Wonderful story about those Zwolle cardiologists who were their own landlords without the local Isala hospital knowing. And do I also understand that in that region all heart patients have a box in their chest because those same doctors had a fat contract with a German pacemaker farmer? So at the slightest rustle you got an implant. Even if your heart beat a little faster because of a desperate crush.
And why? Money of course. You have to ski and the house on the French south coast is also not free and do you know what an evening of gnawing in the local inn De Librije costs? In the old days, the doctor made people better. Especially himself now.
How will that have gone on Friday evening during the football match between the Netherlands and Argentina? I hope that all faster beating football hearts around Zwolle have made it. I have no idea who won, because I’m writing this piece while everyone is still guessing. Some say Argentina wins because it’s the holy Messi’s last chance to become world champions, while others point out to me that good old Daley Blind will eat the shit out of the mat to stay in the tournament. How it ended? You know now. Me too.
It is special that no one actually talks about the charnel grounds in the stadiums anymore. Nobody talks about the dead slaves anymore. Nor about the injured boys, who have been thrown off a scaffolding and can never walk again. It is about the faith of Gakpo and Depay, who sleep with a bible under their pillow. Depay puts his fingers in his ears after a goal because he doesn’t want to listen to anyone but God. And his agent, of course. Perhaps it is an idea to put his hands over his eyes to indicate that he does not see what is actually happening in Qatar.
Although, according to our Singer Laureate Gordon, that’s not too bad. And because we have misbehaved en masse in Suriname, Indonesia and South Africa in the past, we now have no right to point our stubborn finger at Qatar and the surrounding area. This raged the false singer at the EO at a talk show table, whereupon a nice lady, who was also a guest, simply left and went home. Immediately afterwards, the discussion was not about Gordon’s disfiguring opinion, but about whether you can leave a claptrap program like On 1. Or do you have to swallow Gordon’s three kilos of bullshit for another half hour? What’s worse: playing football in a slave cemetery or insulting Gordon, who is the only one who always laughs out loud at his own jokes?
Who also had to laugh out loud this week was a clumsy drawing of Anne Frank on a cozy Amsterdam bowl. The murdered girl proudly and cheerfully held her diary. The potter has now taken the bowls off the market and they are going to transfer a little money to charity. Before such a bowl is in the store, it goes through many hands and is it viewed by several eyes? And is there no one who thinks: this is a bit distasteful and inappropriate? So no. Just like with that Jumbo commercial with that construction workers polonaise. In this case the potter is called Blond and rarely has a small company lived up to its own name.
As long as groups of German neo-Nazis still have plans to storm the Bundestag with great violence, I would not make Anne Frank laugh happily. And certainly not with her diary clutched to her.
A man comes to the doctor and tells about his depression caused by all the misery in the world. Hunger, war, refugees, frightened children, corrupt football administrators, the climate, in short: the total destruction of our planet. Consequence? Sleepless nights and severe heart rhythm disturbances.
The doctor listens. First to the patient, then to his tick. The conclusion was quickly drawn. The patient is fitted with a pacemaker. He wants the same model as Daley Blind.
A version of this article also appeared in the December 10, 2022 newspaper