Don't look at me. I can't turn left any more than I already am.

Continuing their stumbling ways since the '06 elections, Congressional Democrats have now been charged with alienating the Deep South portion of the party's base. Both of them:

Democratic staffer urges vaccinations before visiting Talledaga or Lowes NASCAR Tracks

In an e-mail, the official -- who works for committee chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss. -- noted an "unusual need for whomever attending to be vaccinated against hepatitis A and B," as well as "the more normal things -- tetanus, diphtheria, and of course, seasonal influenza."

Although the memo said nothing about NASCAR, thin-skinned rednecks came out in droves to condemn this slam. Lowes Speedway president (whose name might be the best part of the story) Humpy Wheeler was quoted as saying that no NASCAR event has ever sparked an outbreak — "other than a few headaches because somebody's favorite driver ran out of gas, or maybe a morning hangover."

Nyuk nyuk nyuk, Humpy. Nothing like encouraging public drunkenness around 200,000 of your closest good-ole-boy friends, who are rooting for a sport with such a diverse group of drivers and who lovingly embrace Northerners like Jeff Gordon.

Me? I would've added distemper and rabies to the vaccination list and recommended a penicillin shot as soon as they got home.

Odds against? Astronomical. Significance? Microscopic.

As is my usual Monday custom when I'm oot and aboot in the car, I listened to the CD of Wait Wait from yesterday's broadcast. The show, like its Car Talk cousin, creates the illusion of NPR listeners calling in, when actually you leave your name by phone or email and they call you. The host usually chats up the "caller" for a moment or two about his or her home town, and today's segments were no different; the last of them, though, struck a familiar note for me, since she was from the Lawn Guyland town of Babylon.

I think my family had friends out there at some point, but I remember the town mainly for two things. Most notably, for being the final stop on the Long Island Rail Rot south shore line which was usually my pipe to and from "da city," Merrick and Bellmore being the closest stops to my onetime home and Seaford being where my sister lived.  To this day, I can recite every stop on that line as called out in Penn Station by station agents with graduate degrees in Rapid Gibberish. I also remember it from high school years, when I always had to be up at an obscene hour to catch the bus (or walk/bike in the austerity year when there warn't none) and every. Fucking. DAY, without fail, the LIRR's 5:55 Babylon-to-Brooklyn train was reported on WCBS as being delayed. It was something out of Groundhog Day, years before the movie even got made.

None of which means anything, really, other than to explain that I've heard of the town, duh. The stranger thing today, though, was at the precise second this lady was announcing herself as being a non-captive of that non-whorish, non-Hanging Garden of a town, I was behind a car on Sheridan Drive in suburban Buffalo, more than 400 miles away from her home town.

The dealer on the car's license plate holder? BABYLON HONDA.

There's got to be some cosmic significance in that. I just have no idea what it is.

To the only person on my Flist who would understand anyway:

с днём рождения to yooooooo,
с днём рождения to yooooooo,
с днём рождения dear Jennnnnnnnnnnn,
с днём рождения to yoooooooooooo ::hugs::

P.S. The instant I started composing this, my Gmail lit up with word from indians.com about World Series tickets:

erm, nope, didn't win any:(

But I woulda invited you if I had ::hears world's smallest violin playing::