The Cure for COVID-19.

 

Where were you when you heard they had first

 found a cure for COVID-19?

I was soaking my feet in Epsom salts

when my wife burst into the room,

waving a magazine and shouting:

"They did it! They did it! The cure!"

"Don't have a cheese curd" I said sulkily;

my feet were killing me. "Sit down like a

sane person and give me some details."

I knew that was a rude response, 

but I didn't think she'd simply turn around

and go find a divorce lawyer.

Without telling me anything about the cure.

She wound up with the lake home, 

the Shakespeare folios,

and the silk worms.

All I got was the condo and the cough drop business.

But then she died suddenly of the COVID-19, 

before the divorce decree became final  --

so everything came back to me.

I felt very relieved,

yet frustrated and confused.

Had she been inoculated or not?

I guess I'll never know.

I, of course, got inoculated

immediately.

And met a beautiful woman

online.

We were married in Saskatoon,

where her family was from.

They refused to believe in the

cure for COVID-19 --

because a German pharmaceutical

firm had come up with it,

and they were refugees from 

World War Two.

Predictably, after the wedding,

many of them died of the virus.

Gretchen didn't dare get inoculated,

out of respect for her parents' 

beliefs.

She caught it and became very ill.

But recovered.

And had an affair

with the doctor treating her.

She ran off with him to Nova Scotia.

About that same time they

announced that the so-called

COVID-19 cure was a fake.

It didn't work.

In fact, it made people bald.

So that explains why I lost most

of my curly brown hair in just

a month.

Nowadays . . . 

Oh, but why bother to tell you

about the new cure?

You've heard about it.

Horse chestnuts.

Swallow one whole.

You never get sick.

Your hair grows back.

Wives and lovers are

impelled to come back.

They tore down the whole

Amazon rainforest 

to plant horse chestnut trees.

Now the world is safe.

Now I have my wife back.

The doctor she ran off with

choked on a horse chestnut

and died.

I think that's as good a place

as any to end this story.

Wednesday's Timericks.

 

White House Order Against Diversity Training Generates Confusion  (WSJ)

@khadeeja_safdar    @laurenweberWSJ  

Prejudice in all its glory/now is the triumphant story/No more bleeding heart workshops/with their liberal milksops/He-men only need apply/in the modernized pigsty.

Two of These Mail Ballot Signatures Are by the Same Person. Which Ones?  (NYT)

@larrybuch   @aliciaparlap

My signature is such a scribble/it looks like a garter snake's dribble.

Officials who judge/will just have to fudge --

unless they are prone to a quibble.

Amy Coney Barrett served as a ‘handmaid’ in Christian group

 People of Praise.   (WaPo)

@mboorstein    @jonswaine   @emmersbrown

Small Christian groups, small Christian groups;

We do not like the sound.

Who knows what kind of oddities

in such a thing is found!

A 'handmaid' now, a 'handmaid' now;

it surely seems suspicious.

It could well be, quite possibly,

a role that's plain seditious!

No gasconade, no gasconade;

such groups are very quiet.

I'll just bet you that if we knew

their plans we'd have to riot!

So insular, so insular;

these self sustaining groups --

the only way we're not their prey

is sending in the troops!

Prose Poem: Storage.

 

I don't know about you,

but I decided to go into permanent

storage in July.

I mean, once they said

you had to not only wear a mask

but also put on a hair net

and goggles

I knew it was time to step back into

my closet -- where I had spent

many happy hours as a child

pretending to be lost in a 

treasure cave.

It was easier than I thought.

I mean, like, my built in designer

closet was already furnished with

a bathroom, kitchen, and orangery.

So all I did was step inside one balmy

July day, turn the key in the lock,

and settle down to a luxurious and

total isolation.

So far I have managed to knit

a life-size Holstein cow,

train silverfish to yodel,

and taught myself how to spin ripe quince

into flannel.

I understand that ninety percent 

of the world's population

now stays in their closets 

full time.

Good for them.

I personally will not 

be coming out again

until the Great Lakes

is drained to make room

for wind farms.

Tuesday's Timericks.

 

‘The recovery will be stronger and move faster’ if government spending supports the economy ‘until it is clearly out of the woods,’ says Fed chairman.  (WSJ)

"The patient won't recover without aid that lasts for years"

said the Finance Doctor (to the banks' tremendous cheers.)

Government expenditures are flying up so high

that Icarus is left behind -- a smudge upon the sky.

Who doesn't want free money? is the cry heard round the land;

just find the nearest ATM and give it the command!

Tens and twenties, c-notes, and green thousand dollar bills

keep our fam'lies going and will open up the mills.

I don't know where the money comes to fuel this ample spree;

maybe that old Fed Reserve has grown a Christmas tree.

And underneath it day by day the lettuce and hard cash

drops down from St. Nick's winging sled with satisfying crash.

I guess if worst does come to worst, and we are pauperized,

we can form a beggar's guild and all be unionized.

Trump Took $70,000 in Tax Deductions for Hair Care. Experts Say That’s Illegal.  (NYT)

As long as that yellow hair waves/never will we become slaves/It may cost a mint/but there's no skinflint/who doesn't love how it behaves.

Trump says stimulus relief negotiations over until after election, pulling back from aid talks.  (WaPo)

Relief talks are over, so Trumpy proclaims/He's tired of Congress's partisan games/He sez when he wins the election he'll start/to show once again that he's got a big heart/Till then the blue collars that his bedrock make/can follow his counsel to "Let them eat cake."

TImerick: CDC Updates Covid-19 Guidelines, Acknowledging Virus Can Spread Via Tiny Air Particles (WSJ)

 

When you're with the CDC/you can change a policy/without batting any eyes/or be cautious of surprise/Tell the world that black is white/Say that day is really night/This week viruses can spread/only on a crust of bread/Next week you can change your mind/saying they are unconfined/Maybe Pixie Stix will cure/some old microbe's deadly spoor/Street cred is of no concern/there is fun in each u-turn/Let us toast the CDC/for their stunning flummery!

Timerick: "Trump Remains Hospitalized as Doctors Give Mixed Signals on Health." (WSJ)

 

Doctors are not diplomats/and temporizing drives them bats/They do not like reporter's pokes/Their dander doubtless it provokes/And they are not too organized/and can't agree who's authorized/Each one a god in his own sphere/suspicious of competing peer/No wonder that their prim reports/are no more clear than smoky quartz/There's only three things they can say/that would make sense in any way/Trump is better, Trump is worse/or stays the same; no need for hearse/And just a sidebar to this strife/why don't we hear about his wife?

Coronavirus Surge in Mail Voting Most Likely to Lead to More Rejected Ballots. (WSJ)

 

I mailed my ballot in last week;

my postman then began to shriek.

He told me there was postage due

and all my stamps were missing glue.

The envelop was inside out

and went by way of young cub scout.

I used red ink instead of black;

my signature looked like a yak.

I doodled on the ballot, which

gave the judges all a twitch.

I used a check mark, not an X,

making counters nervous wrecks.

They said my address was not right;

I must be higher than a kite.

Neglecting all my p's and q's

was not a justified excuse.

So up the river I was sent

for choosing the next President!

****************************

And from the Peanut Gallery at the Wall Street Journal comes this response from a subscriber who gives his or her name only as 'Grouchen B.'   

"Tim, if you think you're being funny or clever, trust me, you fail on both accounts.  This is a serious issue, and as someone who will be voting by mail/absentee, I understand why many are confused about what goes into which envelope.  It isn't intuitive here in Minnesota.  And if my 85 year old mother were still alive, and she was smart and still sharp, but she would have needed help to figure it out."

Family

 

Henry B. Eyring.

"Much of what I know I learned from my family."

Henry B. Eyring

If you never learn from fam'ly/if you spurn their expertise/it will be just that much harder/to find any lasting peace/For God created fam'lies/to provide a child with poise/discerning who speaks wisdom/and who just produces noise. 

Healed.

 

President Russell M. Nelson

"The Savior will heal your broken heart."

President Russell M. Nelson

Our murky yesterdays recede/as from our anguish we are freed/by none but Savior, Son of God/who with omnipotence is shod/He will prevail in all our cares/as we confess ourselves his heirs.

Today's Timericks.

 

Since the Rose Garden ceremony introducing President Trump's Supreme Court pick, many people in his orbit have tested positive for coronavirus.  (WSJ)

Step into my Rose Garden, the President invites/come and see the viruses and other pretty sights/If you run a fever and your pulse begins a-slidin'/We will gladly blame it on that nasty Mr. Biden!

Early Works by Edward Hopper Found to Be Copies of Other Artists.  (NYT)

There once was an artist named Hopper

who didn't mind telling a whopper;

He suffered no weakness

about his uniqueness --

which kept him from being a pauper.

China’s mealtime appeal amid food supply worries: Don’t take more than you can eat.  (WaPo)

China and famine are very old friends/Hunger on Beijing quite often descends/Sad history teaches neither Ming nor old Mao/knew how to stop it with guns or with Tao.