Sunday, August 28, 2011

From a CNN journalist's Libyan War diary

August 21, 2011
Where is room service?

That's what we're wondering.

Just where the hell is room service?

Is this because we didn't tip?

Good service or any area where I'm well known and I will tip. But any place I can get away without tipping? Well, score!!! Gonna go for it.

Meanwhile, I am entranced by a painting on my wall.



What does it mean? Are they mercenaries? Are they Libyans? I have no idea.

August 22, 2011
Our Gaddafi provided security detail tells us we're not leaving the hotel. We can hear bombs going off and shooting.

This morning, I was in the sauna trying to sweat off all the booze I've been drinking when it hit me: There's a war going on. Somewhere.

And maybe people are suffering?

I thought maybe I should report on that but then I went into the main dining room and discovered they were out of Equal. Now what was I supposed to eat on top of my grapefruit?

When you encounter real problems like that, suddenly the suffering of others seems so unimportant.

August 23, 2011
Oh. My. God.

There was no electricity for most of the day. When it finally came on, I was so busy charging my cell phone and laptop, I barely had time to watch TV.

And, of course, I'm hesitant to search for online porn because I'm not sure the electricity will stay on.

A group of us went looking for 'rations' because we prefer not to eat in either of the two main dining rooms. So we waited until it was late and began exploring the hotel including the store room and the kitchen.

The hotel must be on top of some secret Del Monte canning factory. Cans, cans, cans, everywhere you look.

I ask, "Where is the fresh sushi?"

No where to be found.

It's true what they say, war really is hell.


August 24, 2011
We stayed up last night with a slumber party.

I spent most of the night afraid to fall asleep, afraid that they'd put my bra in the freezer. It must have been four in the morning before I remembered I'm a boy.

By that time I'd watched Point Break twice. That movie is like 20 years old. The hotel couldn't offer anything newer? Geez, even in Newark they're watching The Beaver.

I feel fat. We ate a lot of candy and potato chips today. I insisted upon calling them "crisps" because if I couldn't be different, I wouldn't be me.

But I feel fat. My ass feels fat. I feel my ass and think, "It feels fat." I feel my ass and think, "I need a shave."

Life is funny that way. Like, lots and lots of times, I've gotten a really bad haircut and wished it would grow out and it took forever. But it seems like I shave my ass one day and the next, it's already time to do it again.

I wonder if I organized an ass shaving party if anyone would show?

I think my real friends would.

But I fear none of my real friends are in Tripoli.

This is just like kindergarten when I pissed my pants and kept saying it was just where I spilled my juice box and all the kids pointed and laughed at me and called me pissy pants.

What was I saying?

August 26th.

Yesterday was so horrible, I couldn't write.

The whole thing has been so horrible, period.

No air conditioning at times. No air conditioning! What kind of a hell hole is this?

I bet you one damn thing, back during WWII, I bet you Patton always had air conditioning. I betcha they didn't f**k with Patton.

So yesterday, we were evacuated by the Red Cross and I saw the true face of war.

It was so scary. It was so ugly.

It took me almost a minute to realize it was Jomana.

The first thing I said to her, I said, "Jomana, where are your pore strips!"

Her pores were so large, you could have hid Muammar Gaddafi in them.

Jomana was crying and, with that skin, who could blame her?

I'm still haunted by those enlarged pores. Even now, of all the things I have seen in the Libyan War, Jomana's pores remain the most frightening. War is hell. Let's hope the next one is catered.

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This parody piece is inspired by Matthew Chance's pity party in The Telegraph of London.
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