer-reviewed study to find out?

In "Sacred Emily" in 1913 (year of my father's birth), Gertrude Stein wrote: "Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose." (Did you know that in one version of this immortal declaration Stein put it in a children's story, carved on a tree trunk, round and round?) So, does Gertrude Stein side with Shakespeare on this semantic matter, or is she saying, "It's futile; it's beyond description; it is what it is"? (Or something else entirely.)

Heroin is heroin is heroin is heroin. 

What do you think? What do you feel? Tell me more. Especially addicts. Weigh in on this. 

Do words matter?

How much?

sacred mysteries

how could it happen how does one drift from one person into another morph from one personality to another barely recognizable brand-new habits different features not physical no wait yes some physical shaped by stress care diversion distraction obsession compulsion call it addiction go ahead how does this occur overnight or incrementally invisibly moment by moment immeasurably imperceptibly unhinged from all consequence untethered from responsibility and remorse reckless to the point of indulgent death-defying what causes this brings it to the fore was it always there under layers of sedimentary deposition dolorous dolomite dangerous cementation percolating for years decades of decadent brew how does this volcano finally erupt when does it hurl lava rocks steam scalding all within eyeshot and after all is said and done said and done ad nauseam when is enough enough when does the person go back to so-called normal will there ever be a normal again was there ever a normal even a paranormal the road to recovery new neural pathways stroke victims new neural patterns relearning speech gait thought glance narrative halting steps a limp holding an unseen cane can one do it learn the healing find the healed self aromatherapy healing touch balm salutary salve soothing song how does one begin where does one start how does one take the first shaky step a sacred mystery  
 

Acute Abysmal Chronic Human Wasting Disease (AACHWD)

Acute Abysmal Chronic Human Wasting Disease (AACHWD) is a progressive yet rarely fatal condition classified as a transmissible modern malady (TMM). Symptoms include obsessive-compulsive repetitive behaviors, such as rapid thumb movements, frequent finger-tapping and swiping, bursts of excitement, aphasia, and neuropathy of fingertips. Other observable phenomena linked to AACHWD include voluble cursing at video or digital-device screens, memory loss, insomnia, and rapid heartbeat. Withdrawal attributes include adrenalin letdown, irritability, sullenness, anxiety, moroseness, lethargy, poor appetite, restlessness, and social withdrawal.

Geographic Distribution and Origins

The geographic extent of AACHWD has changed dramatically since June 29, 2007, the date of the inception of the iPhone. Since 2007, the disease has been found globally in free-ranging humans in loci with either concentrated or sparse concentrations of adult homo sapiens. The disease has been increasingly identified outside of the original endemic areas of the United States and industrialized nations. Earlier manifestations of the disease were seen in 1980, first in Japan, coinciding with introduction and popular use of the video game Pac-Man. Designated “eradication zones” around the areas where it was detected have proved ineffective and fruitless. Scientists doubt whether such aggressive management will succeed in eliminating free-ranging foci of AACHWD.

Transmission to Other Animals 

Concerns have been raised about the possible transmission of the AACHWD agent to domestic animals, such as dogs, cats, parakeets, canaries, fish, salamanders, cattle, and sheep, which may come in contact with infected humans. To date, no such transmissions have been observed or reported.

Diagnosis and Treatment
 

To date, no histopathologic, immunohistochemical, and Western blot testing of brain biopsy and autopsy samples have confirmed a AACHWD diagnosis. Clinicians have relied on anecdotal observations of the aforementioned symptoms, but no accurate measurement protocol, regime, or scale exists, leading some scientists to doubt the existence of a verifiable disease.

 

Recent studies have shown limited treatment success correlated to separation from environmental sources of infection, including exposure to smartphones, tablets, laptops, and gaming devices. Even in clinical trials of treatment, however, some patients continued to exhibit progressive aphasia, memory loss, social withdrawal, vision disturbances, and seizure activity leading to status epilepticus or induced coma.

Hello, Anybody Here?

The GPS-oriented map app said, "Your destination is on the left." It repeated it for good measure. (It wasn't repeating it neurotically; the app developers know people need and want assurance.) It was just past sundown. He consequently was breaking Rule 1a: Don't deliver food in the dark. "You don't drive well at night; it's too hard to find the locations. It's just not worth it," he neurotically had told himself over and over.

"Your destination is on the left."

He emerged from his car (actually, the bank's car), insulated food bag in hand.

The order was for $3.92. Our driver wanted to decline the offer. He typically rejects such a low amount, but he had already declined a few offers day. He didn't want to risk getting "a bad grade" owing to poor performance data.

He couldn't read the numbers on the houses on the winding suburban road. He was careful not to walk on the road, endangering his life for $3.92.

First, he went north searching in the just-fallen darkness for 3409 Sycamore Run. Oops. The numbers were declining.

Reverse direction.

Where could it be?

There's only one more house and it's on the corner, he mused. If it weren't the house on the corner, he'd have to cross a major roadway, and the map app is rarely that wrong.

He walked toward the corner house, stepping on grass already wet from dew. Regretting he did not grab the flashlight in his car, he had to stand a foot away to search what looked like numbers to the left of the front-door steps. As if he were employing a hybrid of braille and sight, he felt the texture of the peeling paint on the wood and drew closer: 3409. Shrouded by a pine tree and bushes, the tired house featured flaked and chipped white paint, creaking wood, missing siding, and worn steps on the porch.

He walked up a few steps and knocked on the door, which gave way, loose on its hinges.

A dog barked, in the manner of a sentinel not an attacker.

He heard a voice say, "You can open the door. Come on the porch. It's all right."

To his right, was a window, the bottom of which was six inches from the porch floor. On the other side of the open window, even with the porch floor, sat an emaciated but alert woman in her early twenties on a mattress with a comforter and a hungry kitten. Heavy-metal music emanated from her phone.

"You surprised me."

"Sorry."

"Here's your order." A half gallon of pink lemonade, mashed potatoes with gravy, and a chocolate chip cookie.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome." He hesitated. He wanted to ask if she was all right, if she needed more food, if it was safe there. He stood for an awkward 10 seconds, above her position on the mattress. "Good night. Take care."

The next day, around the same time, he accepted a delivery of the exact same items to the same "destination." This time, he did not need to fumble in the darkness to find the locale, this time on his right, because he approached from another direction.

He walked onto the porch, just like the evening before. The window was open a foot. The dog barked, a mixed of German shepherd, beagle, and retriever, he'd guess if quizzed. The cat was meowing and pacing.

"Hello, anybody here?"

No answer.

He repeated it, more loudly, and accompanied it with a forceful rapping on the window sash.

He waited a few minutes and then called the intended recipient via a feature of the food-delivery app. He was rewarded with no answer, not even a greeting on the food orderer's phone. He left a message: "Hello, I'm here with your food. I'm trying to deliver it."

Twenty minutes went by.

He thought of leaving the food there, placing it on the mattress through the open window.

He considered walking in through the window.

He considered calling 911.

What if she had overdosed just now? After all, someone had ordered food for this location, presumably hoping to eat and drink it. Would he remember his NARCAN training? (It wouldn't matter; he didn't have it in the car.) What if a crime were in progress? What if she had passed out from hunger?

"Hello, anybody here? Hello!?" he shouted loud enough to arouse neighborly suspicion.

Flummoxed and rattled, he began to walk off the porch, phone in hand, about to hit 911.

The dog stopped barking. He heard a door open. He halted and back-walked to the window.

Walking to the window was a stout woman, old enough and similar in appearance to Yesterday's Child as to be her mother: same oval face, brown eyes, and dirty-blond hair (streaked with gray). 

"You surprised me."

"Sorry."

"Here's your order."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. Take care."

"You too, sir."
 

Getting Even, Going MAD

During the Cold War, military strategists concocted the notion of mutually (or mutual) assured destruction as a deterrent to nuclear war. The prospect — no, the potential and imminent reality — of nuclear war allegedly would be so ghastly and unthinkable as to stop each side from pressing the button, if in fact buttons would be pressed instead of dials turned, detonators plunged, or switches flipped. The concept was known by the suitable acronym MAD.

As the folks at Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (nuclearfiles.org) succinctly put it, “Whoever shoots first, dies second.”

According to one report, the term was coined in 1962 by one Donald Brennan of the Hudson Institute, which was led by Herman Kahn. The 1964 Stanley Kubrick movie “Dr. Strangelove” wickedly satirized elements of Kahn’s strategies.

I am not qualified to comment on whether MAD is or was a viable option. (“Viable option” seems oxymoronic at best.) I am not schooled in war theories or military history; during the Vietnam War, I applied for conscientious objector status. 

But I do claim to be a wordsmith, so let’s start with that.

Mutually assured destruction. Does it work as a relationship tool? Let’s see. Person A threatens to blow the relationship up. Person B counters with, “Go ahead! Go nuclear. Then we both have nothing. We both destroy the planet we currently inhabit.” Kids, house, income, savings, two dogs, three cats, and the pet iguana neither of you ever wanted but the child insisted on all go up in smoke, more accurately it all turns into domestic shrapnel sent flying from your respective attorneys’ offices.

Sound familiar? Veterans of divorce understand this scenario. They and those in their nuclear testing zones intimately and tragically know the radioactive fallout of this strategy when it fails. “Fails” may be the wrong word. It’s safe to say the approach may have worked in the short term — even for years or decades. “Worked” is putting it kindly. It held divorce at bay, the way religious strictures and stringent civil prohibitions against divorce once prevailed.

One need not go the marriage-divorce route to comprehend this. It might just as easily go from threats of infidelity to actual carnal misdeeds, ending with one’s worldly possessions on the curb in the rain.

It all might end with the clanging silence of ghosting, a muffled neutron bomb without detritus.

Maybe MAD works infinitesimally better in domestic relations than on the world stage. An after-nuclear-war planet presumably doesn’t have second and third chances. But uncoupled and divorced people connect anew or remarry all the time, getting a chance to try MAD all over again. Or they trod a lessons-learned path, such as mutually assured security (MAS),  albeit another military analogy.

If you like, carry this same MAD metaphor into the workplace, financial markets, parenting, legislating, and sports. Game-theory enthusiasts and negotiation experts already have.  

Does all or nothing, “whoever shoots first, dies second” ever work in any context?

In the field of substance-abuse and addiction recovery, there’s a tough-love tactic that says, “Maybe you haven’t had enough. Go out and try some more.” Even if it kills you. It’s all or nothing. No half-measures. You don’t hear this much — how else would rehabs make money? Would this be provisionally assured destruction and reconstruction (PADAR)?  

Being twice divorced and not wishing to add the adjective “thrice” to that past participle, I will not suggest strategies for domestic harmony. But as for MAD as a useful gambit in other realms?

Who knows.

The fateful question is: Are you sacrificing a pawn or a king?

The Litany of Social Contagion

War and peace
Talk and silence
Addiction and recovery
Driving vs. walking
Being rather than doing
And vice versa.

Work and idleness
Innovation and lethargy
Blogging vs. reading
Punctuation and anarchy
Kierkegaard and Kant
Voting rather than complaining
Blogrolling vs. not
Love or hate or apathy.

Faith and fear
Acceptance and control
Will and surrender
Community and solitude
Commenting and commuting.

Peace.

Coachez-vous avec moi?

Have you heard about this one? You can hire someone to make sure you stay clean and sober. But it might cost you $1,000 or more per day to enlist the services of such a provider, called a sober companion.

Let me pause here to note how I discovered this fact: The hugely entertaining Sunday Styles section of The New York Times, which spotlights the glitterati, ran a piece on this phenomenon. You've got to admire their pluckiness. Last Sunday's edition featured a section opener on a designer, Anand Jon, who always found himself aswarm with barely (pun intended) nubile wannabe models and who now, um, faces multiple charges of rape, sexual battery, and lewd acts (big shocker); an article on fancy inventions, such as slippers that double as mops; and the piece on sober companions, featuring a profile on an ex-con, ex-user named Ronnie Kaplan. Oh, and the bottom of the page is anchored by a large banner ad (say, 14 inches across by 6 inches deep) by Gucci, for an "indy" silver leather bag: $2,590 for the large and $1,990 for the medium; roughly the cost of a few days for a top-drawer sober companion.

Apparently some of these sober companions come out of the entourages of celebs. Hey, they get sober and why not be a smart entrepreneur and combine the skillset of bodyguard, therapist, coach, pastor, and cashier! A sobrepreneur! (I take credit for coining the term.)

It should be noted that part of the sober companion's services typically involves attending with the client meetings of free 12 Step programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous, or AA. And it should be further noted that AA encourages and suggests that the new person find a sponsor (also for free). The sponsor is someone who shares his or her "experience, strength, and hope" about sobriety (but not about film deals, fitness tips, financial planning, or tattooing techniques).

One of the firms that offers these services is named the brilliantly marketable Hired Power. (Why didn't I think of that? Conscience? Envy? Not quite enough shamelessness?)

Incidentally, this all reminds me of some of the scenes in "The Player," the acerbic and first-rate movie by the late Robert Altman, where the guy pitching movie screenplays is told AA meetings are a hot place to shop scripts.

May I discreetly and delicately mention that (as readers who have read this journal can discern) I have some "credentials" in this arena? Ergo, I hereby offer some suggestions for other sorts of companions along the same lines. Alas, someone undoubtedly will take these suggestions and run straight to the ATM with them.

Labor Coach -- (No, not the one for labor and delivery of babies.) A professional to keep one on task during the workday, making one productive, happy, and whole. (I'd make a great one -- for someone else.)

Lustwaffe -- A personnel weapon, or battery of tools, to assist one in navigating through issues of concupiscence (I just love that word from my seminary days; come to think of it, seminary itself is such a richly layered word, too, in't?).

StepMaster or StepMistress -- Just another name for a sober companion, perhaps skewed toward sub-dom addicts.

Better Up -- Aimed at helping compulsive gamblers or impotent sex addicts or persons with low self-esteem.

Lip Service (or Imus-n't) -- Someone to protect you from saying the wrong thing at the wrong time (not that I'd ever need that, oh no, not me).

By the way, The New York Times article ends with this observation by Mr. Kaplan, "The lifestyle, most of it is a facade....Most of them are miserable. I try to bring meaning to their life." [Some day, I should do a post on the word "lifestyle."]

Excuse me, the phone is ringing. If it's Lindsay L., I've got to turn her down. Men with men and women with women. I know, sounds kinky. Hey, I was just in Berlin!

Lent-ills, and Other Beens

A deliciously ascetic season, Lent was characterized by an iconic "giving up" of some treat, typically food, announced to family and friends. Such as, "I'm giving up Wise potato chips this year," which was a common refrain of my brothers and me over the years. We loved potato chips (called "crisps," I believe, abroad), addictively and rapturously and unhealthily. (Still do.) This addiction was anointed at any early age when my older brother and I, in the 1950s, would have an evening snack of potato chips in a little imitation copper bowl, which, emptied of chips, we irreverently placed on our heads, like a prelate's skullcap, as our parents watched the television sermons of fierce-eyed Bishop Fulton J. Sheen. One year, we learned that Sundays, as "little Easters," did not count as part of the forty days apportioned to Lent, so we felt that gave us a tremendous loophole. And so we binged on chips galore on Sundays. (Was Chips Galore the once and future husband of Pussy, the siren in the James Bond movies?) But, to be honest, that took some of the fun (if that's the word) out of it all; it was kind of wimpy; not up to the challenge. Exercising the loophole induced a guilt for not being guilty enough, if that makes any sense at all (as if this makes any sense at all to the postmodern mind).

One year, I forswore sugar in my daily tea. The habit was to have two heaping teaspoons of sugar in my morning tea, this from the earliest age I can recall. When Lent ended, I never went back to the sugar in my tea, and that's probably more than thirty years ago. What, if anything, does that tell me about human character (mine), and habits, and change? If anything, it tells me that the permanent change was barely intended, was almost imperceptible, almost accidental; mostly effortless; certainly not any result of rolled-up-sleeves willfulness. (Don't you just salivate over those semicolons? Could I ever abstain from employing semicolons, even if I tried? Not likely; not this year.)

The years of attempting to swear off booze, I guess I managed it, or nearly so. But by Easter it was off to the wild races (so, surely, I could not have opted for the loophole each week, because the brakes would not work by Monday morning) without a doubt.

Speaking of doubts, I doubt I ever gave up "impure thoughts" for Lent. How could I, or anyone else? After all, such thoughts invaded my brain unbidden, like gamma rays or rain or oxygen or incense; the charge was not to "indulge" them, though, alas, the glossy pages of porn or a lingerie ad in a Sears catalog (pre-Victoria's Secret), or a fellow teenager getting off the bus downtown in a plaid skirt galvanized my own charged-up psyche -- and made me look like a minor character in a James Joyce short story, call it "Portrait of the Hardest as a Young Man." (To you less innocent than me: yes, a Victorian term: impure thoughts. The actual deeds? You gotta be effin' kidding! [Speaking of "effin' I sort of promised myself I'd try to drop the F word during this year's practice. I can report I have not been successful even before evening. This practice is not as puritanical as it sounds; it makes for an intriguing self-auditory analysis, especially in traffic. My other goal is to avoid conversational interruptions. That may be more impossible than resisting so-called impure thoughts. As I've blogged before, I can't even stop myself from interrupting myself!]).

In later years, it's been toast without butter or some other things I can't even recall. In fact, recently it's been less and less of that youthful melodrama, a drama all about me. And why not? Who's youthful? Not moi.

Naturally, "giving up," or self-denial, has its place in the universe (though not particularly in the postmodern Western Hemisphere), but not if it's all about self.

No, not if it's all about the self, despite proud postures of solipsism proclaimed in one's blog banner.

The inventory of Lenten acts over the years is unfortunately not filled with visits to hospices, jails, or homeless shelters; such are the exception, not the rule.

So, forehead smudged with mortality-reminding ash this evening, I close with this commentary from my Zen Calendar for this day:


sin and evil

are not to be got rid of

just blindly.

look at the astringent persimmons!

they turn into the sweet dried ones.


P.S. After drafting the above post, and revising it several times, I went upstairs, got a washcloth, wet it, soaped it, and set about cleaning the ashes off my forehead. Successive rubbings did indeed clean my forehead, but a redness remained where the ashes were. Then I found that the icon of mortality stubbornly remained on the washcloth, the "human stain" (to use a Philip Roth phrase), which even more stubbornly clung to the sink, as one last black ember refused to be swallowed down the drain, finally yielding to my incessant pouring of water, as if I were some guilty murderer in an Edgar Allan Poe or Stephen King story.

P.P.S. Annual visit to a certain type of medical specialist today. PSA results normal. This is one situation where The Laughorist likes to be "normal."

Free At Last. Maybe. Kind Of. Sort Of.

Well, "they" let me out of the chip rehab. Somebody asked me if I wanted "to get with the program" (or did she, Nurse Ratchit, say "programme", thinking I was an Anglophile?); I thought she said "reprogram"; and that's what they did. They reprogrammed me; put in a new chip. I'm cured.

Of potato chip addiction.

Not that I've ever exhibited any other type of addictive traits.

I just said that for laughs, of course. (It's part of my blog description, part of the nomenclature, nominally.)

I am a little worried, though.

I may fall victim to what novelist Stephen King termed the old-couch syndrome, or words to that effect. What he meant was, tamp down one addiction, and another one is sure to pop right up, just like the springs on an old couch. Hmmmm. What the heck could those other addictions be? Do you have any?

Based on the minimal number of comments I received when I was in chip rehab, I'm thinking that many of you either a) didn't give a rat's ass, b) didn't believe me, c) didn't care or d) were simply dumbstruck. I don't blame you in any event. There's a lot more pressing stuff in the world than alleged potato-chip alleged addiction. Isn't there? (Gosh. I'm glad I didn't tune in to Ersatz Presidente Bush last night; that would've driven me straight to the 20-ounce bag of kettle chips.)

No one called while I was in chip rehab. Not even The Cornflake King.

Maybe I wouldn't've answered anyway.

Are you like that? I do not like to have anyone answer the phone during suppertime. It's sacred (the eating event, not the phone). Not cellphones or land lines or any phones. They (the eating-event participants, sometimes called family; not the phones) all ignore me anyway. Even I ignore myself sometimes.

Anyway, it's late, and I sound hungry, angry, lonely, and tired (at the rehab they told me to be careful of that, and told me to remember it with an acronym: HALT).

Whew. I sure could use a juicy, greasy, salty potato chip. Just one. Please? Pretty please?

Just be patient with me. They say it takes time for the new chip to start working properly. It'll take a while for me to get back to alleged so-called quote normal unquote.

Laugh. Or....

Else.

p.s. I got new glasses today. Very Euro, whatever that means. I've never had so many compliments so rapidly and uninvited for a new pair of specs. Maybe vanity is my new addiction.

Chipping Toward Gomorrah

Dear Blog Readers,
I am writing this from a chip rehab. That's short for The Sierra Mesa Pines Chipaholic Rehabilitation Center. Location: Cannot be revealed. This lovely high-security prison is more or less a degreasing facility for poor slobs like me who can't overcome their addiction to potato chips. (They are called crisps in England and Ireland, right? Sounds leaner to me. I wonder if that gang called The Crips got their name, as well as their ferocity, because of potato chip addiction?) Oh, you know how it goes. I'll have just one. In my case, that would mean "just one 11 oz (311g) bag, thank you." Or just one hour at the potato chip trough. But the bag declares, "No Cholesterol. All Natural." I think I am going to be here longer than the typical 30 days. They keep wanting me to take something called The First Step, and all the while I keep wanting to take The First Chip. Little commandants walk around murmuring, "You need a meeting, not a chip." Maybe you can send me some chips of love over the Internet. Oh, you saw it coming all right. Yesterday, he's blogging about free will (or the lack of it). Today, he's crying the blues. Blues over chips. Blue-chip blues. (Excuse me, the rabid wordplay must be a side-effect of the detoxification process.) They've intentionally left some reading material in my little monastic room. One book had writings of the Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard with the book's spine splayed open like Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan getting out of an SUV, with this passage highlighted by felt-tip neon marking pen: "Ah, one speaks of so many various things which a man may love most dearly: a woman, his child, his father, his mother, his fatherland, his art, his science: but what every individual loves most, more than his only child, the child of promise, more than his only beloved on earth and in heaven--is his own will." Some wise guy added "potato chip" to the list of loves posted by Kierkegaard. Hahahaha. Very funny. Salty humor. The (potato) eyes have it. No skins off my back. Then the smart-alecks who run this chip-free resort left a Zen Calendar in my cell with its convenient little January 8 "scripture" that blares with a quote from Henry Miller: "I know what the great cure is: it is to give up, to relinquish, to surrender, so that our little hearts may beat in unison with the great heart of the world." And some smart-ass scribbled by hand: "while your little heart still beats, Mr. Chipaholic" -- accompanied by one of those saccharine smiley faces (it's a good thing sweets aren't my addiction). (Henry Miller? Whew. I thought he was addicted to something else; and it wasn't pussywillows.) I was going to write a haiku about potato chips, but it only increased my carbohydrate-laced craving. Some lecturer this morning told us we have a thinking disease, not an eating problem. I think not, Herr Rehabmeister. Anyway, I say, "A chip, a chip, my queendom* for a chip."
Yours,
Pawlie Kokonuts

*Since so many of my readers are women (or pretend to be), I thought I'd throw that in there, for sympathy. I ain't getting any (sympathy, that is) in this chip rehab. No sirree, baby.