I read recently that to encourage readership, you should make your website a cheerful place, where people learn to go for a break from the world, or count on you to give them something positive. So I guess throw this blog on the trash fire pile of everything else I am doing exactly opposite of the smart way. Also, this serves as my official warning to you, in case this is like… I dunno, your first time here. Everybody else, I’ve missed the hell out of you, I love you, let’s go.

I’ve been engaged in a personal Battle of the Masks since we last spoke. So many battles that this post got too long and so I’m gonna post it in three parts. But basically, I’ve been out and about, if you wanna live vicariously on how safety stuff is going, here you go.

TRIP TO THE SALON

I got my hair done last week. I was pretty nervous, and my stylist sent me this after, like, the third time I asked him what the safety measures would look like, and he was like, “SAFE”, and I was like, “I NEED MORE INFORMATION” and he was like, “OK, Chill, I got you,” and I was like:

With my appointment confirmed, the salon sent a link to a webpage with instructions: Salon filled at half capacity, mandatory masks, only clients inside the building (if you were driving someone in, you had to wait outside), bring your own drink, they weren’t offering any reading material, text from your phone when you arrived and they’d let you know when your stylist was ready for you, hit the hand sanitizer when you come inside.

It felt pretty safe. When I arrived, everyone was wearing masks except one little old lady, but because there was six feet between customers, nobody was that close to her, so although she studiously ignored my stink-eye, I didn’t feel panicked, just uncomfortable. The salon had rolled up the garage-style door in back and turned off the A/C so there was fresh air instead of re-circulated. Which was kinda hot, TBH, but still appreciated. I hadn’t even thought about A/C as blowing a bunch of germs all over you. But now I do.

My stylist wore a mask, and talked in a mild way about the aggravation of it all. He’s pretty conservative, so I wasn’t too surprised about the aggravation part, but was surprised at how hesitantly he brought it up, as if he was on the fence.

I tried to stay away from my wacky liberal lefto commie talking points and returned serves on his complaints with points I figured he’d appreciate: Holy shit, I couldn’t afford to spend six weeks in the ICU, they’d have to send away to NASA to calculate that bill, amirite?

He was like, yeah, dang, that’s true. But then he said that thing about maybe ‘culling the herd,’ and letting everyone else get on with their lives, which was really hard to hear, and I had to silently remind myself that in this town, if I cut ties with all the people who had different views than me, I’d spend my days not only isolated, but with really bad hair. Also, I am not the boss of everyone, even though I really should be, because the world would work out so much better if I was.

When he was finished, I pointed out that he’s 50, and right on the edge of that herd getting culled, and I would totally wear a mask so he didn’t get it. He laughed a little nervously and said, “You really think this whole Covid thing is that bad? I mean, I don’t think…. Wow, we must get our news from completely different places.”

And that made me sick to my stomach, because he’s probably 100% correct, and what the fuck is going on in our country that ‘news’ could be so different, depending on the audience? Anyway,  I left him 100% tip, partly because he’d refused to take money for the missed appointment during Shelter In Place, and also because I know it’s really easy for me to get up on my high horse when I don’t have to worry about masks fucking up my ability to pay the bills. And also, because he wore a mask.

Up Next: That time I went to the allergist and none of the staff were wearing masks and I lost my shit. Can’t wait? Grab the basics on Twitter (ooh, synergy!)

Just went to my allergist for shots. 100% of patients were wearing masks POSSIBLY BC SOME HAVE ALLERGY INDUCED ASTHMA

0% of the medical staff were wearing masks.

— Anne Nahm (@AnneNahm) June 15, 2020

AND FINALLY

I was looking for this post to publish this morning, and came across a draft right under it titled “VAGINA CAVE” and I was like, What the fuck was that? Which happens more often than you’d think. Am often confounded by my past self, even if we’re both sober.

It turned out to be a comment in response to this book that I felt too insecure to post because the weirdos in my book group don’t know me like you do (we didn’t read the book linked, so I can’t speak to it’s quality, we were just gawking). Anyway, even if you don’t read my comment below, you should go over to that link and read the summary for that book, it’s amazing, the stretches of the imagination an author could come up with so that a guy could cheat on his girlfriend inside her vagina.

On retrospect, ‘stretches’ seems like the wrong word to use in that sentence. Oh well. Anyway:

That story posted about the haunted vagina got cross-wired in my head with the Berenstain Bears story about the mystery of the haunted cave where Brother and Sister Bear get frightened of a whistling noise coming from the cavern, but it turns out it’s just the wind blowing over a hole in the roof of the cave, and I couldn’t sleep last night for mental imagery of the Berenstain Bears lost in that haunted vagina. No questions at this time plz.

But! If you do have further questions, especially before I see you next time about more mask fails, fall down this wormhole about whether or not the Berenstain Bears used to actually be the Berenstein Bears.

And finally, finally further distraction, I went to find the cover of the original Berenstain Bears book about the mystery of the haunted cave, but instead found the original cover with this doctored title, bringing us full circle back into someone’s vagina.

YOU’RE WELCOME.