It pleases me no end to be able to tell you that once again Magellan's Log is drubbing its lazy and inexpert competition senseless with yet another Mother Of All Scoops. You have no doubt read in the establishment press that the justly revered senile, I mean senior (an honest mistake -- both words derive from the same noble Latin root) statesman of all the Fifty United States of America, the 98 1/2-year-old Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC), is in the hospital for some well-deserved rest and intravenal -- that is to say, intravenous nourishment. This may be the official version of things, but it is, as you say so colorfully in your very colloquial nation, unadulteratedly pure balderdash and horse-puckey. National pride allows me to keep silent no longer -- the aforementioned distinguished legislator and solon has been here in Chad for the last two weeks, along with his beautiful 79-year-old daughter and his even more beautiful nearly-13-year-old wife and cousin. He has been taking his ease at the world-famous Pamplemousse Institute, having been placed in the highly talented hands of Linda Tripp and her staff, and thereby regaining his legendary mental acuity and masculine viagra, -- what I really meant to say is vigor. (This is so embarrassing -- I have misspoken and mistyped myself thrice already in this one dispatch. I can only say in my humble defense that this is due to the immense excitement and pride I feel in having someone of this exalted stature in my mother country, even if only temporarily.) Of course, Sen. Thurmond is here for the world-renowned grapefruit cure, using only the choicest, pinkest, roundest, and largest citrus spheres from Kathryn Harris' Florida plantation, harvested only by the most underpaid of migrant workers, and shipped ultra-fresh via Fed-Ex™, the world's leading express courier. He has been treated to, as you Americans say with such colloquial nonchalance, the works -- gallons of grapefruit juice, chilled grapefruit soup, grapefruit smoothies, grapefruit sorbet, grapefruit burritos, southern-fried grapefruit, Krispy Kreme grapefruit donuts, grapefruit popsicles in the shape of hooded Ku Klux Klansmen, total-immersion grapefruit baths (so comforting to a devout Baptist such as Senator Thurmond), Ms. Tripp's legendary two-hour grapefruit massages, grapefruit injections, grapefruit poultices, grapefruit eyewash, grapefruit suppositories, grapefruit enemas, and grapefruit mousse -- both the dessert, and the hair styling gel. Let me tell you that he looks like a trillion Zaire dollars after only two weeks of this TLC, as you can readily see from the enclosed photo***. I have never witnessed such a beneficial transformation in anyone in such a short period of time. Pamplemousse's resident physicians tell me that in only another month he will be able to feed himself, and in perhaps three months he may be able to ambulate under his own power using only an electric golf cart. There is, alas, a slightly bittersweet note to this miraculous recovery. The Pamplemousse ophthalmologists estimate that within about two weeks, Sen. Thurmond will be able to see well enough to discern that Pamplemousse's various attendants, orderlies, nurses, chambermaids, FedEx™ drivers, and bodyguards (not to mention the present writer) are not strictly speaking of the Caucasian race, and thus, in order to maintain the momentum of his remarkable recovery, we will have to keep out of sight lest the shock of that revelation causes him to suffer an unfortunate relapse. That of course, would never do, for it would delay his return to the Senate chamber, where his vote might someday be needed if the pitiful Democratic party (or "Democrat party", and Kathryn and Linda like to say), manage to convince their spineless members to all vote alike one day. I hear that there is little danger of this within the next 10 months, but one never knows. In any case, all of us who have grown to love this kind, gentle, highly principled man will be sad to have to quit his presence. Ambassadortrix Harris has assured me that any stories of his opposition to civil rights for people of color are vicious canards promulgated by Communists and the Democrat party, that the term "nigrah" is in fact a high compliment in the American south, and that the reason we will soon need to stay out of sight is that he feels badly whenever he has to see people of African descent have to work hard, knowing full well how much they have endured in the past under slave-owning Democrat party members such as Thomas Jefferson. Indeed, she told me that long ago Sen. Thurmond changed his affiliation the Repugnican -- oh, there I go again, getting overexcited, I mean to say Republican) party as a protest against this party's exploitation of my metaphorical brothers and sisters. Knowing this made me want to do just a little bit more for this saint among statesmen, so I asked my cousin Sphinktar to make sure that he squeezed an extra dozen grapefruits for today's high colonic. And as though this were not enough prestige and excitement for one backward but progressive little country, I have it on good authority that the ICU next to Sen. Thurmond is being readied for next week's arrival of the de-facto leader of the free world, the recuperating Vice-Pres. Dick Cheney. We Chads will not stent, I mean stint, in the hospitality we show this esteemed personage. Prouder than ever to be a citizen of Chad, I remain
Your faithful correspondent,
***Ed. Note: Although the editors at Magellan's Log in no way doubt the beneficial effects of Chadian grapefruit treatments, when we saw the post-treatment photo of Sen. Thurmond which Mr. Kwaadutu enclosed with his report, we felt certain that the Senator had been subjected to treatments somewhat more extensive than the mere ingestion of Ruby Reds. Off-the-record communication with Mr. Kwaadutu revealed that he is hot on the track of another World Scoop, namely, that Sen. Thurmond is in fact now the world's first successful survivor of a head- (or body- [depending on how you look at it]) transplant. Scroll down to see photo.
END Photos Copyright © 2001 Nfubi Kwaadutu.
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Magellan's Log Copyright ©
2001 Texas Chapbook Press
www.texaschapbookpress.com
The South Rises Again, Sort of,
