|
Big Brother Skateboarding
February 2003
PATRIOT PENTATHLON
By Andrew John Ignatius Vontz
"I understand small business growth. I was one."
-George W. Bush, New York Daily News, Feb. 19, 2000
With the United States facing grave threats of action from terrorist sects around the globe, on October 26th, 2002 the President signed the USA Patriot Act, a sweeping piece of anti-terrorism legislation that will have implications for generations of Americans to come, into law. Under the aegis of terror prevention, the USA Patriot Act grants the government heretofore unseen powers of search, seizure, and communications monitoring.
Now, in the bicentennial year of the seminal expedition of the hallowed explorers Merriwether Lewis and William Clark, every citizen of America must do their part to ensure that the evil ones are kept at bay and that the great American spirit prevails.
But remember this fellow citizens: Babe Ruth wasn’t born hitting homeruns and not every patriot has the skills and training to sniff out evil ones. While we are a patriotic country, with a little practice every citizen could undoubtedly do a little better.
Inspired by the fine work of Attorney General John Ashcroft, who has called on American citizens to more or less spy on each other and who erected barriers around a nude statue at the department of justice in accordance with his Christian principles, I recently held a five-event patriot challenge with Downey, an Icelander friend of mine, to bolster our patriotic stores and to brace ourselves for the long battle ahead. Lady Liberty protects all with her cloak of truth and freedom, even those who are visiting our country from Iceland and thirst for a taste of the sweet nectar of liberty. A worthy competitor I knew Downey would make.
With the firing of the starting gun, Downey and I set out across Los Angeles on an adventure no less challenging than that perpetrated by the great M. Lewis and W. Clark, warriors and tamers of many a caribou herd. Confident as I was in my patriotic fervor, I couldn’t help but wonder if the Icelander would prevail.
EVENT ONE: OPERATION: JUST NOT NUDE
"Rarely is the question asked: is our children learning"
-George W. Bush, Florence, SC, Jan. 11, 2000
Inspired by storied statue clothier John Ashcroft, for the first event, Downey and I had to locate lascivious, provocative statues in need of covering and drape them in clothing. Our objective? To make the world a less naked, and therefore safer place. Storming out of Downey’s apartment, I quickly located several offending human forms rendered in concrete on the grounds of his compound and set about swaddling them in the finest discards from my closet. Frustrated with my speedy start, Downey took a more ambitious and bold tack, heading directly for the intersection of La Brea and Hollywood near Mann’s Chinese theater where he found four statues with breasts jutting out and begging for a licking from any passer by. Duly offended, Downey mounted a statue from the rear and draped it in what he referred to as an Icelandic body bag, a combination of a checked button-down shirt and a striped scarf. The results were visually pleasing, but as Downey failed to securely button the shirt thus leaving the areola portion of the statue’s breast exposed, his mission was a failure.
Advantage: Vontz.
EVENT TWO: OPERATION: FLAG ‘EM AND BAG ‘EM
"Laura and I really don't realize how bright our children is sometime until we get an objective analysis."
-George W. Bush, Meet the Press, April 15, 2000
During times of war, nothing is more important to homeland security than mass displays of patriotic fervor. Every patriot should fly a flag, and fly it high, but take it down at night and never let it touch the ground. And when Old Glory is removed from her place of rest, she will need to be treated with the decorum and respect that she has commanded over the centuries. Sadly, most Americans forget how to properly fold a flag once they leave the Scouts.
Downey had never folded a flag in his life. I, on the other hand, had spent years at the St. Elizabeth’s elementary school on flag duty. And while my storied career in the scouts ended at the Webelo level following a scandalous sketch performance at the pack meeting, I had not let my skills fall by the wayside. For this challenge, Downey and I engaged in a timed flag folding competition with the aid of the great American spirit, George Robert Horning. Sweat glistened on my brow as I stood in the shit-scarred dog park at Runyon Canyon and braced myself for the effort to come. Twenty-two seconds later, I was finished and handed the reigns over to Downey. Being a gracious and sportsmanlike competitor, I gave him a brief tutorial on the finer points of the triangular folding techniques we rely on here in America, where freedom rings over amber waves of grain like the cry of the sirens. Heed its call, friends, or perish.
Like a new sponge dropped in a vat of soapy water, Downey quickly absorbed my lesson and signaled his eagerness to begin. He clocked in at thirty-four seconds, but had failed to tuck the final flat wedge sticking out of his flag back into the triangular portion. I shook my head in disgust and sniffed the air deeply. It smelled of dog shit and sun tan lotion. My charge had learned, but not well enough.
Advantage: Vontz.
EVENT THREE: OPERATION: PATRIOT PEEPER
"I was raised in the West. The west of Texas. It's pretty close to California. In more ways than Washington, D.C., is close to California."
-George W. Bush, The Los Angeles Times, April 8, 2000
At the sight of the red coats invading, Paul Revere did his part and signaled his brothers in arms to rise up and demolish the British. In the spirit of the lamp-wielding Revere and other patriots throughout history, most notably the turkey-loving Ben Franklin who at one time sought to make said bird a national emblem in lieu of the eagle, Attorney General Ashcroft proposed earlier this year that mail men, cable guys, meter readers, and other people with regular access to their fellow citizens’ homes be enlisted as spies, more or less, in the war on terror. Ashcroft suggested that these folks keep their peepers open when they went into other people’s homes and report any wrong (or evil) doing to a confidential tips hotline. While this program has not yet been instituted and indeed inspired a public outcry and drew comparisons to Stalin-era Russia and the Stassi of East Germany, Downey and I prepared for our duty to come in the third event of the Pentathlon, a timed Patriot Peeping simulation. George stashed various items of unpatriotic contraband including a copy of Busty, a photography book full of nude photos called My Wife, and various verboten literature including the Temporary Autonomous Zone by Hakim Bey, a book about Islam, and a book about the Taliban, throughout Downey’s apartment. Downey and I then had thirty seconds to root out the despotic materials. The Icelander prevailed in this event finding five items to my three, his big score being the My Wife book stashed in the couch. On the upside, when I found the copy of Busty hidden under his bed, Downey told me that “he didn’t like big tits.” So that’s how they swing in Iceland, eh?
Advantage: Downey
EVENT FOUR: OPERATION: HOMERUN RED GLARE
"This is still a dangerous world. It's a world of madmen and uncertainty and potential mental losses."
-George W. Bush, The Financial Times, Jan.14, 2000
In tribute to the inevitable bursting of rockets red glare over Baghdad thus freeing the Iraqi people from the tyranny of Evil One Number Two, a.k.a. Saddam Hussein, Downey and I competed in a skateboarding-inspired version of a home run derby, again at Runyon canyon. Lacking a ball and bat, I relied on my American-bred ingenuity and swiftly fashioned a ball from plastic grocery bags taped over wadded-up newspapers and resolved to use my skateboard as our bat. Provisioned accordingly, I again had to offer a quick tutorial to Downey, who had never played baseball in his life. Ten pitches later the count was Downey zero, Vontz ten.
Advantage: Vontz
EVENT FIVE: OPERATION: CARNIVORE
"We ought to make the pie higher."
-George W. Bush, South Carolina Republican Debate, Feb. 15, 2000
One of George Bush’s kindest, most patriotic gestures to the American people has been to deregulate meatpacking and place the regulatory responsibility in the hands of the meat packers themselves. As everyone knows, nothing shows an enemy greater disrespect then consuming him whole as a tasty post-battle treat. You know, like a Pop Tart. But meatier. All patriots must eat to replenish their stores of energy and re-load their handguns, so Downey and I settled in at In-N-Out burger for the final event in the competition, a deregulated hamburger speed eating competition. As this would be the tie-breaking and pentathlon-deciding event, tensions ran high. Still, decorum was of the essence and before we began, we toasted one another with our single cheeseburgers. I took a sip of Coke and prepared for the starting cry from George and was about to dig in when Downey stood and screamed, “Take this Hussein you Kurd-gassing motherfucker!” The male porn star sitting at the table next to us, who Downey happened to recognize, turned his head and nodded in agreement as he took a sip of his shake and lit a smoke. Downey took his seat, George yelled go, and several seconds later I was left with a tiny bite in my hand as Downey belched.
Advantage: Downey
THE PODIUM
If one were to simply total the results in each event and thusly proclaim a winner, then I would have been the champion of this patriot pentathlon. But Downey had learned important lessons about our great country, lessons that no patriot should be without. Not even for a second. While I relished my small victory, I declined to be crowned champion and cede my title to Downey, because he had come so far, gained so much, and resolved to do so much more with the knowledge he had gained. This, fellow citizens, is a lesson from which we can all learn and points to the greater strength of this competition. I invite you to gather your friends, to lay your weapons down and take up the challenge of the patriot pentathlon. For there is everything to be gained.
|
