Senator also draws Newt Gingrich from memory, but life-like rendering makes little children cry.
INNESOTA SENATOR Al Franken received a call in the middle of the night yesterday by a member of the Nobel Committee in Norway to congratulate the senator for his "remarkable, and some would say, geeky, skill" of being able to draw an uncannily accurate map of the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii, completely from memory.
The Senator, speaking before a bank of microphones outside his D.C. apartment, said to reporters, "I don't feel that I'm deserving of this honorary award in the same way that, say, Nelson Mandela is for being able to recite from memory the Encyclopedia Britannica from 'Aardvark' to 'Dysentery'; or the Dalai Lama is for being able to play the entire score of Les Miserables on piano while blindfolded and meditating.
"But I take this honor as a call to action, and I will try to live up to the Nobel standards of excellence by being able to draw the entire planet from memory by 2012. That is my promise to the world. If the world is listening. Otherwise, it's just my promise in general."
The Nobel Committee is said to have had numerous possible candidates for the surprise honorary award, but finally settled on Senator Franken because, as the text of the award reads, "Senator Franken is also hilariously funny, and if his map memory should ever fail him, he will still be able to 'draw' large crowds, ha-ha."
Two of the names leaked as possible candidates for the honorary award were Lindsay Lohan for her "extraordinary courage in walking the runway immediately after her collection" and Michael Jackson for "continuing to make music, despite his autopsy."
© 10.13.09 Kate Heidel
