Pseudoephedrine

It's back....

The Glorious Leader awoke with a runny nose and a bit of a tickle in the throat.  Once upon a time not so long ago this might have worried him. But not anymore. No, now, thanks to him, we all have access to the good stuff.  The stuff that meant the Glorious Leader could march into today’s caucus meeting with his head held high and not even a drip of snot trickling from his nose.

The Glorious Leader was feeling the buzz as he approached the caucus room.  The good stuff was working its magic.  He felt so good he did a spontaneous little twerk in the corridor.  Memories of his glory days on TV came flooding back. 

Gotta love the good stuff.

As the Glorious Leader entered the caucus room, he was pleased to see that most of his MP’s were there.  Sure, there was still one who had yet to figure out where the caucus room was, but the Glorious Leader would deal with him in his first reshuffle.  The thought of reshuffling reminded him of a saying.  Something about shifting deckchairs on a boat.  He couldn’t remember which boat, because his brain was, in truth, a bit fuzzy.  Fuzzy and buzzy.  The thought of that brilliant rhyme made the Glorious Leader smile his trademark smile that some commentators on the left called a smirk.

As the Glorious Leader entered the caucus room, his devoted MP’s were going about their usual pre-meeting routine of tea, biscuits and comparing Wordle scores.  Then, as if they had one mind between all of them, they looked to the Glorious Leader and started applauding.  Those who had forgotten to put down their cups of tea before they started applauding cared not that they were now spilling English Breakfast all over their sensible business attire.

The Glorious Leader soaked up the applause.  Between the adoration and the good stuff, today was turning out to be a good day, despite the fact he now seemed to be running a bit of a temperature.

Then the chanting started.

“Bring back P! Bring back P!”

The Glorious Leader held his hands up.  Please stop.

But the chanting continued.

“Bring back P! Bring back P!”

The Glorious Leader waved his hands.  Seriously, please stop.

The caucus waved back.

“No no,” said the Glorious Leader.  “We’re not doing the jazz hands thing. This isn’t the party conference. And we’ve been through this. We’ve talked about it. You can’t call it P.  Even for fun, in private. We have to use the proper name.”

“But pseudoephedrine is a really long word to say,” said the List MP nobody knew the name of.

“And spell,” added the spokesperson for Arts, Culture and Heritage. “Even the scriptwriter I spoke to agreed it was a big word. Almost 16 letters.”

“But when we call it P people immediately think of P,” reiterated the Glorious Leader, for what felt like the hundredth time even though it was probably no more than eighty. “So we need to use the word pseudoephedrine because we don’t want people thinking about P even though it is why P is called P. Are we clear on that now?”

A sea of blank faces.

“Just call it the good stuff, okay?”

The faces are still blank, but at least they are nodding.

“The most important thing is that in bringing back something that people were not asking to be brought back, something they didn’t even know they wanted back, for no apparent medical or even logical reason, this party has pulled off its greatest ever political coup! Now even people who are really sick will be able to take pills that will mask their symptoms enough to make them feel well enough to go back to work, which is where they belong and what this country needs!”

A cheer goes up round the room. A couple of MP’s start the chant again then remember what they’ve just been told and fall silent.

The Glorious Leader basks in the moment.  He’s pretty sure the headache he can feel coming on is the price of success.

“The thing now, is how do we capitalise on this triumph? In lieu of any actual, meaningful policies, what other things can we bring back? Because I want people to think of us when they think of things that we used to have, then didn’t have for a while, but now we have them again. I want us to live in the minds of the voters, as the party who not only brought back pseudoephedrine but a whole bunch of other stuff they didn’t know they missed.”

A pause.  More nodding, but of the trying to process information kind of nodding.

“You mean like Snifters? I used to love Snifters,” ventures the spokesperson for Coal Mining and Climate Change.

More nodding, this time in agreement and of the ‘as the penny drops’ kind of nodding.

“Well yes, but maybe of more political benefit, to us, in the polls,” prompts the Glorious Leader.

“Fax machines.”

“Hula hoops.”

“Men who deliver milk. What were they called again? Milkmen, that’s right!”

Suddenly the room is alive with suggestions.

“VCR’s!”

“Tangy Fruits!”

“Telephones with a dial which you actual dial!”

“The local screen production industry!”

“Skinny jeans for men!”

“My neighbours!”

Whilst admiring their enthusiasm, the Glorious Leader senses his flock are running in completely the wrong direction. He tries to interject, but all that emerges is a stifled cough.

“Movies where you wear those cool 3D glasses!”

“Lead in petrol!”

“CFC’s! I swear my fridge used to run heaps better on Freon! Screw the stupid ozone layer! Who needs it anyway?”

“Slavery! But in a good way!”

“Apartheid! But only the fun bits!”

Okay, thinks the Glorious Leader, things are going not quite as he expected.  He holds up his hands again.  The room falls silent.  Only the spokesperson for Arts, Culture and Heritage does the jazz hands thing again.

“Maybe we’ll put a pin in that one for now. Circle back later,” he suggests. “Now what’s the first issue on today’s agenda?”

“Our policy on a potential new pandemic resulting from the resurgence of the H5N1 avian influenza virus,” pipes up the spokesperson on Making Lists and Stuff.

“Not that we’ll need a policy on this,” jokes the Glorious Leader.  “Not now that we have access to the good stuff, again.”

The room erupts into laughter. Some List MP’s even start the chant again.

“Bring back P! Bring back P!”

The Glorious Leader lets the have their fun for a while, before deciding he needs to interject, to bring some dignity back to proceedings.

But instead, as if from nowhere, the Glorious Leader sneezes.  An explosive involuntary eruption of mucus and pathogens, launched into the room.

In this way the end has a new beginning.