Tonight during the one and only vice-presidential debate of the election, a truly unexpected and unbelievable event occurred: Conversion therapy proponent Mike Pence wasn’t asked a single question about his stance on LGBTQ issues days after Supreme Court Justices Alito and Thomas openly attacked same-sex marriage. Just kidding! A fly flew on Pence’s head and everyone absolutely lost their goddamn mind. At approximately 10:16 p.m. ET, a fly was somehow able to get past the high-tech plexiglass barrier separating Pence from his debate opponent, Senator Kamala Harris, and landed on the vice-president’s head for all the world to see. For two unadulterated minutes, American citizens sat in awe, wondering when Mike Pence was going to address the act that a literal insect was perched upon his head while he discussed police brutality. That moment never came as Pence apparently didn’t notice that he had a fly in his hair on national television because he is made of wax he was so focused on standing by law enforcement while condemning looters and rioters. After what felt like an eternity, the fly flew away, most likely to get into hair and makeup for an interview with Rachel Maddow about the debate.
Obviously, the internet took the fly moment and ran wild with it, doling out fly jokes with reckless abandon, with multiple Twitter accounts inspired by the fly going viral after the debate. Sadly, the life cycle of the fly jokes poignantly mimicked the life cycle of a fly: Both were incredibly short in nature. But even so, for a brief, shining moment in our nation’s history, everyone on the internet was laughing at the same thing: the comic absurdity of a fly landing on the vice-president’s head, and no one can take that away from us. For two glorious minutes, the fly had a point, was a legend, an icon, and was the moment. You can relive some of the best fly jokes below as you Google “is Mike Pence made of human skin?†and wonder which celebrity SNL is gonna get to play the fly on Saturday. Our money’s on Jeff Goldblum.