{"id":87,"date":"2022-09-05T06:53:48","date_gmt":"2022-09-05T06:53:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/?p=87"},"modified":"2022-09-05T09:32:05","modified_gmt":"2022-09-05T09:32:05","slug":"the-presidents-t-shirts-are-missing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/?p=87","title":{"rendered":"The president\u2019s T-shirts are missing!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Vlodymyr Zelensky opened the left hand door to his wardrobe. It was the side which he reserved for his work clothes; the right hand side contained leisure clothes and clothes for social occasions. It was all work and no play for Zelensky these days and so he seldom opened the right hand side. He blinked twice, scratched his head and then grabbed some empty hangers, as if some clothes might magically appear between his fingers. He looked on the floor of the wardrobe but nothing was there. He was already running late for what was possibly the most important appointment of his presidency and this inexplicable mystery was vexing him.<\/p>\n

Zelensky\u2019s green T-shirts had all disappeared.<\/p>\n

You could be forgiven for believing that Zelensky has only one green T-shirt. They are, admittedly, all very similar but the more observant will have noticed subtle little nuances. Some have a small cross on one side, some are a slightly different pigment of green and some have a cheeky little zip on the left arm. In actual fact he has forty-nine of them: Seven different styles and seven for each day of the week \u2013 just in case he wants the same style for the whole week. His maids wash and iron the T-shirts everyday but they are never all in the wash at the same time. So how could this be? Not one single green T-shirt was to be seen in the wardrobe.<\/p>\n

\u201cANICHKA!\u201d<\/p>\n

His bellow seemed to rattle the entire presidential palace. Anichka, however, was not so easily rattled and she walked into the room rather nonchalantly for what sounded like a life and death situation. Anichka had been a maid to the great and the good for almost forty years and it was not the first time she had seen a president in his underpants. She had seen it all.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes Sir,\u201d she answered calmly.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere are all my green T-shirts?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the wardrobe.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, they are not. See for yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zelensky gestured to the empty hangers in the wardrobe.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know then,\u201d said Anichka, rather indifferently as she shrugged her shoulders.<\/p>\n

Anichka had only been working at the palace for two days and Zelensky had already had enough of her. She didn\u2019t seem to have the same respect as the other maids from the agency had and he was sure from her accent and her abrupt manner that she was of Russian descent. He was deeply suspicious of her.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease realise the urgency of this,\u201d replied Zelensky. \u201cI am meeting with Bruce Willis this morning! Do you know who Bruce Willis is?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course. He used to be an actor but now he\u2019s gone senile,\u201d said Anichka, matter-of-factly.<\/p>\n

\u201cHave some respect!\u201d shouted Zelensky, angrily. \u201cBruce Willis is a living legend! He is a genius of the big screen. His transition from the wise-cracking private detective in the T.V. series Moonlighting<\/em> to the macho action-man in the Die Hard<\/em> movies was inspirational. Just like me, he can be both a comedian and a hero.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was a silent pause for a few seconds and then Zelensky suddenly switched into character and fixed a surly Bruce Willis frown at Anichka.<\/p>\n

“Does it sound like I’m ordering a Pizza?” he growled.<\/p>\n

Anichka was unaware that the line was from the first Die Hard<\/em> movie and she looked slightly bewildered. Zelensky chuckled as his performance momentarily allowed him to escape from the urgency of the matter in hand. \u201c…but it\u2019s not only action and comedy that he does,” he added. “Some of the best scenes in Pulp Fiction<\/em> are close ups of him just looking into the camera….thinking…\u201d<\/p>\n

Zelensky seemed to go into a trance as he said the words. Anichka was uncertain whether it was another impersonation of Bruce Willis or if he was mesmerised at the mere thought of his hero. Anichka cleared her throat.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, he was quite good, wasn\u2019t he?\u201d she replied, damning the Hollywood legend with faint praise. She walked over to the wardrobe and opened a small drawer inside it which was packed with white vests. \u201cHow about you wear one of these? They are just like the one he wore in the Die Hard<\/em> movies. It would be a very fitting way to honour your hero,\u201d she said, in what seemed to be a sardonic tone.<\/p>\n

Zelensky went red in the face. He really wasn\u2019t sure whether Anichka was taking the mickey or whether she was just stupid.<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t be ridiculous! A white vest would be completely inappropriate. The green T-shirt is more than just a showbiz gimmick. It is a symbol of my solidarity with the ordinary people of Ukraine and our brave soldiers. It is a sign I share their hardship. It is the image I choose to deliver my political message to the world. The green T-shirt is a metaphor…for freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was a pause of silence again as Zelensky imagined a close up shot of his own \u2018thinking\u2019 face.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got it!\u201d exclaimed Anichka. She was now getting into the spirit of things a little more and seemed like she was genuinely trying to resolve what was clearly a national emergency. \u201cOrganise your booster vaccination for this morning and wear a button-up shirt, just like you did for the last one. That way you can remove the shirt for the nurse to inject you while Mr. Willis is there and you can show the world your manly bare chest again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anichka was appealing to Zelensky\u2019s vanity and she was beginning to win him over. It wasn\u2019t as daft as it sounded. The publicity stunt she was referring to was a huge success when he did it last time and his vaccination video was shared on social media thousands of times. No-one thought to ask why he was not wearing his regular T-shirt or for that matter why he didn\u2019t simply roll up his sleeve. They were just happy to see their hero show off his bare chest. It would actually work even better if Bruce Willis was present \u2013 in fact it would be a brilliant way to promote the vaccines and the two tough guys could laugh and chat with each other while the medical procedure was taking place.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t think it will look a little contrived?\u201d he asked Anichka, somewhat naively.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course not \u2013 the people will love it. And I\u2019m sure Bruce Willis will understand, as he is a macho actor too. Practically every action film he\u2019s been in there has been some silly excuse for him to take his top off.\u201d<\/p>\n

She was beginning to sound very convincing and Zelensky was quite impressed with her problem solving abilities. She was now acting more like a shrewd political advisor rather than a silly maid who had lost all his T-shirts.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut what about after the vaccination?\u201d asked Zelensky. \u201cI\u2019d have to put the shirt back on again and the cameras would still be rolling. The formal look is really not the right image for me, especially when I\u2019m entertaining Bruce Willis.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLeave it off then. That\u2019s what they would do in the movies. It doesn\u2019t have to make sense \u2013 it\u2019s just show business. Perhaps you could even invite him to go bare back horse riding with you afterwards.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anichka kicked herself for blurting out that last sentence. She knew a Putin reference would not go down well with Zelensky, even if it was said in good jest. Sometimes her dry sense of humour got the better of her. Zelensky\u2019s suspicions about Anichka returned immediately. He was now convinced that she was mocking him rather than trying to help. She was probably working for the Russians and had hidden all his T-shirts to spoil his image and sabotage his relationship with the Ukrainian people.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow dare you compare me to that disgusting Russian ape?\u201d Zelensky spat out his words as though he had just been fed poison. \u201cI never should have trusted you. I\u2019m sure you know exactly where my T-shirts are and I will get the truth out of you…\u201d<\/p>\n

What ensued was not exactly an evenly balanced contest, even if the two of them were about the same height. The slightly built, fifty-five year old Anichka was a tough old cookie but she knew that she was overpowered by the lean and muscular Zelensky. Nevertheless, forcing a grown woman down two flights of stairs, out into the street and then gaffer taping her to a lamppost can be a messy business even for a reasonably strong man. Anichka was now at Zelensky\u2019s mercy but the bruised and mauled president could not help wondering if Bruce Willis would have done a tidier job.<\/p>\n

Zelensky was holding a piece of corrugated cardboard with the words \u201cRUSSIAN SPY\u201d written on it in black marker pen. \u201cOkay,\u201d he said, coldly. \u201cI\u2019ll give you just one chance to tell me where my T-shirts are and if you refuse then I will tape this sign to the lamppost and leave you here for the wolves.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTry the right hand side of the wardrobe,\u201d the defeated Anichka whispered breathlessly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vlodymyr Zelensky opened the left hand door to his wardrobe. It was the side which he reserved for his work clothes; the right hand side contained leisure clothes and clothes for social occasions. It was all work and no play for Zelensky these days and so he seldom opened the right hand side. He blinked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-7"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=87"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87\/revisions\/98"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=87"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=87"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsubnormal.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=87"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}