Sharing the World with the Undead

To the Twitterverse: Who cares if “they” don’t like your tweets? They could run right past you in a marathon, completely unknown and unremarked. With rare exceptions, you would not recognize even one of “them” at the local Target or Walmart. They might as well be Super Mario’s second cousins.

Social media creates bubbles within bubbles, along with occasional car crashes — both real and metaphorical.

Let’s be clear:

The Law of Attraction (which is NOT a law or even much of guideline) says that if you focus on what makes you feel good , then you will attract that which makes you feel good. Law or no, this saying gives us sound advice for how to approach Twitter. Answer posts by people who seem to be holding onto at least a tenuous understanding of your particular multiverse, while avoiding others. Find YOUR people. Mute people asking for more followers for their umpteenth 50th birthday. Consider blocking the persistently rude and possibly crazy. Take time to tweet support to people who are having a rough or worse day.

Twitter is like a big, unsupervised party. Fun people are hiding in the room. Great conversations may be waiting to happen. But anyone can walk in that door. Like politics, Twitter directs some people toward the Dark Side too. They become victims of a pervasive and never-ending MUST-HAVE-MORE-FOLLOWERS culture. Or they just spend their time venting their never-ending hatred for Donald Trump.

Skittles, Reese’s Cups, KitKats, Lemonheads, licorice, Three Musketeers — Twitter is like that big pillowcase of Halloween candy. What do you do once you dump the pillowcase? You sort out the contents.

And throw out the Turkish Delights. Unless you are one of those people who like Turkish Delights. Your account. Your call. Just please don’t start having monthly fiftieth birthdays in a desperate fight to fill your pillowcase with more weird sweets you don’t even like to eat.

Obese Time, filled with to-dos

Eats up its own children,

the fleeting minutes escaping

into the too-much landscape

littered with lists

real or imagined

written or implicit.

Zombie phrase for the day: I think I lost my list.

Ahhhhhhddiihhhhgggh ahh baahhhddd bahhh ihhdd.

My begonia

In critical condition

Drooping, wilts, crumples.

A poinsettia dominates that window space now. I am the poinsettia whisperer. My last one lived nearly ten years, a gift from the Friends of Something or Another who helped out in the North Chicago schools.

Ten Periods is

Four periods too many

Walk walk walk walk walk

END OF DAY

Going outside I

Walk grateful as I detach,

Say “See you!” and smile.

I will find some more of these and add on over the next few days.

Zombie phrase for the day: The young ones are too fast.

Duhhhh duhhhgggg buhhds ahhhrhh dooo bashhth.

Mostly, you can’t go wrong by focusing on the positive. A belief that things will work out for the best can create a mindset where things appear to have worked out for the best. If that best includes attaining the peace of mind that comes from having been bitten by a zombie and then converting into one of the undead, well, your upbeat interpretation of the event will make the transition easier.

Today’s advice: Embrace the airlessness. Just don’t let touchy-feely positive affirmations keep you from running when a suspicious, moaning, former colleague shambles towards you.

Zombie Phrase for the Day: It’s not easy to be me. But at least I am not Rudy Giuliani.

Ihhhzzzz daahhhdd eeddee doohhh beee beeh. Buuuhhhd eeeettth ahhhb dahhhh wooohhhhdee wooohweeeahhhhdeee.

Zombie Phrase for the Day: You can eat the wax paper.

Ooohhhhhg aaahhhhhddd eeed duhhh aaaaahggzz aaaayyyyehrr.

Look at the picture, reader. Were those real humans? Are those real humans? The most normal looking human in the below picture is definitely the guy in the portrait.

That Arizona recount? No one would trust that recount whose brain cells were still remotely functional. And the idea that a former President might be reinstated based on random unsupervised recounts? Right.

Zombies! Zombies explain everything — at least most of what happened right before and after the last presidential election. Some of the participants in the post-election swarming still seem able to speak, but can they reason? Do they make sense? The fraudit can’t be the result of normal human thought processes.

If the current political situation seems incomprehensible, reader, consider the idea of viral amplification of a zombie virus. Does the jigsaw of our political landscape fit together better now? That virus explains many of the true believers, those mensuits and womensuits who can no longer believe in what they read, hear or see.

Zombie Phrase for the Day: Mike Pence has been one of ours for years.

Myyyyyyy Behhhdd ahhhh biiiihhhhdd uhhhdd uhhb ahhhr bohhhr deerrr.

Zombie phrase of the day: I miss real tech support.

Ahhhhhbihhth beeel dehhggg zzzuhhbohrrddd.

Your mind will go where your body takes it. If you tap the “Words with Friends” icon on the phone, you will begin spelling. If you tap Starbucks, you may find yourself in the car headed down the road toward a soy latte and croissant. We tend to ignore or discount our body’s part in our lives, but the habit of picking up a phone can lead us astray in seconds.

But bodies can also help us. Sour or sad mood? Try standing up tall and smiling. Weirdly. the right posture can fix a bad mood. So can baubles and trinkets, whether earrings or Imperial military decorations. Sometimes we simply have to fake it until we make it.

Wear the spiffy hat. Feel the spiffy hat. Be the spiffy hat.

And put the phone down for awhile in favor of larger screens — or even the great outdoors.

Zombie phrase for the day: I can see the truth. I am having trouble articulating it.

Ahhhh gahhh dee daahh duurhhhd. Ayybb abbigg dubbah ahhdihhgubaydtid iddd.

MICROSOFT NEWS POLL

How often do you talk to your spouse / romantic partner about finances and money?

Not often at all 10%

Very often 30%

Somewhat often 30%

Not that often 10%

Other / Does not apply 20%

Sometimes I read and click on the dumbest damn polls. Let’s start with the differences between categories. Who defines often? Obviously the reader who must decide between “not often at all” and “not that often.” But I can sort these from high to low, I believe. They ought to have done that for the readers — start high and go low or vice versa. Still, I don’t care and I can tell they don’t care either.

The Big Question: Who are the 20% of respondents who fall into “Other/Does not apply”? Naturally, we might assume these people are partner-free at the moment, a state otherwise known as “single.” After all, how can a person not discuss money with their partner? I am betting money works its way into the discussion and “applies” somewhere for almost all couples.

Still, I immediately had to consider the question of people with partners who might not talk to their partners about finances. Some possible reasons for this seemingly inexplicable response:

1. We never use money because we only use little plastic rectangles.
2. We live in the woods of Oregon and operate on the barter system.
3. My spouse is nonverbal.
4. We talk about money ALL the time but you did not include that category.
5. We are spiritually advanced and have evolved beyond the need to reflect upon money, as we simply ignore those letters from the Infernal Revenue Service.
6. My spouse has taken a vow of silence.
7. My spouse became lost on an expedition down the Amazon River, although we are still holding out hope she will return.
8. We are too busy playing “Doom Eternal” to worry about money. We barely have time to eat.
9. I don’t actually read those polls before I click.
10. We are too busy talking about season two of “The Mandalorian.”

If the “other” category had garnered 10% of the vote, I might have moved past this poorly worded poll without a moment’s thought. The universe has plenty of inexplicable, weird behavior that I don’t need to think about. But 20% of the vote is a full one in five. That might just be many people currently not in a relationship – but it might also mask hundreds of thousands of intriguing relationship stories that we will never hear.

I want to know when that woman gets back from the Amazon, dammit.

Polls are such a tease. This relationship/money discussion topic could produce results worth reading. Instead, it seems Microsoft has found another marginally useful way to make a little extra money.

Here’s another question for anyone who clicks on these polls: What are the actual odds that the results would come back 10/30/30/10/20? Wouldn’t 11/29/27/13/20 seem much more likely? All those zeroes at the end are highly suspicious in my view. Not only does Microsoft seem to be making up substandard polling questions and responses, the math looks… extremely unlikely.

Sigh.

Zombie phrase for the day: I am not a victim. I am a badass.

Ahhhhhbbb daahhd ahhbigdumb. Ahhhbbb ahhh baadsshhhzh.