A bit of a meme has popped up on Twitter, with people trying to come up with a better name for the swine flu and its accompanying media pandemonium. My friend Damian Amrhein tweeted this one he had heard: “porkulinum panicausinus”
I used to work with Damian and his Germanic origins were always a source of geek humor around the office, so this one popped into my mind: Schweinerdämmerung!
It just seems to fit, given the whole “end of the world” hysteria being whipped up by the media. I came home yesterday to a Seattle Times headline in 72pt type “SWINE FLU FOUND HERE” … c’mon folks. More people have died falling off ladders in the last week than have been killed by this illness. But you don’t see any mass panic about the danger of ladders do you?
I don’t watch TV, especially not the news, and barely read the paper or listen to the radio. The 24hr news cycle is just too worthless to spend time on when all they can do is work into a lather about completely pointless things.
My three year old son calls it “piggie foo.” Of course, one of our favorite stories is Jon Sciezka’s version of, oh, heck, I forget the title but it involves a chicken and the falling sky.
I don’t disagree Chuck but the problem with this flu seems to be its possibly origins and possible species leaping fun…. and think that is part of the excitement in the media…
Jerome