Airing of Grievances 2021

Shake and quake, shiver and quiver before the 2021 Airing of Grievances. Avert thine eyes lest such aggrievance latches on and carries forth from you or if there's something good on tv or phone.

-Covid-19
Now completely out of breath I've been running from Covid-19 for 22 months. So here it follows inevitably to my doorstep and it's waiting to demolish the shells that once were my lungs. In our Earthly story is the disease just an allegory for Death itself? That puffy particle just millions of tiny Green Knights? Alas I tell Him an undeserving "not today."

-Covid-19 testing and vaccinations
Kudos to the young woman who gently swabbed my nostrils yesterday with what sounded like a smiling face under all that shielding. Fewer kudos to the online mess finding that testing spot. It gets worse for scheduling vaccinations and boosters. The information is a world wide web of circular links and vital information beyond pages of unnecessary page puff. Strangely every time I schedule a vaccination I'm confronted with hundreds of choices but to determine any available times or dose types I need to take the time to register all my information before I'm told the venue is booked for the month. Someone out there needs to collect all the availability times and available vaccine types into a single real-time updating database so folks can find that tiny local pharmacy that's just waiting to jab out their entire supply. I would volunteer, but I'm too dumb to navigate all the current systems.

-Covid-19 testing and vaccinations (ctn'd)
Look get vaxxed okay? It's your choice, but go ahead and make that choice. Like all choices, it's up to you, but this particular choice also affects the rest of us. Perhaps that's an unfair situation that infringes on your opinions and your freedom, sure. But that's actually a pretty big component of freedom. Every choice you make affects others. Maybe freedom is actually more about responsibility than opinion.

-mask attitude
Remember when vaccinations started happening and everybody threw their masks down on the ground and stomped on them? It was pretty fun. Notably everybody threw their masks down. When signs say hey the unvaccinated still should wear masks, I kinda think that didn't quite work. Masks came off us all because the pandemic seemed to have ended with the first vaccination. Actually I'm kind of surprised we thought it was a good idea to allow the masks off the unvaccinated as well. Sure, not wearing a mask is a good incentive for getting vaccinated, but I still maintain it's the completely wrong attitude. I hate the feeling of wearing a mask. Everyone hates that stuffiness and the loss of breath despite all that extra breath lingering there on the inside cloth. But we emphasized the mask discomfort over the mask message. I wish we did a little bit more appreciation of everyone else we saw in a mask. Maybe just a quick mask salute to let the suffering and sweaty mask-wearer know their discomfort is appreciated -- because it's all the people outside that mask that benefit. I must admit I'm just a little bit proud to wear a mask. If you see me in public I hope to communicate that I care about your health. Unfortunately I never feel like that's what I communicate. Somehow I feel like you feel I resent you and rather than pride I feel insecurity. It's nothing you said or did, but I can't help feeling that way. I never did any tin drives or rationed food back in world war days, so I thought wearing a mask is the least I could contribute now. I wish I felt good about it, but whatever.

-butts
Everyone else's butt is okay, but mine's been a bit spicy and sore lately.

-Music for the Masses
Yesterday I had a hankering to hear Music for the Masses as I worked. This is not a problem to most of the world, but I couldn't find the cd. I tried YouTube, but the person who uploaded it changed the audio to 75% speed, possibly to avoid the record company taking the file down. I deserve to hear it properly though. I just don't have the physical media on hand and no device to play it. As mentioned in past years I've avoided Spotify, mostly because I rarely actually listen to music at all these days, but also because I fear something is psychologically lost with that lack of personal ownership of the music. It's great that music is like air now, but as life-giving as air is, it's invisible and taken for granted. I prefer my music personally selected and precious.

-My own stupid thoughts on ownership
Who am I, Gollum? We finally live in a world where so many things are scarce (like water for example!), but the joy of music, all music, is available to all of us. Now we don't need to build walls around our attitudes and ownership, but provide everything to everybody. I've always dreamt of such a utopia. I've always feared however, that my inclination toward walls and ownership will always prevent me from sharing. Well, from what I've seen of music today there's too much of it anyway. We'll never hear and love it all. Hey Spotify people, if I'm missing something life-changing, maybe burn me a cd.

-body
Gravity upped its budget this year. It wants my flab and it wants it right down to the ground. Also the sky(?) apparently wants all the rest of my hair. Oh wait, no I think gravity is just pulling my top hair so I just sprout hair downward in all the other pores below my forehead. Maybe this is all just pre-decomposition.

-childless
Okay this is a bit of a reprieve. I think everybody knows I'm too mentally ill to raise children. I hate the sound of children communicating. Usually they yell at each other as they're squirming on all the furniture. Also, how horrifying is it to see all your monstrous faults deep within you personified outside yourself in a constantly growing separate monster? I don't know how all you parents handle that, but I wouldn't be able to. So that's fortunate. My future consists of only soothing decay.

-car
This year's car complaints are with the silver lining that my car is now paid off. Unfortunately It's still just a toy car that severely rattles between 35 and 75 mph. I need to take it in to the Pym Institute and have them maybe shrink it and then resize it again.

-mother forgetfulness
Mom forgets most things I tell her. It sucks to tell her bad news, so I only tell her good news. I guess it's kind of nice to see her light up with any good news over and over. Did I mention this last year? Oh boy.

That's all I have atm. I have many more disappointments, but there's only so much pettiness in myself I can handle and fortunately my soggy brain doesn't acknowledge everything on Grievance Typing Day (today). Perhaps I'll comment out the severely egregious grievances. Actually though, despite the end of the world still happening, the year has been more alright than I can ask during End Times that's for sure. I'm actually listening to Music for the Masses right now. Anyway, if you're legit aggrieved, let me know what I can do. I owe you.