Hugging Epidemic

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/style/28hugs.html?pagewanted=1

Today's post features the article above from the NY Times about the plague of social hugging in today's secondary school system (including a mention of my junior high school). Of course, it made me realize that I would be an absolute social outcast in this setting, as Jerry found himself to be in the following episode:

Episode 103 - The Kiss Hello

[Jerry's Apartment]
Jerry has just arrived with his mail. The door opens and Kramer darts into the room.

KRAMER: Hey.
JERRY: Ah, well. Thank you very much!
KRAMER: For what?
JERRY: (agitated) For putting my picture up on that wall! I'm like Richard Dawson down there now. And every person I see engages me in this long, boring, tedious, conversation. I can't even get out of the building!
KRAMER: You should be thanking me for liberating you from your world of loneliness and isolation. Now, you're part of a family.
JERRY: Family?
KRAMER: Yeah.
JERRY: You think I want another family? My father's demanding my uncle pay interest on fifty dollars he was supposed to give my mother in nineteen-forty-one, and my uncle put my Nana in a home to try and shut her up! And I tell you another thing, Cosmo Kramer, whatever you wanna be called. The kissing thing is over. There's no more kissing, and I don't care what the consequences are.

As Jerry reaches the end of his emphatic declaration, Kramer takes Jerry's head in his hands, leans in and plants a big kiss right on Jerry's lips.

Hiding From the Watchtower

We have these nice, elderly Jehovah's Witnesses who come around on Saturday, distribute their literature, and then proceed to talk your ear off. So if I see them coming down the sidewalk before they spot me, I'll hide and pretend like I'm not home. This weekend we have the pleasure of Emily's company so we had to include her in on the drill. So you had me, Chris, and Emily all hiding behind the sofa to avoid the horror of having to talk to these lovely but loquacious ladies. You'd have thought we were trying to avoid detection by the Nazis! Anyway, it reminded me of the following exchange between Elaine and her girlfriend Tina, whose apartment she is subletting:

Episode 86 - The Opposite

Tina : Elaine, we have a problem.
Elaine : Well, what is it?
Tina : You're getting kicked out.
Elaine : Kicked out?! Why?!
Tina : Well, there's been a number of complaints.
Elaine : Yeah? Like what?
Tina : Well, like last Thanksgiving you buzzed up a jewel thief.
Elaine : I didn't know who he was!
Tina : That's why there's a buzzer.
Elaine : What else?
Tina : Well, apparently, the week after that, you buzzed up some Jehovah's Witnesses and they couldn't get them out of the building.

Morning Mist

Had a great weekend in North Carolina attending my nephew's graduation at Duke University. However, as I departed for the airport on Saturday morning, I had a terrifying moment when I actually idenitified with none other than George Costanza! I was toting my bags to the car, and it occurred to me that I had an awful lot of stuff to carry for one brief weekend away from home. It reminded me of the following exchange between George and Jerry before departing for LA:

Episode 41 - The Trip

Jerry's apartment. George walks in with several stuffed suitcases and backpacks.

Jerry: What is this?
George: What?
Jerry: We're going on a two day trip. What are you, Diana Ross?
George: I happen to dress based on mood.
Jerry: Oh. But you essentially wear the same thing all the time.
George: Seemingly. Seemingly. But within that basic framework there are many subtle variations, only discernable to an acute observer, that reflect the many moods, the many shades, the many sides of George Costanza.
Jerry: (referring to George's outfit) And what mood is this?
George: This is Morning Mist.

Seinfeld on Hospital Rounds

Wow! I have been extremely negligent in regard to my posting so I will try to make amends. Anyway, over the weekend I was making rounds in the Intensive Care Unit when I was presented a case of new onset kidney failure in the setting of profound dehydration. After the intern summarized the patient's history, I asked her to report his laboratory data, and for some reason I requested the information with a quote direct from Seinfeld. It went something like this:

"So what were the patient's labs, which I gather might have been a tad askew?"

Episode 83 - The Raincoats

ELAINE: I know they're your parents, Jerry, and they're very nice people. But don't you think it's odd, that a thirty-five year old man is going to these lengths to see that someone else's parents are enjoying themselves? I mean don't you find that abnormal?

JERRY: It is a tad askew.