my jaundiced eye

ptsd 2.0

MJE likes to peruse the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders periodically to determine whether I have acquired any new professionally sanctioned psychiatric conditions. I try to remain abreast of the latest and greatest in this area, but just to fully ensure that I have updated my psychiatric disorder content page in a fair and balanced manner I cross reference webmd for symptoms and meds to alleviate them. MJE feels that multi-sourcing disorders, psychiatric or otherwise is always the most prudent path.

In my latest review MJE found two new disorders with which I am undeniably stricken. The first:

PTSD 2.0 (post travel stress disorder)

Symptoms: anxiety, depression, hypersensitivity to odors, claustrophobia, rashes about the groin area, acrophobia, nut or pretzel allergies, coprastasophobia, diarrhea, numbness in the lower legs, unusual bruising of the elbows and fore arms, shortness of breath, anger management issues, and occasional hair loss, or rarely, an unusual development of freckles over the buttocks, pudenda and or (please respect the transgenders among us) scrota.

PPTSD Pre and Post Travel Stress Disorder (a rare acute form of PTSD 2.0)

Symptoms: serious physical and or mental trauma including but not limited to: broken bones, bruises, contusions, concussion, dental damage, abrasions, loss of dignity, intense fear of large armed men wearing black skirts, blue jeans and sketchy security badges, heightened notoriety and loss of income due to unmet professional commitments. Additionally, you may incur large medical, legal and public relations related expenses.

Not to fear monger, but MJE believes that any person, or giant rabbit, who has had to resort to traveling via a seventy five ton cylinder full of compressed oxygen stuffed cheek by jowl with masses of other nominally humanoid species traveling at 500-600 mph at 30,000 feet above the earth for any period of time probably suffers from ptsd 2.0. However, this syndrome begins to present itself well before boarding the aircraft or even entering the airport terminal, when you try to park your car and are confronted with the exorbitant airport parking lot fees. Once you enter, you are for all intents and purposes, simply a very large lab rat in a dark circular maze which could aptly be described, in the immortal words of matthew arnold in his incredibly depressing opus, dover beach …

” for the world (or parking tower), which seems

To lie before us like a land of dreams,

So various, so beautiful, so new,

Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,

Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;

And we are here as on a darkling plain

Swept with confused (car) alarms of struggle and flight,

Where ignorant armies (of minivans) clash by night. “

From there you have a miles long trek, dragging your luggage, backpacks, electronic gear, offspring and their attendant junk to reach the gleaming, welcoming beacon of light in the far distance: the terminal. Alas no respite there. The doors whoosh open and you are presented with a teeming mass of ill dressed, unruly, rude, pushy, lost, bad tempered people and their detritus through which you must muscle your way to finally reach: “the kiosk.” If you are able to successfully interact with that bot, you then must slowly shuffle like along like a homeless person with all of your worldly possessions in tow in a disney world worthy line covering the entire square footage of the your airline’s allotted space. At long last you reach a disgruntled airport agent who demands your tickets, identification, first grammar school, mother’s maiden name, best friend from childhood, favorite song, automobile vin number and the date you lost your virginity, with whom and where. In a family feud type gaggle you put your heads together and hope to come up with the correct responses (except for the virginity thing which you and your spouse or partner are permitted to write down separately on small scraps of paper and slip to the agent.)

If by some miracle you clear that hurdle you are released to try to find your way to the security area. Your destination is the tail end of another long snaking line of increasingly fatigued, frustrated and irritated travelers. An hour or so later, your group of already weary companions reach the bored bully of a security officer who demands identification, tickets, high school gpa, primary health care provider and whether you eat pork. If you manage to get past that humorless blue clad clod you then must speed walk as fast as is possible to a stack of plastic bins into which you are required to deposit your shoes, belt, jacket, electronic devices, infants in car seats, prosthetic limbs, pacemakers, breast implants and anything else which you might hold dear. As you watch your existence get slowly sucked into the dark lair of the eye of sauron who sees all including that 4.3 oz bottle of volumizing shampoo you forgot to pitch, you start to feel your life force start to seep onto the filthy floor on which you stand in bare feet. Then the final frontier, the full body scanner. You are nearing the end of the beginning. Beeeeep…goes the alarm and you are whisked off to be given a complete physical in full view of everyone by some blue rubber gloved vogon. After you have been relieved of your iud and nipple ring you are released to descend into the fifth circle of hell via an escalator that is so long you literally cannot see the bottom. Then you wait for “the train”, which will transport you to a distant galaxy far far away known as terminal b.

Now you have a completely new alien terrain to navigate: which way to gate 843, where are the bathrooms, do you have time to buy a neck pillow and where’s the cinnabon place. Those are all deeply personal decisions and far be it for MJE to tell you how to make your life choices but just so you know, if you happen to arrive at the gate 61 minutes prior to scheduled (but highly improbable) departure time you will be denied boarding and must go back to square one. If you do manage to get to the gate in time you will need to break up the herd as there are only single seats available in the waiting area because many passengers choose to let their luggage chillax in seats designated for paying passengers. MJE advises to just let that pass, you may win in the short term but the probability that you will be in the middle seat next to this person are calculated to be around 97.3%.

After an interminable wait, during which you are relentlessly subjected to cnn breaking news, the gate agent announces the boarding call. Attractive people, medallion members, people with screaming infants, people in wheelchairs, people who look like they are at the breaking point, and other random passengers are allowed to board first. Then you board by seat section, and under no circumstances should you try to deviate from the boarding order because you will go to the end of the line and probably get bumped from the flight and rendered unconscious. You finally make it to the jetway! Inexplicably, people are at a total and complete standstill like those ranks of ancient terra cotta chinese warriors you see in national geographic. However, once you make it onto the plane it becomes crystal clear. The smug jerks in first class are sipping mimosas but beyond the dividing curtain to steerage it is like black friday at walmart.

People stumble down the aisle thoughtlessly twacking every previously seated passenger with their bulky baggage, which they try to in vain to cram into overheads bins. They then stumble around searching for their seats like they are lost in a sand storm (Heads up: the seat rows are numbered 15-34, each with six seats labeled a to f. You are not the minotaur wandering around in the knossos labyrinth, for god’s sake.) You finally get to your 14” wide seat where there is no storage space left so you have your carry on bag, purse or briefcase or both, computer case, etc. jammed between your legs, only partially under the seat in front of you. When the flight attendant comes by to inspect things before takeoff you press your knees together like a seventh grader trying to ward off a sophomore in the back seat of his dad’s car. If she tweeks to that baggage storage violation of faa rule 8047210563391526.0863, section a. part g, you can kiss your stuff goodbye, it’s going down, even if your life saving meds are in it.

People finally settle in, the cabin doors close and you heave a way too premature sigh of relief…because out come savory containers of braised curried goat and cauliflower, kung pao pidgeon, cabbage florentine with chick peas and whatever other foul smelling delicacy purchased in the food court prior to boarding, followed by the inevitable miasma of intestinal distress.

You are of course seated at the very back of the plane next to the galley. You hear the flight attendants loading up the drinks cart with cold refreshments, ice and peanuts and you look forward to enjoying a coca cola product and a 1.5 oz bag of nibbles. Out of the corner of your eye you see the cart, you are so close you can touch it….but like a mirage, it fades away toward the front of the plane and you realize that you will not see it again until it whisks by when the pilot comes on the intercom to say they are starting the final descent and are suspending cabin service.

By this point you have fully surrendered yourself to the slings and arrows of outrageous air travel misfortune and sit like a zombie, undead but unable to move. You now no longer have any idea where you were headed or why. Yet there is no rest for the weary, the cleaning crew is coming and you have to get to carousel 10f before someone makes off with what’s left of your baggage and your dignity.

MJE will cover in a later post ptsd 3.0 (president trump stress disorder). It is not only far more serious but potentially fatal.

give me religious liberty or give me death by a thousand duck bites

It’s a damned good thing that MJE took her cholesterol meds this am because reading the crawling chyron of trump’s speech in the rose garden prior to signing the “religious liberty” executive order just about blew a hole in my aorta. When trump utters “religious liberty” surely MJE’s readers, who are a pretty sharp bunch, understand that he is speaking exclusively of christians’ liberty, particularly those of an evangelical stripe, to legally discriminate against “the others.” Trump is demonstrably a man devoid of either religious or moral convictions, a person whose behavior in his personal life and business dealings is anathema to the tenets of virtually every faith. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you (don’t stiff people who provided honest work for you) thou shalt not steal (hard earned money from innocent people for a worthless real estate certificate), thou shall not commit adultery (marla, marla, marla…) thou shalt honor the sabbath (does 18 holes of golf count?) thou shalt not make or worship idols (tax exempt ten foot high portrait of himself in tennis togs or gilded “trump” spelled out in 50 foot high letters slapped on as much as possible) thou shalt not bear false witness (obama born in africa, popular vote, inauguration numbers, wire tapping etc etc etc). That is some shameful track record for sure and as far as MJE is concerned, clearly demonstrates that donald trump is pretty much the last person on earth you could possibly dig up to deliver a sermon on the sanctity of religion.

Obviously prince albino pence, pap smear, hobby lobbied for and probably penned this load of pandering claptrap. He might have been able to pull off delivering this divisive, mean spirited announcement without irony because of his incredible sense of self-righteous piety, but coming from trump it is about as believable as hitler sitting shabbat with the frank family.

Trump intoned that we are a nation of “believers (unless that is you are a believer in islam.) He went on to add that people of faith (again only e-vangels) may no longer be “silenced” “targeted” or “bullied” by the government. And people should be free to speak from the pulpit (unless it’s in a mosque.) “Free speech does not stop at the steps of the house of worship” presumably referring to those located in pearly gated communities of like-minded christian believers. He droned on unenthusiastically from the teleprompter surrounded by the feverish faithful, declaring that he is taking “historic steps” to protect religious liberty (like banning muslims from coming into the country.) But the nirvana-worthy cherry perched on the top of this steaming pile of hypocritical excrement was his solemn pronouncement that “tolerance is the cornerstone of freedom.”

In the immortal words of janis joplin “freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.”

the first 100 days

first 100 days

MJE has been looking back at these past 100 days of the trump administration’s frightening bumbling ineptitude and marveling at how the country has held up under the pressure. Those snooty brits with their snide stiff upper lips have nothing on us.

Right out of the gate trump declared a ban on muslims or anyone who might look like one, entering the country, alienating a pretty huge chunk of the earth’s population, by which I mean humans. Fortunately that little bit o’ racism was shot down fairly quickly. Trump’s team, undeterred, took another bite at that poison apple and again got squashed. 0 for 2

So moving on to repealing obamacare, which for god’s sake should have been a slam-dunk. The congressional republicans have voted to do just that every day they’ve been in session for the past eight years (about 83 working days in toto by my count.) They now have control of both houses of congress and the white house (if you think that this white house can in fact be controlled) yet it turns out that lots of people who never had health insurance before obamacare (presumably many of whom voted for trump and the republican congressional candidates) have it now and they don’t want to give it up…gee, who knew? 0 for 3

But, let’s not forget all those executive orders flying out of the oval office. Gutting regulations, waiving ethics rules, eliminating funding for scientific research, etc. But what about the big stuff? Jobs! Infrastructure! Tax reform!

MJE proposes the following bold actions to quickly accomplish a number of trump’s fantastic goals and huge campaign promises:

Eliminating funding for the restoration of the great lakes and chesapeake bay is all well and good, but what about jobs? Why not kill two (endangered) birds with one stone. Put forth the largest most phenomenal job creation project in the history of the country: fill the damned things in. Talk about shovel ready infrastructure! Imagine millions of americans dumping tons upon tons of tar sands into those huge aquatic money pits. Once complete, it would be ideal terrain for low-income housing developments, again, more jobs!

What about the beautiful wall? Turns out it’s a bit more expensive than anticipated and the government can’t use corporate tax loopholes or stiff sub-contractors to bring the cost down. So how’s this for a plan, all those lead pipes in flint michigan have to come out, right? They gotta go somewhere…how about piled up along the mexican border, and bonus points!!! all those illegals scrambling over them will probably get lead poisoning. But then, bummer, we’d be stuck with a whole lot of undocumented immigrants too sick to hang dry wall.

Tax reform is simply too boring for MJE to think about. I’ll leave that to jarred, he’s got a 2pm on thursday open.

all in the family

In the interest of cutting back governmental spending and streamlining bureaucracy, the conald has opted to appoint his son-in-law, jarred to replace the entire cabinet, joint chiefs and white house landscaping crew. Although he has no governmental, diplomatic, military or horticultural experience, jarred, in the conald’s words, “brings a really, really great combination of ignorance, hubris and entitlement” to the tired washington establishment. All other senior governmental duties will fall to daughter e-vanka, a woman so placid that MJE wonders if she might just be on some sort of anti-seizure meds. Reports are that both kids will donate their chump change government salaries to their favorite (totally tax deductible) causes like unplanned parenthood and meals on heels. They will not however be entirely cost-free to u.s. taxpayers who will foot the bill for their staff, offices, secret service protection, travel expenses and refurbished government issued galaxy 7’s. Ditto new understated mid-price wardrobes for jarred (men’s warehouse) and the lady (steinmart) in an effort to avoid having their underlings resent the fact that the bosses’ typical attire costs more than their annual take home pay.

Even though jarred and e-vanka are assuming the lion’s share of the responsibilities, there are still a number of areas which will require management. Sons donju and ferret have their hands full pretending they’re running dad’s businesses plus squeezing in daily clandestine meetings with him to find out exactly what he wants them to do. That leaves tiphoney and barren and he doesn’t seem to be cut out for a high profile position.

Since all the good stuff is already taken, poor tiph will have to settle for sloppy seconds, as she has throughout her life. However, what with the budget cutbacks and all, there aren’t that many lower tier jobs left. EPA? No need for that now. Health and human services, ditto. NOAA, nope. FEMA, at best a part time job. National endowments for humanities and the arts, gone unless they teach the art of the deal…

The conald may have underestimated his little also ran, bigly. In hindsight he really should have given her more of a role in the campaign because the girl has over 300,000 followers on instagram. If they’d all gone to the polls and voted for him he might have actually won the popular vote. SAD!

game of clowns

MJE is in a state of exhaustion watching the frenetic pace at which the president and his goon squad are digging such a massive political sinkhole. I am also deeply embarrassed at the level of ineptitude exhibited by the aforementioned bunch of birdbrains. If I didn’t know better, I’d suspect they were deliberately trying to make themselves appear as stupid as possible.

Of course this all stems from the chowder head in chief whose itchy thumbs started the most recent debacle, tweeting that obama wire tapped trump tower. The tweet was designed to divert attention from the ever-rising tide of suspected russian entanglements with his campaign, transition team and now white house staff. That is what might be aptly described as shooting oneself in the foot because it trained a laser spotlight on exactly what he didn’t want people to examine.

Devin nunes, the head of the house select committee on intelligence (which is in and of itself oxymoronic in the extreme given that he appears to be an exceedingly dim bulb) is a button-eyed toady previously attached to the trump transition team. Wow, excellent non-partisan choice speaker ryan. Nunes exudes guilt with every twitch. His black eyes dart from side to side avoiding contact as he nervously shifts from one foot to another. If he were in a police line up there is no way he wouldn’t get fingered by anyone with halfway normal vision.

And surprise, surprise, surprise, he did do a naughty! Nunes sprinted over to the white house in the dark of night to supposedly review classified information which was intended to back up the president’s unfounded accusation of wire tapping. He was in such a big fat hurry that he didn’t have time to inform the ranking democrat on his committee, a boner move by any standard, but he managed to top even that by refusing to disclose what the materials were or where he got them. He did however manage to squeeze in two separate press conferences to declare that innocent people had been swept up by incidental monitoring by the big bad intelligence community, a group you really shouldn’t piss off. Devin, devin, devin, just stop! You are embarrassing yourself and by extension the rest of us here in the good ole us of a. I have no idea where the hell the 22^nd district of california is but please do us all a favor and scuttle back there. asap

But things continue to get worser and worser for the conald and his cronies with every passing hour as the purveyors of fake news like the nyt, wapo, cnn, etc. close in and the wobbly ship of state continues to leak like a sieve. Don’t look now, but there is a pack of ballpoint pen wielding bloodhounds right behind all you nincompoops, baying and clawing at the west wing portico. They’ve caught the scent of deceit and will not be stopped until they get to the truth. You can prop dicey spicey up every day in the briefing room tying his hangman’s rope in knots trying to explain all of this away but, fyi, not gonna happen.

Did those guys not learn anything from richard nixon and his handling of watergate? Everyone else in the country that witnessed it remembers the cardinal rule of politics: it’s not the crime, it’s the cover up, stupid.

fast and furious

MJE is unable to keep up! I knew the conald said he’d work fast but who knew that within the first six weeks of his becoming president he’d go from having to fire his head nsa guy, to having his attorney general recuse himself from an investigation because he lied under oath during his confirmation hearing all the way to accusing obama of tapping his phone. The post MJE worked so hard on and was just about put up is now effectively obsolete. Thanks loads conald. And the whip lash is killing me.

I always thought he was off his nut, living in his own alternate reality but he is now in certifiable crazy land. Courtesy of course of his irritable bowel three am twitter feed. I read somewhere that his most irrational tweets tend to come on saturdays when ivanka and jared are observing the sabbath and unable to hit the delete button. Please kids, forget about the fricking sabbath and save the goddam country. Or at least ask yaweh to keep an eye on dear old dad while you are not doing whatever you’re not supposed to do on the sabbath. The united states of america just can’t take another one of pop’s unsupervised unhinged saturdays.

A spokesperson for former president obama delivered a beauty of a barbed denial, stating that “A cardinal rule of the obama administration was that no white house official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the department of justice.” Snap! In one short sentence it denied the unfounded allegation and simultaneously indicated that if the doj had been investigating trump they had nothing to do with it. Yoo, hoo…doj, could you comment on your investigation of conald’s ties to russia? Oh, can’t say anything about any ongoing investigation or if there even is one? So you don’t deny that there might be an investigation into the conald’s ties to russia? Yikes, seems like the conald might have shot himself in the gucci with that tweet storm. SAD.

I can only guess that the intent of the wire tapping tweet was to deflect attention from the ever increasing number of campaign staff and advisors who have forgotten that they’d actually spoken with, met with or grabbed a pirozhki with some russian official or other….I think the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders refers to this phenomenon as mass hysterical self-preservation amnesia. With regard to the conald’s mental state MJE understands that the soon to be published revised edition of the dsm required a separate appendix for that.

coronation of the conald

Sorry followers. this was to be published earlier this week so it’s sort of a let down now…just pretend that yesterday never happened. I know I am.

MJE has been ‘reaching out’ to my vast network of fashionistas, style icons, the kardashians and stallones, as well as to my dc insiders like the unpaid interns on capitol hill to get the scoop on what the inauguration holds for the millions of americans who await it with shock and awe.

My first bit of breaking news is that the theme of the entire day will be the coronation of louis XIV of france who reigned from 1643-1715. His moniker was “the sun king” which is fitting given the sunny hue of the pet as well as his taste for all things gilt. The fact that louis hailed from the house of bourbon probably doesn’t resonate with the tea totaling pet but the pomp, grandeur, ostentation and sense of entitlement more than make up for that. Pet too comes from a royal lineage hailing from queens.

My sources tell me that the pet will don a long powdered wig in a color described by famed hair colorist frederick fekkai as “sunset in america.” He will forgo louis’s silk stockings for the inauguration due to the predicted weather forecast and will instead don double weave cashmere stockings in a regal silver. His footwear for the inauguration will be slightly lower slippers than those traditionally worn by louis owing to the fact that he must be on his feet for at minimum an hour and insiders tell me he has notoriously low arches. He will wear a ceremonial cape of ermine and brocade embroidered with the trump family crest recently commissioned and created by the extremely talented artists at modernchilvary.org in shades of red, cream and blue highlighted in 24 carat gold thread.

Melanoma will follow the conald’s lead and has commissioned a subdued empire- waisted, marie antoinette inspired gown over which she will drape a full length vicuna cape. It is reported that she will wear her auburn mane in a high pouffe, or toque favored by the women of the 18^th c. courts of france topped with a solid gold replica of trump tower. She will follow protocol and remain part of the background, entering the ceremony simply to hold the bible upon which the pet will place his left hand and vow to uphold the constitution of the united states. It has been confirmed that melanoma has been working with a team of learning disability professionals to bring the pet and herself up to speed on the basics of the constitution in advance of the inauguration. Short spark note presentations have been ongoing however there is no word on how successful that tutoring has been.

One big scoop that MJE can report is that the pet has commissioned a carriage designed in the style of that used by queen elizabeth to carry her to westminster abbey for her coronation in which he and melanoma will ride. The pet kept his campaign promise to keep jobs in America so it was constructed by the caterpillar corporation based in peoria illinois. Almost 1500 workers paid by the department of labor were employed as subcontractors and supervised by daughter invanka and sons don jr and eric who generously donated their management fees to the trump foundation. Not surprisingly, given their expertise, the project came in under the $10M budget and ahead of schedule. When not in use, trumpchariot 1 will be exhibited in the smithsonian museum of labor and industry as a model of american can do spirit. It is said that the reason that the carriage’s existence was kept a total secret until now is that the pet demanded that everyone involved in its commission sign confidentiality agreements and were forbidden to communicate with any members of the intelligence community.

After the president and first lady are comfortably ensconced in their gilded parade pavilion emblazoned throughout with the conald’s monogrammed initials, they will enjoy a short inaugural parade. The review was specifically designed not to exceed 45 minutes, as the new president becomes bored in long presentations. Parade planners were fortunate in this regard as almost 90% of the groups invited to participate declined.

There will of course be a long list of balls that evening where the louis XIV theme will continue to be de rigeur. Few specifics are available but anonymous transition sources assure MJE that the entire night will be incredibly great, greater than anything ever seen in us inaugural history. And thanks to the support of generous corporate donors will not cost the american taxpayers one thin dime.

Hail to the chief.

medicare ma

MJE just “enjoyed” another birthday. It was actually pretty great, my sistahood feted me with a wonderful surprise party. I ended the evening wearing a napkin wimple, a palm frond crown like the lemur king in madagascar and a pink sequined bra. I will leave the rest of it up to your depraved imaginations you sickos.

The next day, after a somewhat ragged morning I received an email from medicare ma letting me know what wonderful things she was bestowing upon me to keep me hale and hearty:

Name	Eligibility Date
PAP TEST DR	02/01/2018
PELVIC	02/01/2018
ANNUAL WELLNESS VISIT	02/01/2017
ALCOHOL MISUSE SCREENING	01/01/2016
DEPRESSION SCREENING	01/01/2016
HIGH INTENSITY BEHAVIORAL COUNSELING	01/01/2016
OBESITY COUNSELING	01/01/2016
CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE (BEHAVIORAL THERAPY)	01/01/2016
MAMMOGRAPHY	01/01/2016
COLORECTAL	01/01/2016
PAP TEST	01/01/2016
ABDOMINAL AORTIC ANEURYSM	01/01/2016
DIABETES	01/01/2016
CARDIOVASCULAR	01/01/2016

Well if that didn’t let the air out of my balloon I don’t know what would. It started out happy enough…annual wellness visit. Great! But it turns out that ma suspects that I am actually far from 100% given the rest of the recommended tests and screenings. I had no idea I was at such high risk for so many afflictions. Plus I am a year late on most of them which does explain a thing or two.

Alcohol misuse screening: MJE uses ethyl alcohol exactly as it was intended.

Depression screening: Not until I saw the above list.

High intensity behavioral counseling: I have no idea what that even means. Am I low intensity (or in PET’s words “low energy”)? It is true that I haven’t been exercising as much as I should which is probably why ma feels I might be in need of the obesity counseling.

Cardiovascular disease behavioral therapy: I hope that doesn’t mean I have to lay off the triple cream brie, butter and foie gras. If so I really don’t see the point in going on.

Mammography: Ma’s a day late and a dollar short on that one as you know if you’ve been a loyal MJE follower. And if she truly cared she’d know that too.

Colorectal: Ha ha, already did the crap in a box thing (ask your doc, it’s so much better than a colonoscopy, and I might add a real testament to american ingenuity) and I’m clean as a whistle.

Pap test (twice!) AND pelvic: Seriously? a speculum is the only thing that’s been in that neck of the woods for ages.

Abdominal aortic aneurysm: Does that mean that ma suspects that my stomach is about to blow? Yikes, better haul out the spanxs.

Diabetes: The only sugar I ingest can be attributed to the above proper use of alcohol.

Then one more cardiovascular something or other which I thought we took care of with the aforementioned behavioral therapy.

What about the fact that I am blind as a bat, deaf as a post and walk like chester in gunsmoke because of the arthritis in my hip. Or that my skin is thinner than japanese mulberry paper and I bruise like a week old banana. Or that my brain is like a magic 8 ball and every effort to remember anything results in “perhaps but ask again” or “signs point to yes” or “very doubtful” which is decidedly unhelpful when trying to find my glasses or think of my grandchildren’s names. What about those things ma? What about quality of life, huh? Why are you so focused on stuff like exploding abs and behavioral therapy for my heart, which frankly could use it as it has been in intensive care since nov. 8.

I appreciate your concern, but MJE’s got it all covered. Don’t need you to tell me how to behave, or what to eat or drink. I’ve made it so far without your “support” and suspect that I’ll manage to hang on for a few more years. Now if you would care to cover important things like botox, liposuction or facial peels then I am all ears.

MJE’s persian carpet

So another year come and gone without much to show for it. Fortunately, I have such very low expectations for myself that merely being awake for a time, then being asleep for a time and repeating that every 24 hours or so is enough. It’s great, I am never disappointed. Although I did just read the phantom tollbooth (which was hilarious and thought provoking, but not sure that in this day and age when language is limited to 140 characters it would be understood by most children, or some adults, SAD) and it gave me a momentary twinge about being such a physical and intellectual sloth. But nothing came of it.

As I write, the OB&C is on the phone relating to yet another person the tragic tale of his stolen truck. I would have thought that by now everyone on the planet must have heard about it, but apparently mike in mumbai didn’t yet get the news so is being subjected to the extra long version. He made the fatal mistake of begging the question “how may I help.” If mike’s paid by the call he just blew a whole night’s worth of rupees.

The other day MJE was reading an article from the new york times to the OB&C about melanoma trump’s new cause: cyber-bullying. He looked puzzled. After a long minute or so he turned and asked what exactly is “cyber-bullion.” That my friends, is a question only the gods can answer.

We’ve had the atl circus in town for a bit. Decibelle has made terrific strides and has become a creative and engaging child at long last. And just as forrest gump was always running, she is always skipping, which is a pretty nice thing in and of itself. Anywho, last night she was sitting at the kitchen table with her chin in her hands, musing about something or other and asked me if my mother was alive and I said no (I think knot and alhambra refer to death as being in heaven with the angels, which is surely not where my mother is, that I can tell you), then she asked if my father was alive and I said no. She digested that for a bit and piped up “you don’t have a mommy and you don’t have a daddy so I guess that’s why you have a husband.” Out of the mouths of babes. Except she has it backwards, that’s why men have wives.

In the spirit of a new year, I thought MJE should try to move beyond a silly blog toward something more substantial . But then I remembered the article in the recent new yorker about ruth draper who wrote and performed short vignettes in the early twentieth century. Later in life she met henry james and asked him if he thought she should go to drama school and pursue a conventional career as an actress. She recalled that “He took a long time to answer,” then lowered his voice and said “no — my dear child. You –– you have woven your own — you have woven your own beautiful — beautiful little persian carpet. Stand on it!” And so I shall.

MJE wishes all of her loyal followers a better than average new year but short of that may the end of 2017 find us no worse off than we are today.

Low expectations.

all in the family

Okay so MJE was going to give p.e.t. a pass this week on his cabinet choices, but how can I pass up ben carson’s touting his having once lived in public housing as a child as qualifying him to head up the department of housing and urban development. Well with that low bar of skill sets as a template MJE puts forth for consideration the following candidates to round out the conald’s cabinet.

Let’s start with secretary of state. The conald is looking for someone who will minimize diplomacy and establish more “transactional” ties to other countries. On its face that seems to indicate that he would approach every alliance with an eye to cost vs benefit and winners vs losers. Even if that means that we disengage from nato because, in his mind, there are members whom he feels do not pay their fair share. The fact that this policy might well lead to the proliferation of nuclear capabilities by countries to protect themselves from aggressive neighbors doesn’t not seem to be of concern. In fact, the conald says have at it and may the best arsenal win. Respectful cooperation is for losers.

So with that in mind MJE puts forth decibelle for the position. Her weaponry consists of just one extremely powerful weapon: her vocal chords. With one diamond-shattering howl she can bring an entire household (or grocery store, school room or if necessary, an american adversary) to its knees without a drop of blood being shed or a dollar spent. Talk about cost effective! She, like p.e.t. never concedes defeat and does not stop until she bends others to her will. Putin, abbas, kim jung il…run for cover and a pair of earplugs. You are doomed.

Now, let’s take a look at commerce. I hesitate to be so bold as to put my name forward, but frankly I am totally qualified. MJE spends an inordinate amount of time engaged in it, amazon, ebay, etsy…I know them all better than anyone else. I endure their unrelenting onslaught of advertising algorithms and emails without submission and in fairness, do buy locally whenever possible. That is when the price is lower, availability is better and ease of purchase is superior, which unfortunately means not much.

Secretary of the interior is a slam dunk: daughter albatross, If anyone cares more about the interior, that is her own, then no one does. She is dedicated to that cause to the exclusion of everything else.

Secretary of defense, see above re: decibelle.

National security advisor: ditto.

Secretary of transportation, alhambra our lsd (long suffering daughter in law) would be an excellent choice. She spends hours every day on our country’s crumbling roads and bridges toting her offspring hither and thither. A battle tested road warrior, she will insure that the infrastructure improvements required to make her carpools easier and drive times shorter will be given top priority.

Head of the faa: Son knot seems a good pick, he travels for business a lot and not on some tricked out private jet. He feels the pain of american flyers, the ridiculous hub and spoke system, the inflated flight times to cover delays and enable airlines to crow about their on-time records, the seemingly endless array of surcharges, the cramped seating and surly service, not to mention the disgusting flying public who dress as though they are either headed to bed or just woke up and haven’t had a chance to shower. The last bit is probably out of the purview of the federal government but MJE thought she’d throw that in because something really needs to be done about it.

Small business administration obviously goes to the OB&C. He has managed to assiduously keep our business small through outmoded product lines, inflated salaries, inadequate employee oversight, understaffing and inertia. A perfect fit for running a governmental agency.

Frankly, MJE is pretty sure I could fill the entire cabinet with members of my family and the country wouldn’t be any worse off than with the current picks. Admittedly none of us has any governmental experience or know how but that does not seem to be a prerequisite for appointment anyway.

Just like the family trump.