Well I've been having a glyphosate reaction all weekend. I much prefer to explain celiac disease to people as a condition that causes cooking, but in fact there are other symptoms. There is a state where the body is constantly trying either to get rid of some of the glyphosate inside it, or to lie down and rest after doing that for a few hours, until it's time to purge again, and so the body has to be severely disciplined to get it to do anything besides moving from bedroom to bathroom.
That's where I spent the weekend. After coming back from the bathroom I would sit down in front of the computer and say to my body, "Now take the next magazine off that stack and check it for articles by or about X." I had promised a correspondent a collection of the articles by and about X in a certain magazine. The body, being hypersensitive to everything in its current Weepy Weed Mode, would respond with "I want to check it for traces of mold." I would say "There! Smells like glossy paper and glue, doesn't it? Now let's look for X's name on the pages," and the body would sit up and look at a half-dozen pages and then start to droop over to the side saying, "It's actually possible to sleep curled up on this bench, fairly comfortably, if we could only get that Unsatisfactory Toshiba out of the way. Either the head or the feet ought to be where the Unsatisfactory Toshiba is." I spent the weekend feeling dissatisfied with my own body, which spent the weekend feeling dissatisfied with the Unsatisfactory Toshiba.
A computer is the offspring of somebody's brain, and I am beginning to think that in the case of the Unsatisfactory Toshiba the person who programmed a piece of per brain into it was a certified idiot. The Unsatisfactory Toshiba spent an hour or two, this weekend, looking at a document that was open on its own screen and buzzing and trying to tell me that that document did not exist. It actually flashed the words "does not exist." I thought about telling it that it did not exist, but decided that thought might push the wretched little thing into such existential torment that it would never start again and none of my documents would exist.
Also in the e-mail with the correspondent, the correspondent had carelessly asked for everything by Y, too, and I had carelessly replied, "Y not?" and then I opened one of those old magazines and remembered that Y, X's associate, had been a contributing editor. Every single issue contained at least one article by either X or Y; some contained both, and most contained some other contributing editor's comments, or else the company's advertisements, about what Y was up to.
I like reading both X's and Y's articles and am enjoying transcribing them, during the 20 to 25 percent of the time when I've been able to focus my mind, with the further complication that my astigmatism gets worse during glyphosate reactions, too. Twenty years ago when the editor of the magazine had that silly idea aboutusing a sans serif font in the magazine I wrote to say, "I can read it, but I'm sure many former subscribers can't." Now I'm one of the people who have to hold a magnifying glass over the pages of sans serif type. I hate sans serif type.
Apart from that this is the sort of job I've always done so "prodigiously" well, and enjoyed; and I am enjoying it, so far as my temporary disabilities allow.
This post is one big sprezz but I trust the astute reader to notice what a cheerful little whimper this sprezz has.
</wail>
Oh, and also the Cat Sanctuary is due to rceuve some new kittens. One always wants to snuggle late-summer kittens on a frosty morning but, if living with a Queen Cat like Serena, one is better advised at least to try the "When will that woman come and take those kittens home? You're so kind to put up with them, Serena!" routine.
I don't expect to be able to fool Serena for a New York minute but I think she does appreciate my making the effort.
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