As I sat one recent afternoon in that glorious never-ending traffic nightmare where the BQE joins the Battery Tunnel discharge to form the Gowanus Expressway, I started musing about how such affairs might be resolved if we lived in a slightly less compassionate society.
Taxpayers, fed up with the traffic, might fund the maintenance of huge flying car-smashing machines that would arrive at the focal point of the snarled traffic and bulldoze all the idling cars off the roadway without concern for fault, life or limb.
I suppose there would be initial outrage from some quarters, but people would eventually grow used to this and begin to assume a fatalistic air.
“Did you hear, Aunt Selma had her car swept off the highway last week.”
“Oh my, that’s too bad.”
“Well it just serves her right for trying to get to the airport in the middle of rush hour.”
Perhaps this is how the once-civilized people of Baghdad are learning to cope with their new reality.
Cancer-grrl’s hair started falling out this week, and she induced me to shave my own greying locks in a show of solidarity. So this morning, buzz-buzz — off they came.
Apart from the occasional hangover this is probably the closest I’ll ever come to chemotherapy. Blessed with superior genetic makeup (probably a result of many generations of abandoning weak babies in the snow), my family is virtually unknown to cancer. The men in my family live into old, old age and generally die of quiet stoic bitterness, if they don’t get walloped with a frying pan first.
So if anyone out there has friends in chemo, take a leap and shave it off.
UPDATE
By popular demand, here is my scalp. OK, it’s not completely hairless. I got as close as I could with the electric clippers. Hey, solidarity has its limits.
Everybody I know seems to be getting cancer these days, so I asked myself the natural question: How can I benefit from this situation, and maybe make a little spare cash out of it?
I think I came up with an idea: Humorous cancer t-shirts!
Here’s the logo I’m developing. Needs work, but not bad for half an hour spent with CorelDraw:
Great idea, huh?
