The Perfect Life #12 by Dr. Perfect

The Rage of Chinguardians

Dear Dr. Perfect

I am afraid to go outside in the time of COVID-19 since people are so stupid. How hard is it to socially distance and wear a mask over one’s nose and mouth? Every time I see a nose sticking out over a mask, I feel like I have witnessed a sex crime. Is our country doomed to such stupidity?

Sincerely,

Incensed and afraid

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Dear Incensed and afraid,

I too ponder the intricacies of wearing a face mask under one’s nose. Some intrepid mask wearers believe that their nostrils are an adequate filter on their own, which they are in a very general sense, having a forest of nostril hair between them and your lungs. Or perhaps the mask wearer is content at displaying the most minimal effort possible to simply say, “At least I tried.” This occurs when such precautions take the form of image over a real emphasis on public health.

Such half-assed approaches can be found in other instances, like wearing a pair of pants without a belt or conjuring up a dissertation off the top of your head, using index cards. My pergola porch is a perfect example. The contractors I hired did a subpar job. I knew something was off when the contractors initially estimated seven weeks for completion. It actually took fifteen, and their shoddy craftsmanship wasn’t worth the already low amount I had haggled them to. Come to think of it, I’m even not sure if they were real carpenters. They looked awfully young in their matching jumpsuits.

Texting and driving puts everyone around you at risk, but we do it anyway. We sometimes shift lanes without signaling, or stir our fresh margaritas from behind the wheel. Complacency begets carelessness, which naturally leads to stupidity. You’ve probably seen brazen pedestrians dart across a busy crosswalk, staring into their cell phones without pause or concern. They don’t stop to think that the driver barreling toward them could be just as lost in their phone as well. In the words of the immortal Stephen Tyler, we’re all just living on the edge, in one giant self-centered petri dish with more creature comforts than we know what to do with.

The simplest solution in dealing with mask posers is to report them to the nearest authorities. If that sounds too harsh, grab your cell phone and proceed to berate them in a hysterical fashion while live streaming the public shaming ritual for all to see. Those types of videos usually come off pretty well.

Are mask sizing issues worthy of exploration? Is it possible to consciously purchase an ill-fitting mask and wear it anyway? I’d like to see a study on this. It could bring us closer to understanding the droopy mask phenomenon before us. I can’t justify the actions of these mask offenders, Incensed and Afraid. Perhaps we are doomed to a thousand years of addled grievances throughout the dark winter of our souls. My advice is to wear three to four masks just to make a statement.

I’m no economist, but something irks me about profligate spending. Our government spends money at an astronomical rate, printing and borrowing us into oblivion. Some might call this careless act of governance risky in itself. The devaluing of our dollar eventually renders those stimulus pity checks meaningless. Speaking of money, I’m getting into this corporate cultural censorship action like there’s no tomorrow. My vintage copies of yanked Dr. Seuss books are selling like crazy on eBay. Add this to my Special Freedom Edition Pepe Le Pew Looney Tunes DVDs and expired boxes of hydroxychloroquine, and I’ll have plenty of scratch. I can finally retire and move to Antarctica like I had always planned. Sure, it’s cold there, but I’ll make it work. Don’t try to find me.

Don’t lose hope though. For every mask-dangling dolt, there’re people writing symphonies or engineering the latest Mars rover. And what of Mars? Can we move there yet? Would we want to move there?

The lack of an atmosphere might be a problem. The sloven masses would probably just follow us there anyway, and we’d be right back to a planet teetering on the brink in no time. If you’re anything like me, you’ve tired of hearing wealthy celebrities and politicians tell us to “do our part” to achieve x, y, or z. By answering these advice letters, I am doing my part, thank you, and I wouldn’t change it for anything.

At fifteen, I was raiding my mother’s pantry for Little Debbie’s and sneaking peeks at Miss July in father’s Playboy magazine. I’ve come a lot further since then. I can buy my own Little Debbie snacks now and watch all the free porn I want. But I chose to do neither. What kind of perfect life would that be? You mustn’t live your life in fear, regardless of others flagrantly disregarding COVID etiquette.

Step outside and breathe in the fresh air. Despite the endless apocalyptic rhetoric, the birds are still flying, the bees are still pollinating, and those neighborhood cats are still going through your trashcan. Hiding under your bed with desert goggles and a face scarf might seem appealing at first, but it gets old after the first few months of lockdowns. I know this from experience. You have nothing to fear but fear itself and the likelihood of contracting COVID.

It’s a tough call.

Dr. Perfect has slung advice across the globe for the last two decades due to his dedication to the uplift of the human condition.