I am getting more than a little tired of this pandemic and I’m afraid it’s starting to show.   I was laughing for all the wrong reasons as news bulletins can’t decide if the North Korean dictator has drawn his last breath.  Or not.

Kim Jong Un is dead.  Or maybe just really sick.  Or mildly ill.  Or hiding from the Covid-19 pandemic at an elite resort on the eastern side of a country that claims to have no virus cases whatsoever.

The media has conjectured about the little rocket man for nearly a month.  Originally he was only oddly missing but there was no proof of this. Then someone supposed he was ill, hedging their bet by admitting that information from North Korea is hard to come by.  The President said he hoped LRM wasn’t ill and had received a nice note from him.

Less than a week ago, the New York Post said he was dead.  The story reported that a stent procedure went south because the surgeon’s hands were shaking.  It did seem a little odd that in a country with very few forthcoming details, the shaking hands ingredient had made a break for it and gotten around the world. The Post lamented that getting information from North Korea is like pulling teeth.

We were then subjected to numerous stories about Little Rocket Sister—who they say is a likely successor as soon as they bury her brother.  But of course finding the actual truth is, well, difficult.

In a very short time, Kim Jong Rocket had risen, shuffling up the mortal coil to arrive successfully at gravely ill again.  

I’ve seen this show before.  In Monty Python’s stage musical Spamalot,  Not Dead Fred insists that he’s alive as they toss him onto a cart full of plague victims.  The new North Korean hit of the season is Rocket Man: Only A Little Dead!

In today’s brave new world, honest information is scarce as hens’ teeth.

The most recent news is that someone (I’ve given up on who said what) spotted the dictator’s private train at a resort. Someone else postulated that his procedure was
minor, that his condition was serious yet not fatal. 

I suspect that by next Monday, he’ll be perfectly all right.