Can you catch a virus through a blog?

Je suis malade. Which means, "I am sick." You'll recognize the French malade, of course, from the English malady, a cousin-word meaning the same thing. The English word "sick" is from the Old English, seoc, in turn from seukaz, of uncertain origin.

Interestingly, the Germans replaced that derivative with "krank," their word for ill, which originated in "twisted, bent" - and hence, the word crank. The things you learn.

Anyway, I blame Fannie. Fannie, in case you're wondering, is the 2,3, or 4 year old trollop who had a birthday party at Adam & Meyer's school last Friday, right before they went on the epic two-week vacation we're now about halfway through. Due to Fannie's selfish, selfish party, the children, I'm sure, must have all gathered around and shared - ugh, god, gross, fingers - cake & ice cream.

Those of you without children, who do not work with children, may not have an accurate idea of how gross children are. And I say this with love for children, but it cannot be dismissed or denied. They are disgusting.

Adam & Meyer, for example, two of my most beloved young ones, sneeze violently into communal food. They stick their fingers in their snot-effusing noses and dine like kings on the products mined. Then they touch each muffin in turn to see which one has the right consistency for them. Yug.

So I can only imagine the dreadful state of affairs at little Fannie's little party - what germs are spread when a group of children celebrates. Shudder. And of course the teachers, knowing that a plague would surely ensue, did nothing to stop the horror because, hey, whatever, they're about to send the germballs home for two weeks.

So Adam, Meyer, Lisa, Ben, and now me, have all had various manifestations of the same, weird, French disease. And of course, I mean the English manifestation (version), rather than the French (protest) because we were not able to protest the illness at all, having been doubly weakened by the virus & the vacance. My version involves me wanting to sleep all day long. Their versions, sad to say, have had more disturbing, though relatively short-term, repercussions.

I was a little worried, yesterday, that I would be forever etched in a trainful of French hearts as "That American girl who lost her dinner in the subway." But I avoided that crisis. I was not, thankfully, malade on the crowded train, which would have been gross & a big pain in the ass because the whole train stops when someone is malade. I know because once I was on a train stopped for 15-20 minutes due to someone - maybe Fannie - being malade up the line.

Another train stopped for a while yesterday - though I was not on it to witness, thankfully - due to a "serious voyager incident." This is the French euphemism for a metro suicide, which claims the life of some 60 or so people a year. The attempts always triple in frequency during the Christmas/New Year stretch. When I heard about this serious voyager incident on line 2 last night, I thought two things:

1. So the French have euphemisms, too. (In fact, the word is euphemisme.)
2. What must the driver experience?

And my heart went out, perhaps wrongly, I don't know, to the driver first & foremost. Because it is obviously not his/her fault, and it is obviously an awful experience. According to some brief research, most metro drivers are likely to experience at least one attempt in their life, and many - even after months of counseling - are never able to drive a train again.

The driverless metro line, line 14, has a complete glass barrier between the platform and the tracks, with doors that open to the tracks only when a train is in the station. This would obviously prevent attempts on other lines, but the infrastructure is too expensive. In much the same way, a real, effective guard rail on the Golden Gate Bridge would cost some outrageous amount of money & affect the careful engineering to such a degree that the state of California is reduced to posting hotline help signs at great frequency on the bridge. Maybe the French could explore that option, except I'm really not sure how effective it is.

Huh. Well. That was...cheerful. And now I feel awkward. But it recalls a conversation last night, with my friend Amy, when she received the text telling her of the serious voyager incident on line 2. She asked us, "What do you reply to that? Is there any possible witty follow-up?" We decided, after various attempts that I won't share here lest you think I'm twisted and bent, that no, there is no socially acceptable quip to follow such a piece of information.

So, I just have to end my blog, now, awkwardly. And this is what you get for reading the blog of a sick person.