The Sandwich Heard Round the World
The possibility of becoming a revolutionary figurehead or an enemy of the state would never have occurred to John O'Brien, but then again, few things had ever occurred to him at all.
For two and a half years, John had been enrolled at American University. He had never felt more liberated, his mind open to the possibilities of academic enlightenment and free to be generously bombarded with whatever chemicals John could bum from his friends. While enjoying one such chemical once, John received the Secret of the Universe and, citing his college education's irrelevance in the cosmic scheme of things, chose to discontinue it.
Luckily, John's friend Carl Ward had found part-time employment in the mailroom of a prominent investment bank in the heart of Washington, D.C. Carl, possessing a good heart and a head perhaps only slightly less muddled than John's, recommended his friend to his supervisors. And so John, taxably employed and supplementing his acknowledged income by dealing to his friends and landlord, was on course to lead an uneventful, unremarkable life.
At 11:42 A.M. one Tuesday, John stumbled out of bed, free to enjoy a day off. Aside from a small cadre of cockroaches and some mold around the sink, the only other living things with whom John shared his small basement apartment were a pair of hamsters so addled that such a nominal task as running on their wheel often brought on seemingly impossible mechanical difficulties. Observing the absurdity of their condition, John had named them Vladimir and Estragon. He fed the sleeping rodents then prepared his own favorite breakfast: a bowl of Lucky Charms and a bong of chronic. He settled on the couch and switched on the T.V., beginning to light up and chow down as the local news glowed to life.
"...the alleged incident on the farm, which is said to have take place three weeks ago. Mr. Beck, the goat's owner, has agreed to drop the beastiality charge after receiving an out-of-court settlement offer from Ms. Coulter's attorneys.
"And in local D.C. news, protestors have been gathering in front of the White House for the second annual Peaceable Assembly Day. As per the terms of last year's H.R. 74656, better known as the First Amendment Security Revision Act, citizens are allowed one day each year to petition the government for a redress of grievances in a safe, military-patrolled setting. And as you can see here in front of the White House, people are turning out for all kinds of causes on this once-a-year opportunity."
The newscast cut from inside the studio to a shot of the protestors. A scowl spread across John's cereal-stuffed face. "Echh. Hippies," he muttered.
"Everyone from the A.C.L.U. to Jews for Jesus is here today," the newscaster continued, "and I think I speak for most D.C. residents when I say I can't wait for them to be gone tomorrow. When we come back, we'll bring you an update on Hydra, the three-headed cat born last week, and bring you a dire official warning from the Surgeon General's office about marijuana use and its newly declared side effect of rotting off men's testicles. We'll be back in a moment."
This latter revelation caused a Vesuvius-like eruption of coughing in the wild-eyed John, sending a marshmallow pot of gold rocketing from his mouth and splatting against the T.V. screen, where it remained stuck. Estragon briefly opened one eye to investigate the loud hacking, recognized it as part of his master's routine, and immediately fell back asleep. John had not yet completed his coughing fit when the guitar riff from Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" filled the room; his phone was ringing. He picked up its receiver.
"(cough) Hello?"
"Johnny, why aren't you at work?"
A grimace spread across his face at the sound of the shrill voice. "I've told you a hundred times, Benneta, I have Tuesdays off."
"And I've told you a thousand times, John O'Brien, that I want you to call me Mom! If not Mom, then Mother, or Ma, or something else that acknowledges the fact that I carried you for nine months and brought you into this world!"
"Right. Uh, thanks for that. What's up?"
"I know it's probably no use, but I thought I'd call again to see if you'd sent your resume anywhere else."
He sighed and twirled the phone cord. "No, Benneta. I told you that I've got all I need right now."
"But John, don't you want something more? Do you have no ambition at all?"
"Of course I have ambition," he said as he took a huge bong hit. "I swear, one day my music is going to take me places."
John's band, a conceptual Christian death-metal act called the Bloody Virgin Marys, had inexplicably failed to take him places in the arenas of either Christian rock or death metal.
"John, you left college three years ago! The band is going nowhere! When are you going to make something of yourself?!"
"Uh-oh, Benneta, I think I hear the air-raid sirens- the terrorists must be coming. I've gotta go." He quickly put down the receiver, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Beginning to reload the bong, he looked over to Vladimir and Estragon. "The nerve of some people!" he proclaimed. In response, Vladimir shook his head, licked himself, then fell back asleep.
John was just returning to his placid stupor when the Sabbath riff filled the room again. Exasperated, John picked it up. "Now what?" he exclaimed.
"Uh, now what what?" a perplexed male voice replied.
"Oh, hey, man," John said, recognizing Carl. "What's goin' on?"
"Not too much. Want to meet for business lunch?"
"Eh, I'm just finishing breakfast," he said, scraping at some bong resin.
"You sure? I was going to go to McDonald's," Carl replied.
John had often said that there were only three things that drew him from his apartment: work, weed, and the sweet promise held within the Golden Arches. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes," John declared. Imbued with a sense of immediate purpose, John arose, hung up, and headed toward the Metro.
-
On the north side of the White House, more than several squads of heavily armed Secret Service officers flanked the group of citizens employed pliably enough to attend Peaceable Assembly Day. They corralled the conscientious objectors into a neat, tightly patrolled quadrangle in which pandemonium could safely ensue. Two protestors had broken out in a fistfight, violently pummeling and strangling each other and trampling their respective cast-off signs, which read "Peace for Israel" and "Peace for Palestine." Three others, one wearing fashionable Nike sneakers, another sipping a Frappuccino, and another chattering into a Razr cell phone, held signs bearing vehemently anti-corporate slogans. With the exception of one joker holding a sign reading "I'm Holding a Sign," the protest was a spectacular kaleidoscope of causes, a gathering of concerned citizens joined not by common origin or thinking but by common purpose: to speak out, to right what they saw as wrong, to keep fighting the good fight. They knew that one day, they would overcome.
"I fuckin' hate hippies," John said, observing the scene. Carl and he had just crossed 17th St., noshing on their just-bought McDonald's sandwiches and having a spirited conversation, when the Peaceable proceedings came into their view. The Secret Service agents had moved the crowd several yards back from the White House lawn, centering it on the road that separated Lafayette Park from the President's palace. Thus, John and Carl sauntered along as close to the White House fence as possible, keeping John's hippie allergy from being agitated by maximizing their distance from the mass of civil obedience.
"Anyway, as I was saying, ZOSO is obviously better than II," John continued.
"You're out of your mind," Carl replied. "That's like saying Physical Graffiti is better than I. Do you like Foghat now, too? Tell me, are the Eagles better than Creedence?"
"Man, don't be such an elitist. The guitar part from 'Life in the Fast Lane' is real, real good." John finished his McChicken, then turned his nose up at the wrapper that was left. "Hey, do you see a trash can anywhere?"
Carl looked around. "Not one in sight. They probably don't want the hippies to have anything to eat from."
"Aw, man, I want to get rid of this trash. Maybe I'll just drop it."
"Just wait until we find one," Carl advised as he looked on at the armed agents. "I don't think it'd be wise to even litter right now."
"Echh," John replied. He then looked to his immediate right, at the White House lawn beyond the fence. Inside John's foggy head, a lightbulb blinked on. He raised one eyebrow, looked around him, and believing that there were no eyes on him, made a decision. He crumpled the yellow wax paper into a tight ball, and nonchalantly, without looking, cast the McChicken wrapper aside and onto the White House lawn.
This was, indeed, unwise.
Before John knew it (quite literally, as a result of his chemically dulled reflexes), three Secret Service troops had thrown him to the ground, trained their automatic weapons on his head, and bound his hands and feet. "Ow!" was all he could muster as his face ground against the pavement and a booted foot pressed down on his back. "Jesus, man, that hurts!" he cried.
Then a conscientious objector who had been protesting for peace in the war on Christmas noticed the agents as they detained John. "Hey, look, they're beating that guy for throwing trash on the lawn!"
A pro-NAMBLA protestor joined in, saying "We have a right to put our trash wherever we put it! Fuck the man!" He quickly dug through his pockets then threw the first thing he could find: an empty condom wrapper. It plopped onto the meticulously cut lawn next to the McChicken wrapper.
Others began to join in. "The President is trashing our country!" "Take back what you give to us!" they shouted as they catapulted their missiles. Soon, every protestor, having found their martyr, began to emulate his action, throwing whatever trash they had on their persons onto the White House lawn, creating a no-man's-land of flying garbage.
As the Secret Service agents hoisted John atop their shoulders, something occurred to him. "Oh, shit!" he exclaimed, desperately scanning the crowd in search of Carl. He spotted him standing by the fence, trying to appear as innocent a bystander as possible. "Hey, man, can you take care of the hamsters?" he called. Carl did not turn to acknowledge John, but gave a brief thumbs-up to signal his affirmative.
Meanwhile, the trash-tossing had become a full-blown deluge, an ongoing meteor shower of waste that continued to pelt the White House lawn long after John had been hauled away.
-
"...runners-up in the Time Magazine poll include Mahatma Gandhi, George Washington, and Martin Luther King, Jr. In a press release, Ronald Reagan's estate thanked Time's readers for naming him the Most Popular Leader in World History.
"And in a continuing story, the attack on the White House during Peaceable Assembly Day appears to have been a first strike, as several similar assaults have taken place in the subsequent days. Insurgents have spray-painted the Thomas Jefferson Memorial black, covered the statue of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in silly string, and most appallingly, thrown several Whopper burgers at the face of the George W. Bush Memorial. Federal troops have been authorized to use all necessary force to put down the uprising.
"The terrorist leader, apprehended immediately after he launched the first projectile towards the White House, remains secure in federal custody."
-
As he walked toward the interrogation room, Agent Edwin Johnson clutched John O'Brien's FBI file in his left hand while he clenched and unclenched his right. Johnson, a gruff, mustachioed man who had distinguished himself at Bob Jones State University and Quantico with his unswerving constancy of ineptitude and flights of self-heroizing fantasy and who for fifteen years had been enjoying a thoroughly unsatisfying marriage, was excited; at long last, he was able to interrogate a real live terrorist. He had been disappointed when he found out that the terrorist's last name wasn't Muhammad or al-Whatever, but found immediate solace upon reading the name O'Brien. A fervent Protestant, Johnson relished the prospect of taking down an IRA operative.
And so, upon entering the room, he was shocked not to find the burly Mick he'd expected, but the scrawny brat who greeted him with "Oh, hey, man. Can I have my phone call? I have these two hamsters, see, and-"
"Shut the fuck up," Johnson reflexively snapped, still off-guard at the sight of this punk. He collected himself and looked at the file. "John O'Brien. That your real name?"
Quieted but smirking, John replied "My mom named me after her favorite Beatle. I suppose some asshole was gonna get me sooner or later."
Agent Johnson mentally vowed retribution for the terrorist's insolence. "You seem to have no prior ties to terrorist organizations, but you do have a criminal record."
"Aw, man, I thought I got that expunged," John said exasperatedly. "All I did was walk out of a 7-11 with a bag of Cheetos, but I honestly just forgot to pay."
"Tell me, Mr. O'Brien, what have you got against the United States?"
John considered this, furrowing his brow and looking up to the ceiling. After a moment, he replied "Mmm, not too much. I wish our drug laws would be more like Canada's, but no biggie, really."
Johnson fumed. "I want to know why you launched an attack on this sovereign nation, Mr. O'Brien."
"Man, like I told the other guy, I just couldn't find a trash can. In retrospect, I guess chucking the McChicken wrapper was a bad idea. There, I apologized- can you mark that down in your file?"
The fury within Johnson was barely containable. "Goddammit, I'm going to get the answers I want from you, no matter what I have to do. Tell me, Mr. O'Brien, have you ever heard of waterboarding?"
"Well, I went to Maui for spring break once, but I'm not a big surfing fan."
Johnson exploded. "I swear on Jesus' name I'll take you down!! Try all you want, you terrorist piece of shit, but freedom and justice will always prevail in this great land! America will never fall at the hands of uppity hippies like you!"
For the first time since Carl had slipped Woodstock into his Netflix queue, John became livid with rage. "A hippie?! Man, fuck you, Porky Pig! Hey, while we're at it, nice mustache- you've really let yourself go since you were in the Village People! Now where's my phone call, man? I've got hamsters to worry about!"
Johnson cursed the activist Supreme Court, which had unfortunately prohibited him from doing what he felt was necessary for the good of the nation: beating the living hell out of his suspect. He forced himself to exit, but not without first turning around and leaving John with a warning: "You're going down."
-
"Protestors are once again violating the terms of H.R. 74656, forming a demonstration outside of the White House in a show of support for John O'Brien. It was announced yesterday that the terrorist leader was convicted by a federal grand tribunal of violating Title VIII of the USA PATRIOT Amendment and was sentenced to death.
"Demonstrators appeared not only for O'Brien, but rallied for other imprisoned criminals and insurgents like Mumia Abu-Jamal, Dennis Kucinich, and the late Cuban guerrilla leader Che Guevara. Despite numerous letters and phone calls from his prison cell asking for support, however, no one outside the White House today stood in support of Michael Moore.
"O'Brien's execution is scheduled for midnight tonight."
-
For two and a half years, John had been enrolled at American University. He had never felt more liberated, his mind open to the possibilities of academic enlightenment and free to be generously bombarded with whatever chemicals John could bum from his friends. While enjoying one such chemical once, John received the Secret of the Universe and, citing his college education's irrelevance in the cosmic scheme of things, chose to discontinue it.
Luckily, John's friend Carl Ward had found part-time employment in the mailroom of a prominent investment bank in the heart of Washington, D.C. Carl, possessing a good heart and a head perhaps only slightly less muddled than John's, recommended his friend to his supervisors. And so John, taxably employed and supplementing his acknowledged income by dealing to his friends and landlord, was on course to lead an uneventful, unremarkable life.
At 11:42 A.M. one Tuesday, John stumbled out of bed, free to enjoy a day off. Aside from a small cadre of cockroaches and some mold around the sink, the only other living things with whom John shared his small basement apartment were a pair of hamsters so addled that such a nominal task as running on their wheel often brought on seemingly impossible mechanical difficulties. Observing the absurdity of their condition, John had named them Vladimir and Estragon. He fed the sleeping rodents then prepared his own favorite breakfast: a bowl of Lucky Charms and a bong of chronic. He settled on the couch and switched on the T.V., beginning to light up and chow down as the local news glowed to life.
"...the alleged incident on the farm, which is said to have take place three weeks ago. Mr. Beck, the goat's owner, has agreed to drop the beastiality charge after receiving an out-of-court settlement offer from Ms. Coulter's attorneys.
"And in local D.C. news, protestors have been gathering in front of the White House for the second annual Peaceable Assembly Day. As per the terms of last year's H.R. 74656, better known as the First Amendment Security Revision Act, citizens are allowed one day each year to petition the government for a redress of grievances in a safe, military-patrolled setting. And as you can see here in front of the White House, people are turning out for all kinds of causes on this once-a-year opportunity."
The newscast cut from inside the studio to a shot of the protestors. A scowl spread across John's cereal-stuffed face. "Echh. Hippies," he muttered.
"Everyone from the A.C.L.U. to Jews for Jesus is here today," the newscaster continued, "and I think I speak for most D.C. residents when I say I can't wait for them to be gone tomorrow. When we come back, we'll bring you an update on Hydra, the three-headed cat born last week, and bring you a dire official warning from the Surgeon General's office about marijuana use and its newly declared side effect of rotting off men's testicles. We'll be back in a moment."
This latter revelation caused a Vesuvius-like eruption of coughing in the wild-eyed John, sending a marshmallow pot of gold rocketing from his mouth and splatting against the T.V. screen, where it remained stuck. Estragon briefly opened one eye to investigate the loud hacking, recognized it as part of his master's routine, and immediately fell back asleep. John had not yet completed his coughing fit when the guitar riff from Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" filled the room; his phone was ringing. He picked up its receiver.
"(cough) Hello?"
"Johnny, why aren't you at work?"
A grimace spread across his face at the sound of the shrill voice. "I've told you a hundred times, Benneta, I have Tuesdays off."
"And I've told you a thousand times, John O'Brien, that I want you to call me Mom! If not Mom, then Mother, or Ma, or something else that acknowledges the fact that I carried you for nine months and brought you into this world!"
"Right. Uh, thanks for that. What's up?"
"I know it's probably no use, but I thought I'd call again to see if you'd sent your resume anywhere else."
He sighed and twirled the phone cord. "No, Benneta. I told you that I've got all I need right now."
"But John, don't you want something more? Do you have no ambition at all?"
"Of course I have ambition," he said as he took a huge bong hit. "I swear, one day my music is going to take me places."
John's band, a conceptual Christian death-metal act called the Bloody Virgin Marys, had inexplicably failed to take him places in the arenas of either Christian rock or death metal.
"John, you left college three years ago! The band is going nowhere! When are you going to make something of yourself?!"
"Uh-oh, Benneta, I think I hear the air-raid sirens- the terrorists must be coming. I've gotta go." He quickly put down the receiver, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Beginning to reload the bong, he looked over to Vladimir and Estragon. "The nerve of some people!" he proclaimed. In response, Vladimir shook his head, licked himself, then fell back asleep.
John was just returning to his placid stupor when the Sabbath riff filled the room again. Exasperated, John picked it up. "Now what?" he exclaimed.
"Uh, now what what?" a perplexed male voice replied.
"Oh, hey, man," John said, recognizing Carl. "What's goin' on?"
"Not too much. Want to meet for business lunch?"
"Eh, I'm just finishing breakfast," he said, scraping at some bong resin.
"You sure? I was going to go to McDonald's," Carl replied.
John had often said that there were only three things that drew him from his apartment: work, weed, and the sweet promise held within the Golden Arches. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes," John declared. Imbued with a sense of immediate purpose, John arose, hung up, and headed toward the Metro.
-
On the north side of the White House, more than several squads of heavily armed Secret Service officers flanked the group of citizens employed pliably enough to attend Peaceable Assembly Day. They corralled the conscientious objectors into a neat, tightly patrolled quadrangle in which pandemonium could safely ensue. Two protestors had broken out in a fistfight, violently pummeling and strangling each other and trampling their respective cast-off signs, which read "Peace for Israel" and "Peace for Palestine." Three others, one wearing fashionable Nike sneakers, another sipping a Frappuccino, and another chattering into a Razr cell phone, held signs bearing vehemently anti-corporate slogans. With the exception of one joker holding a sign reading "I'm Holding a Sign," the protest was a spectacular kaleidoscope of causes, a gathering of concerned citizens joined not by common origin or thinking but by common purpose: to speak out, to right what they saw as wrong, to keep fighting the good fight. They knew that one day, they would overcome.
"I fuckin' hate hippies," John said, observing the scene. Carl and he had just crossed 17th St., noshing on their just-bought McDonald's sandwiches and having a spirited conversation, when the Peaceable proceedings came into their view. The Secret Service agents had moved the crowd several yards back from the White House lawn, centering it on the road that separated Lafayette Park from the President's palace. Thus, John and Carl sauntered along as close to the White House fence as possible, keeping John's hippie allergy from being agitated by maximizing their distance from the mass of civil obedience.
"Anyway, as I was saying, ZOSO is obviously better than II," John continued.
"You're out of your mind," Carl replied. "That's like saying Physical Graffiti is better than I. Do you like Foghat now, too? Tell me, are the Eagles better than Creedence?"
"Man, don't be such an elitist. The guitar part from 'Life in the Fast Lane' is real, real good." John finished his McChicken, then turned his nose up at the wrapper that was left. "Hey, do you see a trash can anywhere?"
Carl looked around. "Not one in sight. They probably don't want the hippies to have anything to eat from."
"Aw, man, I want to get rid of this trash. Maybe I'll just drop it."
"Just wait until we find one," Carl advised as he looked on at the armed agents. "I don't think it'd be wise to even litter right now."
"Echh," John replied. He then looked to his immediate right, at the White House lawn beyond the fence. Inside John's foggy head, a lightbulb blinked on. He raised one eyebrow, looked around him, and believing that there were no eyes on him, made a decision. He crumpled the yellow wax paper into a tight ball, and nonchalantly, without looking, cast the McChicken wrapper aside and onto the White House lawn.
This was, indeed, unwise.
Before John knew it (quite literally, as a result of his chemically dulled reflexes), three Secret Service troops had thrown him to the ground, trained their automatic weapons on his head, and bound his hands and feet. "Ow!" was all he could muster as his face ground against the pavement and a booted foot pressed down on his back. "Jesus, man, that hurts!" he cried.
Then a conscientious objector who had been protesting for peace in the war on Christmas noticed the agents as they detained John. "Hey, look, they're beating that guy for throwing trash on the lawn!"
A pro-NAMBLA protestor joined in, saying "We have a right to put our trash wherever we put it! Fuck the man!" He quickly dug through his pockets then threw the first thing he could find: an empty condom wrapper. It plopped onto the meticulously cut lawn next to the McChicken wrapper.
Others began to join in. "The President is trashing our country!" "Take back what you give to us!" they shouted as they catapulted their missiles. Soon, every protestor, having found their martyr, began to emulate his action, throwing whatever trash they had on their persons onto the White House lawn, creating a no-man's-land of flying garbage.
As the Secret Service agents hoisted John atop their shoulders, something occurred to him. "Oh, shit!" he exclaimed, desperately scanning the crowd in search of Carl. He spotted him standing by the fence, trying to appear as innocent a bystander as possible. "Hey, man, can you take care of the hamsters?" he called. Carl did not turn to acknowledge John, but gave a brief thumbs-up to signal his affirmative.
Meanwhile, the trash-tossing had become a full-blown deluge, an ongoing meteor shower of waste that continued to pelt the White House lawn long after John had been hauled away.
-
"...runners-up in the Time Magazine poll include Mahatma Gandhi, George Washington, and Martin Luther King, Jr. In a press release, Ronald Reagan's estate thanked Time's readers for naming him the Most Popular Leader in World History.
"And in a continuing story, the attack on the White House during Peaceable Assembly Day appears to have been a first strike, as several similar assaults have taken place in the subsequent days. Insurgents have spray-painted the Thomas Jefferson Memorial black, covered the statue of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in silly string, and most appallingly, thrown several Whopper burgers at the face of the George W. Bush Memorial. Federal troops have been authorized to use all necessary force to put down the uprising.
"The terrorist leader, apprehended immediately after he launched the first projectile towards the White House, remains secure in federal custody."
-
As he walked toward the interrogation room, Agent Edwin Johnson clutched John O'Brien's FBI file in his left hand while he clenched and unclenched his right. Johnson, a gruff, mustachioed man who had distinguished himself at Bob Jones State University and Quantico with his unswerving constancy of ineptitude and flights of self-heroizing fantasy and who for fifteen years had been enjoying a thoroughly unsatisfying marriage, was excited; at long last, he was able to interrogate a real live terrorist. He had been disappointed when he found out that the terrorist's last name wasn't Muhammad or al-Whatever, but found immediate solace upon reading the name O'Brien. A fervent Protestant, Johnson relished the prospect of taking down an IRA operative.
And so, upon entering the room, he was shocked not to find the burly Mick he'd expected, but the scrawny brat who greeted him with "Oh, hey, man. Can I have my phone call? I have these two hamsters, see, and-"
"Shut the fuck up," Johnson reflexively snapped, still off-guard at the sight of this punk. He collected himself and looked at the file. "John O'Brien. That your real name?"
Quieted but smirking, John replied "My mom named me after her favorite Beatle. I suppose some asshole was gonna get me sooner or later."
Agent Johnson mentally vowed retribution for the terrorist's insolence. "You seem to have no prior ties to terrorist organizations, but you do have a criminal record."
"Aw, man, I thought I got that expunged," John said exasperatedly. "All I did was walk out of a 7-11 with a bag of Cheetos, but I honestly just forgot to pay."
"Tell me, Mr. O'Brien, what have you got against the United States?"
John considered this, furrowing his brow and looking up to the ceiling. After a moment, he replied "Mmm, not too much. I wish our drug laws would be more like Canada's, but no biggie, really."
Johnson fumed. "I want to know why you launched an attack on this sovereign nation, Mr. O'Brien."
"Man, like I told the other guy, I just couldn't find a trash can. In retrospect, I guess chucking the McChicken wrapper was a bad idea. There, I apologized- can you mark that down in your file?"
The fury within Johnson was barely containable. "Goddammit, I'm going to get the answers I want from you, no matter what I have to do. Tell me, Mr. O'Brien, have you ever heard of waterboarding?"
"Well, I went to Maui for spring break once, but I'm not a big surfing fan."
Johnson exploded. "I swear on Jesus' name I'll take you down!! Try all you want, you terrorist piece of shit, but freedom and justice will always prevail in this great land! America will never fall at the hands of uppity hippies like you!"
For the first time since Carl had slipped Woodstock into his Netflix queue, John became livid with rage. "A hippie?! Man, fuck you, Porky Pig! Hey, while we're at it, nice mustache- you've really let yourself go since you were in the Village People! Now where's my phone call, man? I've got hamsters to worry about!"
Johnson cursed the activist Supreme Court, which had unfortunately prohibited him from doing what he felt was necessary for the good of the nation: beating the living hell out of his suspect. He forced himself to exit, but not without first turning around and leaving John with a warning: "You're going down."
-
"Protestors are once again violating the terms of H.R. 74656, forming a demonstration outside of the White House in a show of support for John O'Brien. It was announced yesterday that the terrorist leader was convicted by a federal grand tribunal of violating Title VIII of the USA PATRIOT Amendment and was sentenced to death.
"Demonstrators appeared not only for O'Brien, but rallied for other imprisoned criminals and insurgents like Mumia Abu-Jamal, Dennis Kucinich, and the late Cuban guerrilla leader Che Guevara. Despite numerous letters and phone calls from his prison cell asking for support, however, no one outside the White House today stood in support of Michael Moore.
"O'Brien's execution is scheduled for midnight tonight."
-
"Mr. O'Brien! Any last words for the record?" the Fox Daily News reporter giddily asked, drooling at the chance to get a top-of-the-fold quote from the most famous terrorist in America.
"Yeah," John replied as he was strapped into the electric chair. "Don't fuckin' litter."
The chair was every bit as uncomfortable as John had imagined. His newly bald head itched but he was unable to scratch it, owing to the fact that his hands were secured and he was wearing a helmet designed to zap him into oblivion. Worse still, he had heartburn. Refusing the lobster and steak offered him by the prison's cook for his last meal, he instead made a special request. It was granted, and the last meal John had on earth was the same that had doomed him in the first place: a McChicken sandwich.
As the minister began to administer the last rites, John's mind began to wander. He looked around and smiled as he noticed Carl enter the room. "Oh, hey, man!" he called.
Carl stared at his friend in trancelike disbelief. "Uh, hey."
"How are the hamsters?" John asked.
Carl snapped out of it and grimaced. "Uh, I'd kinda hoped you wouldn't ask. There was a terrible accident with the wheel, and after that, well, there wasn't much left of them."
John gave a look of final exasperation. "Ah, shit," he said resignedly.
"Yeah. Sorry, man."
"No biggie. It could be worse, after all," he said, indicating the helmet with his eyes. He sighed.
As the priest finally quit his droning and finished the rites with "May God have mercy on your soul," John caught a glimpse of the TV in the next room. The news was broadcasting from outside the White House, where swarms of the same hippies whom John so loathed waved signs supporting him. Some even held McChicken wrappers in the air. John's thoughts turned from mangled rodents, and he grinned. Aghast, Carl asked his friend "What're you smiling about?"
Just before the executioner threw the switch, frying him like his favorite foods, John looked to his friend and replied "Tell Benne- tell Mom that I made something of myself."
posted by Jason at 10:20 am
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home