I started laughing uncontrollably today. But it was one of those things that shouldn’t really be funny. As I’m sure you know, the Pope died. Its a sad but expected loss. His health had been dwindling, and the whole world knew he was not long for this place. Over on CNN’s website, they’ve been running constant play-by-play coverage, as they do with just about every story. And this article appeared this morning, mile-long line for glimpse of pope.
And I started laughing.
When I was a kid, my family took a trip to Disney World, and my experience waiting in lines has never ever been the same. While we stood in line for tickets, and me being a huge fan of School House Rock, I started singing “Elbow Room” and jabbed some poor guy in the kidney while I was claiming my space in the name of Manifest Destiny. But that’s not really why I was laughing… It was all the signs they used to have at the various rides.
So I’m reading about the pope, and the mile-long line, and the first thing I imagine is the Louvre museum scene from the movie ‘Eurotrip’. I picture people standing in line, and a mime-robot is there trying to entertain the masses and earn money to feed his robot family. Then I see the first sign, “The wait from this point is [240] minutes.” And the numbers are those stick-on numbers so they can change the sign as needed. At the front of the line was a standee, which looked like an archbishop with his hand put out to his side about waist level, and a word bubble hung over his head, “You must be this tall to view the Pope.” From there the scene went crazy… women holding screaming kids, people placing their belongings into cubbies before going to view the Pope, people coming out the other door some saying it was the best viewing ever while others were trying to play off that they slept through the whole thing. Finally, I turn to my friends and say, “Screw this guys, he’ll still be dead later, this line blows, lets head over to Lenin’s tomb and come back here when the line dies down.”
Hours later, I’m still chuckling. Yes, I’m weird.