A fine starter to the New Year (out with the old, the new, and anything else I ate that day)

So, I blew the starter.

No, I am not a cheerleader on a reality TV show set at the Ohio State University.

Get your mind out of the gutter. Or out of the Buckeye backfield. Goodbye Columbus. Or words to that effect.

But I jest about the fine Big 10 school and all it stands for. After all, it is not Miami - the one in Florida, of course, not the one up the road in Ohio.

But I digress, which happens when I go without food for more that a day, living on crackers and lime Gatorade. More on that later.

Nay, the starter I blew was under the hood - of my sexy minivan.

I tried to be a good boy New Year’s Eve and stayed overnight at the friends who had me over for their house party. Little did they know I wouldn’t leave until 4 that afternoon. I was being that good.

Plus, what they say about mixing beer, wine, sparkling fruit wine, fried salami, lamb, goat cheese, sugar cookies and chicken turns out to be true.

But alas, I wound up with my auto on a side street in Oak Park, the hood up, the electric off, smoke briefly billowing under the hood, much as my stomach was around noon.

So, a half dozen phone calls and 90 minutes later I wind up getting towed home by this chubby little Italian guy who loved to talk. Nice kid.

I learned that people in his profession make more money than most reporters for a job that is pretty similar if you think about it - coming across people in uncomfortable situations, chatting with them, then taking their money. No wait. That makes him like a psychiatrist. Or a divorce attorney.

And that’s how my New Year began.

Two days later, back at what passes for a job I grab a salad and a chicken sandwich for lunch. Again, trying to be a good boy.

This, too, shall pass. And pass. And pass. And pass.

It’s not safe to eat anything anymore, but for Space Food Sticks, if you can still find them, so it might have been the lettuce. Or the honey mustard.

I’ve ruled out the low carb fettucini because no one I dined with Wednesday wound up doing Linda Blair imitations in the dark hours before dawn but for lonesome me.

One of life’s toughest choices is what end to attend to first, especially at 3, 4, and then again at 6:30. That’s all I’m saying.

That, and 5 pounds later I’m convinced I don’t have the stomach to be a super model. The looks, maybe, but not the intestinal fortitude.

Dehydrated baby I am, I did go to the doctor to learn I will live or at least not die from this malady, which passed in less than 24 hours, taking with it a good part of me I hope to never see again.

Turns out there’s some stomach virus going around. Also turns out that in the county I call home there have been more than a dozen cases of salmonella in the past week or so. But the health department, bless it’s soul, doesn’t want to cause a panic so wouldn’t say where anybody ate just yet. All they would give was the demographic information, which fit nicely with the folks who working preparing food in most local eateries.

But I worry too much by nature. There’s no one here to do it for me. It’s when you’re sick that a spouse could come in handy. That’s what love is for.

Me, I took it easy, relying as usual on the kindness of friends who fed me soup one evening, then potatoes the next, and staying in for the weekend.

The place needed a cleaning anyway. I do tend to live like a grad student. Yeah, being single - it’s just like George Clooney’s life, really, just on a smaller scale.

Besides, a new starter (plus a battery and a total bill over $600), a g-i cleansing and an early spring cleaning (given the weather) are a fitting way to begin a year.

And now I have more empathy for the Bush Administration. I mean, just when you think things can’t get worse...


At least I didn’t have a camera phone. Or any neighbors from a rival religious sect. Or do I? Maybe that’s why I was sick.

I’m going with that. Damn Congregationalists at the church next door.