I wasn't lying when I said Sexy Bach was popular. It consistently gets 30 or 40 views a day, which is pretty good as far as I'm concerned, and it's well on its way to outshine my previous video, BaRock Obama.

There only seems to be one problem: the only people watching the video don't seem to speak English. Take a look at this map:



Italy's blowing up, and Romance languages on the whole seem to take the cake.

I know, I know--music is the universal language, but I don't think people from other countries are really getting the video. I'm not seeing any comments or as many of the usual five-star ratings I've become accustomed to. The problem seems clear: foreigners (as always, several years behind the musical trends of the U.S.), misspelling "Sexy Back," stumble upon my video. After hearing the discordant opening seconds, they leave, without further engaging the song. Perhaps if they stuck with it another thirty seconds or so, they would find that there are some rather intriguing, humorous and, yes, even accessible, moments to be heard.

Also, the video portion itself is fucking wack. I'm open to ideas of making new visuals. Dan or Ezra?

Sexy Bach

So popular:

Sweden Savory

Doesn't Sweden kind of look like a dick here:






?

Poland Loves (Loved?) Me

I have Google Analytics installed on this Web site, which means that when you (that is, Dan) visit my site, a little piece of code is sent from your computer which tells Google the date of your visit and the city from where you are visiting. I would say I average about 5 visits per day, which is pretty impressive considering before today I updated twice in over four months, and both of those posts were about taking my cat to the vet (which, I am very happy to inform you, turned out AOK!).

So imagine my surprise when I noticed a significant upsurge in page views for one day in the middle of October--up roughly 1000% to 47 views in a day. I checked the map and found that 34, or 72.34% (analytics) of my visits that day came from Poland:




On another note, Poland's not looking so hot these days...

Avoid Disappointment and Future Regret

Sometimes when I'm home I let the TV run in the background as I lie down on the couch and do things like play Brick Breaker on my phone.

Today, in one such instance, a commercial for a $50 U.S. gold coin was aired. It claimed to be the highest-value U.S. coin ever produced, which I later found out was not quite true. What struck me was not the amazing opportunity that lay at my hands (which were clearly too occupied with brick-breaking), but the line that came on at the end of the ad, telling me that I should buy the coin so as to "avoid disappointment and future regret."

I figured one of two things must have just happened:

1) I imagined what I just heard.

2) "Avoid disappointment and future regret" is a (cumbersome) turn of phrase I had never heard before.

I did a little Google search to find out whether or not the phrase was used in regular discourse, or even irregular discourse. As it turns out, the only use of those five words strung together as such is in reference to that ad and others like it by the National Collector's Mint.

The National Collector's Mint, BTW, isn't a mint in the U.S., but a collection of mints in third world countries which also use "dollar" currencies. The NCM then prints up coins identical to historical U.S. mints and acts as if they're selling you a $50 coin for 50 U.S. dollars, when it's really 50 Liberian dollars, or about 78 cents American. It kind of makes me question why the play money I had as a kid, which must have been printed on loose leaf with a portrait of Alf written on the front, had to have the words "NOT LEGAL TENDER" written across it. Kind of killed the fun.

But I digress.

I really like that little sales push. I figure any sort of replica vintage coin scam company must have some sort of a sense of humor, and I like to think that "avoid disappointment and future regret" is at least a little bit ironic.

Merry Christmas and I hope no one in the world gets a fucking National Collector's Mint coin this year.

Ira is still out of sorts. I took him back to the vet today. Henry drove me, but he decided to stay in the car while I went in. I guess he doesn't like the vet.

While I was waiting, a little girl pointed to Ira in his carrier and told her mother he looked like "Oreo." Her mother asked what his real name was. "Ira," she said, initially bewildered. "That's a cute name for a cat." I thanked her.

We went in, where the nurse proceeded to take Ira's temperature. Slightly higher than yesterday. They do it rectally, and the nurse commented that Ira took it well. The nurse yesterday said the same. I don't know what that says about Ira.

The doctor came in and told me the test results had come in, and that everything was negative except for a 1/100 positive for corona virus, which is sort of a virus cocktail. How that type of thing is possible, I don't know. I should have asked. Apparently 1/3 of cats have a similar test result, and that I have no reason to be alarmed, unless it turns out to be feline infectious peritonitis, which is terminal. I asked her how likely that was, and apparently it's not that likely.

Then they took Ira back to the kitty gym to work out his traps and delts.

They also gave him an antibiotic, which should bring the fever down.

After the doctor left, the nurse told me that sometimes when the animals die, people donate their medication back to the clinic for other animals. Upon hearing the start of her sentence, I thought the nurse was asking me to donate Ira to science after he passes. I told her this, and she told me she was an organ donor. Me, too.

Turns out I was a candidate for free kitty antibiotics. The nurse said the doctor "really likes" me, with a twinge of incredulity, and that that was why I was getting the freebies. I thanked her.

I bought some more special prescription kitty food. I am becoming more careful about keeping Lindsey away from it, but after Ira was done eating, I decided to let Lindsey have some. I started to think that maybe this ailment is contagious, so I took it away.

Ira is sick. I took him to the vet today. They did a battery of tests and
filled him with some sort of fluid because I hadn't seen him drinking. The
fluid puffed him up in the shoulders, like he had been working out his traps
and delts in the kitty gym. The whole thing cost $234.

They thought maybe he had swallowed a piece of string, because a cat the week
before had done the same. They checked his mouth and didn't see any, so they
were pretty sure it wasn't that.

I had to take off the first half of my shift tonight to take him to the vet.
When I came into work my supervisor asked how he was. I told her he was probably
OK, but that finding out was costing me half a month's pay. She told me her
cat swallowed string and they had to remove it, but the surgery gave her an
infection and they had to put her down.

The vet also gave me special prescription kitty food. I gave some to Ira, but I
accidentally opened the door and I think Lindsey ate most of it.