If the swine flu won't kill you, surely deep fried bacon will.

About five years ago, if the swine flu had hit then, I probably would have shrugged it off, thinking, “Meh.  Whatever.  Probably not a big deal.  If I get it, it’s no biggie.”  I could skip over the stories of face mask sales going up and hand sanitizers flying off the racks in the newspaper (you know….five years ago, when newspapers still existed) and find out what the scores of last night’s hockey games were.  That would be so much more interesting.

Of course, that was before child.  Now, things are different.  Much different.

Now I’ve got the equivalent of the devil and the angel sitting on either side of my shoulder, whispering not-so-sweet-nothings in my ear.  I call them Rational and Irrational.  Sure, I can ignore some of the doom and gloom parts of the news of the flu, but I have to admit, sometimes they plant a bug in my brain and they’re hard to sort out.

Rational and Irrational like to argue with each other.  They like to argue with me.  I can tell them to shut it and watch American Idol, but dammit, they’re still nagging and whining in the back of my head, carrying on like a bunch of old ladies (no offense to Deven’s mother’s movie club, of course)

To give you an idea of what these debates are like, I give you the following:

Rational – Please.  This really isn't a big deal.  It's just that the media has nothing else to rant and rave about since no one wants to say anything bad about Obama.  Except for Fox, of course, and no one’s listening to them anyway.

Irrational – WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!

Rational – Knock it off.  There’s anti-bacterial soap.  There’s medical care.  Everyone is watching this and keeping a close eye.  It’ll be the most watched flu virus ever.  Twitter, blogs, Facebook, you name it.  If the flu virus doesn’t make you sick, the coverage sure will.

Irrational – Don’t take the kid to the play area this morning.  That place is a Petri dish with all those kids drooling and sneezing all over the place.  You have no idea where those kids have been.

Rational – And that’s different from any other time?

Irrational – It’s a conspiracy.  The flu was invented by the government as a test to see how people would react to something much more terrible.

Rational – Um…damn.  You need to get off the Internet a little more often.  Wow.

Irrational – Don’t eat out at restaurants.  You have no idea who’s cooking your food and sneezing on it.

Rational – I like Chik-Fil-A sandwiches though.  And their diet lemonade is heaven’s water.  I can’t fry chicken in the kitchen anyway.  Remember what happened the last time I tried that?

Irrational –  You learned how to draw your eyebrows on with eye pencil really well though.

Rational –  If I don’t eat out, who will support the economy?

Irrational – This is America.  I’m sure there’ll be someone to take your place at the buffet.  Besides, you need to stay away from pork.  How do you think this got started?

Rational – You’re blaming BACON for this?!  What the hell kind of sicko planet are you from?!

Irrational – We should close the border with Mexico!  Quarantine everyone who’s been to Mexico recently!

Rational – Pfft.  Good luck with that one.  How many people go to Mexico for Spring Break again?

Irrational – I’m hitting refresh on that Google flu map to see where it’s spreading every five minutes.

Rational – Oh geez.  Yay technology.  What would you have done in the days before the Internet?  No wonder everyone’s freaking out over this.  Too much information available too quickly.

Irrational – Let’s seal up the house and not leave.  That way, we can’t get sick, right?

Rational – You want to seal yourself inside a house with a three year old?

Irrational - ……

Rational – Yeah, forget it.

Irrational – Yeah.