Month: April 2004

http://homepage.mac.com/kathodavid/PhotoAlbum12.html

So get this: The Feds nail this guy who’s attempting to smuggle drugs by having swallowed fifty one condoms filled with heroin (he’s what’s traditionally referred to as a “mule.”) He’s brought to Mary Immaculate hospital where laxatives enable him to pass forty four of them. But levels of opiates in his urine prompt doctors to be concerned that one or more of the condoms has ruptured, so they operate and remove the remaining seven. It turns out they weren’t ruptured, but hey, they didn’t feel like standing around and risk just letting the guy die, no matter how scummy he is.

Claiming that he hadn’t given them permission to perform the potentially life-saving operation, and that he “still has nightmares” about it, this transporter of illegal drugs is now suing the hospital for $5 million. This after already having tried, and failed, to sue the Feds for $25 million.

Here’s hoping the judge gives the mule a swift kick in the ášš.

PAD

Americans love humility. They love it when great people are humble. Part of what got W. as far as he has is his self-effacing, aw-shucks act.

At tonight’s carefully staged news conference (if I read between the lines correctly, he had a list of reporters, knew the questions they were going to ask, and had answers prepared…like “Hollywood Squares”), one of the last questions he got (and one which I think he didn’t know ahead of time) was that, in 2000, he said the biggest mistake he ever made was trading Sammy Sosa. But now, post 9/11…what would he say was his biggest mistake?

He couldn’t come up with one.

There was so many things he could have said that would have played well, cost him very little politically, and would perhaps have gone a ways to portray him as someone who learns from his miscalculations. Because it’s the lack of learning curve displayed by this administration that is its most alarming tendency.

He could have said, “I made a mistake in underestimating the levels of evil that a bin Laden would sink to. I pledge to my fellow Americans, I will never make that mistake again.”

Or, “I made a mistake in saying that the mission was accomplished. It’s not yet, but we have to finish it.”

Or, “I made a mistake in my estimation as to the intensity of fighting that continued in Iraq, but we have brave soldiers in the field and we will support them.”

Or, “I made a mistake in giving the country the impression for months on end that I was stonewalling the 9/11 commission.”

Something. Anything. In the words of Doctor Evil, throw us a frickin’ bone.

Nothing. Hundreds of Americans, thousands of Iraqis dead, WMDs still MIA, no clean exit strategy, no clear idea who runs Iraq after June 30, intelligence lapses being investigated…

…and he can’t think of anything in three years that falls under the category of, “Ooops. My bad.”

Whatever happened to the buck stopping at the desk where he sits? Or does that buck permanently rest on the Clinton desk, since Clinton continues to be blamed for whatever’s gone wrong in the past few years.

PAD

So we were heading back from the “To Be CONtinued” convention in Chicago. A decent if not huge attendance, but I try to support regional SF cons where I can. The crew running it was enthusiastic and attentive, and everyone had a good time, I thought.

I was sitting next to Caroline on the flight back. She drank a bottle of cold milk during take-off, which was good, because the sucking kept her ears from getting clogged during the climb in altitude. During the flight, she smiled, she burbled, then she started to drift and her eyelids were closing.

And then we hit turbulence.

Forty-five minutes of it.

Poor Ariel desperately needed to go to the bathroom, but she wouldn’t go when the fasten seatbelt sign was on, and during the brief moments when they’d shut it off, others would sprint past her before she could get up.

Naturally Caroline, who carries her bathroom in her pants, wasn’t concerned about that. The eyes continued to close, close…

And then, with one final jostle of turbulence as the plane headed toward the airport, her eyes snapped open and the milk made its triumphant return through her mouth.

Everywhere. Everywhere. I grabbed into the seat pouch for a barf bag. None. Of course. Wasted precious seconds finding another, tried to get it in front of her mouth. Automatically she yanked her face away from the bag and decorated me with the remainder of her stomach’s contents.

Being barfed on by your kid is one of those few life experiences where, no matter how many times it’s happened to you before, each time is like the first.

Her little Easter outfit was shot, as was the interior lining of her chair. I unbuckled my seat belt and changed her out of her outfit into another “emergency” outfit Kath had packed in the diaper back, trying to hold the squirming vomit-covered crying infant while hoping no flight attendant would come over and tell me I had to be buckled in. Didn’t happen; I suspect the crew wanted no part of the whole mess, and I for one don’t blame them.

The one advantage was that I was able to get her off the plane quickly upon landing. People stood up in the aisle to start getting their stuff from the overhead. I rose with the bedraggled infant in my arms, facing out, and announced, “Pardon me. Anyone care to stand in the way of a baby who just barfed?” They parted like the Red Sea…which I guess made it Caroline’s way of contributing to the whole Passover experience.

I’d been hesitant to give her baby dramamine before the flight because, yes, it knocks the kid out and avoids these problems, but the child often wakes up *incredibly* cranky. So I figured I’d take the risk with the relatively short flight.

Nice risk taking there, David.

PAD

We haven’t had one of these in a while. Have at it.

Over at Lot Auctions, we’ve got theScience Fiction, Mysteries, and More Bookstore Liquidation Sale – over 4000 new paperbacks are up for sale in this batch. You can bid individually or in groups, like the name implies. This auction is scheduled to end on the 15th, but more’s going up as we inventory it. And in the next few days, we’ll have some unique items of Peter’s up for auction as well. (Now where did I leave his housekey…?)

Peter just left a message on my voicemail telling me that he’s at To Be CONtinued 3 this weekend in Chicago, along with:

* Tim Choate
* Max Grodenchick
* Harry Harrison
* Luke Ski
* Chase Masterson
* Frederik Pohl
* Jeffrey Willerth
* James J.J. Wilson

So go and say hi. As for me, now that I know he’s gone, I’ll have a few fun things from the PAD archives to post…