Guest Commentary
Another shameful doping scandal
Mack Hall

"Hello. Sniff. Boohoo. I know that my name, Winthrop Postlewaithe, is on everyone's lips, and that millions of little boys and girls look up to me as the World Champion Turbo-Four-Way-Chess Champion and want to follow in my footsteps - Queen's Blasto- Rook to Knight's Nuclear-Drive- Pawn 32 ? - and be just like me, me, me. Sniff. Boohoo. But I stand here before you today a disgraced person. Sniff. Boohoo. I want to apologize to my kazillions of fans, to my mom and dad who raised me to be strong and unafraid in a universe not always kind to a little boy whose dreams of piloting the Starship Enemaprize to nebulae really, really, really, really, really far away and defeating asteroido-serpents with his made-in-China-and-covered-withlead paint GollyGeeWhizSabre (four 3A batteries sold separately) were cruelly trashed by neighborhood meanies (I'll get you for pantsing me in my Captain Quiche space suit, Ficus Norstenwhortle; you see if I don't!).

"Sniff. I want to apologize to the whole world, because I know everyone on the planet has been following my, my, my career (and to Kim Il Jong in North Korea, which must be a really rockin' place, thanks for all your emails of support, dude. You rock!). I, I, I know the whole world revolves around me, me, me and my, my, my Turbo-Four-Way-Chess career, especially when I, I, I won three Sorta- Gold-Like medals and two Sorta- Silver-Like medals in the 2004 Delphic Games in Threefrogs, Louisiana, I passed every doping test there was, and I swore to the people of the world that I had never and would never take unfair advantage of my, my, my special gifts by the Vague, Nebulous, Fuzzy Something-or-Other Beingness Thing or Whatever Mr. Glock has to go away and meditate to in some episodes of Space-Rangers-in-Tight- Bodysuits by taking unauthorized dark chocolate with more than 60% hamstersweat.

"Sniff. Boohoo. I, I, I must tell you all how I have let you down, because of course you spend all your pathetic little lives thinking about me, me, me and being so sorry that you could not be me, me, me. I mean, like, you know, who wouldn't want to spend every waking hour sweating and agonizing over every moved in Turbo- Four-Way-Chess (not like those loser nerds who play Three-Way-Chess) just like I, I, I do, and wanting to be the gosh-darnestbestest player in the whole wide universe. Sniff. Boohoo. I mean, like, who wants to be a mere entrepreneur or skilled craftsman or shop owner or doctor or truck driver or any of that bourgeois stuff when you could be the galactic expression of a supe-

rior mind drooling over a four-way-turbo chessboard? I mean, like, that's even better than running foot-races.

" I, I, I also want to apologize to the Intergalactic Truth Investigative Vapor Team, who knew that probing deep into my, my, my really deep soul to find the poison planted there by evil doping coaches (I, I, I, of course, did not know that the Gypsum Mind-Melt was being practiced on me, me, me by an operative of the Dork Side of the Farce) was much more important than searching out Klinkthe Kans who want to blow up Planet Earth.

"I, I, I want to thank my soul-shadow, Hether- Mystyeyey-Shannin- Cheyyenne-Dauwn- La'To'tisha, and all you little people out there for standing by me, me, me in my, my, my dark mid-day of my, my, my existential soul, and, like, y'know, stuff. Way to go, H-M-S-C-D-L. And now I'll take a few questions from the media before the ITIVT take me away to a penal colony. Yes…?"

First (and only) reporter: "Who did you say you were?"

Mack Hall is a resident of Kirbyville