Amorcito

This is Godzilla's favourite lullaby, which is nice, but gives me some pause, because I suspect it's slightly less about pinko themes than poor Victor Jara's usual songs are and is actually about smoking a cigarette after getting laid. What sort of heartbreaker have I let loose on the world?


At least it's beautiful. And at least when I forget the Spanish lyrics it has that nice simplicity of a lullaby that lets you invent your own lyrics without really thinking about it, a la "I was rocking my darling son, wishing he'd go the fuck to sleep, the phone rang off the hook, while the oven went beep beep, ay ay ay, etc".

Victor Jara and Caetano Veloso are both rich sources of lullabies. Not that Godzilla needs them at the moment. He's a pretty placid kid so far. But he seems to like listening to them, and I like listening to them, or singing them, depending on the circumstances. He likes this one too, but what cunt doesn't?




 I should just look up Spanish songs with "ai ai ai" lyrics.

Excuse me while I disinfect this guy

I'd understood there is a lot of contention among parents and anti-vaccination advocates about the standard vaccination schedual for infants in most countries. It was contention I was more or less prepared to ignore.

I mean, I understand there is a risk of damage with vaccinations, which is why a few families have collected major civil awards in the US when their kids got fucked up by them, and I can give credence to the idea that most children are over-vaccinated on most normal scheduals because there's an unhealthy financial relationship between most public health services and pharmaceutical companies. Sounds like a likely story. I also understand vaccinations don't equal immunization, given that I've been vaccinated on schedual and have been tested and am immune to NOTHING - my immune system showing a disdain I can't help but admire. "You're bothering me with dead pathogens? Sister, please. Talk to me when you've got real problems."

But given Godzilla will be doing a lot of travelling starting soon - given he won't be spending all his time in this isolated little podunk town while his immune system matures - and given that I think vaccinations are a social responsibility in a crowded and transitable world - I don't have many second thoughts about him getting his jabs on schedual, the poor mite. Of course I'm worried something will go wrong a la lawsuits, and of course I've heard the horror stories about children crying for days after the jabs, and I don't buy that old chestnut that infants don't feel pain, but I'm not as worried about these things as I would be about him sitting on an airplane for 14 hours at eight months of age while hundreds of possibly filthy individuals get thier breath recycled all over him and his unvaccinated immune system. 

And not, it turns out, as worried as I would be if he hadn't had any vaccinations and was just hanging around this podunk town where it turns out our entire circle of friends has declined to have their children vaccinated against anything. This came out at a Christmas party this weekend to which I'd taken Godzilla and I was so glad I'd been too busy breastfeeding him through a growth spurt to let other people have even a modicum of success in their constant efforts to manhandle him and his cuteness. No wonder everybody gets whooping cough here every winter. Fucking hippies. They have it done homeopathically, apparently. That's where they lose me altogether. I can buy into an unhealthy financial relationship between government and pharma with more alacrity than the most paranoid hippie but the point where homeopathy becomes a viable alternative is where I step off the crazy train.