Posted on by rjonakait

Snippets

Only a couple weeks ago I was singing: “I am getting sutured in the morning./ Bing-bong machines are gonna chime./I still could party/but I must be hearty./So, get me to the OR on time.”

I had my left knee replaced. Because I had the right knee replaced a decade ago, I knew it was not a walk in the park. (Did you get the humor?) Because of the weakness and the opioids, I have missed some of my self-imposed posting deadlines.

I guess a friend was trying to make me feel better by sending me an internet page indicating that things could be worse. It said that a knee replacement was only the third most painful orthopedic procedure. I don’t know how such things are measured, but two spinal procedures topped the list. Fourth and fifth were ACL repairs and a shoulder replacement. This only reminded me that I have had two ACL operations and one shoulder replaced. I don’t really desire pain, but I am apparently composed of faulty and injured joints.

Two months ago, a friend had a hip replaced, and during his recovery he said that he was told a hip replacement was a relatively easy procedure compared to a knee replacement. After I mentioned the pain rankings, he asked where hips were on the list. I did not know. I only saw the top five, but I told him it was far below the others under the heading “Almost a Vacation.” The friend was not overly amused.

A medical technician told me that she was going to have a manicure later in the afternoon. It soon came out that the next day she was flying to Miami to be with her boyfriend.  She told me that he was from New York but now worked in Florida. I asked what he did, and she replied, “He’s a personal bodyguard. . . . He works for a private family.” I decided to stop my inquiries.

During my recovery, I have listened to a lot of radio. Unfortunately, my local NPR station was having its dreaded fundraising week. I am always fascinated by the matching grants. You know, the ones that say, “If we raise $10,000 by tonight, a donor will match it.” If that amount is not timely raised, does the supposed donor really withhold the money?

It hardly lightened my mood, however, to listen to any news. There was 24/7 coverage of the Mideast conflict. That was not surprising, but I was bewildered not to hear more about or from Jared Kushner. I thought that he and his pappy-in-law had solved the Mideast. On the other hand, the Mideast has apparently made Kushner successful since the Saudis have given him $2 billion to play around with.

And then, of course, there are the shootings that seem to happen even more than Mideast violence. The new House Speaker met the news of the Lewiston massacre with the old recipe—prayers for the evil to end. I assume he believes that God is eternal, and Johnson must know that people have been uttering prayers for as long as prayers have existed. He did not address why prayers should now stop the violence when they have not before.

Of course, in the time of Jesus, apparently evil existed, but there were no mass shootings. Perhaps we should all reflect on that.

At least one of the recent shooters seems to have been mentally ill. Is someone with a mental illness “evil”?

Can you turn the other cheek as Jesus commanded and also carry a gun?

Posted on by rjonakait

Snippets

Old joke: I dreamt God sneezed. I didn’t know what to say.

I grew up saying Gesundheit after someone sneezed. When I moved to New York, I taught myself to change this reflexive Germanic response to “God Bless You.”

Why do we say “God bless you” after someone sneezes but not after a cough? A hiccup? Or a fart?

“Truth rests with God alone, and a little bit with me.” Yiddish proverb.

I was watching The Simpsons show with the homage (or at least I think it was an homage) to My Fair Lady. After the Pygmalion transformation, however, the Groundskeeper Willie reverts from the new gentleman created by Lisa to his old self because he is happier that way. I realized that we have no sequel or updating to the classic musical or straight play where it is explained what happened with Eliza Doolittle for the rest of her life. How do you think she ended up?

There may be no free lunch, but apparently there is free shipping.

I am sparkling; you are unusually talkative; he is drunk.

A spokesperson for the FDA had posted on her Facebook page: “I prayed hard for God to use my professional and personal experiences with crisss (sic) to serve Him. . . . In May, the White House called me to ask and asked if I would consider a high level communication role at the FDA. I knew God was directing my path, and I had to come back to DC to work. . . . I will not lie. I will not do anything that violates my personal ethics and values. I ask all day that my Lord and Savior direct my words and actions to do what’s right and to help others through these difficult times for our nation.” Her personal ethics and values and her request that Jesus direct her words did not prevent her from promulgating misleading statements. She was dismissed a few weeks into her tenure. God, apparently, prescribed a short path for her. Or perhaps He slapped his knee and chuckled, “That was a good one.”

Was the Heavenly Father upset when His only Son converted to Christianity?

The right wing spews that Democrats are “socialists.” In the next breath, they shout that Democrats are “anarchists.” You can be neither. You can be one or the other. But you can’t be both at the same time. But then again, if facts don’t matter, why should language or logic?

A young friend told me that he was in a band that does a mashup of surf and punk music. And I wondered: Is this like the Sex Pistols performing Little Deuce Coupe?