The News Don't Matter

Everywhere I go it’s the newspaper. I’ve had it. I walk out of my building into six degrees above global warming with a skin cancer index of dead in two weeks. I’m sweating. I can see my breath as a clear stream in the car exhaust. I walk closely behind a cheap cigar smoker for the fresh air. A woman with a matching hat and handbag steps on my foot with her stiletto and then threatens to sue me for checking out her behind. So I limp to the corner newsstand picking up the pace as one of the pitbullasorouses that Michael Vick didn’t murder is slobbering at my inseam. All to see Jimmy the Other Greek for some toilet literature.

Jimmy the Other Greek tries to sell me the New York Times, Post, Sun, Newsday and the Daily News, Dispatch, Tattler, Record. I tell him its summer. I hate the beach. I want a bikini magazine.

Jimmy says nobody wants to buy the papers these days and he doesn’t understand why. I tell him to just read one and the mystery will dissolve. He tries to sell me Sports Illustrated. I tell him the bikinis are too small. I want a big bikini magazine. Bikinis that actually have a whole woman inside them. I’ve looked at these models. They even live around here. They live on bottled water and makeup. They couldn’t eat if they wanted to. They have no internal organs.

Jimmy the Other Greek says there must be something he has that I want. He owes me money. I never lent him any money. I would just hand him a twenty for the two dollar Times and he wouldn’t give me any change. He put it on his tab. This has been going on for years and he owes me enough to put me through NYU Law School for a semester. I hear you can get laid there.

He tries to talk me into smoking. He says he’ll give me the cigarettes for free and all I have to pay is the tax. The entire price of cigarettes is tax. The pack costs a buck fifty and the rest of the fifteen bucks is federal, state and local tax. And they won’t let you smoke them anywhere. Not even in some co ops now.

Jimmy apologizes and said that he had some big bikini magazines last week but the Taliban came by and threatened to rip his moustache off. So he gave them away to the illegal immigrants who hang on the corner waiting for day work managing hedge funds.
Okay, forget it. I’m going to whistle while I toil this week. I need a sandwich. The counter I have the least fear of because not even a germ could survive the filth is two blocks south on Broadway. Order kosher ham on whole grain styrafoam with pomegranate mustard goddess low cal dressing and a fat Coke.

President Obama is seated three stools down sandwiched between the earplugs and dark sunglasses. I yell Hey Prez, what are you doing about getting my brother a job. Obama says he’s worried about his job. I say what about the deficit? He says look where I’m eating. I ask about the stimulus and he says he’s leaving a tip. I think Social Security will be there long enough for me to finish my sandwich so I leave the man alone.

House Speaker Boehner is at the corner getting a hot dog and negotiating the relish. Says he’s on the way to a tea party on Park Avenue. Old money and cucumber sandwiches. He needs a dog. A red hot. In Texas it would be a barbeque, big hair and boobs. Here, it’s a wrinkle post with a tiara. His socks are too thin, like hose. Black guys can pull that off but white guys just look like their wannabe sidekick.

I like Obama and Boehner. I know they really try doing what are today impossible jobs. Maybe I should say super impossible. They are not the problem. Politicians are not the problem. We are the problem. We’re just the bigger and harder working version of Greece right now and we still think we’re America.

Maybe last millennium. Before Wall Street started playing Monopoly with real real estate. We were all house happy. So the colleges and doctors figure if everyone’s a millionaire lets triple prices. I own two hundred credit cards.

My TV is not big enough. You need a screen wide enough to make you turn your head. Keep you active. My car is too small. I could never fit a NFL cheerleading squad in there. Not a polite fit. I don’t spend enough time beating my kids. They’re wild animals.

Don Arrup
Satire1