My sister Vickie came over today and we went shopping at Super King, the discount supermarket in Northridge that specialises in produce. That's almost all I ever buy there, so at the end of a blog, when I say "I'm gonna go to the produce market", I am referring to Super King. I just call it "the produce market". The place is always packed, even on a normal day (whatever that means anymore, haha). But today, as soon as we walked inside, we could tell it was a whole lot busier than usual. Every single checkout lane was open - 11 in all - and the lines in every lane extended to the back of the store. "Let's bail and try Vons", I said to Vickie, meaning the regular supermarket near my apartment. Vons probably would've had long lines, too, but likely not this bad. But Vickie protested that she'd driven all the way from Santa Monica and she needed to shop for her family. You can't beat the prices at Super King, so I acquiesced. The good news was that the shelves and produce bins were mostly full. They had tons of fruits and vegetables of every kind, even though it was mosh-pit crowded in that section of the store. In the grocery aisles, the only things they were almost out of were (you guessed it) toilet paper and water.
Before we even entered the store, we had to search far and wide for a shopping cart, finally locating one several light years away at the end of the parking lot. Now, as we stood looking at the checkout lines, I got an idea. "I'm just gonna get in line right now. You go get what you need, then come back, take my place and I'll go get my stuff". So that's how we did it. I waited in line with the empty cart while Vickie shopped. Then she came back, put her items in the cart and waited while I got what I needed. It turned out that were were able to make several runs each, because it took us an hour and twenty minutes to get through that checkout line. At least I got everything I needed for several days, so I won't have to repeat the experience until midweek, maybe longer if I make smaller salads, lol.
I am coronavirused out, and I'm sure you are too. This is just the weirdest thing. I mean, how did it get to this point? We were hearing dribs and drabs about the virus for a while. When was it first mentioned? Early February? Before that, the big news was Kobe Bryant, and when he died that's all you heard about for a solid week. That was on January 26th, and I don't recall hearing anything about coronavirus at that time. Oh, maybe a sqib on the news, a ten second report out of China, but I mean even three weeks ago it was still not a big deal. So what happened? Did we screw up here in America, and if we did, was it Trump's fault? They say a major part of the problem is that it's a "novel" virus, one nobody is yet immune to. But so was Ebola, and that was far more deadly. We contained that before it got out of hand, so what in the world happened this time? I mean, I understand all the precautions but it just feels really weird now that the whole world is shutting down. Yesterday they announced that all Los Angeles City Libes will be closed until March 31st, so we'll watch movies from my own personal collection until then. Not to worry, I've got a lot of good ones.
Well anyway, I "get it" and I don't. I know it's 100% for real, and yet I see the 24/7 hysteria on MSNBC and I can't help but wonder if there's an agenda attached to all of this. I know Trump fucked up, but I also wonder about the Republican conspiracy theory that this is, in part, another attempt to get rid of Trump.
Now don't get me wrong, and I mean - really don't get me wrong. You know there is no one more anti-Trump than me. I am Number One in that regard, and yet I know there is such a thing as germ warfare, I know there are biological weapons, and I know that there are all kinds of subtle and highly sophisticated ways of releasing said bioweapons. You don't have to unleash another Black Plague to get the world's attention. Here we have something akin to the flu causing the stock market to crash. I guess what I am saying is that this feels like there is something attached to it, like a program or an agenda. I say this because of the way in which the news media went from doling out little squibs about corona until about two to three weeks ago. Then they went on 24/7 coverage, and not just coverage but fear mongering. Keep in mind that the news media (and television in general) controls the minds of most Americans and much of the world. How would folks know what phones to buy if the tv didn't tell them? Ditto the news media. They tell you what to fear. Did you ever notice how it's always bad news on the news?
In short, why does it feel as if we live in a world of Constant Chaos? When I go on my hikes, and I am on a trail in a natural setting, I see squirrels running up trees and hawks flying, I see mountains standing where they've stood for thousands of years. I see plants of all kinds growing entirely on their own with no human assistance, and what I see is that the world is just fine.
That's what I see when I get away from the constant hysteria of the news media. I see that the world is just fine. Because animals and mountains and oceans know nothing about agendas. They just live, they don't plan or antagonise.
Did you know that the news media is controlled by the CIA? I know that sounds like Conspiracy Theory 101, but it's true and you can research it if you care to. Have you considered that we are doing what we're doing right now - i.e. hunkering down, "social distancing" (love that new term) and stockpiling tp - all because the news media told us to? Well, they didn't tell us to buy a year's worth of toilet paper but you get my drift. Everything we are doing right now was dictated by the news. And the news is controlled by the CIA.
Have you heard of behavioral science? Herd mentality? Do you ever feel like you're adrift and at the mercy of the next headline? That's what's going on here, and while I do not discount in any way the severity of the outbreak, I do question it's origins and what looks to me like a carefully manufactured buildup of publicity and hysteria on the part of the media.
Well, that's my mini-tirade. I'll shut up now and self-quarantine my opinions. But I stand by what I said (oh shut up already, Ad!).
When Vickie and I finally got out of Super King, we had just enough time to head over to Total Wine for some wine tasting. I told Vickie, "I'll bet they've stopped doing it" for hygienic reasons, and I was half right. They had stopped the wine tasting, but only for today and only because they didn't have an employee available to pour the wine. "It's been an all-day crush", one of the cashiers told us. "Like Christmas only worse". It must've died down though, because when we got there it looked like normal business, a few people in each aisle. Our consolation prize was a beer tasting, but with those they only give you a teeny-tiny thimble sized cup of beer for each sample, whereas the wine tastings are more substantial. I guess they call it Total Wine for a reason.
Back at Pearl's, after dinner we watched two episodes of "Tales Of Tomorrow", utilizing my new Blu-Ray player for the first time. The "Tales" dvds are from my own collection as you know. They are not Blu-Ray, just regular dvds, and the picture quality isn't great because the shows haven't been remastered, but every episode is great and I've had a blast watching them so far. The first one Pearl and I watched tonight was called "Time To Go" and starred Sylvia Sidney as a woman who opens an account at a new bank in town, only it's a different kind of bank - a bank where you save time instead of money. It works like this : you try to find shortcuts in your daily life that will help you to stop wasting your time. You find ways to cook dinner faster, for example, or do your chores more efficiently, spend less time inside the grocery store (haha!), and on and on. For every minute you save during the day, you are credited in your account at the bank. The bank's president touts the benefits of such a set-up : "At the end of your life, we give you back all the time you've saved, and you get an extension! Some of our account holders have gone on to live five years longer than they would've".
All of this sounds like a good deal to Sylvia Sidney, who starts keeping track of everything she does all day long, analyzing ways to cut corners and save time. She becomes so obsessed with saving time that she drives her her husband crazy. He finally walks out on her but she doesn't care. She's saving so much time, she's gonna live forever.
That is, until the bank president comes calling one grim afternoon to tell her that the bank is closing her account. All the time she has saved will be lost, it cannot be refunded. You see, the bank president, his stockholders and employees are all Aliens. We already knew this because it was explained to Sylvia Sidney when she opened her account. "You deposit the time you save in our bank, and we use it to restore our planet, which is being slowly destroyed by the gamma rays from a Supernova. If we didn't have the time our customers deposit, our civilization would be wiped out. But we're working to repair our atmosphere, and the benefit to you is that we pay back your time with interest"!
Yeah, it sounded like a good deal at the time......."at the 'time', get it? But hindsight is 20/20 (2020, get it?), and now the bank prez is informing Miss Sidney that her account is kaput, her time is gone and there's no refund and no insurance. The reason? The pressure from the gamma rays has increased to the point that it's overwhelming the repair work on the Home Planet. The Aliens need more "time" to fix things or they're gonna be toast. They need much more "time", in fact, so much more that they are now closing the accounts of all their customers, and not only that, but they're collecting on the fine print included in the account paperwork, which states that in the event of an emergency, the holder of said account will forfeit the remaining time in his or her life, to be used at the bank's discretion!
So all in one afternoon, Miss Sidney discovers that she's not only bankrupt, but "out of time" in general, because the bank has a legal claim on her life. Doggonitt, shoulda read the fine print, right? But of course nobody ever does. So now, at the end of the episode, in the words of the title it's "Time To Go" for Sylvia Sidney.
The second episode we watched was called "Plague From Space". I've just posted the entire episode on Facebook and I urge you to go to my page and watch it. For one thing, it will spare me having to describe it to you (in what has already been a very lengthy blog), and for another thing, you simply have got to see it! It is so appropriate to what is going on that it's not even funny, and it wasn't meant to be, haha. I mean, c'mon........"Plague From Space"! How great a title is that?
When you start watching the episode, you'll be immediately hooked because the dialogue is so akin to what's happening now. And like "Time To Go", there's Aliens in "Plague From Space", too! So you can't go wrong, trust me. Just go to my FB and watch it right now. It's only 27 minutes long and it's the perfect antidote to Coronavirus Overload.
I'm gonna sign off now and read for a little while before hitting the sack. We won't be going to church tomorrow, due to Pearl's age and viral vulnerability. Actually I'd be surprised if they're even having church tomorrow. Many churches have gone to online services only. I tried the Reseda Methodist website but there's no news either way, they never update it. Well, it's a moot point cause we can't go anyway, so there won't be any singing tomorrow. It'll be only the sixth Sunday I've missed in over five years with the choir. So that's about 274 out of 280 weeks, give or take. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. We'll see what happens, but hopefully there'll be a return to singing very soon.
I'll see you in the morning, then.
Tons of love! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment