Sick kid. Not too sick, but sick enough to stay home from school this morning. One of those raw hoarse coughs kids do so very well. As it turned out, we had her annual check-up today, so it fit nicely. By then she was better, and I didn’t feel like I was bringing the winner of the Little Miss Spanish Influenza contest into the waiting room. I had promised her there wouldn’t be a shot, and she was relieved – but she doesn’t have the clawing dread of shots I had as a child, so it’s not that big a deal. At the end of the exam the doctor asked if we did flu shots; I said we did, and he offered one for her on the spot. Sure.

Sorry, hon, I said.

She shrugged: that’s okay. I don’t mind.

And she didn’t. Utterly nonchalant about. Well it was longer than I thought, it was like sting then hissss, but only two seconds. That’s the spirit. We went home and she fell asleep on the sofa with Spongebob blaring at high volume. Kids and soldiers: they can drop off anywhere, any time.

I made dinner – cornbread-encrusted catfish with cilantro-lime cocktail sauce, garlic-and-olive oil fries, a mixed green salad. Sounds nice, no? All pre-made. The catfish was pre-encrusted and frozen; the sauce came out of a bottle, the fries came with a  frozen sauce packet, and the salad was mixed in the bag, presumably not with pig-distributed e.coli. Growing up in North Dakota, fish night meant fishsticks, with fish that had been caught during the Korean conflict and tartar sauce that looked like regurgitated Elmer’s Glue. One of these days I should sit down and tote up all the ways the smaller things are better. It would take me an entire day.

Alas, that’s it; I have an obligation tomorrow that requires I write my column tonight, so I’m off. I do however have a Halloween Diner, if you’re interested; grab it fast, since the end-of-the-month bandwidth guillotine is sure to fall, and there’s nothing as useless as a Halloween episode on November First. I like this one, mostly for the production. Homebrewed, but not entirely embarrassing. The MP3 version - now with consistent levels, I think - is here; the link below takes you to the fancy art-embedded edition, and gives you the chance to subscribe via iTunes, which of course I hope you do. Whatever you do: please read this first. It's not essential, but it'll help.

New Quirk as well, of course. Enjoy! Have a fine weekend; thanks for the patronage, and I’ll see you Monday.