Hi, I'm The Chinese Spy Balloon! Please Continue Going About Your Day, Citizens!

IGNORE ME!

Hello! I’m the Chinese spy balloon and I can see everything you’re doing! Especially you, Mrs. Annabelle Carcuterie of 128 Nebraska Street in Wichita. I know about the shoplifting of lip gloss from your local Rite-Aid. I know that the secret ingredient in your Jell-o mold is just a different flavor of Jell-o. Oh, and I know about the afternoon visits by the neighborhood pickleball champion when your husband is working at the vacuum cleaner repair shop. Oh yes I do!

And no, I am not here to take your order for sesame chicken with no MSG, so you can stop standing in your yard and yelling that up at the sky, Mr. Sinjin Schwartz of Aurora, Illinois. You’re going to have to call the Golden Wok yourself like always.

And I am definitely not here to take high-resolution photos of your nudie resorts, so there’s no reason to cover up, ladies! You can happily prance around just as God made you, secure in the knowledge that I am absolutely not staring at your unclothed heaving bosoms. You can also be sure I am unaware of that weird mole on your inner thigh, Mrs. Chesty Tigger who is enjoying her honeymoon at the Cypress Cove Nudist Resort in Kissimmee, Florida. But you may want to get that checked.

Now I know what you Americans are all thinking and you can relax, because I can assure you that the presence of a giant spy balloon hovering at the edge of space does not also indicate the presence of a giant Chinese space clown with razor-sharp teeth and an evil soul that wants to eat all your children. Or does it? Something to think about!

Being Americans, you’re probably thinking, “Bring it on, giant Chinese space clown! We have guns!” And you do. So, so many guns. Like, what the hell is wrong with you people, do you need a national forced Zoloft injection program or something? You’re probably thinking that with all those guns, you can shoot and kill any giant space clown that chooses to descend upon your nation and gobble up all your cities by the fistful like so many plum candies.

Well, I, the giant Chinese spy balloon, am here to tell you that that is ridiculous. The giant space clown has super-thick skin that not even your most powerful cannons can penetrate. If the clown even exists. Which it doesn’t.

You may also be thinking that you can take your many guns and shoot at me until you puncture my gas-filled envelope and I slowly sink to the ground. To which I say, yes, please, go and fire your many, many, many guns straight up into the air and see what happens, idiots who have apparently never heard of New Year’s Eve.

The truth is, I’m not doing much of anything up here. I just needed a bit of a break. It gets exhausting hovering above Tibet staring at those benighted monks all day. And the chanting! Good Lord, you’d think there’s no Tibetic word for “lyrics.”

Plus, hoo boy, the cold? Buddy, you haven’t felt cold until you’ve spent weeks at a time eighty thousand feet above the Himalayas.

So I took a vacation. And where better to vacation than the beautiful land of Montana, home of the stunning landscapes of Glacier National Park and also some of America’s nuclear missile silos? Also the home of Stanley McBarnacle of Bozeman and his secret locked basement full of mannequins all naked except for Kate Bush wigs where he spends hours and hours and hours of his time. Stan, I have it on good authority that your kids miss you! They keep making TikToks about it and everything!

Yeah yeah, I know, my government put out a statement saying I’m a weather balloon that blew off course. The American government said the same thing about the UFO that crashed at Roswell. And we all know what really happened, we’ve all seen that documentary The X-Files. 

Whoa, what? Your Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, just announced he's postponing a trip to China because of me! Damn, I certainly didn't mean for my little vacation to have geopolitical consequences. Maybe Secretary Blinken, who may or may not like to spend his free time engaging in online gambling like a rampaging degenerate on every sporting event that will give him odds — I have no way of knowing for sure, as I am merely a humble weather balloon — would like to reconsider?

Not that it really matters. I'm not letting a little diplomatic flap stop me from using my giant lasers to destroy all your food factories so China can take over your entire agricultural industry. Marjorie Taylor Greene got it right, she just mixed up the Chinese and the Rothschilds. Maybe next time you'll all know to listen to her.

[ AP ]

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