Welcome to the second installment of Well, That Sucked, our weekly compendium of exactly what it sounds like. Thrown in this week’s garbage: hypochondriacs.
You know that constant, creeping feeling of death? That sense that no matter how cautious you are when you cross the street, how many vegetables you eat, how often you go to the gym, how thoughtful you are about your cholesterol, you will die. You will die in a way that will devastate your family, you will get sick in the kind of way that bankrupts you emotionally and financially, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
What I’m saying is that you’re probably going to die this summer.
If you’re a professional hypochondriac like I am—when I was seven, I worried my veins were “too blue” and decided I would be the first to develop “vein cancer,” which would then obviously be named after me—this has been a rough week. There were, of course, the usual threats, such as plagues and murders, and feline AIDS. This week, however, we learned about some more pressing health concerns—even more pressing than my patented cancer.
On Tuesday, France reported its first death from the new SARS-like coronavirus, while Saudi Arabia reported five new cases. If you’re living in Toronto, that conjures up a lot of fear considering how urgent the last SARS crisis became for the city. But, luckily, Toronto’s mayor says that “everything’s fine,” so what do we really have to worry about?
But hey, Toronto, don’t be blue: the rest of the country is also a tall, dark glass of garbage-juice. The City of Edmonton said it had to fumigate four transit buses this year for bed bugs, which means that if you have ever taken a bus in Edmonton in your entire life, you’re not allowed to walk into my apartment. My mattress is already wrapped in five layers of plastic and I still think every ball of thread I find on my sofa is a blood-sucking parasite. You wait outside. We can meet in the park. You sit over there.
Perhaps the least charitable part of this week is that even your stupid drugs won’t save you. H7N9, or bird flu, has mutated and developed a drug resistance to the Tamiflu vaccine. And, great news, swine flu is still a thing, and it’s still killing people. Worse, maybe, is that coverage of epidemics and viruses is maybe worse than the risk you actually run of getting any of them. If you think your life is lacking a feeling of hysteria, just search “pandemic” in Google News and order a hazmat suit while you’re at it.
A trip to a family cottage or the beach this summer could help you relax, but do not do that. Sit in your obsessively clean apartment that smells like the comforting scent of chemical sanitizers and consider that West Nile virus hit an all-time high in the U.S. in 2012 and is poised to return this year. Summer hasn’t even technically started yet but there are documented cases of the virus in Los Angeles, Texas, and Russia.
Fellow hypochondriacs, this hasn’t been our week. But when have things been good? If it isn’t a mutated flu, it’ll be heart disease. Or water intoxication. Or loneliness. But, as I always say, we’ll be dead soon, and then none of this will matter.
Have a great weekend, everybody!
