Read Online Little Green Men by Christopher Buckley - Free Book Online
Authors: Christopher Buckley
Tags: Satire
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public and not mischievous gibberish. Or, for that matter, confidential medical data."
"So you deny having reported that at the hospital?"
"1 was in an emergency room being tended to and medicated for a possible subdural hematoma, Mr. Cooke. In such circumstances, I could not affirm or deny the correct spelling of my own name. However, I will mention our conversation to your chairman when I speak to her later today. My wife and I are on her benefit committee for the myoplasmitis luminosa dinner in December. Good day."
Banion felt a Pyrrhic sense of triumph on hanging up. Cooke would probably not run the item he had hoped to, but Banion had certainly not won him over to his admittedly intimate cult of personality. Cooke was probably telling everyone in the newsroom, "What an asshole." Banion knew that he was not especially popular among the foot soldiers of the fourth estate. They viewed him as an aloof, supercilious mandarin. He viewed them as a bunch of uncouth, envious hacks. The arrangement suited Banion perfectly. Let him who would turn down a guest slot on his TV show cast the first stone.
Still, it was with a squirrely stomach that he opened the next day's Post the moment it landed on his stoop at 5:30 a.m . Nothing. Wait - a brief item on page three of the Style section, slugged "Teed Off."
Sunday Host John O. Banion was taken to the hospital Sunday afternoon after reportedly driving his golf cart into a tree. A hospital source said that he appeared somewhat disoriented, but was released after tests showed no serious injury . Substitute Host Rick Simmons filled in. Banion is expected to return to the show next week.
"Somewhat disoriented" was a significant improvement on "raped by aliens." Banion, standing in the kitchen in his bathrobe, peering down at the Post, let out a faint sigh of relief. He would E-mail Renira and tell her to prepare damning research for his column on the ... let's see ... abominable deterioration of emergency room care in America's ... best be careful, the bastards might retaliate by really leaking everything . . . well, Renira would find something about the medical establishment worth damning.
As he plunged the metal filter down onto the coffee grounds, Banion ruminated gloomily on the jokes about his golf-cart technique that would follow. Jack! Running in Ind y this year? Well, it could be a lot worse.
He heated his milk and mixed it with the coffee. He shifted uncomfortably. There it was again, that pain - in the ass. What the hell had happened?
"There's a tremendous amount of material on this subject." Elspeth Clark, his Georgetown University research assistant, dumped a heavy cardboard file box labeled "UFO's" on Banion's desk. Banion winced at the label. What if a reporter had seen her coming into his office with a box labeled "UFO's"?
'Are you doing a show on it?" Elspeth asked.
"No, no. Of course not. It's ... I may ... I don't know ... do a column on it. Use it in a book."
"Not the Ben and Max book?" This was how she referred to the Franklin and Robespierre book.
"No. I'm toying with a book on millenarianism and the decline of rational thought. Something along those lines. Not sure yet."
Elspeth began pulling books and files out of the box. "I had a fax from Paris yesterday, from that Robespierre scholar I told you about? The one I found on the Internet, in the Sorbonne chat room? He did his Ph.D. thesis on the Revolution and says he remembers seeing a letter somewhere from Robespierre to Madame Farci, his mistress, mentioning a conversation he'd had with a Monsieur Franklin about
'mon petit probleme’* and that Monsieur Franklin had recommended 'un cours bien therapeutique d'electricite. ’** He thinks he might be able to find the letter. He said we'd need to pay him for his time. Might be worth it. If we have a letter establishing t hat Franklin was advising Robes pierre on electrical therapy for venereal disease, then it's not so far out that they would have been
"So you deny having reported that at the hospital?"
"1 was in an emergency room being tended to and medicated for a possible subdural hematoma, Mr. Cooke. In such circumstances, I could not affirm or deny the correct spelling of my own name. However, I will mention our conversation to your chairman when I speak to her later today. My wife and I are on her benefit committee for the myoplasmitis luminosa dinner in December. Good day."
Banion felt a Pyrrhic sense of triumph on hanging up. Cooke would probably not run the item he had hoped to, but Banion had certainly not won him over to his admittedly intimate cult of personality. Cooke was probably telling everyone in the newsroom, "What an asshole." Banion knew that he was not especially popular among the foot soldiers of the fourth estate. They viewed him as an aloof, supercilious mandarin. He viewed them as a bunch of uncouth, envious hacks. The arrangement suited Banion perfectly. Let him who would turn down a guest slot on his TV show cast the first stone.
Still, it was with a squirrely stomach that he opened the next day's Post the moment it landed on his stoop at 5:30 a.m . Nothing. Wait - a brief item on page three of the Style section, slugged "Teed Off."
Sunday Host John O. Banion was taken to the hospital Sunday afternoon after reportedly driving his golf cart into a tree. A hospital source said that he appeared somewhat disoriented, but was released after tests showed no serious injury . Substitute Host Rick Simmons filled in. Banion is expected to return to the show next week.
"Somewhat disoriented" was a significant improvement on "raped by aliens." Banion, standing in the kitchen in his bathrobe, peering down at the Post, let out a faint sigh of relief. He would E-mail Renira and tell her to prepare damning research for his column on the ... let's see ... abominable deterioration of emergency room care in America's ... best be careful, the bastards might retaliate by really leaking everything . . . well, Renira would find something about the medical establishment worth damning.
As he plunged the metal filter down onto the coffee grounds, Banion ruminated gloomily on the jokes about his golf-cart technique that would follow. Jack! Running in Ind y this year? Well, it could be a lot worse.
He heated his milk and mixed it with the coffee. He shifted uncomfortably. There it was again, that pain - in the ass. What the hell had happened?
"There's a tremendous amount of material on this subject." Elspeth Clark, his Georgetown University research assistant, dumped a heavy cardboard file box labeled "UFO's" on Banion's desk. Banion winced at the label. What if a reporter had seen her coming into his office with a box labeled "UFO's"?
'Are you doing a show on it?" Elspeth asked.
"No, no. Of course not. It's ... I may ... I don't know ... do a column on it. Use it in a book."
"Not the Ben and Max book?" This was how she referred to the Franklin and Robespierre book.
"No. I'm toying with a book on millenarianism and the decline of rational thought. Something along those lines. Not sure yet."
Elspeth began pulling books and files out of the box. "I had a fax from Paris yesterday, from that Robespierre scholar I told you about? The one I found on the Internet, in the Sorbonne chat room? He did his Ph.D. thesis on the Revolution and says he remembers seeing a letter somewhere from Robespierre to Madame Farci, his mistress, mentioning a conversation he'd had with a Monsieur Franklin about
'mon petit probleme’* and that Monsieur Franklin had recommended 'un cours bien therapeutique d'electricite. ’** He thinks he might be able to find the letter. He said we'd need to pay him for his time. Might be worth it. If we have a letter establishing t hat Franklin was advising Robes pierre on electrical therapy for venereal disease, then it's not so far out that they would have been
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