Shortly after the Catalan government defied Madrid and held a referendum on independence, Jaume Vives held his own “vote” on whether to separate his central Barcelona balcony from “this Catalonia of madmen.”
Using a megaphone, the 25-year-old journalist declared the nine votes cast by his assembled friends and family were really 2.4 million - a slightly inaccurate reference to the 2.3 million who voted for a break with Spain.
Then he suspended the decision - just as Catalan president Carles Puigdemont had done with his October 10 decision to pursue independence in the Catalan parliament.
A video of the stunt has been watched 890,000 times on YouTube as people on both sides of the independence divide turn to satire to break the tension of a real-life drama that is both dividing and maddening the nation.
The drama’s two main actors - Puigdemont and Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy - are the butt of most jibes.
The anti-independence camp has aimed its jokes at Puigdemont and what they see as his reluctance to be decisive and his flip-flop statements on the independence question.
In recent weeks, he has declared independence then suspended his declaration, accepted an invitation to address the Senate then declined it, and called for an independence vote in Catalan parliament -- and then deferred it.
One bar in Barcelona recently put up a sign that declared free beer for all - but then, tongue-in-cheek, said the measure was immediately suspended pending talks with the beer company.