I can't act to save my life.
Despite my breakout role as "Pa" in a second grade production of "Johnny Appleseed," my talent never really developed for some reason. My words get jumbled. My face turns red. It's really not a pleasant sight.
But last Thursday, I had to harness my limited abilities in order to save my life one day. Last Thursday, I played an anthrax victim in a bio-terrorism test conducted by the state and the Centers for Disease Control.
And you thought us media types just attended our Liberal Conspiracy meetings in our spare time.
"The Exercise"--as I've ominously dubbed it--was a test to see how organized and how quickly the state could act in the event of a bio-terror attack. We pretended that domestic terrorists had spread anthrax among the unsuspecting audience in a dark rock concert.
According to the card that hung around my neck, I was a 43-year-old Hispanic man who worked in the arena after the attack. This was not much of a stretch, of course, since Broeske is a very Latino name and I am often attacked in arenas.
During The Exercise, I waited in a line to get into the gymnasium/treatment center. After waiting about an hour, I eventually talked to a pharmacist who gave me an empty bottle of anthrax antibiotics with my name on it. He thanked me for waiting and told me that I would be rewarded with cookies for my patience.
The Exercise was just one of many tests for the state health department. Earlier that day, they combined mandatory tetanus inoculations with a similar bio-terrorism exercise to see how fast they could stick needles in whiny, unruly people.
U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona oversaw a similar exercise in Tucson on Friday. Things went splendidly, of course, since the boss was around, making Arizona the safest place in America to contract anthrax. Good for us!
But I'm glad we're covering all of our bases. Sure you've got a better chance of watching the Cardinals win the Super Bowl than contracting anthrax, but it's good to know that the government is taking this sort of thing seriously.
The American public is still scared of the terrorists that murdered more than 3,000 people. And if the government doesn't take these threats seriously, some company is going to sprout up and swindle germ-fearing people across this great country of ours.
Oh wait, too late.
Safer America is the first retailer to outfit your insane desire for safety. Either through its website or its Manhattan store--conveniently located blocks from the World Trace Center--the average Joe can protect himself from nuclear, biological and chemical attacks.
Say you have a family of four. You've stockpiled enough franks and beans in the bomb shelter to last you until 2412 and you have enough ammo to outgun a Texan NRA coalition. You still need a pair of gas masks, potassium iodide and maybe some biohazard suits. Thank God for Safer America, supplying all that and more for only $1,425.
Maybe your number one concern is how you're going to get out of your office on the 67th floor. Don't worry, Safer America provides an Executive Chute, Executive Escape Hood, and Executive dose of Potassium Iodide for just $945.
Sadly, our oppressive government trying to protect its people will probably run this company out of business. Those bastards will likely do more bio-terror exercises to increase response time and then there would be no need for high-priced bio-suits and potassium iodide.
Oh what a world.
Mark Broeske is an English Education Junior. Reach him at mark.broeske@asu.edu.
