form, which is such a big hit that the experts who thought it up are immediately put to work on developing a policy for the Persian Gulf.
February
1—A new policy requiring random drug testing of all airline pilots runs into a snag when nearly half of the Delta pilots are unable to hit the specimen bottle.
2—Miami City Commissioner Rosario Kennedy, responding to a Herald report that taxpayers spent $111,549 to decorate her office says—we are not making this quotation up—”there’s not one item that really stands out. It’s not the Taj Mahal.” Donations of clothing and canned goods pour in from concerned taxpayers.
3—In the ongoing war against the federal budget deficit, Congress gives itself a pay raise.
4—The United States yacht Stars and Stripes recaptures the coveted America’s Cup when the Australian entry, Kookaburra, is sunk by a Chinese-made
“Silkworm” missile. The U.S. Sixth Fleet steams toward the troubled region with orders “to form humongous targets.” Liberace goes to the Big Candelabra in the Sky.
6—In a White House ceremony marking his 76th birthday, President Reagan attempts to blow out the hot line.
7—Famed Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward reveals that, in a secret hospital interview, dying entertainer Liberace revealed that Woodward’s upcoming book, Veil, would be “a real page-turner.”
8—True item: Senator Lloyd Bentsen, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, sends out a letter telling lobbyists that for $10,000 each, they can attend monthly breakfasts with him.
9—Representative Arnold LaTreece announces that for $15,000 each, lobbyists can kiss him on the lips.
10—George Bush announces that he is available for $12.50.
11—President Reagan tells Iran-contra scandal investigators that he did not approve of the arms sale to Iran.
15—George Bush reduces his price to $3.99, including the souvenir beverage mug.
17—In Colombia, police arrest Carlos Lehder for jaywalking and discover, during a routine search, that his pockets contain 1,265,000 pounds of cocaine. Lehder claims to have “no idea” how it got there.
19—Mario Cuomo announces that he doesn’t want to be president and immediately becomes the Democratic front-runner.
22—George Bush announces that he doesn’t want to be president, either.
22—Andy Warhol goes to the Big Soup Can in the Sky.
23—Panic grips the nation as a terrorist group seizes 150,000 new, improved
W-4 forms and threatens to send them to randomly selected Americans through the mail.
23—Famed Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward reveals that, in a secret hospital interview, dying artist Andy Warhol revealed that Woodward’s forthcoming book, Veil, would be “available in bookstores everywhere.”
24—President Reagan announces that he cannot remember whether he approved the sale of arms to Iran. In a quotation that we are not making up, the president tells White House reporters: “Everybody that can remember what they were doing on August 8, 1985, raise your hand.”
25—White House reporters examine their diaries and discover, to their shock, that on August 8, 1985, they approved the sale of arms to Iran. They are immediately arrested.
March
2—The Miami Grand Prix is won by Mrs. Rose Gridhorn, 83, of Hackensack, New jersey, driving a 1976 Chrysler New Yorker with the left blinker on.
3—Comedian Danny Kaye dies moments after granting an interview to Bob Woodward.
7—In the widening scandal on Wall Street, the heads of three major investment firms rob a liquor store.
9—In Tallahassee, state legislators agree on a plan to tax professionals who perform services. A few hours later, they decide it also should apply to lawyers.
11—Florida Governor “Bob” Martinez, who ran for office on a platform of opposing taxes, announces that he will support the new tax on services, until it is passed, then he will call for a referendum so voters can vote against the tax, although he will campaign for the tax, but then he will change his mind and announce that he is calling a special session of the Legislature to repeal the tax. Everybody naturally assumes that the governor is joking.
13—Noncandidate Mario Cuomo, carrying out his normal duties as governor of New York state, meets with the heads of state of England, France, Norway, Sweden, and Germany.
15—A barge loaded with garbage sets out into the Atlantic under the command of explorer/author Thor Heyerdahl, who is seeking to prove his theory that South America could have been discovered by ancient mariners sailing from Islip, Long Island, in crude garbage barges.
18—The Southern Methodist University football team is suspended from intercollegiate athletics when National Collegiate Athletic Association investigators, after taking urine samples, determine that the school’s leading rusher, majoring in communications, is a horse. 2
1—The IRS releases an even newer, simpler W-4 form in response to complaints from a number of taxpayers, all of whom will be audited for the rest of their lives.
23—The Southern Methodist University horse is drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs.
24—A place called Chad defeats Libya in some kind of war. This really happened.
27—In what is hailed as a major arms race breakthrough, United States and Soviet arms negotiators in Geneva agree to wear matching outfits.
30—In an illegal industrial waste dump somewhere in Louisiana, lightning strikes two adjacent putrid pools of festering corrosive toxic slime, setting off a bizarre chain of chemical reactions that cause the pools first to bubble, then slowly, horrifyingly, to solidify and pulsate upward, gradually forming themselves into shapes that, in the ghastly light of the flickering electrical storm, appear almost human. “Hi!” they shriek cheerfully into the swampland emptiness. “We’re Jim and Tammy Faye!”
April
1—Speaking in unison, an estimated three dozen congressmen, all of them age
43, all of them blond, and all of them named Dick, announce that they are seeking the Democratic presidential nomination.
3—In the Persian Gulf, Iranians attack the Islip garbage barge, but are driven off by courageous flies.
6—Noncandidate Mario Cuomo, in the pursuit of his normal gubernatorial duties, reaches a tentative pact with Soviet arms negotiators.
12—At an art auction, Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers fetches the highest price ever paid for a painting, $39.8 million, paid by grateful Miami taxpayers wishing to hang it in the office of City Commissioner Rosario Kennedy.
13—True Anecdote: In National League baseball action, the Atlanta Braves’ Dion James hits a ball that would have been caught easily, except that in midair it strikes and kills a dove.
14—In Colorado, Gary Hart declares his candidacy for the presidential nomination, making the announcement while standing in front of a dramatic backdrop of soaring mountains, towering pine trees and four Miami Herald reporters disguised as rhododendrons.
15—The lifeless body of Atlanta Braves player Dion James is found under an enormous mound of dove droppings.
16—President and Mrs. Reagan release their tax returns.
19—The IRS sends back the Reagans’ tax returns, gently pointing out that you’re supposed to fill them out.
22—Crack U.S. counterintelligence agents in Moscow begin to suspect that the new U.S. Embassy in Moscow, constructed by Soviet labor, might be bugged, when one of them sneezes in the ambassador’s office and six chairs say,
“Gesundheit.”
23—The National Basketball Association grants Miami a franchise. The new team will be named The Enormous Bloodsucking Insects.