Trump Distancing

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Free advice to help relieve stress in this tough time! Perhaps the most important one: Practice Trump distancing.

Like you, I’ve been watching tons of news coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in hopes of relieving my anxiety. Not surprisingly, it hasn’t helped. Therefore, as a public service, I’m offering you the following advice:

  • Reduce your TV news viewing to thirty minutes a day. That’s all you need to keep up to date. Too much news tends to increase your anxiety level exponentially.
  • As a corollary, try to keep Fox News viewing to a bare minimum. It appears to be a source of accurate reporting but actually tends to result in serious levels of misinformation and potential harm.
  • Practice Trump distancing. As best you can, avoid watching or listening to any pandemic-related pronouncements by the President. If you find you have overdone it, try scrubbing any resulting infection with a healthy dose of Dr. Fauci.
  • Only watch White House press conferences as models of what not to do in a pandemic. In other words, do not stand closer than two meters and avoid all handshaking, face touching and lectern contact.
  • Wash your hands frequently with soap and water. Moreover, if excessive Trump exposure causes an outbreak of profanity, try washing your mouth out with soap, too.
  • Before taking any new medications as a pandemic prophylaxis, ensure you have the OK from a qualified MD. Remember that the MD after Donald Trump’s name stands for “mad dictator” not “medical doctor.”
  • Do not base your Easter celebration and church-going plans on the President’s advice. Probably best to stay home and binge on chocolate bunnies.
  • If you and your family are housebound, maybe now’s the time to haul out those old standbys like Monopoly, Risk and Clue. And for those who don’t have a stockpile of board games, why not try your hand at Fantasy Pandemic? Each player gets to pick six countries and then you compete by tracking each team’s daily increase of COVID-19 cases.
  • Thanks to the Internet and social media, you’re free to set up your own lottery. For example, players can bet on any number of things including the date for the stock market to return to its previous high, Trump’s Electoral College total in November and even the date a coronavirus vaccine is announced.
  • Make friends with a survivalist. Who knows? If things get really bad, he may be willing to share some of his water, canned goods and ammunition.
  • Don’t forget to exercise. It’s often difficult to motivate yourself to work out when you’re feeling isolated and alone. Try taping pictures of Donald Trump to a boxing bag, a step or the bottom of your running shoes. That should give you the extra incentive you might be lacking.
  • Count to ten slowly. If that doesn’t work, repeat or maybe try counting to twenty. As a last resort, you can always try counting backwards from 100 in binary or hexadecimal.
  • Eat well-balanced meals and restrict your alcohol intake. Here’s a handy rule of thumb that should help: limit yourself to one beer or one glass of wine for every cheeseburger consumed.
  • Welcome humor. For example, picture anti-vaxxers fighting to get a COVID-19 vaccine or a reluctant Donald Trump being perp walked out of the White House next January.
David Martin
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