Rubber Book

Quick! Someone waterproof that book!

Harpers Magazine has announced it was they who actually published a Koran-in-the-latrine story first. Given the pillorying Newsweek is taking for their article about the Guantanamo Book Club, this journalistic display of one-upmanship is puzzling. Does Harpers want to bring the wrath of both the White House and the entire Muslim world down on their collective heads? Or is it just an extremely clever ploy to increase circulation in Jalalabad (where word is they’re getting killed by Atlantic Monthly)? Regardless, I am sensing a trend that could lead to disaster for everyone who isn’t a plumber.

Recently, when my young daughter was reading the new Harry Potter (which I obtained in galleys in exchange for a promise not to tell anyone) an evangelical friend of hers grabbed it out of her hand and threw it in, yes - the toilet. She had heard the book was satanic and, being a creature of the media, knew this was the latest trend in literary criticism.

My daughter was mortified so I, in a clumsy attempt to make her feel better, thrust a Left Behind book into the commode on her behalf (she became even more mortified). My wife, to show her disapproval of this rash action, and re-calibrate the tone of the play date -- which thanks to me had clearly gotten out of hand -- found my new issue of Secular Humanist Weekly and you can guess where she put it. Flush! Things got soggier from there.

Today, the word “dustbin” doesn’t say contempt the way it did when Karl Marx was slinging it around. If you really want to show you don’t like something now, a toilet must be invoked. Because no one can agree on anything at my house, the bathroom is constantly underwater. The plumber is practically living with us.

I have seen the future and someone better put Noah on speed dial. The Second Flood has begun and it’s going to make the first one look like a pool party.