As she lay upon her sofa, gasping, Florence Nightingale devoured blue-books, dictated letters, and, in the intervals of her palpitations, cracked her febrile jokes.
Eminent Victorians, Lytton Strachey
Thank you, thank you . . . thanks a lot! Wow, you guys are on fire tonight! Must be diphtheria or something going around.
*laughter*
Hey, great to be back in London. I just flew in from Scutari, Albania . . . and boy are my arms tired!
*groaning*
You know Scutari’s not a bad place if you’re an Ottoman–but who wants to be a crummy footstool?
*mix of groans, laughs*
Hey–I tell the jokes other nurses won’t touch!
But seriously folks: You know, the Crimean War is a real mess, and we ought to pull our troops out of there!
*applause*
But at the same time, let’s give it up for our fighting men in that God-forsaken hell hole.
*louder applause*
Never want to offend anybody . . . unintentionally.
*laughs*
People ask me–what was it like being the only woman tending to the entire British army. And I say–it’s nice to have 200,000 men to choose from.
*laughs*
I mean, until the internet is invented, I’ll have to make do with the one or two guys without wedding rings I meet in fern bars.
*laughs*
Speaking of the internet, did you know that 160 years from now, everybody’s going to remember what a great nurse I was, but nobody . . . and I mean nobody . . . is going to remember that I’m the first recorded person in history ever to use the expression “LOL.”
*cheers*
Can you believe it? I come up with the most useful abbreviation in, like, the history of the world, and all anybody remembers is I saved a couple of thousand crummy lives.
*laughs/applause*
You know, I just played a week in Vegas . . .
*raucous applause*
Yep. The first 19th century female to perform there while lying down–outside of a bordello.
*titters*
Hey–what happens during the Victorian era stays in the Victorian era–you know what I’m sayin’?
You know, a lot of female comics make jokes about how dirty and disgusting men are, but listen, they’ve never seen filth like I saw in the hospital when I got there. It wasn’t hard getting men out of the trenches to fight. They had a better chance of living charging into a bayonet than they would in the infirmary!
*laughs*
Listen, you’ve been a great audience. I’ll be here all week! Be sure and tip your waitresses–and try the chevapchichi!