Marquel on Marquel

There was really nothing in the Times today plus Marquel was laid up in the hospital on Friday for a small procedure so he had little to write about.

“Yes I had a small procedure on Friday. Haven’t felt at the top of my form.”

“What kind of procedure, Marquel?”

“Isn’t that a bit intrusive?”

“I couldn’t say unless you tell us the procedure.”

“Let’s just say it took two surgeons and the sous chef from Bouley to complete it.”

“But you wrote a piece on both Friday and Saturday. Let’s face it you’re bellyaching.”

“There’s a little of that. But the memories of ivs stick with you if you’ll pardon the pun.”

“Of course I pardon it. Do you think your using this sorry case of belly button gazing is going to allow you to use this as your daily column?”

“Not really. Maybe I should look at The NY Times once more. I’m TPVs Times correspondent after all.”

“Okay, let’s do it together.”

[The boys spend fifteen minutes on the living room floor looking for something satirizable.]

“Here’s something. This British cryptologist just died. He was better than Turing and helped end the war.”

“We could say his epitaph is indecipherable.”

“And his will can’t be probated because it’s flummoxed all the judges and lawyers.”

“Everything flummoxes lawyers and judges. There’s nothing funny there.”

“No you’re right. How about this. The CIA won’t give up their drones. If you’ve ever met one you’d know they’re all drones.”

“Too true to be funny.”

“The Afghan voted. In record numbers.”

“Nah, no good. Any Afghan voting is already record numbers.”

“How about this. The EU is worried that Malta is selling citizenship. That gives them automatic EU citizenship.”

“That’s sad, not funny. Isn’t anybody doing something stupid today that we can satirize?”

“I think that’s the problem.”

“What?”

“Everybody’s doing something stupid today. Satire works when you can point out that stupidity. But you can’t do that if everyone’s acting stupid. There’s nothing smart to relate to.”

“So…”

“Yeah, we wait.”

“Until somebody does something smart?”

“Uh huh.”

“Good night, Gracie.”

***

If you want to wish Marquel “Good Night,” do it @MarquelatTPV.