Life's a Bleach, and Then You Die....

[captainsblog]

Yes, we've reached that point. Multinational corporations are having to put out news releases warning customers not to inject or ingest their household cleaning products, and poison control centers are reporting an uptick in calls about people doing just that- all because someone went on television and did it for the lulz:

Yesterday, President Trump stood at the lectern in the White House press room and, while the cameras rolled, asked his science advisers to test whether they could treat coronavirus patients by injecting ultraviolet light or disinfectant into their bodies. Today he explained to reporters that he had just been joking. “I was asking a question sarcastically to reporters like you,” he said, “just to see what would happen.”

By then, of course, I'd already tried getting in on the trend:



It's frightening that it's come down to this, but also not entirely surprising. One thing it reminded me of is how life, all so often, eventually comes around to imitating art.  Way back in '78, the National Lampoon, in between its high school yearbook parody and the success of Animal House, put out a dead-on spoof of the standard Middle-American Sunday newspaper, the brainchild mostly of future Wait Wait Don't Tell Me panelist P.J. O'Rourke and soon-to-be-Brat-Packer John Hughes.

I still have most of it somewhere. It came complete with ad circulars (Swillmart- "Where Quality is a Slogan!"), a Pomade magazine, and a full four-color comics pullout. This page spoofs Ripley, but check the bottom- it riffs on Wrigleys gum ads that actually ran in these sections back then:

What's the most healthy thing you can do?

A. Play in traffic
B. Eat rat poison
C. Chew Wiggley's Double-Fruit Gum
D. Drink bleach

(Much of the entire parody is duplicated here, including the full comics section where the Amazing Squirrel Man from my icon comes from.)

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The workweek ended rather quietly. On Friday, I did finally get the Stupid Website to take our direct deposit information for the Stimmy Money, but I've since read that the cutoff for the next wave of deposits was sometime on Wednesday.



I was supposed to have a Virtual Happy Hour with the Rochester office on Zoom at the end of the day Friday, but I either got there too late or it never got going. At least nobody named Dick showed up.

Yesterday was then designated as a "Small Business Saturday," an opportunity to spread the love and some funds to those who have stayed open and risked much in these times.  Eleanor had already decided to stock up on ribs and barbecue meat, so our trip to Lorigo's was as much coincidental as intentional.  The nice thing about being an "essential business" is you can still sell nonessential but heartwarming stuff:



At least it's Beetlejuice, not Bleacheljuice:P

Eleanor spent much of the rest of the day out front gardening. It was the first above-70F sunny day I can remember in ages, we had the windows open, and when I did the Wegmans run later, this affirmation was among all the red lines and warning signs in the place- among others they've planted around their stores, to remind us that if we stick with the program, we're gonna be okay:



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By daybreak, the heat was back on and the rain was coming down, but we still got out on the Canal trail for good long walkies with Pepper's buds:




Counterclockwise from top left: Jake and Ursula and their moms near a pier; a field of dreams of better times; a bridge to nowhere; and the can that keeps getting kicked down the road....

No other plans for today other than music, reading and maybe a DVD.  Probably not this one, though:

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ETA. Just saw a post from mark from dw_maintenance on my reading page that Dreamwidth is pushing an update later today that will, among other things, mess with how external blogging clients like Semagic transmit passwords to the DW servers.  But there is a workaround in Semagic to do after this change takes effect. So, for your (and my) future reference,....

https://dw-dev.dreamwidth.org/221358.html

Comments

[thanatos_kalos]

Of course the cut-off was Wednesday-- nothing like making the impoverished suffer more amirite?! *headdesk*

[captainsblog]

I operate on the premise that everything coming out of the Regime is a lie- and that therefore we still have hope of getting it this week.

[thanatos_kalos]

::g:: We'll see...I'm apparently getting the paper cheque this week, which means Fuck Face von Clown Stick's signature in the memo section and in some form letter. I'm donating $20 to the ACLU in response to that hideousness, a well as either burning the letter or wrapping Pepper's shit in it. :P