Bird Poo Flu and the Pink Sombrero

No matter how many times he saw those things, he never got used to them. He blamed them for his adult-onset Tourette’s syndrome, which tended to flare up at the most inopportune times: at shops, at bars, and at job interviews. Those things — those obnoxious cranial accessories — came to represent everything that was wrong with the world. They were symbols of deception and propaganda, giant beacons of a collective aversion to critical thinking, and ubiquitous reminders of a blind compliance to authority. Those oversized, obnoxiously garish monstrosities had single-handedly transformed a once-functional member of society into an Underground Man: a venomous, misanthropic recluse. They were cumbersome. They were pink. And they housed zombie brains.

As he walked east on Na Gark Lane, he saw them everywhere. On men and women. On fruit sellers and street sweepers. On bank tellers and babies. A city bus passed on his right; the common people were packed in tight, each of the riders adorned with one of them. His adult-onset Tourette’s syndrome bubbled to the surface. “Damn you pink sombreros!”

It had all started about three years ago. The media had begun reporting that a virulent new form of bird shit was coming from some birds in Asia. Videos had emerged of bird shit falling from the sky and landing on the heads and shoulders of unsuspecting citizens. The victims fell to the ground like sacks of white rice dropped from a low-flying cargo plane. Footage had shown laundromats packed with panicked people trying to remove bird poo stains from their clothing. An attractive shampoo model had gone on television and stated that bird shit had caused her hair to fall out, rendering her bald. A famous footballer had revealed that he couldn’t leave his bed after bird shit landed on his foot.

In response to the bird shit epidemic (dubbed Bird Poo Flu), the brightest minds went to work on solving the crisis. Experts ranging from rap stars to social media influencers weighed in on the matter, with the consensus being that nobody should leave their house.

Lockdowns were imposed around the globe. Schools were shut down. Churches were boarded up. People who dared to leave their homes were vilified in their communities and hunted by law enforcement officers. Many faced severe punishments, and scores were even executed publicly. Famous celebrities implored people to stay inside their homes. Hip hop stars, capitalizing on the fact that ‘poo’ rhymed with ‘flu,’ cranked out some lit songs with some bangin’ beats.

At some point during the lockdowns, an emergency decree was passed allowing people to leave their houses if, and only if, they wore a pink sombrero. Late night television’s top comedic pundits helped promote the agenda, donning pink sombreros and, as a gag, pink condoms on their flaccid penises.

The experts unanimously agreed that, due to the potential burden facing laundromats, everybody needed to wear a pink sombrero. Everybody needed to do his part to ‘flatten the laundry list.’ The politicians heeded the advice of the scientific community, and mandates were put in place requiring every man, woman, and child to wear a pink sombrero. Those pink hats were required for just about everything in the early days, and those who did not adhere to the mandates risked severe repercussions.

Airplanes became a battleground for pink sombrero usage, with critics saying that the hats were too large and cumbersome to be comfortably worn for long flights. They further maintained that there was little to no chance of a person getting pooped on while aboard a flying airplane. But the pro-hatters fought back, arguing that the planes were in the air and that birds were also in the air.

“If we are in the air with the birds, there is an even greater need for pink sombreros,” they insisted.

Despite some protestations, airline pilots were also required to wear pink sombreros; they faced disciplinary measures if they failed to comply. But they weren’t the only ones. Almost all industries required the wearing of pink sombreros, with narrow exceptions being carved out for occupations in which the employees already wore protective head coverings (for example American football and welding).

As days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, a vociferous group of anti-hatters emerged: outspoken dissidents who argued in favor of personal liberty and freedom. Social media was replete with examples of people trying to walk into shops and restaurants with a sombrero hanging off of their head, on their back, held in place only by a string around their neck.

“Put your pink sombrero on!” said a security guard to one particular anti-hatter.

The customer pointed to his pink hat. “I got it right here.”

“Put in on properly!”

“I’m inside. I’m safe from bird poo flu in here.”

“Hey moron! You think birds can’t come in through the door? They can fly over the bird detection devices. It happens all the time.”

A line was drawn in the sand, separating the pro-hatters from the anti-hatters. Families were divided. Holidays were ruined. Marriages were destroyed. As the divide deepened, some even began to lobby for a mandate for pink condoms on flaccid penises.

Over time, however, the anti-hatters began to gain momentum. More and more people became aware of some of the problematic aspects of the pink sombrero mandates. For one thing, the pink sombreros didn’t protect people’s arms and hands. Furthermore, people were vulnerable when seated or, even worse, lying down at the beach.

Viral videos were posted to social media of prominent politicians relaxing at the beach, their giant distended bellies and grotesquely enormous asses naked and exposed to the Bird Poo Flu. Another video purported to show famous celebrities engaged in a poolside orgy — with nary a pink sombrero in sight.

About a year after the outbreak of the Bird Poo Flu, leaked documents appeared to indicate that the ‘Bird Poo Flu’ was little more than an elaborate hoax. Apparently, the original videos that had come out of Asia were pranks recorded by a counter-culture sect of North Korean rabble rousers. In subsequent days, prominent statisticians published findings which revealed that Bird Poo Flu was, in fact, no more dangerous and no more prevalent than regular everyday bird poo.

As a result of the findings, the anti-hatters became emboldened. They brazenly ignored sombrero mandates. Some viral videos showed huge numbers of citizens burning their pink sombreros in bonfires. Around the same time, the pro-hatters lost momentum, with many of their members crawling into hiding as their house of lies crumbled like a stale pink cookie. Millions of hatters changed their social media photos to a hatless pic. With little to no fanfare, they logged in to their social media accounts and deleted their pro-sombrero posts in an effort to distance themselves from their insane opinions.

Eventually, life went back to something resembling normal. Airline pilots could, once again, fly airplanes without donning a pink sombrero. Teachers, even bald teachers, could conduct their lessons with an uncovered head. Infants could suck on their mothers’ teats without being forced to wear giant pink hats. Ah, life was resembling a Norman Rockwell painting once again.

However, the return to normalcy was not uniform around the globe. Tragically, there were pockets of the world in which the seeds of programming had been planted so deep into people’s reptile brains; regions of Earth in which the magic potion of sombrero cultism had seeped so deep into the collective bloodstream; that no amount of logic could convince them to remove the pink sombreros from their heads. As fate would have it, he lived in one of these pockets.

His neighbors’ woke up every day and ate a breakfast of compliance rice soup topped with cognitive dissonance spice and a side of blissful ignorance. Regardless of what information they were presented with, they stubbornly refused to waiver from their position.

“It turns out the whole thing was nothing but a prank,” he said to a friend as they drove in a car.

“I don’t like to wear, but we have to wear,” replied the friend.

“The government said that we don’t have to wear them in cars.”

“Oh, but I want to be safe,” said the friend, leaning forward and peering out past the hat’s pink rim into the fluffy white clouds that lay beyond the car’s windshield.

“But it turns out the whole thing was nothing but a prank,” he repeated.

“I don’t like to wear, but we have to wear.”

And so the cycle repeated. On and on. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year. After five years of Groundhog Day, he reached the end of his rope. He got to the point were the mere thought of interacting with the zombie class terrified him. After hiding in an underground lair for months, only crawling out of his dungeon on rare occasions to procure the bare necessities, he hatched a plan. He gave away all his possessions sans some essentials. Included in his remaining possessions were a passport and a sombrero.

“Take me to the airport,” he ordered as he slid into the backseat of a taxi.

The taxi driver glanced at him in the rear view mirror. “That’s a nice sombrero you got there.”

“Thanks.”

He exited the taxi and entered the airport. It was crawling with pink sombreros, each of them hatching demonic eggs into the rotting zombie brains. If he never saw another one of those damn things, it would be too soon.

With his lone carry-on bag over his shoulder, he humped through the line toward the security checkpoint and, when it was his turn, he threw his bag onto the conveyor belt.

“Your sombrero, sir,” said a security guard.

“Yeah? What about it?” he replied.

“It — it’s not pink.” The security guard’s mouth fell open.

“Yeah, I know.”

“It’s black.” The security guard put her hands to her mouth.

“So what?”

“It’s just that we…” Apparently never having encountered this scenario before, she struggled to find the words. “We require a pink sombrero at this airport.”

“Well, I don’t have a pink sombrero.” He squinted his eyes. “I got a black sombrero.”

The security guard whispered something to a co-worker before turning to the wannabe passenger. “Well, we can find you a pink one, sir. No problem.”

“I don’t want a pink one!”

“Is there a problem here?” A second security guard appeared, this one larger and meaner.

“This gentleman doesn’t want to wear a pink sombrero,” said the first security guard.

The large, mean security guard grinned sadistically. “Oh, he’s gonna put on a pink sombrero.”

Someone handed the mean guard a pink hat. Holding the hat in one hand, he raised the other one and closed in on the recalcitrant wannabe traveler. “Easy, buddy. We’re just gonna swap out hats.”

“I don’t want a pink sombrero!”

Wham! A third security officer tackled him from behind, sending his black hat flying through the air. The three guards struggled with him on the floor, making every effort to fit him with the pink hat.

“I don’t want a pink sombrero!” he said as the guards pulled the string from the pink hat up against his neck. “I don’t want a pink sombrero!” He screamed as his neck was pulled back by the hat’s string in an action reminiscent of the camel clutch, a wrestling move made famous by the Iron Sheik.

“Oh, you gonna wear this pink hat, right here” said the mean security guard, sitting on the man’s back and pulling on the hat’s string with all his might.

As blood dripped from his mouth, he produced his final sound on this Earth.

“You gonna wear this pink hat, dammit. You gonna — ”

“Get off him. He’s not responding.”

The security guards rose to their feet and backed away, contemplating their next move, their eyes fixed upon the unresponsive wannabe traveler.

“There’s nothing to see here,” the mean security guard announced to the shocked onlookers as he motioned with his hands. He turned to a co-worker and whispered, “Call a medic.” He knelt down, placed two fingers under the man’s jaw, and placed the pink hat over the victim’s colorless face.

An onlooker removed his pink sombrero and bowed his head.