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God Having Fun on a Dull Day

               God was, as a general rule, fairly slow to anger, but there were some people that he took an immediate dislike to.  He didn’t admit it to many people, after all, who could God confide in?  He was the one who people confided in, he wasn’t supposed to need someone to tell his secrets to.  However, this particular person just really ticked him off.  He didn’t know why this guy got under his skin, he just knew he did.  His anger was getting the better of him so on a slow day, one in which he didn’t have to smite anyone, he decided to have some fun.

                He was sitting at His desk and buzzed his new secretary, or pardon me, his administrative assistant, Joan of Arc.  Sometimes God felt like he was Murphy Brown, a character from  an old 90’s television sitcom who couldn’t keep a secretary if her life depended on it.  God never told anyone but he always thought Candace Bergen was hot and he missed the old days when television was smart and witty rather than crass and appealing to a human’s basest instincts.  He shuddered when he thought of shows like Jersey Shore and knew he’d have a  thing or two to say when the producers of that particular sign of the apocalypse showed up in heaven.

                He waited patiently for Joan to answer his summons.  He knew she was sitting at the desk in the front office, perplexed by the blinking lights on the new phone system.  Joan may have been a whiz at military strategy but the girl couldn’t figure out a phone system no matter how many times their phone specialist, Alex  Bell tried  to explain  it to her.  God had just poured himself a shot  of  tequila when Joan finally answered, her young voice confident and clear.  “Yes sir?” she asked, “What can I help you with?”

                God tipped his head back to swallow his tequila and then said, “Joan, I can’t remember who’s in charge of the Invention Department now?  Did I just promote someone over there? I can’t find my darn internal directory so could you look it up for me?”  He poured himself another shot and prepared to wait.  Joan had only been on front desk for a week and he knew there was a lot of information to absorb because heaven was huge and getting more bureaucratic as time wore on.  God had tried to think of different management strategies to have things run more efficiently but he couldn’t seem to eliminate red tape, no matter what system he tried.

                As he drank his second shot, he pondered how much easier things seemed to be in the old days.  It seemed pretty simple to talk directly to Adam, Noah, even Moses, although he supposed he shouldn’t really count Moses as he talked to him as a burning bush but lordy, things certainly changed.  The biggest downfall was when everyone voted for a union – nowadays, God couldn’t talk to anyone without having to go through a pile of people.  “Oh, well,” he sighed, at least I can talk directly to the managers of all my different departments.  Joan buzzed him and said, “I think I found the guy you want to talk to Sir,” she said, clearly proud of her ability to access a list of department heads on her computer screen.  “Okey-dokey, Joan”, God said cheerfully.  “Who runs that department?  The last one I remember was that Franklin fellow.  Is he still there?”

                “No, sir,” Joan replied promptly.  “Remember that you appointed him as just an interim manager after Tom Ryan, the guy who invented five-pin bowling, got into a fight and knocked some woman out when he hit her with a bowling ball.  You gave Ben Franklin the job because you’d just gotten your new bi-focals and wanted to let Ben know how much you appreciated his invention.”

                “Oh, that’s right,” God said, as he pushed his bi-focals up higher on his nose.  “These things are great.  They make reading much easier now.  I don’t get headaches the way I used to.  Is Franklin still there or did Ryan come back?”

                “No,  Ben only stayed a little while because he wanted to get back to his lab and Ryan kept hitting people with bowling balls so you didn’t think that set a good example for a department manager.  You appointed a new guy, some fellow named John Hopps. “

                “Oh, right, how on earth could I forget that?” God said.  He rubbed his chest and nodded ruefully.  He was having a bit of heart trouble a while back so had a pacemaker put in to set things right in the heart department.  He was so profoundly grateful for the existence of the pacemaker that he made this fellow Hopps department  manager after Franklin whined about not having enough lab time one too many times.

                “Could you connect me to Hopps, Joan?” God asked.  “There’s something I need him to look into.”

                “Sure thing, boss, “Joan replied and instantly rang through to the Department of Inventions.   Joan remembered with distate that Greta Garbo was the administrative assistant for that department and she always hated talking to her.  Joan could never understand what she was saying with her heavy Swedish accent and thought her to be aloof and cold.  However, she had to call the department.  When God requested something, you jumped to make it happen.

                Greta answered quickly and told her that God wanted to speak to John Hopps immediately, it was urgent.  God hadn’t told her that it was an urgent matter but Joan had been around long enough to know that bureaucracy could get in the way of even God’s request but making an urgent request would hasten the process considerably.  Joan heard Greta’s sharp intake of breath and in her low voice, she said “He’ll be on the line in a jiff.”

                As soon as Hopps answered the phone, Joan transferred the call to God and picked up the magazine she had been reading when God had buzzed her.  She was soon engrossed in reading an article in People about whether Brad and Angelina were about to split up. 

            “Hopps?” God asked, “Are you there?”

            “Yes, Sir, “ Hopps answered nervously.  “What can I do for you this fine day?”

            “I need to know who invented the flyswatter,” God replied.  “There’s some work I need to have done and I need it done sooner rather than later.  I want you to connect me to his extension.  I’ll wait while you find the number.”

            Hopps flipped through his departmental directory and found the name that God needed.  He pushed Dr. Samuel Crumbine’s three digit extension and when Crumbine answered, Hopps told him that God wanted to talk to him.  Crumbine was quite scared. He was a minor inventor who toiled in the dark recesses of his lab, just trying to stay out of the limelight.  Since he’d come here in 1954, nobody had much bothered him and he much preferred it that way.  He waited to hear the click on his phone line to tell him that God was right there, ready to talk to him.  He swallowed audibly and said, “Crumbine here, sir.  What can I do for you?”

            God hesitated because it had suddenly occurred to him that it was a rather unusual request.  But by golly, this fellow was certainly an irritant and he wanted the situation dealt with. He forged ahead and said to Dr. Crumbine, “Sam, how have you been?”

            Crumbine was surprised at God’s interest in how he was and didn’t quite know what to say so he sputtered, “Well, okay I suppose but my lower back has been acting up lately and my prostate surely isn’t what it used to be.”

            God cut him off so that he wouldn’t have to hear a litany of the man’s health complaints.  People did this to him all the time – what did they think he was – a doctor?  A nurse? Well, he wasn’t.  If they wanted a doctor, they should call Fred Banting, Hippocrates or maybe Florence Nightingale.  He wasn’t here to listen to people’s health complaints.  “Sorry about your troubles, Sam.  I need you to make something for me and I need it sooner rather than later.  I’ll need it by the end of the day. That work for you?”

            “No matter what it is, sir, I’ll work hard to get it to you at the end of the day,” Crumbine replied.  He hoped that whatever God wanted was easy to make because his back was bothering him and he had wanted to duck out a little early and use his heating pad as soon as he got home.

            “What I want, Sam is a flyswatter.”
           

            “But, Sir, Crumbine stammered. “I’ve already made one of those.  You could probably pick one up at any Wal-Mart or maybe even a Canadian Tire.”

            “I know that, Sam” God said, the tone in his voice suggesting that Crumbine best not treat him like an idiot.  “What I want is a big flyswatter, say one that’s about two feet wide so that when I use it, I’ll know I’ve swatted somebody but good.”

            Crumbine breathed a sigh of relief.  He had all the necessary materials in his lab to build it by the end of the business day.  “Any particular colour,” he asked, wanting to make sure the huge flyswatter would be made exactly to God’s specifications.  He heard through the grapevine that two poor saps named Jacob Davis and Levi Strauss messed up one of God’s requests and God had not been a happy deity.  Apparently, God requested some blue jeans because he was going to a country and western dance where his favourite singers Patsy Cline and Hank Snow were going to be performing. Strauss and Davis didn’t check the details with God and had his jeans ready to be picked up when God wanted them.  However, God wanted red jeans, not blue ones and so Levi and Strauss were sent packing.  No one knows where they were sent, they just disappeared and the rumour was that they were living somewhere pretty hot and humid and they’d never need to worry about blue jeans again.

            “Hmm,” God mused. “I’m thinking that a blue flyswatter would be good.  Maybe then it wouldn’t as conspicuous as yellow or white.  Yup, blue is what I want.”

            “Yes, sir,” replied Crumbine. “I think you’re right, blue would be less conspicuous,” even though he was secretly thinking that there was no way that a two foot wide flyswatter would be inconspicuous, no matter what colour it was.

            Crumbine turned to the task at hand and  within a couple of hours had the flyswatter ready to be picked up.  He called Greta and asked her to call Joan to let her know that he was available to run the flyswatter to God’s office if God wanted him to.  He was hoping he could deliver it because God’s office was near the front door and he wanted to slip out to go home. His back really was killing him.

            Crumbine got the go-ahead to deliver the flyswatter so packed up his briefcase and hurried over to God’s office.  He left it with Joan who praised him on the durability of the swatter and told him she thought God would be pleased with it.  Crumbine left for the day knowing he’d put in a good day’s work and wondered if he should grab a burger on his way home.

            God hefted the flyswatter and was very pleased with the inventor’s work.  He went into the executive washroom and carefully placed his blue three piece suit on a hanger on the hook on the back of the door.  He stood in his boxer shorts and closed his eyes and nodded once and was instantly changed into a 6’ housefly.  He looked into the mirror, saw himself as a fly and nodded.  He looked pretty good as a fly, even if he said so himself. 

            He closed his eyes, meditated for a moment and then transported himself to earth, which is where his biggest irritant was.  He’d asked Joan to check into this guy’s schedule and so found himself backstage at a concert hall in Toronto.  He was standing in the hall outside a dressing room.  He pushed open the door and the young man was sitting on a stool in front of a mirror, combing his hair.  God walked over to him, raised the flyswatter and smacked him on the top of his head.  “I don’t know what it is about you,” God said,  “but you irritate me to no end.  I just had to smack you and now I feel much better. I’ve got to get back to where I belong. There are wars and whatnot to sort out.”  He disappeared and Justin Bieber was rubbing the side of his head and crying when his manager came into the room and told him it was time for him to go onstage.