Sit Down
Alberto Gonzales sat down on the couch and kicked off his shoes. He couldn't believe students had heckled him at the Harvard Law School. What kind of world was this? The truth was he had hated law school. Why did he even bother going to his 25th reunion? Why did he think that would be a refreshing change from being heckled by Congress? Wasn't he the most important lawyer in Washington? Where was the respect? Outside his house, a car cruised by with the radio blasting, "If I swallow anything evil, put your finger down my throat!"
Several miles away, former Senator Evermore Breadman tried to get up, but his expensive doctor gently pushed him back down, and pleaded with him to get the surgery. "Nobody's cutting me!" shouted Breadman. He had no time for surgery. Wasn't he the most important lawyer in Washington? No time! "You can pour Liquid Plumber into my guts if you have to, but nobody's cutting me!" Breadman's guts were full of Chinese herbs fighting the evil spirits festering inside him, and it was a painful battle. The specialist groaned, wondering why he had agreed to see Breadman on a Sunday anyway.
Two blocks away, Dr. Khalid Mohammad was working the George Washington University Hospital emergency room, doing vaso vagal tests on a man who had fainted after standing at a party for 90 minutes arguing about Alberto Gonzales. "Sometimes you just have to sit down, and if you don't, your brain will run out of blood and your body will make you sit down." The man grumbled in annoyance. He had practiced law in this town for four decades! He had worked in the Department of Justice! How the heck was he supposed to sit down in the middle of an argument about Alberto Gonzales! Dr. Mohammad groaned, and turned supplicatively to the worried wife, who agreed she would make sure the man sat down at least once an hour.
Three floors above them, John Doe's sister sat down to try to talk him into going home with her. The amnesiac's identity had been established months ago, but he still refused to believe anything they told him about his previous life. A lawyer! Hell, no, he wasn't going to be a lawyer. He was having visions of God and angels almost every day! That was more important. "As long as you keep telling the doctors these things, they aren't going to let you leave. Don't you understand that? Those are just hallucinations from the temporal lobe epilepsy. You have to tell the doctors that you understand that so that you can come home." But John Doe would never tell a lie--only truth could come from his lips now. Why did they want to give him medicine to stop these seizures anyway? He loved his TLE seizures. As his sister again started telling him about the extremely important law practice he had and how vital it was to work on getting better, the synapses speeded up the electrical impulses in his temporal lobe until he blacked out and entered deep inside himself. His eyes went vacant, and he rocked himself slowly. His sister stopped talking in mid-sentence, interrupted again by God. She looked out the window at the Watergate a couple of blocks away and waited.
Over at the Watergate, Condoleezza Rice sat down in her red leather recliner. She sipped her celery/quince/rutabaga/lemon/soya/horseradish/cherry smoothie and stared out the window. First the cowboys, and now the lawyers--they were all pissing her off. She dug her nails into the chair arms, thinking about George Tenet's book and his appearance on "60 Minutes". Why couldn't she work with people like Kissinger? Lawyers were ruining Washington. People should lead, follow, or get out of the way, and there were too many lawyers standing in her way. And now Congress was going to hold hearings on why they didn't let a bunch of foreigners come streaming into New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina under the guise of bringing aid? Puhlease, the State Department had more important things to do--they didn't have time to screen visas and cargo for New Orleans charity relief! Too many people in this town kept losing sight of the big picture. After a few more sips, she calmed down and felt ready for the week to come. Down in the Potomac, Ardua looked up at Rice and smiled.
Several miles away, former Senator Evermore Breadman tried to get up, but his expensive doctor gently pushed him back down, and pleaded with him to get the surgery. "Nobody's cutting me!" shouted Breadman. He had no time for surgery. Wasn't he the most important lawyer in Washington? No time! "You can pour Liquid Plumber into my guts if you have to, but nobody's cutting me!" Breadman's guts were full of Chinese herbs fighting the evil spirits festering inside him, and it was a painful battle. The specialist groaned, wondering why he had agreed to see Breadman on a Sunday anyway.
Two blocks away, Dr. Khalid Mohammad was working the George Washington University Hospital emergency room, doing vaso vagal tests on a man who had fainted after standing at a party for 90 minutes arguing about Alberto Gonzales. "Sometimes you just have to sit down, and if you don't, your brain will run out of blood and your body will make you sit down." The man grumbled in annoyance. He had practiced law in this town for four decades! He had worked in the Department of Justice! How the heck was he supposed to sit down in the middle of an argument about Alberto Gonzales! Dr. Mohammad groaned, and turned supplicatively to the worried wife, who agreed she would make sure the man sat down at least once an hour.
Three floors above them, John Doe's sister sat down to try to talk him into going home with her. The amnesiac's identity had been established months ago, but he still refused to believe anything they told him about his previous life. A lawyer! Hell, no, he wasn't going to be a lawyer. He was having visions of God and angels almost every day! That was more important. "As long as you keep telling the doctors these things, they aren't going to let you leave. Don't you understand that? Those are just hallucinations from the temporal lobe epilepsy. You have to tell the doctors that you understand that so that you can come home." But John Doe would never tell a lie--only truth could come from his lips now. Why did they want to give him medicine to stop these seizures anyway? He loved his TLE seizures. As his sister again started telling him about the extremely important law practice he had and how vital it was to work on getting better, the synapses speeded up the electrical impulses in his temporal lobe until he blacked out and entered deep inside himself. His eyes went vacant, and he rocked himself slowly. His sister stopped talking in mid-sentence, interrupted again by God. She looked out the window at the Watergate a couple of blocks away and waited.
Over at the Watergate, Condoleezza Rice sat down in her red leather recliner. She sipped her celery/quince/rutabaga/lemon/soya/horseradish/cherry smoothie and stared out the window. First the cowboys, and now the lawyers--they were all pissing her off. She dug her nails into the chair arms, thinking about George Tenet's book and his appearance on "60 Minutes". Why couldn't she work with people like Kissinger? Lawyers were ruining Washington. People should lead, follow, or get out of the way, and there were too many lawyers standing in her way. And now Congress was going to hold hearings on why they didn't let a bunch of foreigners come streaming into New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina under the guise of bringing aid? Puhlease, the State Department had more important things to do--they didn't have time to screen visas and cargo for New Orleans charity relief! Too many people in this town kept losing sight of the big picture. After a few more sips, she calmed down and felt ready for the week to come. Down in the Potomac, Ardua looked up at Rice and smiled.
posted by washingtonwaterwoman | 8:36 PM
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