Monday, November 22, 2004
Viva Allegra!
This weekend was extremely windy. I like the wind well enough; it sounds cool and moves things about; the only thing about the wind that leaves me less than happy is that it brings out lots of airborne crud that makes me sneeze. This was the case this weekend, exacerbated by vigorous sessions of housecleaning in preparation for guests on Thursday. All this led me to take stronger allergy medicine than usual - in addition to my little nose-squirt steroids, I also took a pill. The thing is, these pills - which most people seem to take without a second thought, except perhaps thoughts of blissfully clear sinuses - get me pretty well stimulated. My heartrate speeds up a little, I talk faster, I move faster; if I exercise, I perspire more, and more quickly too. These allergy pills have a definite impact on me - not one I particularly dislike, but one I certainly notice.
I used to take Claritin pills for my allergies, and every time I did I’d think of the Velvet Underground song “Heroin,” humming the name of the drug I’d taken to that tune as I sensed the drug moving through my system, making my heart pound and my energy level soar. Lou Reed’s nodder’s anthem was a fitting counterpoint to my supercharged systems, slowing me down a little even as the soundtrack in my mind built to crescendos of jangly electric guitar and seismic bass lines. “Claritin… it’s my wife, and it’s my life....” Yeah, good times.
Well those good times have undergone a major change. Our insurance company has encouraged (compelled) us to switch from Claritin to Allegra for lozenge-based allergy prophylaxis. (I really just wanted to have the letters x, y and z all in a single phrase there. Whoohoo! Monday morning wordosity!) The Allegra pills work about the same as the Claritin did - both are effective in keeping my head clear, and both get me a bit worked up and agitated in a friendly, “let’s build an addition to your house” kind of way. The thing that’s different now is that I don’t have that soothing mental “Claritin” soundtrack to keep me centered and cool, like Lou Reed always is. Instead, I find myself with an endless loop playing in my head of the opening song to a children’s show from my youth, one that I never watched but whose theme I couldn’t escape - a “Sesame Street"-style show to teach spanish-english bilingualism, called “Villa Allegra.“ That song featured (typically hyperactive) children sing-shouting the name of the show, followed by the following catchy lyrics: “Laa la la la la la la la laa la la la la - villa allegra! ( - repeat until insane).”
Needless to say this has done VERY LITTLE to cool my overheated homeostatic systems and as a result I’ve had scattered thoughts and misfiring memories and notions all weekend. I also slept very little last night, what with those damn kids singing like munchkins on coke till three in the morning. Now I’m living without drugs (those drugs, anyway) and the kids in my head are starting to settle down for a nap, so I am almost ready to have a normal productive day. However, what remains of my pharmaceutically-overdriven weekend is a house that’s already almost clean enough to host thanksgiving here (premature, I know, especially with Shedzo the dog and his feline friend Hairscatter still performing their insidious work enfelting our hardwood floors), and a few garbled notes in my little book. Those notes are just going to confuse me when I compile my writings into a coherent opus someday, so I’m going to disgorge them now and let you struggle with them instead of me.
Does it strike anyone else as strange that lessons teach you more, but morals get you to do less?
Stories about characters who don’t yet exist: “The Dangerous Proclivities of Harlan Nass”; “Zafu Zabuton: Enlightened Being.”
When I’m reading about legal services programs and my eyes are tired, I do find it entertaining to think I’m finding repeated references to the training and use of “pro bozo attorneys.” I imagine a bunch of jaded clowns in suits with bulky litigation briefcases, saying stuff like “get those amateur paintfaces the hell out of my tiny vehicle, I’m running a business here dammit, now where’s that writ (followed by a long squirt in the face with seltzer).”
Great line from the most recent alumni magazine to come to me from my old college, spoken by a biologist who spent time on the space shuttle (or space station? hard to remember and I recycled the damn thing in a burst of sanitary energy), who was describing his precautions for sleeping, including getting into in a bag so that his hands didn’t float up in front of his face, and the frightening consequences of his failure to do so: “That’s not good because if you wake up you think there’s some sort of hand coming at you.” Dude: 1) if you wake up? Are you suggesting that sometimes you don’t? 2) some sort of hand? Like a monkey hand, or an angry robot hand? Or more like a human hand, closely resembling your own? No it’s your own damn hand you silly astronaut, the very sort of hand you’re most used to seeing. If you can’t recognize your own best friend (I know space can be a lonely place) this bodes poorly for your skills distinguishing new lifeforms from your own sorry ass. 3) and what’s so “not good” about having an extra hand sometimes? I often think that I’d be better off with an extra hand on occasion. And in space, I imagine I’d find it even more useful. In sum, I think you’re a sissy, and you had better stay in your sack and leave space exploration to those of us who aren’t askeered of the occasional disembodied hand floating up to our noses while we sleep. Spacedork.
That’s probably enough for now. Have a restful monday. Viva Allegra!