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join us on the dark side

join us on the dark side

I finally got around to reading the articles on the smallpox vaccine from the past week.

A Newsday article states that "people with eczema also are advised not to get the inoculations because the vaccine can cause a potentially fatal skin eruption." Which means, should the situation arise where we need to be vaccinated, Natalie will be out of luck.

Or, we can hedge our bets, get her the shot, and hope that she does not get the skin eruption, which is only "potenially" fatal. Our other choice is to just let her die of smallpox? Hmmm. I guess we'll take the chance on the skin eruption.

Not that I think it will come down to this. If biological terror ever does come to rest here, I don't think any kind of vaccination program is going to help.

Nope. It's going to end up like "The Stand," where one person exhales and another catches whatever he's got and so on and so on. Some people will be naturally immune and will survive. And then we will choose up sides and trek across the country to our designated spots for good and evil, dark side or rebel force, liberals or right wingers, the damned and the saved.

The dark side will have gambling and strippers and imported beer. The other side will have potluck dinners and group hug sessions and cranberry punch. The dark side will have the Batman from Batman Beyond. The other side will have the cheesy Batman from the original series. The dark side will have an X-Box and home theater in every house. The other side will have Nintendo 64 and Betamax.

In the end, both sides will die of either starvation or a violent mutiny gone wrong. I say enjoy armageddon while you can. It doesn't last very long.

So I've packed an emergency bag for my family with walking shoes and a guide to blackjack. Should push come to shove someday, we're off to the dark side.

Posted by on September 25, 2002 11:56 AM |

Comments

What about the "super outfits"? You didn't pack those?

Posted by: Tracy | September 25, 2002 12:02 PM

Thank God I've spent all my life playing flight sims. I'll head over to the heliport and borrow a chopper, gas it up and go find me military base with some jets.

Course playing fighting games will turn out to have been a total waste of time.

Posted by: D | September 25, 2002 12:21 PM

Thank God I've spent all my life playing flight sims. I'll head over to the heliport and borrow a chopper, gas it up and go find me military base with some jets.

Course playing fighting games will turn out to have been a total waste of time.

Posted by: D | September 25, 2002 12:21 PM

Oh ffs...

Posted by: D | September 25, 2002 12:21 PM

I'm coming with you, but I'm bringing the two eps of the Batman tv series with Vincent Price in 'em (just taped them this weekend. getting ready, you know)to balance out the darkness with a teensy bit of cheesy light. K?

Posted by: Jessica | September 25, 2002 05:01 PM

but, in the Stand, the liberal huggy bunch ended up surviving, while the bad guys blew themselves up with their own short-sighted evil.

me? i'm heading for Boulder, if i survive the plague/ locusts/ famine/ war/ boils/ frogs/ leprosy/ etc. i mean vegas is cool, but that Jamie Sheridan is just creepy.

wow. i guess you really had to see the movie to have any idea what i'm babbling about.

Posted by: kd | September 25, 2002 05:04 PM

We are dead, and this is hell.

Posted by: Solonor | September 25, 2002 05:08 PM

People with eczema can't get the vaccine? Looks like we'll be joining the dark side, too!

Posted by: robyn | September 25, 2002 05:52 PM

I will be on the gray side, floating on a fancy airmattress in the stagnant swimming pool of an abandoned mansion, tray of gin and tonics at my side, and roasting squirrels on the coals of a bonfire built from a hundred disused cellos.

I have just two questions, first, how effective is a cowpox vaccine against smallpox, and second, to my knowledge only labs in the US (CDC I think) and in the USSR (ahem) had live smallpox samples in their deepfreezes. Is it all accounted for, in which case this whole discussion is moot, or is some missing? I would be most worried about the Russian samples, except for the whole high-quality anthrax thing in the States (didn't they say it matched US samples?).

Posted by: miguel | September 26, 2002 04:27 AM