First of all, gotta love it when you look at your referral stats and see that someone from the Pentagon’s been looking at your blog.

And on a totally unrelated note . . . earlier this week, as I was sitting on my couch in my red flannel pajamas with a box of tissues, blowing my nose every five seconds, I realized how much I miss having someone take care of me when I’m sick.  I absolutely despise being sick — I’ll admit, I get a little whiny, and all I want is to get better as soon as possible.  I really miss the days when I was in a relationship, and someone was there to fetch me soup, orange juice, tissues, movies, an extra blanket, or whatever I needed.  Someone who would look at me lovingly despite my red flannel pajamas and my matching red nose, or just sit and rub my legs, feet, or forehead when I was too sick to do anything more than crash on the couch. 

Now that I have good friends in the neighborhood, many of whom are single, I almost feel like we have a duty to each other to deliver soup, tissues, cold remedies, or whatever when someone’s knocked down with the plague.  I would have loved to have a friendly face stop by the other day, and I’m sure any of my friends would appreciate the gesture.  Sure, you might catch a cold, but what goes around comes around, whether it’s the sniffles, or chicken soup.  Personally, I prefer wonton when I’m sick, just for the record.

So we all know how challenging simply walking down the street in New York City can be, right?  So why do people feel the need to make it more difficult by not only offering flyers to me, but literally shoving their entire arm in my direct path, forcing me to swerve wildly in order to avoid being knocked in the stomach?  Even on the days I take the subway to work, when I’m only walking a few blocks on either end, I am accosted no less than 3 or 4 times during those blocks.  First, the Metro and A.M. News folks, who are by far the most polite.  They never use the full-arm approach, and when you mutter, "no, thank you," they’ll even tell you to have a nice day.  Upon exiting the subway, however, I leave the polite news territory and enter the land of the menu people.  These folks act as if they’re out to get me, viciously thrusting menus at me, with absolutely no regard for my personal space.   Drives me absolutely batshit.  There are at least two of them every day, in the two blocks between my subway and work.  And finally, as an extra added bonus, there’s the fur guys.  I work in the fur district, where all the wholesale furriers hang out, and as a result, in addition to the news and menu people, I’m often bombarded with flyers for fur sales.  Do I look like I wear fur?  The only fur I own is so faux that I feel guilty about the teddy bears who have died so I can have cool fuzzy green shoes and a fluffy silver coat.  But real fur?  No thanks.  And regardless, there’s no need to shove that much paper at me before I’ve even come close to having coffee.  I’m surprised I haven’t throttled someone yet — some of you have seen me before coffee — not a pretty sight.

Okay.  Today’s rant is now over.