Not been a great week. I’m not talk ing about Obama or problems with the entire United States of America, including Guam and parts of Puerto Rico.
I’m not talking about prices up and jobs down.
Not talking about what a hole our Second Avenue subway’s in.
Not even talking how worldwide plumbers want to stick a plunger down our leaky vice president’s throat.
I am not mean enough to mention potholes large enough to accommodate Michael Moore‘s behind.
I will never tell that I hear DSK‘s embroidering the letters PIG on a sampler.
I wouldn’t even so much as refer to traffic looking like the 8th Army due to bike lanes, Broadway pedestrian malls, roadside eateries and that transportation commandant Janette Sicky-Kahn, who has a bicycle spoke up her poke.
Besides the fact that New Yorkers’ need to put a certain amount aside for holdup money, everyplace you go it’s problems:
* College kids are demonstrating.
* Workers are picketing.
* Hollywood’s divorcing.
* Politicians screaming.
* Market’s falling.
* TV’s plopping.
* Middle East is exploding.
* Lindsay Lohan‘s partying.
* Jennifer Aniston‘s dating.
* Mrs. Madoff‘s sulking.
So it’s not proper to inflict on you my own individual miseries, although I also don’t think it’s fair I should suffer quietly on my own. Thus, class will come to order, kiddies, while mother tells you about the old adage that most accidents happen in the kitchen? Shove it!
In one seven-day period I cracked a tooth in half, got bitten by something, fell off a runaway treadmill, dealt with a pest and my dog started limping.
The way I’m going, I could be injured sitting at a baseball game — just by falling off the bench.
I’ll start with the tooth. A friend delivered a package of specially prepared, handmade, high-test granola. Fit for a king, he said. King, yes. Me, no.
I hit an almond and broke a molar in half. No fake-o molar. A real God-given job that has ploughed through lamb-chop bones and is now costing more than my entire retirement package. I have so far been to a dentist, three visits to a periodontist, a root-canal endodontist, then again the dentist for an impression and in three weeks back for a replacement tooth.
To distract patients’ attention, this dentist has a TV in his surgery room. I’m scheduled for “The View” on Tuesday and Anderson Cooper on Wednesday.
The insect. From nowhere, nothing, no reason, my right foot suddenly sprouted a red bump. It’s a bite, they said. From what? My housekeeper? A friend who accompanied me to a screening and, when the credits came on, put my foot in his mouth? A bite from what? I don’t live in the Congo. Rabid apes don’t swing from Park Avenue chandeliers.
They told me to bandage it. I bandaged it. They told me to schmear cream on it. I schmeared. They told me to ice it. I iced it. It’s still there. So far all I’ve come away with is that handwritten prescriptions cannot be read, but doctors’ bills are always neatly typed.
The treadmill. Understand, this all happened to me in one week. Health addicts insist I work out because my sitting at a computer is not what they consider big-time exercise. I never did a treadmill before. They said: “Press the ‘increase’ button one tick at a time so speed increases slowly.” I had an appointment. I was in a hurry. My finger lingered on the “increase” button. It shot up to “9” from “2” and threw me. I have bruises, cuts, scrapes, scars, sores.
Tutankhamun’s remains have less bandages. I’ve discovered life isn’t whether you win or lose. It’s whether or not you can deduct your wounds.
Days later I roused myself for dinner at a neighborhood restaurant. From the next table a stranger called over: “How you doing with your treadmill? I’m the guy who sold it to you.” His ravioli reheated when I suggested what he could do with it.
The dog’s limp was handled. The vet took care of that. The pest has been handled. The NYPD took care of that.
One more small almost insignificant thing.
As I was writing this, my computer developed a hiccup. I therefore did the only intelligent thing. With my bandaged knee and iced foot I hobbled to the phone and called my techie who practically lives in. Guess where he is this one week?
Away. On vacation. In Poland.