PARTING SHOT APRIL 2010: ONE MONTH IN THE WAR ON DRUGS

April 1: The news in today’s Dallas DurgFear is even worse than usual. Apparently Crack-94 has more horrifying powers than its predecessors. Crack-93 and Crack-92. There is a wrenching story about some Narcoticops who became addicted merely by holding several packages of the drug. At the office, one woman was talking about a grandchild who got hooked on the stuff just from hearing his parents mention it. Unbelievable.

April 4: The fiendish cartel is at it again. Is there no end to their diabolical ingenuity? After Colombia and Peru were covered with two feet of concrete as a result of the Trans-Andean Defoliation Act of 1991. the monsters fled to Bolivia. We thought we had them on the run when our scientists perfected the first generation of coca-leaf-eating drug moths at a cost of $4.1 billion. How moving the sight, as the first squadron of those brave little moths fluttered into battle! Then, two years later, the drug lords introduced their own line of genetically engineered coca-moth-eating drug frogs! We countered the following year with drug-frog-eating drug weasels, and victory seemed within our grasp. But now DrugFear reports that the drug lords have created hordes of ferocious drug-weasel-eating drug tigers! It is a terrible setback for our side.

April 10: Standing in line for the morning urine check I heard Vada, who works with me in Information Reduction, telling about her weekend. She and an old friend wound up at an “underground” restaurant where the chef just happened to serve a French dish cooked in real wine. Vada swore that as soon as she realized what had happened, she stopped eating and tried to induce vomiting, but it was too late. The new U-SAY-NO test kits are the best ever, easily capable of delecting violations up to six months after the fact. When we filed into the lab to “render unto Caesar,” as Howard always puts it. Vada was fired and fined. It’s her second offense in ten years, meaning she’ll lose her pension and could face jail time. Sad. She was a good worker, though of course she could have done more had she not been an addict.

April 13: Late to work again. There I was, scooting down Hillcrest toward Northwest Highway, when suddenly the giant iron crossbars clanged into place across the intersection and traffic screeched to a halt. That’s the fifth time since Christmas I’ve found myself in a Perot Zone. The Narcoti-cops try to be as courteous and quick as possible, but when you’re searching hundreds of cars and all the homes in the surrounding neighborhoods, these things take time. As First Therapist Quayle used to say, “Demand side, supply side! No place they can hide!”

April 17: Another mandatory political debate tomorrow, the fourth one this week. It seems we spend all of our time these days in the cafeteria sipping decaf, nibbling wheat thins, and watching candidates wave their arms and yell on the big TV screen. I would never be so foolish as to complain to a company Therapist, as Howard did last week, but really, all the big issues were settled long ago. Of course it is better now that we are united.

April 18: What a surprise! There was actual disagreement in the debate today. Of course, all four candidates for County Land Clerk agree on the death penalty for drug users and life in prison for their immediate families. All wore buttons proclaiming “Zero Tolerance” and “Zero Tolerance Is Not Enough.” But here’s a twist: one of the minor parly candidates declared himself “’pro-choice” on the method of execution. Under his plan, instead of being burned at the stake. drawn and quartered, and crushed by elephants on a local cable channel, the condemned user could choose to be buried under three tons of broken glass for six days. then burned at the stake, drawn and quartered, and crushed by elephants on prime-time TV. I doubt the candidate has much of a chance, but it’s nice to see such diversity of opinion. That’s what this country was built on.

April 22: What a lousy day. Stayed up late last night studying our company’s 214-point plan for doing our part in the War on Drugs this year, along with Therapist Hallaran’s 117-point plan for implementing the 214-point plan. At decaf. I had to listen to Eloise bragging again about her son, who’s a veteran of the Battle of Medellin and the invasion of Havana.

April 25: It’s pretty clear now who will be the country’s next First Therapist. Bathshire has been running way ahead in the polls, largely because of his promise to increase the share of the GNP spent fighting drugs from 85 percent to 93 percent. Smithers, the liberal, had talked about scaling back the Home Jailer program-as if any American family would balk at donating a spare bedroom or a hall closet for locking up drug users. But Smithers triumphed in last night’s debate: a team of physicians, lawyers, priests, and chaperones revealed that urine tests for every day of Smithers’s life, all forty-five years of it, were in a locked and guarded vault in San Diego! And Smithers confirmed rumors that his entire life has been videotaped, from birth until that very moment! If anyone accuses him of going to a wild party in college, or dating someone who later attended a concert by a musician who later recorded a suspicious song, well, he has the tapes. I wrote down his conclusion: “Ladies and gentlemen, I am the only truly clean candidate in this race. That’s why ’I Have Done Nothing’ is my campaign slogan. Now my opponent says he is clean, but what about that mysterious eleven-day gap during the summer he claims he was at Y Camp? I say to him, ’Mr. Bathshire. where are your tests?”

April 29: At last I can get back to work. Today I’ll try to make it up through D in the alphabet. I’m ready for a challenge. Any amateur could correct the Cheech and Chong movies, though it’s hard to make all the cuts and still have much left. But Casablanca, now that’s a tricky one. Cigarettes everywhere, problems with the location-should it be Rick’s Detox Center, or Rick’s Bike Shop? Not to boast, but I’m proud of my work on one particular scene. It’s rather famous. Bogart raises his glass and says ’’Here’s looking at you, kid.” Well, just a touch here and there, and voila! You’d think he’d been drinking milk forever.