Nostradamus
Foretells Four Julie Andrews Films While Being
Mistaken for Someone Else
by Bob Iozzia
Dear Journal,
Today, as I was exiting Madame Poupon's House of
Spicy Treats, my favorite Paris brothel, another
unrepentant debaucher who was entering mistook me
for someone named Ernst Edelweiss.
I am usually a venomous elitist during most
encounters with those below my station (which is
all but three people known to me), especially
when they misidentify me as an inferior being (which,
as you may recall, is all but three people known
to me).
But I did not punch him in the throat to point
out his egregious mistake, as was/is my right—the
erroneous name has a very soothing ring to it.
Perhaps someday I will compose a soothing folk
song entitled “Ernst.” And perhaps this
song will be featured in a play about a family of
entertainers who are compelled to flee their
homeland because they can no longer get a good
gig, piece of fish or non-scratchy undergarments
due to an invading epidemic. If that isn’t
rousing enough (it is), Ernst, the patriarch of
the family, has a nasal-bronchial condition that
causes him to constantly sniffle and make honking
phlegm noises that prevent everyone in the family
except himself from sleeping soundly.
The children approach their nanny and threaten to
expose her past as a female posing as a male
posing as a female posing as a male unless she
kills their father so they can finally get a
decent night’s sleep. She agrees only after
the children agree to address her as the Queen of
Genovia.
One night, with the deal sealed with a toast of
schnapps and handshakes all around, the Queen of
Genovia whips out from beneath her nightgown a
magic umbrella that allows her to fly about
everywhere, including the adults’ adulterous
bedroom. Declaring, “This magic umbrella
served me well whilst vibrating under my
nightgown; now it will screw someone else,”
she opens the parasol thingy, flies in three
ritualistic circles above the sleeping patriarch,
collapses the fabric flying machine, and crash-lands
her underrated voluptuous frame on the patriarch’s
raucous mucus-gurgling head, killing him
instantly.
With the flying umbrella as the getaway ox cart,
the murderous nanny and accomplice children flee
their mountain home for the sanctuary of a
nunnery in a foreign land, where all at last
enjoy a restful night. In the morning, Mia, the
eldest criminal coconspirator child, replies to
the Mother Superior’s inquiry of, “How
did you sleep, dear?” with, “Like a
fucking log, thanks, hon.”
Soon thereafter, Mia’s fellow self-orphaned
siblings join the breakfast table and affirm in
unison, “It’s a wonderful life, as well
as a small world after all!”
The youngest criminal collaborator child, Adolf—he
of stooge haircut and sketchy lip hair—wonders
aloud, “Where is Nanny, Queen of Genovia?”
No sooner do those words enter the ears of the
others than she is spotted umbrellaly airborne
above the rooftop, dressed in a cheap dress and
sporting a stupid-looking hat with a prop flower.
Mother Superior asks no one in particular, “Why
is she singing about spoonfuls of sugar?”
“How the hell should we know?”
premenstrual Mia shrieks. “Did we get here
before you?”
I shall call this play “The Sound of Mucus.”
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