In the wake of the discovery that one of Saddam Hussein’s sons removed $1 billion in cash from Iraq’s treasury shortly before American troops reached Baghdad, new evidence has surfaced indicating that Saddam’s family also removed almost $1 billion worth of ice cream from Baghdad’s dessert reserves. In a press conference Wednesday, Donald Rumsfeld said that a caravan of refrigerated tractor trailers was seen near the Syrian border recently. Rumsfeld said, “If the Syrian government is planning to harbor these ice cream thieves, they’ve got another thing coming.” When asked if he was alluding to the threat of military action against Syria, Rumsfeld exploded, saying, “No, goddammit! Why do you people always misconstrue everything and draw your own conclusions?!” Rumsfeld continued, saying that U.S. spy satellites were attempting to find and track the ice cream. “That ice cream will be found and returned to the American people,” said Rumsfeld. When asked if he had misspoken and perhaps meant “Iraqi people,” Rumsfeld again exploded, shouting, “The media is [sic] ruining this country! F*#@ you people! I hate you all! Let me do my goddamn job! Go to hell!” Rumsfeld also mentioned that the fugitive members of Saddam’s regime “are going to have a hard time keeping that ice cream from melting in the dessert.” When asked if he meant to say “in the desert,” Rumsfeld exploded for a final time, spraying blood and guts all over the press corps.
Courageous hypoglycemia survivor Ian Vandewalker had a low-blood-sugar attack Saturday at an end-of-the-semester party in Bloomington. The party, put on by the infamous military-family, “The Saxons,” was an all-afternoon barbecue bash featuring a keg and backyard-sports. Vandewalker was enjoying himself as much as he ever does when his “condition” got the better of him. “All I had had to eat was one Boca Burger all afternoon. And I played basketball, so I was, you know . . . exerting myself,” said Vandewalker from his hospital bed Sunday. Vandewalker’s “condition” requires that he eat quite frequently in order to be able to maintain any semblance of civilized human behavior. The “condition” is usually brought on in children by excessive fantasizing and not paying enough attention to reality, so it is generally thought that children who acquire it fully deserve the suffering to which they are subjected. Symptoms of low blood sugar progress from irritability and nausea to extreme irritability, reduction in cognitive capacity, lightheadedness, and extreme nausea. “Oh boy, that’s where I was Saturday night, baby. Extreme nausea and how! Damn, that sucked. The worst thing is, the only thing I can do to get out of it is eat--and I was too nauseated to eat! Oh, the disgusting irony.”
In the early evening Saturday, Vandewalker, rapidly losing strength, was reduced to nibbling on mini tortilla chips, whose sodium content added a dehydration headache to the pre-existing low blood sugar headache. “At some point, I realized if I didn’t get out of there, I would be leaving in a hospital stretcher. Or worse, people might just carry me out with their bare hands under my shoulders and me flopping around all undignified. So I had to come up with a plan.” Vandewalker’s plan involved a transparent lie about having to feed his cat, Pinky. “It was the best I could do. In that state, I couldn’t really initiate a conversation about my ‘condition,’ so telling the truth just wasn't an option.” Vandewalker hoped to get something to eat and return to the party, health restored, with an amusing anecdote about throwing up in the parking lot of his apartment building. But things were worse than he thought. Despite Ian’s efforts, infusing his body with fruit juice, protein shakes, yogurt, and apples, the nausea and headache didn’t go away, causing Vandewalker to retreat into his lipid bath to absorb nutrients overnight.
World-renowned engineering psychologist Ian Vandewalker finally discovered what he has been looking for all this time. In a recorded statement played by computer from his moon base, Vandewalker said, “I was in the stall in the men’s lavatory in the basement of Sycamore Hall at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana when I looked down and there it was. Right under my nose all along! The Diaphragm Actuator V-3000-2, in perfect condition. And to think I never noticed it before! How could I have been so stupid? Now that I have the Diaphragm Actuator, I can realize the final stages of my plan. Only a few more pieces must be found before . . . no, I wouldn’t want to reveal too much, would I? End transmission.”
Echoing Danny Gonzalez and his infamous “maximum velocity” strategy, homemaker Ian Vandewalker recently revealed his new life plan to be “110%”. In a statement played by moon from his computer base, Ian explained: “I’ve been living at maybe 15 or 20 percent for the past few weeks, what with getting all my school work done for the end of the semester and everything. It’s been all work, all the time. And now it’s going to be all life, all the time. In fact it’s going to be more than all--ten percent more, to be exact. So I wholeheartedly invite everyone to join me in my new life-affirming attitude.” Interested parties should contact Ian at his new home in Burbank, California for details. T-shirts, hats, and vinyl decals reading “110%” are available in the NPR Online Shop. Support comes from: the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation for Support for NPR’s New Media and New Initiatives.