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Saturday, February 17, 2018

As I lay Dying

I discovered a curious thing last night. Alcohol is more effective at cutting the neuropathic pain in my shoulder than Neurontin. Secondarily, I rediscovered that I am not able to drink alcohol anymore without immediately developing a splitting headache and a sense of profound exhaustion. And I'm not talking about a lot of alcohol. Just two beers. Clearly, the second case cancels out the benefit of the first--or rather, merely replaces one pain with another. So, I'm early to Starbucks this morning because the maid is clattering about in the house, and I'm nursing a residual headache, feeling a bit like a roll of cotton, watching Dharma eat packets of brown sugar.

Additionally, given that I had consumed the alcohol last night, I did not feel it would be wise to take my usual tablet of Xanax before bed, and therefore lay in a waking state for some considerable time, wondering what would happen to me, or rather, to my body, were I do suddenly pass away--an odd sort of entertainment as it seems now, yet somehow a pressing question last night. 

But, I mean, who would know? I am generally alone in the house, day and night, and generally I receive no calls on the telephone. True, someone might note, after several days, an absence of Facebook interaction, but would they conclude from this that I was dead? Probably not. 

So how long would my corpse lay without being discovered? Well, if Louis were outside of Bali, as she is now, it might be a month or more. Of course, the big fat brown dog will have come by, but will have been merely irritated by my unavailability, and will not likely have sounded any public alarms. It seems an awful long time for a corpse to lie untended. Of course, eventually the electricity will be cut off for nonpayment, as well as the water--but then, I will not have been missing these anyway, nor will anyone else have missed them. In fact, given that I am dead, I assume that I will be unconcerned one way or another, because unaware, regarding my death. 

Still ... it struck me last night as being distinctly lamentable, as well as inappropriate, for a corpse to lie around by its lonesome for weeks on end. One shudders to think of the deterioration, and the attraction of vermin, and the odor. 

Come to think of it ... hmmm ... No wonder I couldn't sleep! 

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