Thank you to everyone who inquired as to my condition. I’m fine. I didn’t slip and fall on the ice. I’m a little upset by the fact that no one seemed to care whether or not the pets of the cast of The Play That Goes Wrong had become infected and a little surprised that no one believed that I’d gone to the theater on the wrong night, given my history in that regard.

The correct answer to the quiz in the last blog was Other. When I got to the theater I couldn’t find my CDC proof of vaccination, so, instead, I offered, and, after hours of negotiation, had rejected, a letter of exemption provided by Novak Djokovic’s doctor, whereupon I was put in a taxi and asked to leave the neighborhood.

I’m kidding.  There was no taxi.

Today, on the first work day of 2022, I cleaned the apartment. So now I don’t have to worry about doing that again until 2023, or 2024, whichever comes first.

I’m not sure if my inability to make that determination is evidence of a specific erosion of arithmetic skills, a general cognitive decline, or a rift in the space-time continuum (which seems to take the blame for almost everything else), but, in any case, it’s a clear demonstration of cerebral atrophy in the age of Covid, confirming the adage, use it or . . . , something.

What I am sure about is that I’m a valued Amazon customer. Why else would they, having seen all the bamboo products I’ve been buying (towels, sheets, serving trays, waste baskets, scaffolding) send me a complimentary, complementary, red panda (giant pandas being out of stock, again)?

Okay, I haven’t yet purchased bamboo scaffolding, though it is available in the world and might come in handy as a sort of jungle gym for Ralph (the panda).

It also occurred to me that I could teach Ralph to type (after someone first teaches me), so that someday, perhaps, he could relieve me of the arduous task of transcribing these blogs from the audio cues I leave on my recorder while talking in my sleep.

Following the lead of the NFL and NBA, I have decided to upgrade my health and safety protocols. Fortunately, I was able to do this unilaterally because I represented both sides of the negotiation, which was not a conflict, though perhaps a potential psychiatric case study.

First, I initiated periodic self-testing. Every half hour I ask myself how I feel.

Next, I cancelled all international travel. Well, not all (though I might if I could), just my own.

And, though it wasn’t part of my original plan, I beta-tested the even stricter precaution of not leaving my home at all, the inspiration for this being brought about, not by any CDC guidelines, but by the fact that I couldn’t find my keys.

A couple hours later, having crawled through six rooms on my hands and knees, with flashlight in hand, and suffered through a humiliating investigation of my garbage, which fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, had been piling up since well before the keys disappeared, I was about to abandon all hope, as if I were entering the gates of an even worse hell, when, in a moment of sheer desperation, I peeked underneath the pillow on my bed, the last place I would have, and had, thought to look, much like when the police searched the rocker panels used to hide the drugs in The French Connection, and practically fainted from disbelief upon discovering that that was, in fact, were the elusive objects had chosen to hide from me, causing me to consider the possibility that I had put them there, while asleep, in an unconscious effort to restrict my movements in the Age of Omicron (not to be confused with that other supervillain sequel, Age of Ultron).