COVID-hog Day
Do you remember Bill Murray’s “Groundhog Day,” where the protagonist wakes up every morning to live the same day over and over again? Get up. Go to work. Wear a mask. Come home. That’s it, that’s life now. Welcome to 2020 ( postMarch 15). The — Worst — Year — In — Memory. You think you’ve had a bad year? We started with the Australian wildfi res, which made our California wildfires look puny by comparison. Kobe Bryant was killed in a helicopter crash. Kobe!
Then we experienced COVID-19. I had to learn new words that I could’ve gone without. “Lockdowns” — we’re human, we don’t respond well to staying inside for four weeks. It was supposed to be six weeks, but hey, we’re human. There’s only so much Netflix you can watch, although I did binge watch Ozark, Yellowstone and The Queen’s Gambit, three of the best series I’ve seen in a while. Lockdowns led to massive layoffs as over 71 million Americans filed for unemployment. The restaurant and bar industries have been decimated. The travel industry is on life-support.
Then George Floyd was murdered. Yet another Black man killed by white police. Only this time, while being fi lmed by the public. This led to protests across the country, which led to riots in many urban cities. The country protested against police brutality, so President Trump sent in anonymous federal officers to brutalize the protesters. Makes sense.
No sports. No Olympics. No NCAA March Madness. Major league baseball and basketball were canceled, then came back with no fans. LA is relevant again as both the Lakers and Dodgers won their respective NBA and MLB titles. Tried watching NFL with piped-in crowd noise and no fans. Gimmie a break, ain’t the same.
Vegas got canceled. Not that marginal TV series, but actual Las freakin’ Vegas! It was so bad that the usual bumper-to-bumper traffic on Las Vegas Boulevard evaporated. People were taking Instagram pics of themselves being the only thing on Las Vegas Boulevard. No traffic, no humans, no nottin’. No more buffets in Vegas (or anywhere else). Most of my favorite Vegas bars and restaurants closed in March and never reopened. Unreal.
Did you get coronavirus? Spread it to your spouse, children and co-workers? Did you get fired from your job? Are you about to get evicted from your house? Then you’ve got a lot in common with Donald Trump. Seems he had a bad year too. Don’t worry about Trump. Rumor is Mark Barnett is offering him another TV show, either “The Political Apprentice” or “The Biggest Loser.”
We had our presidential elections and Joe Biden won in a “landslide.” Only problem is a third of the country doesn’t believe in truth or facts. If you repeat “rigged” and “stolen” every time you and your sycophants speak, many believe it.
Fox News called Arizona for Biden on Election Night with lots of votes still to be counted. Fox News was correct, however their viewers don’t want accurately reported facts. They want to watch what they believe, truth be damned. So now, many Republicans are watching OAN (One America News), Newsmax TV, Alex Jones’ Info Wars, Breitbart and any other media source who will tell them what they want to hear. OAN is like Fox News on steroids with a shot of Jack and a Red Bull chaser. No truth or facts, just all propaganda, all the time. There’s a huge demand for an alternative factfree universe.
Not sure what Kayleigh MAGAnany is gonna do when she’s unemployed next month. I can see her Fortune 500 job interviews in 2021. “I was the Minister of Dis-Information for the Trump Administration for eight months. I lied to the FAKE NEWS jackals and the American people daily, while my boss ignored COVID and the deaths of 325,000 Americans. I think I can spin your company poisoned and killed some people.”
“You’re hired!”
While we all want to put an asterisk next to this year, for me the nightmare of 2020 ends at noon on Jan. 20, 2021.