#187: Perqatory

Arthur Trope Presents: The Inscrutables

No. 187

“Perqatory”

Finally heard from Artie. His connection in London ran into mechanical problems, so his layover stretched into eight hours. Then the delay caused the crew to go into overtime, so they had to find a new crew which caused another delay. There’s nothing worse than sitting in an airport all day after you’ve just gotten off a long-haul. It’s its own form of hell. Or Purgatory. But I guess it was ok bc Artie managed to talk himself into Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class Lounge where it sounds like he gorged himself on shrimp cocktails & various other types of cocktails, & got himself a mani-pedi while he was at it, bc apparently you can do that in there. He said got seated in a chair next to David Attenborough and chatted him up about giant sea turtles and vampire squid, and man did that guy need a pedi. There were some other celebrities he said but couldn’t quite place them. Maybe Artie had a million frequent flier miles to spare, but I suspect he came up with this panel just so he could expense the lounge visit. I don’t know how well this one fits Slothrop’s globalization directive, but everyone can probably empathize with travel issues. But Artie said it’s like a different world in the lounge & he never wants to come back to this one. But I guess he managed to pull himself away & catch his flight, bc he finally made it to Mumbai and he reports that the meetings have been promising. I’ve been skeptical tbh, but there may be a Bollywood version of Miss 4th of July *and* an animated version of Gus the culturally-insensitive, alt-country, cat from Cats coming soon to a theatre near you. If you live in India. -Ed.