Sidetracked Charley

I was practicing the theory of washing hands to avoid illness. Frankly I was feeling very obsessive compulsive with my pocket full of anti-bacteria wipes. And a bit high. The major ingredient is after all alcohol in those things. I thrashed them and decided to use soap in the lavatories. I must admit this cramps my style just a bit. Not everywhere you are in contact with people has public restrooms. I changed to moist towelettes for diaper changing. They don't come in tidy and convenient packages so I had zip lock bags in my pockets. Now I have a cold and very red and raw hands. And I have made all my friends feel like Typhoid Mary. Seems I am not alone. I was listening to NPR this morning about the flu and religious practices. Everything from Holy water to shalom has been condemned. Never mind sitting (or kneeling) close to your fellow worshipers in a pew or on a prayer rug. I am reminded of the time I gave up all food from the sea because of the mercury level. Then all vegetable...

I was reading up on the growing threat of Swine Flu this morning. I do not live in a major city and with my lifestyle (artist in own studio) I can avoid a lot of the risk centers. But I do live in a border state with Mexico and between the drug traffic and illegals crossing (not to mention tourist traffic) I cannot be totally sure of safety from the feared pandemic. This morning's news was, however, particularly interesting in that I evidently survived a previous pandemic in 1968. From Yahoo News : While all the deaths so far have been in Mexico, the flu is spreading in the United States. Eleven cases were confirmed in California, Kansas and Texas, and eight schoolchildren in New York City caught a type A influenza virus that health officials say is likely to be the swine flu. The new flu strain, a mixture of various swine, bird and human viruses, poses the biggest risk of a large-scale pandemic since avian flu surfaced in 1997, killing several hundred people. A...