They Smited Me With Science!

Spinning the Wheel of Vaccine Side Effects

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There I was, safe in the assumption that science has got my back. When my number was called (age group), I marched to the vaccination site in a parking lot next to a cemetery in Prague. I should have known that this was a sign. I should have known that even though I had chosen the LEAST likely brand of vaccine to cause nasty side effects (Pfizer), that things could always go tits up.

Maybe I shouldn't have made the remark about hideous side effects like infected bumps in the junkal region. Am I CRAZY? Am I a PROPHET? Am I just tempting fate?

Oh, yeah. Side effects followed. Like hell raining from above instead of below, I got smitten in the biblical sense of the word. The fifth seal of the viral apocalypse was opened, and infectious bumps rained down upon me, dangerously close to my junkal region.

Science decided to smite me. Or maybe it was the god of the rednecks, smiting me for being an unapologetic atheist. What a god! If the fecker exists, why would anyone follow a monster like that?

Angry Boils

Have you seen the classic cult movie How to Get Ahead in Advertising? Oh, it's a doozy. It's a classic formula flick: Man gets boil on neck, man screams at boil as it grows in size and anger, boil literally comes to a head, and replaces the man's head and takes over everything.

A few days after my intramuscular injection of untested hard drugs (aka corona vaccine), I started getting weird pimples in weird places. Left buttock, right buttock, chest, left thigh. One after the other, they appeared, angry enough to cause me to pop them rather than give them a second thought.

I've had plenty of experience dealing with pimples as an adolescent, and now that I'm in my second adolescence (middle age), I know EXACTLY how to deal with the feckers. At first I attributed the sudden appearance of these nostalgic reminders of pubescence as a side effect of working at home and ordering KFC bucket deliveries.

But then something strange happened: the angry boil on top of my left thigh grew in prominence. Pissed off that I would try to squeeze the life out of the fecker, the oozing chancre decided to try to take over my life. And for the last 5 days, it did.

Nemocnice Bulovka

Every city has a medical institution that is so subpar that it gets a bad reputation. And nicknames follow. Way back when I was a feckless yoot with a low-paying post-high-school job, I drove Ford Escorts carrying packages of nuclear medicine to hospitals up and down the California valley. I loved the rock music blaring on the speakers, windows down, wind in my hair, 70 mph on CA highways, carrying unknown isotopes in needles waiting to be injected into unknown people.

One of the hospitals on my route was the UCD Med Center, a teaching branch of the University of California, Davis Medical degree program. Part of the program was an outreach for indigent locals, meaning, poor people without insurance.

The waiting rooms were full of them as I rushed past with my radioactive payload waiting to be delivered. They coughed, sweated, stank, and pissed themselves as an introduction. We soon began calling the place the UCD Wretch Center. The name stuck. Oh, the humanity.

Cut to: Act 2 in Big Sir's life, middle age, living in Prague. After a week of cursing my growing carbuncle, it got REALLY painful. Like making-me-limp-all-day painful. It grew to the size of a golf ball, so I went to the nearest emergency room.

Sadly, when you are Libeň La Vida Loca in an industrial Prague suburb, that emergency room is at the infamous Nemocnice Bulovka. Bulovka Hospital is not just a dilapidated, confusing sprawl of crumbling buildings with the accessibility of a hostile foreign country, they built the fucker on several hills. Because they wanted the shuffling, moaning, staggering, limping fucks to WORK for their treatment.

Cabs can't park inside, buses don't take you anywhere near the building you need to go. And you need to go to several. Just for one problem. But on a Friday night, it's the only place you can go if you fear that the oozing, infected, black-and-crimson-red, golf-ball-sized blight on your thigh just might possibly be slowly killing you.

The Evil Eye

I waited outside the night emergency room entrance at Nemocnice Bulovka. It seemed like the back entrance to a library rather than a building of medical treatment. I asked a young couple in front of me just in case. “Yeah, this is the emergency room entrance,” they said.

“Are you in the line?” I asked. They answered 'yes' and I joined them, standing. No seats for the wicked.

Soon they went inside and I was next at the outside entrance. Then a carload of loud yoots listening to mindless disco music pulled up and dumped its payload of babyshit onto the sidewalk. I call them babyshit because they were so green that they had no idea of the rules of ordinary, well-formed, solid shirtbird adults like me.

So they cut in front of me, barged through the door, and took their place right behind the kindly couple who had previously advised me. Then I heard them laughing and speaking Russian. Da. Da-hahaha.

So I looked through the window and gave them the Evil Eye. The same type of Evil Eye that was burning inside the angry boil dangerously close to my junkal region. It was an eye raised during the Cold War, watching the Russians and Americans scoff, threaten, cajole, and abuse each other nonstop. Fortunately for mankind, the Russians ran out of credit first. End of Cold War.

But Fuck the Russians anyway. They STILL wanna take over the world. That's how I was raised, and these sons-of-Stalin whores just Pushkined past me like a piece of American trailer trash (how did they know?).

I began the hairy eyeball routine with the weakest of the group. As they tittered and whispered, an older one would look out the window at me to check the threat. They found the burning Evil Eye watching them. Yes, I am old, fat, and hobbled from a leg infection that burns like a white hot knife wound. But I am ANGRIER than my boil. And in the immortal words of Ivan Drago: I must BREAK you.

They must have seen me channeling Dolph Lundgren, because the oldest one soon came out with younguns in tow, and said 'we go after you.' Or maybe they saw my tiny role as a Russian General in the casino commercial. Mad respect. You don't fuck with that dude.

That's right, bitches. Age and treachery before youth and ambition.

Another Ring of Hell

After my referral from the emergency room physician, I hobbled uphill to the next ring of hell. It was the surgery center, and I was in for a fine Friday night indeed. At first I was pleasantly surprised. The long, dimly-lit hallway only held a half dozen people waiting for treatment. So I checked in with the medical receptionist, who told me to take a seat at the end of the hall.

I plunked down on one of the rows of cold steel chairs lining the hall of the basement in the Bulovka surgery center. It was exactly like sitting at a bus stop in a ghetto. Why did they make the seats out of steel? Easier to clean? Durable? Or just another ring of hell the poor wretches must work through to receive their treatment.

After three hours I wondered why I had not brought a book. My phone battery had died, there was no reception in the basement anyway, and I had been to CZ hospitals several times before. You always wait at least 2 hours, even when you have an appointment for a specific time. It's the commie way. You must wait long enough to earn the right to be called a patient.

Finally, the door swung open and they called my name. I limped in, and they told me to take off my pants. They must have read my file from the previous doctor. Rarely do I have that effect on people otherwise.

On a side note, I remember reading a sales pitch for a private medical clinic disparaging ordinary public Czech health insurance. “They are cold, impersonal, and will command you to unceremoniously undress in front of a room full of people.” Hmm. Maybe the expats expect them to play Pomp and Circumstance first? I'm sure the finer halls of medicine have disco music and stripper poles for the money-grubbing whores. #dieyuppiescum!

Those of us who live in the real world (aka American refugees, non-yuppie-scum, etc) take the public health insurance offered by the employer. So far, it has probably saved my life a few times. So when I bitch and moan about Czech medicine, it's only the natural reaction of a sick person with a finger suddenly thrust up the buttockal region. Yes, it is abrupt, invasive, sudden, and stern. But it is fair.

Nonspecific Abscess

After my unceremonious disrobing without music, I proceeded to receive the diagnosis: nonspecific abscess. After some brief interrogation (are you gonna kill me cuz I'm American?), the doctor told me that I had a nonspecific abscess possibly due to my COVID vaccination. What? B-B-but. I got the PFIZER. Ain't that the good jab?

She smiled the knowing smile of someone in the medical profession who pretends to know everything. But just practicing.

So she wielded the metal tools of her trade dangerously close to my junkal region, looked down her nose at me and said nothing. She didn't speak English. And my Czech is bad on a good day, when there's no evil boil burning on me like hellfire.

First came a small sting. She then said 'lokal.' I got it. Local anesthetic. Cool. Pop away, doc. Then came a scalpel. Ooh. This is getting good. I expect a right proper gorefest to follow. My hand slowly covered my junkal region, just in case. I never know if the night doctors have exceeded their 5 cocktail maximum.

I kept looking over my belly at the progress of the wide-awake mini surgery. There was blood. There was pus. There were weird colors of both. Suddenly, the attending nurse pointed to the doctor's name tag. She stopped cutting and swabbing blood and pus to look.

Aw Jeez. Did I spurt some on ya, doc? My bad. I'm embarrassed. It was an awfully angry boil on an awfully angry dude. So sorry.

But then she laughed, and the nurse tittered. They pointed to each other's name tags and compared them. I understood from bits and chunks of Czech convo that the doctor's name tag photo was new, and that the nurse was jealous. Hers was old and outdated, just like her and the hospital. This exchange went on for a minute.

In case you may be questioning the nastiness of my particular ailment, right when the two ladies were comparing badge photos, an elder nurse walked by and glanced at my open wound. The grimace on her face said everything. In her 60 years of service, there was still something that could twist her face like a pretzel. Not a comforting thing when you are on the surgical table.

Um, hey? Sucking leg wound down here? Ladies, will you please mop up the gore, give me some pain meds, and shove my ass out the outpatient door? Compare badge photos later, if you please.

The Aftermath

I finally got home after midnight. I slammed down some wine and antibiotics, limped to bed, and got up the next day to repeat the process. I had to go back to the Bulovka Hellspital. Four days in a row. Each time a 3-4 hour wait followed.

But I remembered to bring a book. And water. And a snack just in case. I was always told to sit at the far end of the hall at the third door. It's what they call triage. The most serious cases go first. And as angry as my boil and I may be, others have it worse. But everyone in the hallway in Bulovka looks like they're in the same degree of suffering. But I had to wait 6 hours on Friday night, 4 hours on Saturday, and only 2 hours each visit on Sunday and Monday.

It wasn't about the time of day I arrived, it was about the random spinning wheel of fate. It's a bit more obvious in the U.S. Gunshot and stab wounds go first, followed by heart attacks, overdoses, and trouble breathing. But in CZ, you can't tell. A surprising lack of violence here. And zero crack or meth. Just a bunch of people suffering in silence together in a dimly-lit basement hallway of a decrepit old hospital on the side of a suburban Prague hill.

But sometimes a gurney full of fresh pain would come rolling in with ambulance personnel pushing. And I would get pushed to the back of the pain bus again. Such is the nature of probability. Open book, shift buttocks on steel seat, soldier on. Be patient, my patient.

On Monday I got the good news: my wound was healing (they had slashed, sliced, drained, and re-bandaged it 4 times by then). Better yet, this doctor spoke English. He said that I didn't have to keep coming back to Bulovka after this. I could choose the closest clinic to my address.

Now I have a day off from the hospital for the first time in 4 days. I had previously taken Friday and Monday off from work just to relax, pre-boil. But like the man said, man makes plans, God laughs. Fecker.

The last doctor I visited at Bulovka was so friendly that I almost expected him to ask 'Can I do anything else for you?'

I should have replied: Yeah. After 14 hours of sitting on your hospital's cold steel benches, I have a new side effect. Can you kindly treat the angry 'roids which are now festering and burgeoning and brimming with anger inside my angry ass?

Yes, gentle readers. I went into the Bulovka hospital for a four-day treatment of an angry boil and left with a burning ring of fire.

The Takeaway

I don't want this to discourage anyone from getting the vaccine. It's how we beat this thing. But if somehow, somewhere, somebody crawls out of the primordial ooze (alt-right fux) and says: See! Vaccines don't work! They give you the same angry boils I got when I went to that Tijuana Donkey Show!

I can't tell those type of people anything. It's like talking to a wall, a rock, or a religious person. Same stony stare. They might believe that Bill Gates is inserting microbots into the vaccine to take over their minds. And that aliens took their cows and themselves up for a brief whirl around the planet with a side excursion of bonus anal probe.

Weird how rednecks don't believe in science, but they do seem to believe in science fiction.

I'm vexed my damn self. I'll still continue to believe in science, even though the pharmacy business has so tainted the process that profits supersede results.

In the meantime, take some time to read up on the various flavors of vaccines out there, including the long list of side effects. Keep in mind that the side effects are usually much milder than the short and long term effects of the actual coronavirus. That shit could kill you, regardless of age.

Me, I've just got angry boils and a case of the old bum grapes. Like Gloria Gaynor and my Sactown homeboys Cake said, I Will Survive.

Notes From the Lockdown Part 3:

The Shitty Sequel

I don't know about you people, but I've had just about enough of this fucking coronavirus. Just when we thought we were out of the woods, the crazed corona creature reared its ugly head again. We did the lockdown. Twice. Each time we were released into the wild again, gulping fresh air like a whale who's been underwater too long (Ok. I'm the whale in this analogy), then forced to submerge again.

There was absolutely no problem working at home due to being a writer. Hell, I hate commuting in tin cans full of dismal people going to dismal jobs they hate – only because it adds hours to my work day. Working at home means I get to wake up whenever and take breaks whenever. But there is a downside to working at home.

Apparently, there's a slow process of devolution and entropy inherent in the process. According to the philosophers at The Oatmeal, it's only a matter of time between leaving the office water cooler conversations behind and total loss of personal hygiene and bladder control. Apparently, we need offices to keep us civilized.

For me, I just missed the damn pub and my beer and fried cheese.

Third Time's A Charm

We all know the drill: the first movie is charming, refreshing, and even sometimes, a rollicking tour de force. The first time the virus closed CZ tighter than a frog's asshole (and that shit's watertight. Word.), it was a novelty. Stay home and work? Hells yeah, baby! Wear a mask? Mkay, I can do that.

But in the pandemic sequel, they locked our asses down again for the second time. I started missing the Czech pub. I can't begin to describe the Czech pub experience, but it has to be the single most gratifying pub experience in the world after the Irish pub. Czech pubs possess a certain spirit (hundreds actually), a casual style of dining (greasy yummy gimmeh!), and a calm that borders on the mystical.

Just when we thought it was safe to go back into the water: lockdown part 3. The thing I don't get about this is the fact that during the 1^st two lockdowns, Czechia was the safest country in Europe. While the virus was cutting a deadly swath through Italy, Spain, and France, CZ locked its borders and stopped the flow of incoming people so fast it would put Trump's border wall to shame.

But then they released the lockdown, and we went back to work, shopping, eating/drinking (pubs!), and the rest. And just like in the time of the Spanish Flu in America after WWI, people quarantined, were released, and partied like it was 1919. Then el bastardo Spanish Flu virus returned with a vengeance for the sequel (This time, it's personal) and killed 50 million people globally. All those poor fux wanted to do after forced quarantine was to go out in public, get liquored up, and French kiss random strangers. As one does.

Essential Business

One of the most hotly contested aspects of the coronavirus lockdown in the Czech Republic is the closure of everything except what the government deems 'essential business.' Sure, pubs are considered essential to every Czech who contributes to the global title of Highest Beer Consumers in the World. But not to the government. There was apparently too much laughing and drinking and hugging and spitting in each others faces, even though it is rarely in anger.

So the gubmint decided to close all pubs and restaurants, allowing for food pickup windows and food delivery. But this time, they did not allow people to stand outside the beer window and drink. This time, in their infinite wisdom, They decided to make public drinking illegal. This time, it was fucking personal. One of the greatest charms of Czechia (and Europe in general) is that some random douchebag cop won't walk up to you while you're having a beer on a park bench and tell you to pour it out (as in Mair-Kuh, where I'm from). Oh yeah, Mr. Redneck Cop, yessuh! Then I poured the beer down my throat while he yelled at me to stop. I told him that pouring beer on the ground was alcohol abuse. And to go fuck himself (maybe). I digress.

So by telling the Czech public that they weren't ready to leave their hovels and eat, drink, and be merry, they announced a list of restrictions. Among them, a list of exceptions to the lockdown, which they called 'essential businesses.'

Restaurants and pubs weren't apparently essential businesses. But flower shops were. Mysteriously, flower shops all over Czechia kept supplying lovers and mourners with flowers nonstop. Which is weird. There's still love in the time of coronavirus, but funerals were halted. Nobody could go to funerals. I guess they piled up the bodies in freezers for months (or cremated them), because I didn't see any floating down the river.

The wife told me the flower shops stayed open because the fearless leader of CZ is an oligarch who prospered in agriculture, including flowers and such. Go figure. Corruption in the Czech Republic? Say it isn't so!

Flea markets were apparently considered essential business. Lucky for me, because one of my favorite weekend pastimes is to go walking around vast areas of concrete landscapes in search of wacky items to add to my growing list of projects which I'll never finish. But it keeps the body and soul moving, as it were. Currently I'm working on a home tiki bar and DIY retro/steampunk lamps built from scrap.

The biggest flea market in Prague is the one near u Elektry tram stop in Vysočany. That place is YUGE. It's about 2km long and a half km wide. I like to go there for the necessary walking to stave off atrophy, pursue my hobby as a budding hoarder, and get to the far end of the flea for some fine draft beer.

I don't know why random trash and treasures are considered essential business, but you can be sure there was some serious bribery behind it. While nobody needs to be sitting in a tiny sauna breathing sweat and viruses from strangers, certainly nobody needs to buy second-hand lamps from random Slobs from Slobovia.

And just when I popped my head out for a flea market stroll after the second lockdown, I was caught on camera in the Czech media, which said something like 'shame on these bastards for going to flea markets in a pandemic.' The news rag went on to say how people weren't respecting safe distances, blah, blah, blah.

While I was at the flea, I remember thinking something like 'WTF are all those people doing over there at that table?' Naturally, I wandered over. It was a table full of second-hand electronics you could find in a garbage can: old chargers, plugs, cables, adapters, and various items only a person living in a cave without electricity would find appealing.

Once I got to the table, I knew it was a setup. Seriously? Who would buy this shit? Then my wife sent me the news: my Wide Ass (Inc) was captured by the Czech media at the flea market (must have been a wide angle lens). I'm easy to spot, even though it's from behind. I'm the largest human in the photo.

Darkest Before Dawn

There's supposed to be a vaccine on the horizon. While I just came up for air on Thursday to have fried cheese and beer at the pub, the good news is on the way. We can now go back to all the drinking and cheesing and gallivanting we normally do. But we still wear masks. And we squirt the anti-viral hand gel on our hands when we enter the shrines of CZ consumerism.

Last night I had my first fried cheese and beer in a pub in more than a month. And this is the single most religious experience an atheist can possibly have in pandemic times. Just in time for Xmas.

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I wish you all my sincere best wishes during these troubling times; and happy holidays!

- Ho ho ho, Big Sir

Notes From the Lockdown Part Deux

or A Breath of Fresh Air...

It's now officially been 2 full months since the Czech borders slammed shut and the everyone started wearing masks. Stores closed, restaurants closed, pubs closed, and a certain Wide Body Jetsetter huddled in his hovel while he shivered, shook, and gently rocked back and forth in a fetal position.

No, I am not afraid of getting the coronavirus. All that shivering, shaking, and gentle rocking was withdrawal symptoms. How in the holy hell was I supposed to get my pivo and smažený sýr?

Straight From Mother Nature's Poxy Lips

Just when you thought it was safe to go about your normal dull routine, Mother Nature chucks a killer virus into the world for shits n giggles. Thanks, Ma. Aren't there enough things already out there to kill us? Sharks, grizzlies, tornadoes, lightning, drunk drivers, cancer, terrorists, and NRA members? Nope. Apparently we humans are getting too big for our britches and we must be stopped at all costs. Mother Nature is a bitch.

That ho has been trying to kill us since we crawled out of the primordial ooze. After millions of years grunting and flinging poo at each other in caves, we finally got the renaissance retrofit. Age of reason, mental expansion, and the ability to kill each other in larger and larger numbers. So why does Ma keep chucking all these fucking viruses at us? Black plague, small pox, AIDS, SARS, MERS, and COVID-19. Mother Nature hates us, I tell you. Her and the animal rights activists.

But we keep coming up with cures for most of the evil kisses blown from Mother Nature's Poxy Lips. As soon as we do, we let our guard down. We go back to our dull routines until the next crisis comes along.

Not a Plot

The worse thing about the internet is that there's no filter. The sheer megatons of bullshit circles the globe at lightning speed through broadband lines pushing gigaquads of data into the minds of people with no judgement whatsoever. Social media is one giant incubator for cockamamie ideas, and no idea is too silly to share. Hmm. This here wackjob comment has 3.2 million shares. It must be true, thought nobody with a brain, ever.

Fourth Horseman

We were put into panic mode while people started dying. So we looked for answers from the media, the internet, our 'fearless leaders.' WRONG. Nobody knew shit. Especially the politicians. Did you hear the one about how the virus was deliberately created in a lab in China? You did? You really shouldn't listen to Trump. You'll rot your brain. Or you'll inject weed killer or some dumbass thing.

A nice doco I watched on Netflix (the only thing to do during lockdown) was called Coronavirus Explained. All those charts and graphs were neato, especially with jazzy background music. The condensed version: this virus is a clever little bugger. For something not even considered to be a living thing, a virus reproduces like rabbits on meth. And the creepy part: it evolves to become a more effective killing machine.

All those charts and graphs showed how a virus like SARS killed people too quickly, so we got a handle on it by this little concept called quarantine. But this COVID bugger doesn't kill everyone. It wants to survive to reproduce, so killing all of its hosts is counterproductive. This tricky bitch hides in carriers without symptoms, who go on with their dull routines, passing in on to other carriers and/or killing buttloads of people. This virus is hip to the whole quarantine bag.

So while people in China and Italy started dying in huge numbers, the Czech Republic slammed the borders shut and locked down the country. Prague became a ghost town, people huddled in their hovels, and the country practically stalled. Meanwhile, over in Merrucka, El Trumpo and his Quixotic lapdogs managed to do fuckall, and now the U.S. has more coronavirus deaths than anywhere else in the world combined.

Can We Breathe Yet?

People are slowly hitting the Prague streets again, some with masks, most with their noses sticking out over the top. The tension was loosening and I could feel the pent-up frustration of pent-up people dissolving.

So I decided to have a Sunday outing, first by returning a newly-purchased laptop for service (they don't make 'em like they use to!) at Alza. I wandered through the near-vacant Prague Market area after I dropped off my lappy at the geek hut, and I heard the sweet sound of live jazz music wafting on the breeze. I followed it like a spastic beatnik until I found the source: a jam session in a fenced-in beer garden. They weren't serving beer, but damn those cats could jam. I sat on a bench nearby and listened for a while. It was the sound of freedom.

For Strength!

Then I decided to go and test out the free movement principle, since the beer windows in select pubs are also serving food. So I went over to the same pub mentioned in my first Notes from the Lockdown post, U Sadu. I missed my Sunday Guinness, what can I say?

So I sat there on outdoor seating conveniently spaced 2 meters apart, and ordered my Guinness from an actual waitress, who actually brought it to me at my table. I stared at the glorious cascade of black and tan beer bubbles shimmering and rising to form the creamy head. You can't tell from the photo; I was wearing shades and a mask. But I was getting all misty, I tell ya.

I took in the lay of the land. Joggers blew by with sneakers plopping over cobblestones, a baby chirped at a table nearby, and the waitress brought me a menu. When I asked if I could order fried cheese, she said yes. I wanted to fall on the cobblestones like a sack of beer-soaked potatoes and kiss her feet with joy. But I didn't. Social distancing and such.

I lowered my mask to drink my first pint. I had to. Sucking a pint of Guinness through my mask would be like being waterboarded by the Irish Republican Army. Soon I was on to my second, third, and fourth Guinness. And then the fried cheese. The mask lay unworn on the table.

After 2 months without fried cheese and beer in an actual pub, the clouds parted, the heavens opened, and a ray of sunshine beamed upon my full moon face. I completely forgot coronavirus for exactly the amount of time it took me to wolf down 4 pints of Guinness and a plate of fried cheese and french fries.

And O the joy which flooded my soul. And my guts!

Notes From the Lockdown

or Love in the Age of Coronavirus

- Prague, CZ March 2020

It's Day 5 of the coronavirus quarantine in the Czech Republic. Borders slammed shut, all but essential grocery stores are closed, and masks are now required for all people outside. As of March 16, nobody is allowed in or out of the Czech Republic until somebody kills this evil little coronabug.

Normally people would think 'Hey, being trapped in the country with the largest beer consumption in the world ain't bad.' Normally that would be a good thing, just drowning your sorrows in the pub with the other poor slobs in Slobovia. But the pubs closed. Now the panic really begins in earnest. But since the Czech Republic consists of 50% drunks and 50% thieves, the government came up with a solution to keep the locals from setting the cars on fire and bashing in the pub windows to raid the medicine cabinet: beer windows. Just saunter up to the pub window, pay your money, and a hand thrusts the beer through the window.

Window Beer

On Sunday I ordered a pint of Guinness through a pub window in a nice pub in Žižkov. In this sad version of a drive-thru window, people just get their beer and stand 2 meters apart from each other and drink on the sidewalk in the cold. The pub was aptly named U Sadu. The charm wore off after one pint and I left.

But only a handful of pubs have the walk-up window. Most are closed. I saw an old man on the nearly deserted Prague streets yesterday with a bag of groceries and no face mask. Was he insane? Doesn't he know that he'll probably die if he catches the damn bug? Then I saw the contents of his paper bag as I passed: bottles of vodka and rolls of toilet paper. Apparently that's all you need in a viral apocalypse.

State of Emergency Declared

Czechia is the only country in Europe with such strict quarantine measures. Almost EVERYTHING is closed in Prague. The Czech government declared a state of emergency in a very brief statement, followed by a bunch of specific things which are hereby verboten for the next 30 days. They even released them in English for a change. Probably because they think the coronavirus is being spread by all the dang foreigners, not all these fucking Czechs who can't cover their mouths when coughing.

In addition to closing every damn thing, the long list of new rules includes closing offices and shops, forcing people to stay at home, requiring them to wear masks in public, and banning all events. The last one is a bitch. I bought tickets to see William Shatner in Prague last December. The event was scheduled for March 15 – and canceled the day before. Shat happens. But not in Europe.

Hoarding of Masks and TP

The CZ government requires people to wear masks in public and avoid general contact with others. That's all fine and dandy, but all the masks sold out in about 5 minutes. So the government decreed that those without masks must wrap scarves around their faces. I can fully understand the draconian mask laws here. Every other Czech aged 8 to 80 in this country puts one finger on a nostril and blows snot noodles on the sidewalk. And they love to loudly hawk up lung oysters and shoot them everywhere. Forcing them to wear masks might put an damper on some of that white trashery.

Smile!

But I've gotta hand it to the mask creativity of these people. In lieu of buying actual masks, Czechs just wrap scarves around their mugs. Or make their own masks at home. I've seen all colors of material wrapped around surly faces, from pillow cases to old Christmas socks. One lady strolled by with a red purse, red shoes, wearing a red mask while talking on her red cell phone. You go girl! Better red than dead!

Czechs must really be shitting themselves, because they are buying up every last roll of toilet paper they can get their hands on. People panic buy. Every time there's a hint of an emergency, scared sheep stock up on a billion pills and canned food. But this time, they're raiding the toilet paper shelves.

Why? Do they think that the companies will stop producing TP in the wake of coronavirus? And how is TP the ultimate measure of survival? This must fall under the 50% of Czechs who are drunks. Only drunks think survival depends solely on booze and TP. Like the old man in the street the other day with the bag of booze and buttwipes. Or my drunken college flatmate. He only ever bought booze and TP. Damn, did he see the future?

Free Movement Prohibited

If you've ever wondered about what life behind the Iron Curtain was like, wonder no more. As of this moment, the CZ guvvie dragged out the Old Commie Rule Book on this one. Cross border travel is restricted, and even taking leisurely walks is verboten. Everyone out for a walk must walk with a specific purpose. They're not even sugar coating the thing, as the doc reads 'Prohibition of Free Movement of Persons.'

Of course they can't prohibit people from shopping, and they specify exactly what is allowed. And everything on the list is completely fucking sold out. Masks, medicine, hand sanitizer, and TP. A worse bunch of capitalists I've never seen.

I demand that these people be returned to communist bondage at once, where standing in lines for oranges and toilet paper was the norm. They not only like it, they pine for it. The grocers regularly have sales called 'retro week' for a taste of the good old times: cans of processed meat by-products and random goods with plain brown wrappers.

Wide Body Jetsetter Grounded

As I wander through the ghost mall in search of the solitary store where I can buy canned beans for burritos, I think of those zombie apocalypse films. How can you not? There's panic, empty spaces, and bloody lunatics robbing the stores of precious rolls of shit tickets.

Do Not Approach the Bus Driver

One of the nice things about the lockdown is that family time isn't affected. I can still prop up the fluffy pillows in bed next to my sweetie, and watch 28 Days Later, followed by 28 Weeks Later. As one does.

I think about European history during war time. How the expat writers bumming around Europe writing their novels were suddenly whisked away by embassies and returned from whence they came.

I can't be whisked away anywhere, and not just because I'm pushing 300 lbs. I'm not an expat (and not much of a writer, if I'm being honest), I'm a permanent resident of the Czech Republic, forced to stay here until the virus dies out. I canceled my yearly trip the states to see my family. I didn't want to contract coronavirus while stuck in a plane for 14 hours, land in the states, go to dinner with family, and accidentally kill my dad. That would be awkward.

Soon after my decision to stay grounded, the Czech government made it official by slamming the borders shut. So by decree of the government of Czechia, I'm stuck here with all the slobs from Slobovia, without my pubs or my fried cheese for the foreseeable future. Fortunately, I can work from home.

But I can't cram my wide body into a jet. Fuck. Well, I'm off to the ghost mall soon; it's the only place I can go. I'll wander past all the closed shops and darkened halls to the light at the end of the virus-ridden tunnel: the only open supermarket. I think I'll get a bottle of vodka and a roll of TP, if I can get one.

Today I fast-walked with purpose, shoulders bent forward to the wind with the ghost mall up ahead. I now work at home and want to avoid this whole damn corona-poxy-lips thing. But it's amazing how quickly you run out of things in the viral apocalypse. I was wearing my mask, as were most sensible people I passed. But then a homeless man rose from a bench and lurched toward me with his hand out. The rat bastard wasn't wearing a mask or a scarf and he was asking for money. I gave him the stiff arm and shook my head no.

With no mask and sleeping in the cold, that guy wouldn't last much longer. But for a second, when he got in my face without a mask, I felt this urge to knock him down and run. That's what survival mode does to humans. Everyone gives each other the hairy eyeball, no trust.

In my case, I've probably just watched too many zombie apocalypse movies.

Prague Bus Driver, Day 7 of the Viral Apocalypse

Beat the Prague Heat!

How to Beat the Bejesus Out of This Bastard Prague Heat.

photo via Flickr by ataferner

If you happen to be in Prague right now, this heat wave might make you think about moving to the North Pole to bask in glacial darkness for 24 hours per day. Europeans don't have AC. Even when the last EuroHeatWave killed 14,000 people in France, they did not install AC in their quaint little maisonettes. Non. They just said c'est la vie and ate a snail. That same heat wave killed more than 70,000 across Europe.

So when the sun beats down and burns the tar up on the roof, and your shoes get so hot you wish your tired feet were fire proof, follow these Wide Body Jetsetter tips to keep your hot ass cool.

Heat Follows My Wide Ass Everywhere

Where I come from it gets hotter than a two-dollar pistol. Growing up in the Central Valley in California is like sitting in the waiting room just outside of Hell. And whenever one of those smarmy TV reporters did their weekly How to Beat the Heat report, I wanted to beat them like a red-headed stepchild. Easy for you to beat the heat in your air-conditioned studio, to which you drive to-and-from in your air-conditioned car to your air-conditioned house. All of my working poor life I had to drive 20-year-old cars with no AC to and from jobs with bosses so cheap they only turned on the AC in their offices and let the labor slowly suffocate in the heat. At home? If I happened to have working AC and turned it on for more than five minutes per day, it cost me $300 per month.

I have always hated the heat. Even when I was a skinny bastard. Imagine how I hate it now, with 100 pounds of blubber strapped onto my frame. When the sun bakes down on my skin, I feel like a walrus slowly turning on a spit. Goo goo g'joob. So these are the things I do to avoid heat stroke, heart attack, and heat rashes in my nethers:

Heat-Beater #1: Get a Job in a Modern Building

Prague is surrounded by a sea of gray concrete Soviet block housing and new tech offices in equal proportion. Get your ass a job in one of these tech companies. If you have an IT degree, you're gold. If you're a 'creative' soul (doomed) like me, you'll have to work in the mail room or strapped to a phone line listening to people call you a cocksucker because your company didn't send them their collectible train on time. But hey, these offices have AC, so it's better than sitting at home slowly sliding down your sweaty, faux-leather couch.

Heat-Beater #2: Tramspotting

They now have air-conditioned trams in Prague! Finally! Sure, there are only about 40 of them, but some wise soul at the Prague Transport grew tired of having to scrape dead old people off the tram seats every summer. So they bought a fleet of new trams with AC in them. You will know them by their orange racing stripes on their noses. However, you can lead a horse to water...

The Prague Transport web forum is filled with complaints from Czechs saying 'bullshit tram with bullshit people opening windows so the AC doesn't work. Total bullshit.' Yes, the word 'blbost' was translated on the fb forum as 'bullshit.' I've been lucky enough to have ridden the AC trams without windows opened by shitbirds. That AC REEEEAAAAALLLLLY works, man. It's like stepping out of a desert into a meat locker. I pity the vůl who tries to open the window on my watch.

Heat-Beater #3: Run Behind a Water Truck

The Prague roads get so hot that they get all gummy like caramel, so you will often see huge orange tanker trucks spewing water from all sides on the road around them. When the day is hotter than Georgia asphalt, run behind that water truck and cool your jets. Sure, that water plume may contain chemicals known to Putin to melt the faces off of journalists, but WTF are you gonna do when it's over 95 fucking degrees outside?

These aqua-autos are now being supplemented with misters. Not Mister Rogers, not Mister Robinson, but little misty fountains (mistifiers?) popping up around Prague. Apparently, too many seniors were keeling over in the heat. They were keeling seniors, which is neny dobry. More about the mistification process here.

Heat-Beater #4: Like. Go to the Mall.

photo by Tiia Monto

I view the mall as a necessary evil, a temple to mass consumerism peddling mostly overpriced blbost to rehabilitated commies with too much cash and credit. I call them Czigga rich. Anywho, malls are not just for hormone-addled teens anymore. Grown-ass adults like me go there to slowly putter up and down the frozen food aisles in supermarkets til I get goosebumps. You can even buy cold beer on tap and just casually sip it for hours while watching all the spotty teens and their Czigga rich parents strolling by. If there's a cineplex in that mall (and there usually is), go watch the latest Hollywood blbost and snort up the AC like a Hollywood producer snorts the booger sugar.

Heat-Beater #5: Wake Up at the Crack of Dawn and Open All Your Windows

As much as I hate mornings, as much as I'd rather sleep til noon, my wide ass wakes up stuck to my sweaty sheets at dawn. And I have my number 2 fan on me all night. I stagger to my feet, bounce off my walls, throw hot coffee on my face to wake up, then open up all the windows in my flat. Can't leave them open all night, nosiree Bob. I live on the ground floor in the ghetto and gypos would crawl into my flat and steal my widescreen and my wife. Plus it stays hot all night until about 5 am.

Like a Monkey With a Machine Gun

Czechs have AC but they don't know how to use it. Most of the buildings in Prague were built before AC was invented, so central AC is out of the question. This means overpriced fans and overpriced portable AC units. Don't try to buy a desk fan in a Czech appliance store, the greedy bastards will charge you 50 bucks for a Chinese-made fan that costs 5 bucks to produce. And the portable AC units cost more than a used car. Go to building supply shops like Obi or Hornbach. I got a desk fan for only 300 crowns ($12). It's my number one fan.

Like anything new, it takes time for the monkey to figure out how to get that spark onto the stick pile. Such is the AC learning curve. Take a look around Prague. Anytime you see one of those portable AC units in a small shop, the stupid bastards have the front door wide open, with the AC vent hose just snaking outside. Big Sir's Final Tip: AC basics. Dear knedlikyheads, they've got instructions in Czech on that portable AC unit that cost more than your old Škoda. Here's how AC works: it sucks the hot air into the unit, passes it through a compressor, condenser, and evaporator to chill that air out. Then it spews cold air into the hot space. That big white hose on the beast is not the tail. It vents ugly, stale, hot air. So that needs to be connected to a vent in your window or wall. Anything else is just pissing into the wind. Maybe these are the same idiots who open the windows on the AC trams.

And with that, I'm turning on my number one fan and closing my windows. It's 10 am and already starting to get as hot as fuck. Stay cool, my ninjas.

UPDATE: TRAMSPOTTING PART DEUX

The Czech government is finally caving into the reality of constant, unrelenting, massive heat waves every summer. So they have announced that they are increasing the number of air-conditioned trams over the next five years. They will even retrofit older trams with pimpin' coolio systems. I guess they got tired of scraping dead elders off of melted plastic tram seats.

So the normal way to spot trams is getting easier. In addition to the 2 out of 5 trams with the yellow-gold nose paint (AC heaven), they're adding new AC trams all the time. Since you can't tell from the paint any more, look for the frosty snowflake symbol by the doors. But wait! There's more! At major tram stops, look for the following sign. It contains tram numbers and arrival times. The kicker: the wheelchair symbol and snowflake symbols tell you which trams are modern and comfy and which ones are evil commie rust buckets with steep-ass stairs. Now I can just wait for my dream ride.

Also: the trolley-bus hybrids that snake around the Prague periphery are also AC havin' mofos. And these tasty bastards even have legroom.