Your “Politeness is the flower of humanity” Friday Evening Open Thread

Can’t leave without sharing this. The president has turned into my great uncle when he came down with the dementia and had to be put in a home. We’re all gonna die sooner than we should. Speaking at a White House meeting earlier today about small business and regulation

The light bulb — they got rid of the light bulb that people got used to. The new bulb is many times more expensive and — I hate to say it — it doesn’t make you look as good. Of course, being a vain person, that’s very important to me. It’s like — it gives you an orange look. I don’t want an orange look. Has anyone noticed that? So we’ll have to change those bulbs in at least a couple rooms where I am in the White House. … We have a situation where we’re looking very strongly at sinks and showers. And other elements of bathrooms — where you turn the faucet on, in areas where there’s tremendous amounts of water, where the water rushes out to sea because you could never handle it — and you don’t get any water. You turn on the faucet and you don’t get any water. They take a shower and water comes dripping out, just dripping out, very quietly, dripping out. People are flushing toilets 10 times, 15 times, as opposed to once. They end up using more water. So EPA is looking at that very strongly, at my suggestion. You go into a new building, or a new house or a new home, and they have standards where you don’t get water. You can’t wash your hands practically, so little water comes out of the faucet. And the end result is you leave the faucet on and it takes you much longer to wash your hands. .. For the most part. you have many states where they have so much water, it comes down — it’s called rain. They don’t know what to do with it. … A lot of things we do are based on common sense. If I didn’t get elected you wouldn’t have a steel industry. … We weren’t going to have a steel industry.

The “I’m vain” remark is the closest thing to self-awareness I have ever heard out of him or any of his spawn.

So, I went and had my pre-op appointment for the foot surgery I’m having Tuesday AM. This surgery is a bit more involved than I imagined. The doc said it’s just about the most radical foot surgery you can get aside from amputation. There will be a large incision starting about 4 inches above my ankle that will go down to below my inner ankle bone and then curve around and continue towards my big toe along the side of my foot for another 4 or 5 inches. Then some more small cuts on the back of my calf to facilitate access for stretching out the Achilles tendon. So they’re re-attaching the posterior tendon, fusing two bones together above my ankle and two below my ankle, and stretching the Achilles. I’ll be under the knife for around two hours. For two months after the surgery, I will need to be prone with leg elevated and ice-packed, getting around the house on the rolling knee scooter, which I have to rent for a hundo a month with no insurance help, crutches for maneuvering the stairs into the sunken living room (thank goodness it’s only three steps), no walking, no driving, and he’ll evaluate my progress after the two months is up. He said there is a possibility that the convalescence might take a little extra time past the two months, and that it varies from patient to patient. I will be relying on the kindness of all my friends from the wine bar for grocery and liquor runs, as well as any other various and sundry favors or rides that I might need. Fortunately the list of people who have volunteered to help far exceeds the number of times I anticipate needing such help, so that should be no problem.

Upside is I’ll go at least two months teleworking instead of driving the 70 mile RT to the base and back. Plus, drugs (don’t be jelly, Hippo). The Man brought me a bunch of edibles, so that’s going to be good too.

This is not quite what I thought I was getting into, and it’s a bit scary, but I’d rather go through it now than spend the rest of my life limping around in constant pain as is currently the case.