The Centers for Disease Control predicts that up to 50% of all Americans may come down with H1N1 flu this season.

You may remember the H1N1 flu by its former name, swine flu, a term that fell out of favor after an organization that calls itself SOS (Save Our Swine) threatened to sue the U.S. Department of Health and Hospitals if the name wasn’t changed.

Porky Pig, acting as SOS’s spokesperson, appeared before the U.S. Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee recently to voice his concerns: “Ev-ev-everybody knows that West Nile Virus is … is … is … caused b-b-by mosquitoes, but n-n-nobody c-c-c-calls it Mosquito Virus,” argued Porky.

Porky’s not the only pig who’s squealing about swine flu.

Arnold Skidmore, best known for his role as Arnold Ziffel in the classic TV series Green Acres, has been an outspoken critic of the flu’s name from the beginning. The popular porker, who sports a “PIGS: THEY’RE NOT JUST FOR BREAKFAST ANYMORE” bumper sticker on his car, lambasted health authorities for what he termed “species profiling.”

“We’re sick and tired of being stereotyped as filthy, disgusting animals,” grunted Arnold. “Despite the many contributions that pigs have made in the entertainment industry – Babe, Charlotte’s Web, The Three Little Pigs – the doors of opportunity are often closed when you’re a porker,” he snorted.  “I’m convinced I would have won an Emmy for my work in Green Acres had I been a dog.”

So the name of the flu was changed from “swine flu” to “H1N1 flu.” They could have named it “R2D2 flu” – at least that would have been easy to remember – but NOOOO!

Some health officials worry about the possibility of a pandemic, or even worse, a pandaemic, especially in the city of San Diego, where pandas are known to live. But the Centers for Disease Control says there is no reason to panic, as long as you follow these simple flu-prevention tips:

1. 1.Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you sneeze or cough. This is both good hygiene and common courtesy as well. Nobody wants to be on the receiving end of a nasty spray of phlegm or snot. Even if you don’t have H1N1, it’s just darn gross. If you can’t find a tissue, borrow someone’s shirtsleeve.
   

2. 2.Don’t touch your face. Who knows where your hands have been? Nose pickers, here’s your chance to break the habit. Pick and get sick!
   

3. 3.Stay away from sick people. Avoid doctors’ waiting rooms, where sick people tend to congregate, no matter how much you enjoy whiling away the time reading the October 2007 issue of Sports Illustrated. Every virus known to man is festering in the pages of that disease-ridden magazine! The college football section alone has enough vaccine-resistant flu viruses to kill an entire army. (It is ironic that the Geneva Conventions of 1949 outlawed the use of doctor’s waiting-room magazines in germ warfare, yet they are still commonly found in doctors’ offices throughout the country.)
   

4. 4.Wash your hands regularly. In the summer, when it looked like we’d have plenty of swine flu vaccine in time for flu season, the Centers for Disease Control was advising us to wash our hands long enough to sing “Happy Birthday to You” in the process. In the fall, when there wasn’t enough flu vaccine to go around, health officials began advising us to wash our hands long enough to sing Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven.” Now that winter is upon us and there’s still not enough vaccine, officials are instructing us to wash our hands long enough to whistle Beethoven’s 5th Symphony in C minor, or until our skin peels off to expose raw bone, whichever comes first.
   

So it looks as though we’re going to spend a great deal of time this flu season in the bathroom, washing our hands. Which isn’t so bad, because bathrooms have come a long way, evolutionarily speaking, since I was a child.

Back in the day, bathrooms were used for personal hygiene and waste-management purposes only. You took care of your business and got out.

You didn’t stop to admire the paintings on the wall, because there were no paintings. Back then, interior decorators hardly set foot in the bathroom.

Now, interior decorators, like teenage girls, have gotten into the bathroom and won’t come out. You go to a party at someone’s house, and when you feel the call of nature, you discover your hostess’ bathroom has paintings on the wall, candles burning, decorative towels, and soap that looks and smells like a lemon.

Can I use this soap to wash my hands? How do I dry my hands? Can I use these towels?

Then, as soon as you come out of the bathroom, the hostess comes running into a crowd of guests, screaming, “OH MY GOD! SOME INBRED HAS DRIED HIS HANDS ON MY FRENCH IMPORTED DESIGNER TOWELS! THEY’RE RUINED! WHO COULD HAVE DONE SUCH A THING?”

Darn! Next time, I’m going to dry my hands on my pants!

There will certainly come a time in the not-too-distant future when the bathroom will no longer be utilized for normal bodily functions, but instead will be used exclusively as a place of peaceful contemplation, where you will sit and meditate on a nonfunctional, ornamental, designer toilet, which is not even hooked up to the plumbing, surrounded by scented candles and paintings by Monet.

(If you feel the need to void, please go down the hall, through the den, out the French doors to the shed in the backyard, which has been placed over a hole dug in the ground.)