The bad news is wearing me down people. Seriously grinding me away. At this rate I will be a mere tablespoon of bitter cocoa powder by May. (What? Did you expect my essence to consist of buttercups and lollipops? Yeesh.)
I have decided to combat my overwhelmed-by-the-woes-in-the-world feeling by writing a short list of utterly irrational fears. Let me recommend you give it a go as well. In fact, leave me some suggestions in the comments. I don’t really have all that much to do as I’ve decided in order to avoid any more blisteringly apocalyptic news nuggets I must stop watching TV, or reading the paper, or listening to the radio, or going online, or reading my email, or answering the phone, or…
Antihistamines Might Save Mankind
During a freak electrical storm I am called upon to climb a cell phone tower and save a basket of kittens that are inexplicably hanging from the highest rung. My severe allergy to cats kicks in and I begin sneezing. The lightening combined with the cel tower amplifies my sneeze, which is picked up by a nearby alien ship passing through our solar system. Translated into their language my mucus-ridden message is mistaken for a declaration of war and earth is attacked. The aliens become our overlords. Yadda yadda. Civilization is doomed.
I Should Have Taken The Stairs
I am trapped in an elevator with The Situation, Glenn Beck, and Charlie Sheen. The sheer volume of megalomania and tanning spray sends me into a coma.
There’s No Advice About This on Match.com
I’m dating an asthmatic zookeeper. (Trust me, it’s a step up from the primates I normally attract.) While caring for a hormonal cougar (no pun intended, don’t give me that look) the zookeeper suddenly has an episode. I run across the compound to fetch his only inhaler, which is sitting in a box of live mice in his office in the reptile house. I think we all know this doesn’t end well.
Do Your Laundry Next Time
On a day when I am wearing that really baggy pair of granny panties, the ones I have no business keeping with the stretched elastic and the holes in several strategic places, I am sideswiped by a limo. The paramedics are forced to cut my jeans off. Meanwhile the guys in the limo are concerned and get out to see if I’m okay. Legs akimbo, raggedy underwear on display, my comic heroes, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, stare down at me in horror. And before you ask no, I definitely didn’t shave my legs that day, either.
How Did He Get Through Airport Security?
While attempting to leave my apartment, a masked, sword wheeling Ninja stops me demanding I answer the following question: If an exterior angle of a triangle is 95 degrees, and one of the remote interior angles is 50 degrees, what is the measure of the other remote interior angle? If you had any concept of how poor my math skills are you would understand I am in serious peril.
Should Have Skipped The Chili
During an interview with the famous Charlie Rose, instead of appearing charming and erudite I accidentally pass wind.
I’m A Sucker For A Fedora
While enjoying the view of a celebrity actor/author paddle boat race in the park, a freak accident occurs involving a scorching hot cup of Starbucks, a box of scorpions, and a common kitchen whisk. Paddle boat fourteen begins to sink. I leap into the water to save the celebrities. Suddenly, a great white shark appears out of nowhere and heads straight towards us. Only one celebrity can be saved while the other is left behind as food. I’m forced to choose between one of my modern-day writing heroes, Neil Gaiman, and Jon Hamm, Mad Men’s Don Draper. (Oh, don’t act so high and mighty. It’s not that easy a choice.)
My Finest Hour
I am awarded a very high-ranking new prize in fiction known as the Nobelitzer or the Pulbel, No, definitely the Nobelitzer. Due to some bad oysters, my close personal friend Margaret Atwood is taken ill and unable to introduce me. In a mad scramble the producers of the event have no choice but to replace Atwood with the only available literary celebrity, Jersey Shore’s Snooki. At the pinnacle of my writing career I am introduced by a woman who has penned such memorable quotes as: “I’m not a slut, I’m a whore. There’s a difference.” And the unforgettable, “They were huddled together like a family of Ellis Island immigrants just off the Mayflower.”
I’m telling you, give this a try. It is far more pleasurable than reading the actual news. Here, I’ll even start you off with the next one:
While carrying a recently purchased hand-blown crystal vase, you accidentally enter a side door and find yourself walking across the alley of a professional bowling tournament…
On an unrelated but very important note, I wanted to say a huge thank you to @TruthfulMommy aka Debi, social media mom extraordinaire. Debi has decided to start doing a post on Fridays where she highlights what she calls “blogs of consequence”. I was incredibly honored to be included in the inaugural batch. Her kind words made Madame Paradox cry is what I’m saying, people. So please find her at: www.motherhoodthetruth.com Admire her fortitude, her humor, her Ninja-like mommy skills, and all around kick assery. I know I do.
Madame Paradox 
Um, have you seen the movie Devil? It might make you completely avoid elevators for the rest of your life. We recently visited a monument, and when faced with the choice of climbing 32 flights or taking the elevator, I decided 32 flights wasn’t that bad.
I saw the promo, that was quite enough. Not a big fan of cramped spaces, particularly ones inhabited by demonic forces. Hi Emily, thanks for stopping by.
Laughing too hard to come up with my own heart-stopping scenarios now. Plus? It’s 1:00 and I haven’t eaten lunch yet. So very hungry….
I’ll have to come back to reveal some fresh apocalyptic concerns when I’m not contemplating eating my own fingers. Without Parmesan cheese.
In the meantime, I love love love this. Your posts are so worth the wait, my friend.
(p.s. I can’t decide who makes a worse elevator partner between the three you suggested. If I had to pick just one…Oh, dear God. I’d rather have to pull an inhaler from a box of live mice.)
Only you could find a way to make me feel good about my procrastination. The elevator one is my favorite. I mean in an utterly perverse kind of way. Short & sweet, made me laugh. Thanks so much for your enthusiasm my friend. I am a lucky girl to have such supportive pals.
Save Neil Gaiman, please. 😉
Yes, well, *obviously* we must save Gaiman, he’s a national (er, international) treasure. But you see my dilemma? He is a fine specimen of a man, after all. 😉
Pingback: Which TV News People Should make The ‘Time 100′? – mediabistro.com
That toy robot from my childhood that had glowing red eyes and shot steam from it’s ears comes marching out of my closet (with a pool cleaner as a weapon) and steals my cat.
Oh he’s been eyeing your cat for *ages* my dear. He’ll probably eat the cookies in the kitchen before he leaves too. Be warned. 😉
Unlike your fears above, the following a quite true and most rational.
I never smoked cigarettes in high school because I was afraid one puff would leave a black mark on my lung and then I’d get into a car accident and the hospital xrays would reveal the black mark to my parents and I’d get in trouble for smoking.
Or my other personal favorite: I played softball in the eighties when aids first came out and there were all kinds of rumours about how you could get the disease. I was afraid of getting aids via mosquito bite in left field and people wouldn’t believe it came from a mosquito.
All scenarios scared me senseless but I must say,if I were you,I would be most horrified at the thought of the literary midget that is Snookie tainting anything to do with your Nobelitzer. I shudder at the very thought. I may have to use my ninja skills to render her unconscious so that I could infiltrate all snookified and give you a proper intro. You are awesome. That.is.All! We will laugh about this post when you are a rich and famous best selling author!YOu can do it!WOOTWOOT! FIST PUMP ( that was a little Jersey for ya:)
I am so relieved someone is going to step in and save me from that indignity. If you happen to have a timetable as to *when* exactly this rich famous bestselling author stuff is going to start, I’d be quite interested to hear. 😉 Thanks you as always for your kind words. I’m glad my angst made you laugh.
Oh, dear, I have a terrible urge to alleviate some of your angst. Like, yes, the aliens become our overlords, but they’ll provide affordable national healthcare (they’ll want you to be nice and strong so they can impregnate you). And maybe Stewart and Colbert are the kinda guys who like granny panties because they’re really aliens…And Ninjas never talk to you—you’re dead before you even notice them so you probably won’t have to worry about math until you’re in front of the Pearly Gates because Heaven probably has an entrance exam administered by the College Board…
Of course Ninjas won’t bother with the math, how could I have missed that? What a relief. As long as I don’t have to deal with geometry I’m sure death and the afterlife won’t be a problem. Thank you J.A. that was awfully funny. 😉
You made me laugh til I tinkled! Bravo Madame
Paradox.
Thank you my dear. I’m so glad I made you laugh. xo
I’m carrying a crystal vase, I pass a bowling tournament and… and… Heidi this hard! Ummm… Ok, it’s 3am and I’ve been staring at this for ten minutes and coming up with nada.
I will say though that if someone asked me to add two double digit numbers in my head or else they would kidnap my child, I would say, “Sorry, sweetie! It’s been fun!”
Also, fingers crossed for you to win that Nobelitzer.
…a bowler lets go of his ball prematurely and it goes careening backwards into the crowd. Everyone immediately parts like Moses and the Red Sea and the ball rolls right out the door of the bowling alley and then directly toward me. I notice a moment too late and my instinct is to toss the vase up in the air, so my hands are free to ward off the bowling ball. A man driving by notices the flying vase and stops to catch it before it hits the ground. That man? Tom Cruise. Upon return of the vase, he insists that I accompany him to a Scientology center. I feel obligated because he is Tom Cruise and he saved my vase. I go with him and once there, they do some sort Scientology thing to me that wipes my brain clear of all cognitive thought processes. I live out the rest of my days cleaning out bathrooms on a sea org compound in Nevada.
Ok A) You really need to go to bed one of these days and B) That made me laugh. My favorite line had to be “I feel obligated because he is Tom Cruise and he saved my vase.” Certainly the logic of someone who *never sleeps* lol. Thank you for adding to my list of potential disastrous news. Also I’m sure Mazzy will understand about the math, I know I do. 😉
“Quirky” is too gentle a word for Ms. David; so is “brilliant”.
j. //
Aw shucks Monsieur. You’re either too kind, or just politely suggested I’m mentally ill. I’m not sure which. lol Thanks for stopping by Jason. 🙂
Somewhere in Closeted Scientologist Land, Will Smith is reading about “Antihistamines Might Save Mankind” and thinking, “WHY THE EFF DID MY AGENT NOT CALL ME ABOUT THIS ONE?”
…the balls rolling straight toward your ankles. Imbued with the power only overpriced, questionably hand-blown glass can give you (seconded only by the power awarded by questionably “hand-tufted” rugs sold for $99), you leap across three lanes, mercifully landing in the empty and final fourth lane. Your free hand clasped to your heaving and remarkably perky bosom (really, it’s like an 18-year-old’s, in a good way, not a ravaged Ali Lohan way), you look up into (this is for you, BECAUSE WE’RE FRIENDS) David Beckham’s teary eyes. Turns out he left Victoria and is need of comfort, the kind of comfort only a woman holding a hand-blown glass vase can give. (Seriously. The more I write “hand-blown,” the clearer it becomes that you’re just setting all of us up for soft porn. GET A GRIP, YOU. ALSO, ME.)
You know my liberal use of the term “hand-blown” probably was ill advised, but damn, that was funny. And thanks for the Beckham insert, you really do love me, don’t you? 😉
I’m with you on the masked Ninja guy and his math question. That sword and my neck would meet before I had time to realize that the answer is not something I could calculate on my ten fingers.
I believe my math tutor spent so much time with me my parents probably funded his college education. If only all the clients whose budgets I took care of had known, bwahahaha!