Bits & Pieces

 

Bits and pieces from this reporter’s notebook.

Da-deet-da-deet-deet.....I went to see a doctor about heartburn last summer. I saw the fellow for eight minutes after spending a half-hour with his nurse. She told me to stop eating peppermint Altoids; it worked. The bill was $255. But because I didn’t have medical insurance -- just hospitalization -- when I resubmitted the bill at their behest, it was only $143. Apparently that’s not uncommon, but it is nuts. Considering that two-thirds of Americans want universal health coverage -- like the rest of the developed world -- it should just be a matter of time before we get leaders who aren’t in the pockets of the medical industry and sanity will ascend.

Da-deet-da-deet-deet....Desperate for some distraction from the computer, I looked for something to zone out with on the idiot box. Twaren’t a darn thing. One of the TV listings was for a 2004 movie called "Snow" which was listed as a comedy. It must have been our illustrious Treasury Secretary endorsing the Bush-line lunacy for privatizing part of the Social Security system. Reminds me of the joke about Sweden switching from driving on the right side of the road to the left; they thought they would try it first with trucks and buses only for the first two weeks.

Da-deet-da-deet-deet....Other TV listings for the evening included MSNBC looking into the Martha Moxley murder for the umpteenth time and CBS wondering anew what happened to Princess Jon-Benet. No wonder 59-million people voted their gut instead of their brain.

Da-deet-da-deet-deet....I voted my brain, but I turned it off for a while and watched a meaningless football game; meaningless in that I didn’t care who won. I tuned in to hear just how dumb the announcers could be; they make baseballers sound like they have both an I and Q. One thing caught my eye. When the quarterback ran out of bounds on the other team’s sidelines, no one made an effort to slow his flight. He wound up leaping over a bench before he could even slow down. Not very sportsman-like.

Da-deet-da-deet-deet....Finally, I’ve heard the term Chrismukkah twice already, and I’d like to carol against it. For god’s sake -- whatever god that might be -- will the mindless iconoclasts who would take away Christmas please freeze in the dark of their own shallow souls. I’m not a major holiday person, and some of my roots are Jewish, but Chrismukkah is an offense to the very notion of culture.

And that’s SetonnoteS...I’m Tony Seton.

 

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