Peril

Should I, like, cancel my flight to Nice on May 11th (i.e., a week from next Monday) along with my participation in the Cannes Film Festival? Or should I just double-up on the alcoholic hand-wipes and hope for the best?

I know one thing. The travel-industry reps who are downplaying the swine-flu reports on the news shows are reminding me of Murray Hamilton, the mayor of Amity in Jaws, telling Roy Scheider to be careful about scaring away tourists with all this shark talk.

45 thoughts on “Peril

  1. Do the latter. Cannes isn’t exactly Veracruz. Why give up a nice trip to the south of France? Probably safer there then it is here in Philadelphia, where thirty miles south at the University of Delaware the stuff is festering.

  2. I don’t think you have anything to worry about but you should bring some face masks to the airport.

    Honsetly I think the media is making a mountain out of a mole-hill. the H1N1 flu isn’t really that widespread.

  3. Are you kidding me? This is the most ginned-up nonsense since the Avian Flu. Total worldwide deaths from that horror? 248. Remember SARS from way back in 2003? 774 deaths worldwide since then. Go to Cannes.

  4. Get on the plane. Pop an Airborne, or some Emergen-C, every two to four hours. Keep antiseptic wipes on you, and some hand sanitizer to use after washing your hands in the airplane bathroom. Don’t touch your face. If you cough or sneeze, do it into the crook of your elbow and not your hands.

    You’d probably be fine even if you didn’t do all those things, but if you really want to be safe on a plane, that’s how you do it.

  5. I think you’ll be okay until you get to Cannes. Once you’re there, though, remember Outbreak and avoid movie theaters like the (literal) plague.

  6. Hmmm. This strain of the flu has killed one person in America so far. The normal flu kills, on average, 100 people per day in the U.S.. Traffic fatalities kill about 120 people per day. If you want to safeguard your health, don’t ride in a car.

  7. Dig the catastrophic nonchalance.

    “Is this an epidemic?”

    “Not really.”

    “What should we do?”

    “Um, like don’t travel.”

    “Is it really that bad?”

    “No.”

    “Then how come we can’t travel?”

    “Because we say so.”

    There hasn’t been a disaster film yet that has accurately portrayed the mind-boggingly schizo tone that the powers that be communicate with. It’s all one big double bind.

    DON’T TRAVEL/BUT DON’T HURT THE AIRLINE INDUSTRY.

    DON’T GO OUTSIDE/KEEP SHOPPING

    YR ALL GOING TO DIE/ VOTE FOR AMERICAN IDOL

    And people really wonder why this country is collectively on medication?

    And re: Josh Massey’s Right-Wing Humor: Republican sarcasm is so weak and diluted it ceases to be sarcasm and reveals itself for what it really is: childish petulance.

    Hey Josh: The fucking ice caps are melting. Maybe we didn’t cause it, who knows, maybe earth is cycling right now, and I know that to ignore the obvious is a trademark of your kind, but really, can’t you come up with anything better than taking a shot at Global Warming? It’s almost 2010, dude. Give it up.

  8. The CDC has a very hard time not calling Biden a fucking idiot this morning. This kind of thing is exactly what people concerned about his mouth were concerned about. Vice Presidents should be seen not heard.

  9. Actually, I take back what I said to Josh. That’s not fair. Because none of this is real. There is only Josh and one other person in the world pretending to be everyone else.

  10. Josh is a cobag because he went for the asshat comment instead of the gold mine of “Jeff, if you get swine flu, imagine being able to tap something out about it!”

  11. Don’t go to Cannes, Wells. Matter of fact, don’t leave the house. That is, unless you want to die.

    I’ve stocked up on Hot Pockets, Campbell’s Soup and bottled water. I have enough hand sanitizer and surgical masks to last me, my girlfriend and my dog about eight years, which is probably overkill since we’ll all be dead in less than six months. I’ve got six layers of saran wrap held to my windows by seven layers of duct tape and now I’m just gonna watch porn and cry over the extinction of the human race while pondering the inevitability of my slow, agonizing demise.

    We had a good run, mankind. I guess we should just be thankful for that.

  12. Well, my dog just made a funny noise. It’s curtains for him. Crap. Now the only way I’ll be spared is if I strap on one of my gas masks and burn his body in the backyard. Sorry, buddy, I love you, but I can’t take any chances.

  13. When it mutates and becomes so lethal that it kills 97% of the population, where would you rather be, Jeff: lovely Nice or corpse-ville New York?

    Milkman – yes, best not try to explain to these idiots that more and more deadly pandemics are probable outgrowth of longer periods of incubation for all kinds of nasty viruses. It’s very possible that something simple that we have on immunity to could also emerge from all this ancient ice that is melting.

    But, let’s continue to pooh-pah the evidence.

  14. A word of advice, televisiontears; make sure that fucker’s good and dead BEFORE you burn him. I hear that’s how the Great Chicago Fire started.

  15. Which is more likely to make you sick? A viral outbreak in Mexico City or week-old cake molding in your pocket?

    Decisions, decision.

  16. I don’t think you have anything to worry about but you should bring some face masks to the airport.

    Honsetly I think the media is making a mountain out of a mole-hill. the H1N1 flu isn’t really that widespread.

  17. If it’s my time, it’s my time. There’s the real possiblity I might lose my job. That’s life. I get sick, I get sick. I lose my job, I retire early. I’m going home to watch the Blaxer game, pour me some bourbon on the rocks and kick back.

    Go to Cannes.

  18. Jeff should go to Thessaloniki. This is where the real story is.

    I love how this weeks Nature has a bunch of articles about Global Warming, but J Mass wants to get his science from Glenn Beck.

  19. “The swine flu is just as dangerous as global warming.”

    That’s Republican code for “We’re willing to acknowledge it’s bad as soon as it starts affecting white people.”

  20. I knew someone would scoop me in my toadyish desire to congratulate MilkMan for his Miracle Mile reference. Well played.

    That movie is slapdash, amateurish, compelling and harrowing. I honestly don’t know what to make of it. It’s like a fever dream. And it has an ending that rivals The Last American Virgin for gut-punchiness.

  21. It’s funny that I just read the book about the John Landis ‘Twilight Zone’ incident, which includes an odd ‘Miracle Mile’ anecdote. Apparently, WB wanted a full length Twilight Zone movie (as opposed to anthology-based as it eventually was), but couldn’t find any story in the series that could carry a movie. They commissioned several scripts, and at one point, they tried to make ‘Miracle Mile’ into the movie. But Steve De Jarnatt balked at the changes to the ending, because the studio guy wanted Harry to be crazy. (I assume this means that the twist ending would’ve been that he imagined the phone call but everything else happened based on the reaction to him… otherwise, it’s just stupid.)

    I love ‘Miracle Mile’, maybe more than it deserves, but I think people paying to see a ‘Twilight Zone’ movie would’ve been disappointed with the ending it has.

  22. “The CDC has a very hard time not calling Biden a fucking idiot this morning. This kind of thing is exactly what people concerned about his mouth were concerned about. Vice Presidents should be seen not heard.”

    No, you’re wrong. If one reads the fine print on the CDC website, it, in fact, encourages “social distancing” in those communities where outbreaks have occurred. Biden’s answer may be politically incovenient, but he’s right. If you want to seriously reduce your risk, then reduce your exposure to other people–at least for a week or so, until the true virulence of the virus comes into focus. If H1N1 plays out like the Spanish Flu of 1918, then Biden won’t be the “fucking idiot” after all, will he? The people who survived the Twin Tower attacks where those who acted instantly and did not stand around waiting for some “authority” to tell them what to do.

    The official CDC flu numbers are lagging behind–by up to a week–the actual cases as they appear in ERs. This is because most hospitals cannot perform the definitive PRC tests for H1N1 diagnosis.

    As for flying, I would wait a week and then decide.

  23. Matt Carney, is that you? Even Gibbs had to correct him. Try again. Besides, even if he were 100% correct, he shouldn’t be speaking on this issue.

  24. burma is correct — what is the government going to recommend next … the number of recommended wipes to clean your ass after a shit? It’s getting too pervasive. Shut up, Joe, leave it to the pros.

  25. No, Burma is foolish. If you don’t believe Joe, here is a “pro”:

    Virologist Ruben Donis, chief of the molecular virology and vaccines branch at the CDC:

    Q: Does this one scare you?

    R.D.: I saw figures that do scare you. We’ve received 300 samples from Mexico, and these cover the span of Feb, March and April. And you look at flu A, traditionally it’s A/H1 or A/H3 or it’s B up until the end of March. There are two or three cases up to [the] last days of March that are swine. Then in April they skyrocket. So all the cases in the D.F. areas, where most samples came from, it really transmits very efficiently.

    Q: Did Mexico react quickly enough?

    R.D.: They didn’t know. They probably thought it was regular flu.

    Q: Flu is a seasonal disease that peaks in winter. Maybe this will end in the United States with the end of the flu season.

    R.D.: We’re in a good position. The folks in Buenos Aires are in trouble. They’re entering winter now.

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