-- Wednesday, 21 August, 1974
The following is the
transcribed version of a script of a broadcast which occurred after our press
deadline, repeated here in its entirety:
“How I Spent My Summer Vacation”
Act III, Scene I, Take 600
To whom it may discern:
I shall begin at the beginning.
I could start at the end, but then you, the reader, would have to stand on your
figurative head to divine any semblance of logical, rational meanings from
this, the most recent of a series of pompously verbose expostulations and
subjective truths.
It all began innocently enough on
Monday, 1974, in the restaurant of an average metropolitan airport in San
Diego, California, the world’s finest city. It was eight o’clock in the
morning, and although I had seemingly recovered from a nocturnal attack of phlebitis
(a rare sub-tropical disease of the interior vena cava indigenous to San
Clemente and Whittier), I had to wipe the sleep from my eyes as I studied the
depleted breakfast menu. I had been awakened ninety minutes prior to this point
in time, Senator, by seven short bursts of sonic energy from Mommy Fortuna's
mechanical wind-up chicken.
But we digress. I ordered
myself a first-class: eggs, orange juice, coffee, muffins, and the killer,
sausages. These feisty little red-hot dachshund wieners did an about-face in my
digestive tract into a doggy bag just as we were about to land at Los Angeles
Airport, in the heart of smog city.
The airline, TWA (who could
forget their famous tea?) illegally, immorally, and fatteningly left us with only
thirty (count 'em) minutes to catch our connecting flight. The TWA terminal was
more than a stoned throw away, so we arrived ten minutes late, amid
tram/bus/taxi/feet and handbag confusion. Fortunately, page 76 of the script
called for some generator problems, so we reached our goal.
The flight went smoothly. It
was 9½ hours (in the centimeter, gram, second system) from L.A., so I had ample
opportunity to program my bio-computer with such contemporary literary
artifacts as "Goodbye Columbus", "Man and His Symbols"
(heavy!) and a complete rendition of a recent issue of Time magazine. Did you
know that General Morons and the Nixxon Corporation rank primary and secondary,
in this and the other remaining cosmos? These googols of U.S. Imperial Dollar
Credits could be put to much better use on urban renewal programs on the moon.
As usual, I had already seen
the airline's Channel One flick "Sugarland Express" starring Goldie
Hawn, so I had to be content with self-initiated brain teasers and pumpkin seeds
while the retinas of the rest of the airborne anxious androids were glued to
the silver screen.
Because of the extended time
distortion ratio which occurs when the Earth revolves around Neptune, we
arrived in “jolly old” about 7 a.m. the next morning, with a loss of eight
hours somewhere in there. I'm sure we'll get back this lost time on the way
back to the United Snakes, so Great Grid hasn't really cheated us out of our
due.
It was a beautiful grey-green
English dawn when the intrepid travelers touched down at London's Heathrow
Airport. The signs that lined the moving walkway proclaimed "Welcome to
Britain." I did indeed feel welcome. To me, it was just like coming home.
There are many cars in England, most of which look understandably foreign. These include Cortinas, Volvos, Vauxhalls, Datsuns, Minis, Hillmans, Volkswagens, Mercedes, Fiats, Capris, Triumphs, etc. etc. ad infinitum, ad nauseum. I have been here two days (and that's a long time in this end of the biosphere) and I have yet to see a Cadaverlac Eldorado or any other species of the dinosaur of the future. I have not seen Elton John or Mr Heath.
Welcome to "The Era of the Age of Epic Proportions" – Top of page 17
Flat 5 of #6 Roslyn Hill in
historic Hampstead is just charming. There are four rooms, including a kitchen,
water closet, bedroom, and living room. Physical therapists and other religious
ecstatics will be pleased to note that an invigorating climb of 2½ flights is
required to reach the abode where we dormicide. This morning, through the
bedroom window, I watched the sun Helios arc on his axis over the verdant
foliage which surrounds us, tastefully interspersed with superannuated
Victorian or Edwardian (only your geriatrician knows for sure) mansions and
pillar boxes. 98.6 degrees to the south-southeast is the world's largest
hospital, rising like a sixteen-story bedpan over (ironically) the Vale of
Health.
I will write more after the
painful removal of the ovarian cyst that has engulfed the kosher pickled pig's
knuckles of my writing hand.
Remember, "There are no
small actors, only small parts." (that's a line from something, I can't
remember quite what).
See you on the other side of the record as we slip through the hole of life. Groovy.
