Partners of a miracle – MK

Explosion

In Severodvinsk, during the tests, when the first explosion was made, we were taken inland, away from the sea, ordered to lie down in the pits and cover ourselves with overcoats. And that’s it. No other protection. I saw a flash through my eyelids with my eyes closed. Those who did not lie down in the recess were thrown back by the blast. The dogs – they were put up on observation towers instead of people – were burned on their sides, turned towards the explosion. Well, dead fish surfaced – not to describe. Birds died … Sometimes we went hunting, at random you shoot up – the dead one falls. And then they pulled it out together. The fish caught were tested for radiation and dumped back into the sea. And then they began to burn it on the shore so that the rest would not be poisoned. We, the sailors, miraculously survived, were sent home in coal holds. They arrived black as blacks.

Ax in blood

In a provincial town I come to the district committee. It is necessary for the arrived correspondent to report to the district committee. I walk like Stirlitz through the deserted Gestapo corridors. Not a soul. What’s happened? All at the front or at the sowing season? And then from the basement – a healthy shaggy man. Hands covered in blood and… an axe. I backed off. In my brain: instructors and heads of departments are hacked to death. Now it’s my turn. And he: “Ugh, worked it out … Meat was brought from the village. Hanging in a holiday order … “. And he bent down, instead of a soiled hand, he holds out his shoulder for a shake. Kafkaesque painting. Bosch freaks. Pieter-Brueghel visions.

Caviar without bread

Did an essay. About the Ikryansky district, near Astrakhan. The director and the party organizer, grated rolls, were taken to the red corner, to Lenin’s corner … Life consisted of continuous corners: military glory in schools, satire and humor in the newspapers … A joke circulated: “What is between Krupskaya’s legs? Corner of Lenin. Then they took me to the island: “Look how ordinary fishermen live…”. They ripped open three sturgeons, dumped caviar into bowls. Salted with large crystals. I hawal. From the belly. To nausea. Unrefined. Raw. With films. They didn’t give me bread. And you can’t eat a lot of caviar without bread.

Yeltsin and Chubais

First of all, he brought a cat to the country house. Red. He named him Chubais. Then he bred the sheep. I bought a healthy male stud and two ewes. Soon there were more than twenty of them. The manufacturer worked like a non-stop piston. Well, he looks like: a cloudy look, a majestic posture, the charisma of the leader. I named him Yeltsin. When the sheep trampled and ate the surrounding fields, they hinted to me: we need to get rid of them. I decided to start with Yeltsin. He invited a carver from the village, he came and sharpened the knives. I held my pet by the legs. The invitee fiddled for a long time, and having coped, he shouted: “That’s it, they slaughtered Yeltsin!”

I could not imagine what resonance his exclamation would produce. An hour later, a neighbor looked in: “I heard that the communists in the Kremlin stabbed Yeltsin to death?” I was taken aback, I did not connect the news with the liquidation of the ram. The neighbor continued: “Yes, yes, it was broadcast on the radio. She heard screams…”

Then I realized what was the matter. And I thought: “Well, Chubais is alive …”.

Shortage to help

Deficiency contributed to the disguise of indiscretions. My friend got scarce men’s things and, when she came off to her lover, then gave them to her husband and explained her absence by standing in line for them for a long time. The husband was pleased with her care. Suddenly, the lover’s wife covered a couple, arranged a benz, it came to assault. The lady who covered up her sins by standing in lines for shortages returned home with a bruised face. And again she explained to her foolish husband that she suffered because she got into a fight, getting a gift for him. Once again he was touched, touched, grateful …

Disco

From the very beginning they explained to him how to behave at the opening of this disco. I had to introduce myself to the invited American correspondents as a student. And he says: “I am the head of the agitation and propaganda department.” They have eyes on their foreheads: that is, everything is under supervision again ?! We tell him: “They warned you: you are a student at the Institute of Steel and Alloys.” And he said: “I’m not ashamed that the Komsomol is the organizer of everything advanced.” The next day we read their newspaper: “Opposite the KGB building, under the control of the Komsomol, a youth disco was opened.”

State security on guard

Did the employees of the State Security Committee use their official position? A rhetorical question! Our tour group was given a spy to oversee our behavior and signal non-compliance with the moral code. This man took his mistress on a trip, settled in a room with her; and the group had an equal number of men and women; the rooms were supposed to be double rooms, respectively, we huddled together, but were afraid to utter a word – after all, the guardian of morals had to write a report, he could attribute seven deadly sins … But he had no time for anyone, not for work and surveillance, – he completely immersed himself in intimacy with his thief .

Encore bottle

In the store, an old man with a drunken, long-unshaven face attracted attention. He was trembling, his body, covered with tattered clothes, shook, restless trembling fingers ran over the buttons of a red and yellow striped shirt, he twitched all over, as if electric discharges were passed through him. A crumpled ruble fluttered in trembling hands.

Two guys came in, one of them nodded at the old man:

Here’s our third one.

The old man ingratiatingly podsemenil to them. They made simple machinations, which consisted of clapping in their pockets, pulling out rubles and change, and silently moving their lips, together with their eyes raised to the ceiling, this meant counting and scraping up the required amount. One of the guys went to the cash register, the old man jogged into the line in the wine department. I was next to him. The guy brought the check. The old man twitched even more convulsively. As he approached the counter, the excitement reached its climax. Hands were shaking, fluttering. He took a bottle from the saleswoman… And as soon as he took a step, the bottle flew out of his thrashing hands and shattered on the floor with a ringing crunch.

The old man froze, his lower jaw fell off, he looked as if not a bottle had escaped and broken, but his own life. The guys, ready to grind it into powder, looked for a long time at the fragments, shining brilliantly in a puddle of precious drink, at the culprit and loudly repeated: “Mother!” – after which they frantically left the store.

Buyers overcame their stupor, the marketplace returned to everyday life. Lines moved, sellers began to fuss. I handed the check to the saleswoman who bought the old man. She gave me a quarter. With a habitual movement, I slipped it into the inside pocket of my jacket and released it. And I felt (and heard!) – slipping over my chest, stomach, leg, hit the floor …

The store was closed again. You don’t see that kind of “encore” repetition very often. But – a miracle! The quarter, whole and unharmed, stood on the tiled floor like a proud queen. I was afraid to touch it – it would suddenly fall off, the bottom would bounce off. Didn’t bounce.

The crowd roared in admiration.

“It’s all right,” the old man said soothingly, seemingly addressing me and the sympathetic fans, but in fact comforting himself with the hope of an accomplice in a miracle.

Same rights

I didn’t sleep well the night before the operation. A third patient was brought to the ward, where my loneliness was shared by a snorer-neighbor, a boy with a damaged spine. He drank at home with friends. Fooling around, someone threw his shoe out the window, he dived in after him. And he got off cheaply, although the prospect of remaining bedridden forever loomed before him.

At first the boy moaned, then he began to vomit. Within an hour, he vomited half the ward’s stinking mass of alcohol.

I sat on a computer chair with wheels and went to look for medical staff. Wandering, I found two nurses in the ward of convalescent officers brought from Chechnya. This four drank alcohol and played cards. They told me to get away. I insisted:

– Put in the corridor to vomit, and only then in the ward.

“Everyone has the same rights,” said one of the sisters, blond and impudent. You are sick and he is injured. Has the right to lie in the ward.

“But don’t puke drunk,” I said. – Kindly clean the room. I have surgery tomorrow, I have to rest.

“We’re not cleaners,” said the second.

“We’ll take and reschedule your operation,” her friend threatened.

The officers no longer intervened.

“All right,” I said. – How to call the doctor on duty?

They were silent.

I went to the empty console and began to call the emergency room. They didn’t pick up the phone there. I called the reception of the head physician and the operating room. They answered: the surgeon on duty will be free in two hours.

Here come the girlfriends. They rolled the puking guy out into the corridor. They removed the linens from the clean beds and blotted his vomit.

The cleanliness in the hospital was monitored by the inhabitants of a nearby boarding school for persons with developmental delays. The girl who came in the morning to wash the ward looked to be fourteen years old, in reality she was twenty-four, and the level of thinking was preschool. I gave her a steward.

“Okay, I’ll buy a cake,” she was delighted. – My birthday is coming. It is forbidden to take food out of here. And you can have a cake.