Erica Kane survives plane-crash

The Canandaigua YMCA has three wall-mounted “plasma-babies” in its Exercise Gym (Wellness Center).
“Plasma-babies” are what my brother-in-Boston calls all wide-screen, flat-screen high-definition TVs. Other technologies are available, but he calls them all “plasma-babies.”
Thankfully they are all closed-captioned — no sound — so Patrick Cox isn’t blaring at you in the Taxmaster ads.
Normally, north-to-south, they are tuned to CNN, the Sports-Channel, and the Weather Channel.
Yesterday (Monday, June 21, 2010) the middle one was tuned to Channel 13, the local ABC affiliate.
It got the midday news.
I arrive about 11, and work out until about 2.
So I was there long enough to catch the beginning of the soaps.
A newspaper article was displayed, headlined “Erica Kane Survives Plane-Crash.”
Over the almost 10 years that I worked at the Mighty Mezz, I never saw anything like that.
If there was a plane-crash, the Messenger didn’t name a survivor in the headline.
The headline might be “Two Survive Plane-Crash.”
This article also had a giant photograph of Erica smiling.
In the real world this would never happen.
Ya might see a photo of a survivor in the hospital Intensive-Care unit, hooked up to 89 bazilyun tubes and assorted monitors.
Eyes closed, relatives gathered and praying.
Erica Kane — actually Susan Lucci — is a soap star.
The soaps aren’t the real world, much as viewers might wish.
People are always yelling at each other, and insanities fade to black.
I don’t know what soap it was, or even care.
“All My Children,” I think.
Back to Sports-Channel please.
There was Erica, scantily clad and attractive in a hospital bed, smiling at all-and-sundry.
One-by-one the show’s characters got trotted in, so she could beam and tell them she’s fine.
Play an actual plane-crash survivor; she probably refused.

• “Canandaigua” (“cannon-DAY-gwuh”) is a small city nearby where we live in Western NY. The city is also within a rural town called “Canandaigua.” The name is Indian, and means “Chosen Spot.” —It’s about 15 miles away.
• I work out in the Canandaigua YMCA exercise-gym.
• The “Mighty Mezz” is the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper, from where I retired over four years ago. Best job I ever had.