Top negative three-word Amazon.com reviews of Eat, Pray, Love

• Whiny, self-indulgent and dull
• Glib, narcissistic and lightweight
• Trite, Inaccurate and Mildly Annoying
• Whine, Cry and Shop for Father Figures

Thwarted by Ikea

My futon couch/bed frame broke for good just before I went away on all my travels. I've had it for about 8 years and it was really comfortable up until a couple of years ago. The extra-thick mattress finally lost its shape, so after that point it's been just a regular sucky futon instead of an ultra-deluxe futon. Still, it's a futon.

So as soon as I got back from Idaho I set about getting a new one. I still like having a dedicated office, which means that I'll still be sleeping in the living room. But I thought at least I'd get a nicer frame. I found one at Ikea that's more of a fold-out couch that looked good and had an optional cover to make it look even better.

The problem is that the frame, good mattress, and cover all come separately. I went to the store once to try it out- it looked great and they had them in stock, so I came back the next day with a rental car to buy it. By this time, naturally, they had sold out of the mattress but still had the frame and the cover, both of which I bought because they assured me the mattresses were coming later that day and would be available the next morning. I was looking forward to my third trip to Ikea in as many days.

Meanwhile, I still had to my old futon to contend with. I disassembled the frame and put it out by the trash cans. I kept the futon inside leaning up against the wall so I could still sleep on it. Coincidentally, my new neighbor Brian moved in and to make room, they were throwing out some old mattresses. We decided we'd go in together on 1-800-got-junk for a pickup.

Now we're caught up to this morning. The junk collectors collected the junk and left. Then I made sure ZipCar had the big car available for rent. Then I called up Ikea to double check the mattresses were there and in stock.

So, as one would expect, the story ends with me waiting "three to five days" for more mattresses to arrive at Ikea, while owning a useless new couch frame and cover and having no old futon mattress to use in the interim. So I'll be sleeping on the floor next to part of a couch for the next week or so.

When I try to fight squalor, squalor always wins.

Aww shucks

Diverse group allegedly in British plot

LONDON - They had diverse backgrounds, coming from countries around the globe, but all shared youth and worked in medicine. They also had a common goal, authorities suspect: to bring havoc and death to the heart of Britain.

Terrorism: bringing people together.

Scoots

The Bush sentence-commuting of Scooter Libby is astounding. If he really believed the prison term was "excessive" he could have let him go to jail for a while then commuted the rest of the jail time. Instead, he gets a fine and probation. Oooh! That'll teach you not to perjure and obstruct justice!

The president made the decision without seeking any advice from the Office of the Pardon Attorney at the Justice Department, the White House had previously acknowledged.

Health Care for Everybody! (Eventually)

San Francisco opened enrollment in its universal health care plan yesterday. The press releases tauted the July starting date, but now that it's July it turns out the plan is only open to people who already use a couple of particular free clinics. Then it will be open to people who use all free clinics, then not until January will the plan be open to people like me who just can't afford health insurance but aren't checking in to SF General every week. So basically the plan is not covering anyone who isn't getting free health care already.

One of my writer's organizations finally expanded their health care plans outside of NYC so I called them up. For any of the plans I can afford, there are discounted doctor's visits and prescriptions and then rates for all sorts of different hospital and emergency care. The thing is they all have deductibles and maximum pay-outs. If I understand it correctly, a trip to the emergency room would involve a co-pay on each part: the ambulance, emergency room care, hospital bed, and services. If you add it all up, you've got several thousand dollars' worth of bills. I only have a few thousand dollars in my savings account, so I would be broke after a hospital visit after paying a couple hundred bucks a month for the privilege. The alternative is not having health insurance and having to declare bankruptcy from a hospital visit anyway. Either way, I'm broke at the end.

Both options are just terrific.