defectivejunk - book2

Book2: Chapter 16 - A Solitary Occupation

nospam@example.com (NN) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 21:37:14 -0400

I was staring at a bowl of oranges in my car when the alarm went off. I couldn't make it stop. There weren't any alarm controls. I couldn't do anything at all. I stared as hard as I could at the dashboard. I bored holes in the quality Japanese engineering with my stares. That's when I realized: it was a tornado warning. My anger had manifested itself into a horrendous firestorm of nature's wrath. Except instead of fire, it was wind. Also the wrath was more of a really pissed off breeze. Also I wasn't too angry, but I didn't know that at the time. I was perfectly acceptable about causing a tornado in the middle of October. I could live with that, I thought. I could live with this tornado. I have to accept myself as I am, and if that me that I am spawns tornados in the middle of Halloween candy season, so be it. I'm a tornado spawner. That's when the bell rang in my head. I had to go. I heard a voice from a far away distance. It was drawing me in.

"Welcome to Museo De Tacos," it said hauntingly. "Would you like to try a Spicy Bean and Pepperoni Burrito value meal with guacamole strips today?"

I was captivated, but I couldn't respond. I'd never experienced anything like this before. The voice called me again. "Sir? Hello? Are you there? Is everything ok?"

I was enraptured. The voice seemingly cared for my welfare. It was amazing. I'd never had a voice put its own welfare after mine before. I knew, at this moment, that this was the moment. This was the most gracious voice in all the land. Until it spoke again.

It spoke again, but this time was different. The landscape disappeared with a dolly zoom of indifference. All was darkness. I was alone. I was sitting on nothing. I stood. But then I could no longer sit down. "You're losing them", it fearfully moaned at me. "You're loooosing theeeeem. You're disobeying all the ruuuules. They can't follow yoooooou."

I was terrified. I'd never had a voice turn against me so quickly. Sure, they all turned eventually. But not like this. NOT like THIIIIIS!

Suddenly a television appeared in front of me. The picture was snow. I turned the knob. Nothing happened. Except it broke off in my hand. Then the antenna broke off. Then a voice appeared on the screen. "Thou shalt not require prerequisites!" it screamed at me. Spittle flew out of the glass and hit me in the face. "Thou shalt not intentionally misdirect your readers!" I tried to wipe it off, but it took the skin of my face with it. I screeched in horror at the blood and skin on my hands.

"I should NOT have to take a class to understand you, sir! Pepperoni in a burrito? Who the HELL do you think you are to put pepperoni in a burrito?!" The voice had a point. I wasn't anyone that deserved to be able to put pepperoni in a burrito. I didn't have a good reputation to precede me. But I had done it, without thought or remorse. And suddenly, I was pissed off.

Who the hell was this voice. Who was this ugly, fat, mustachioed piece of SHIT voice who thinks he can tell me what to do. If I want to put pepperoni in a burrito, goddamn you fuck I'm going to do it. And I'll create a tornado, and run over a raccoon, and kill you, and rape your family. And one of these days I might create a clone of myself. So help me god. I'll do it. Do not tempt me. I will fucking do it, and you'll enjoy it.

I yelled "FUCK YOU, you .. VOICE. Who the fuck are YOU to tell me what I can't do. Get out. Just ... get out. Let me live my own goddamned life for once. Let me make my own decisions. LET ME MAKE MISTAKES."

"Fine. You want that? Fine. Here it is."

And everything returned. I was back in the drive up. I stared silently ahead for a moment. Then the voice returned. "Sir? Are you there? May I take your order or not?"

I cleared my throat. "Ahem! Yes, I believe I would like one of those pepperoni burrito value meals after all. Thank you."

And the voice over the drive up speaker answered. "Sir, we .. we don't have those here. We just have normal tacos and burritos and such. With beef and chicken."

And I looked up, and I saw that I was sitting at Taco Bell.

There was no such thing as a pepperoni burrito.

It was the most horrifying moment of my life.

Book2: Chapter 15 - Venison Beach

nospam@example.com (NN) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 20:51:37 -0400

As I sat watching the carbon dioxide bubbles trying to escape from their soda prison, I wondered if I would ever be able to eat cheese puffs the same way again. I didn't feel comfortable being in the same room with a bag of that snack ever since I was assaulted by one – a mentally challenged bag of fiery hot fake popcorn. The kind that sticks in your craw the second you try to ingest any of its contents. The kind that makes you wonder what you're doing with your life. The kind you immediately regret.

That reminds me of this girl I knew back in school. I don't know her anymore, but when I did know her, her name was Epiphany. Her parents were a spaced out hippie from South San Francisco, and an uptight baker from the streets of Detroit. And a retired bank manager turned astronaut who grew up in Herzegovina. An astronaut, not a cosmonaut. Let's be exceptionally clear about this. I don't want there to be any misunderstandings and puzzled questions later because you missed out on some minor yet important detail here at the beginning of the middle of the story.

Anyway, her parents met in a pub the last night it was open in downtown Denver, Colorado. What happened that fateful night is forgotten to all but them, and now you. Once you have finished, please write me a letter explaining these events so the legend of the parents of Epiphany are not lost to the annals of history.

It was the dawning of the tenth millennium and the blue-toned great grandchildren of mankind were watching the destruction of the original planet Earth for the last time. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Approximately eight thousand and twenty years earlier, a weird narcoleptic girl was born after the coupling of two strange men, and one relatively normal flower girl. The moon was crescendoing in the eerie Midwestern sky, a single cell from one man was finding its way to a single cell of a female, and the Blair Witch Project was showing on HBO again. They couldn't get enough of that stupid ass movie. Here three people are siring a child and all they can do is watch that piece of shit. I paid like a dollar to rent it from the rental shop and I still want my money back. I could have bought a dollar's worth of poison for that dollar.

But I digress. I try not to, but since the cheesy assault I've been having more and more problems with staying on task. Like two days ago I was sitting in the bank drive up trying to write a check for five thousand dollars to pay my electric bill, when all of a sudden I started thinking nonstop about how Drew Carey is doing. I mean I wonder if he has any tv shows or other projects in the works or what. Is he just sitting at home all sad. Or maybe he walks his dog to the park and has this awesome kick-ass life I can only dream of even though he only had this mediocre sitcom on tv for a few years. Then I ran over a raccoon.

He didn't die, but gave me the dirtiest look I've ever seen a mammal whose fur looks like a mask give a human, outside of the Batsquirrel reruns on Nick at Nite. (There were problems on-set. Robin was played by an actual robin. And the Batmobile was an acorn with a sign taped to it that said "batmobile". These were mistakes they were making)

Suddenly, the bartender tells me to stop talking to myself. Look I'm not trying to be disruptive it's an unconscious habit I have when I'm typing. What do you mean only losers bring a laptop into a bar and write on their shitty great American novel. Yeah losers like Hemingway, if he had a laptop and an urge to drink margaritas at 5 pm and none of the good bars were open yet. Yes you heard me this place is a hole. No you get out. I'm tired of your attitude Frank. I know I broke up with your sister in high school. She wouldn't put out. You know this. You already know this information I'm telling you. She was so a slut. Every dude in school but me got a piece of that. Cmon man even the kid with no eyebrows. Yeah man that kid. The one that always wore the same orange shirt to class. Dude I know. That is the basis for my outrage.

Look I'm sorry man. I thought you knew about her. We're cool right. Nah I'll just stop for now. I hit a roadblock anyway. Can I get a Miller Lite. I've had hell of wine coolers and other fruity drinks already. Might as well stick with what's working.

Book2: Chapter 14 - No Thought Was Put Into This

nospam@example.com (NN) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 12:42:05 -0400

It was the night of Brian's funeral.

There was a kid in school that I never liked. One time he drew a moustache on my face with permanent marker. I wasn't asleep or anything. He and some bigger kids held me down in the bathroom. Then, later that day, he pushed me down some stairs and drew it on me while I was writhing on the ground. I got him back though. The girl I liked had a big crush on him, but he ended up marrying a fat chick and squirting out some kids. Serves him right. Jackass. I hope he owns a minivan.

I threw a watermelon at his head, and I threw a watermelon at his feet. I drew a watermelon on his stupid face, and I ate a watermelon in jail one time. I had a photocopied picture of him from our yearbook taped to a dartboard out by the alley. It fell off the tree I had him nailed to. The tree I nailed San Diego against. That won't make sense yet. I didn't want to hang him back up. So I decided to take a walk.

The moon was sighing wistfully amongst the clouds. He smelled like an old cheese grater: metallic and rusty. "Sigh. I wish I had a watermelon. But there's no watermelon in space," he remarked. I looked at him and shrugged. "Sorry dude. You want me to build a rocket and send you a watermelon? I work for a company that builds rockets."

"No .." he responded, "... no, that's ... that's ok."

I kept walking.

A couple of minutes later, he yelled back. "Th...thanks though."

I was walking down the road, walking down the road, and I saw an asteroid hit the sidewalk. It wasn't a meteor. Or a meteorite. It was an asteroid, from the asteroid belt, and he was pounding the pavement with his asteroid fists. "WHY! WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME WHEN ALL I DID WAS LOVE YOU!" He was pretty upset.

There's another kid I never liked. He used to do wacky stuff like steal my pen when I wasn't looking, or knock my books out of my hand in the hallway. I got him back though. He married some ugly girl and probably squirted out a couple of kids. Also, one time, I stabbed him in the head with a mechanical pencil. Serves him right.

The asteroid saw me and stopped. Then he yelled again. "MY ORBIT IS APPRECIABLY PERTURBED! I'VE HAD ENOUGH!"

I had to respond. "...You're high. ...Or possibly crazy."

"Hey buddy, I'm not the one seeing a talking asteroid on the sidewalk."

"Touché, asteroid."

It was the afternoon of Brian's funeral. I was in his hometown. Everyone had just left the cemetery. I went off by myself to a chain restaurant to eat lunch. In case you've never had to eat by yourself in a restaurant, let me tell you this. It's boring eating by yourself in a restaurant. So I was sending messages and checking things from my phone. You know, things. Just things.

Some redneck saw me and laughed with his redneck buddies. "BEEP BOOP BEEP BOOP. Haw haw haw haw haw!"

I looked up, but I immediately looked back down.

"Hey I'm important, look at me with my fancy toys, I'm too good for you!"

"HAW HAW HAW HAW"

I didn't look up.

"People always in here sending messages, you wanna talk to somebody, go CALL EM AT HOME."

The laughing stopped. They shifted uncomfortably in their Wranglers.

I paused; closed my eyes, and slowly opened them in his direction.

I was not in the mood for this.

After all. This was a bad day. All around. I'd just left my friend's funeral, because he'd killed himself, because – in my mind – I'd forced him to go out to lunch with me, which let to us getting in a fight with some idiotic people in a restaurant.

"This is a place of business, not a hangout for

STUPID FAGGOTS"

I rose. I picked the man up by his neck, and guided it through a plate glass window. One second the window listed some dinner specials - meatloaf, chicken salad, watermelon slices. The next second, there weren't any more specials.

They say he bled to death in the hospital. I wouldn't know. I never went back to that state.

Serves him right.

Book #2: Chapter 13 - Breaking the Sixth Wall

nospam@example.com (NN) — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 21:58:48 -0500

I went with Brian to lunch. Actually, I had to talk him into going. Over a period of several weeks. He didn't like going out among people, but he especially hated going somewhere with another guy. He was afraid everyone would think they (or we) were a couple. Most of the time, he wouldn't even go by himself to lunch. In fact, he didn't even like to eat in the company lunch room, because he would have to figure out where to sit. Most days he would have probably ended up eating alone. I would have too, because he would never sit with me. And I didn't like anybody else. So I went out to lunch most of the time. What did he do? Usually, he ate in his car.

"I don't think this is such a good idea. We might get caught." He kept looking nervously over his shoulder at the door, waiting for someone to notice our lurid combo orders.

"Caught doing what? Eating lunch?"

"You know what I mean. Caught ... together."

"It's not like you walked in and pulled your cock out, we're eatin and"

"DUDE. SERIOUSLY. SHUT UP! Good god, you're going to get us beat up!"

"Nobody gives a shit. Really. You've got to let it go already."

"Me let it go? ME let it go? Talk about the obsessive compulsive pot calling the kettle black. You're the one obsessing about my suicide."

"...What the fuck did you just say?"

"You know you are. You think you could have stopped it. Everyone knows you tried as hard as you could. Even taking me out to lunch here. Of course, that backfired pretty badly. And that's what you're thinking about now. You blame yourself for it all. Even for what happened here. But the point is, you tried as hard as you could. Nobody blames you."

"This is impossible. I can't believe what I'm hearing. You can't have said this. Leave me alone already. This didn't happen. It didn't..."

"It's up to you to let me leave you alone. I'm gone. You're the one bothering yourself. And you're doing that thing you hate where a writer has a big conversation between two characters and doesn't delineate which one said what. It gets confusing.", Brian said.

Brian continued, "Even worse when you have the same character talking twice in a row. But anyway, that's not the point. The point is, here you are revising a bad event just to make it worse. Just to make it harder on yourself. You always do that. Things are bad enough for you. You don't need to make everything worse. You're just one person. You can't fix everything. You can't be everywhere and everyone. After all, no one but yourself expects you to be perfect. You're the only one that finds it shameful to be human.

Hell, that's what you were trying to teach me, wasn't it? You know it yourself, but you just can't live with it. If you just had the willpower to do what you know is right instead of being afraid of being weak, your life would be a whole lot better.

But first things first; you have to stop thinking about me. I'm not coming back. After all, you're not even sure why I did what I did. You have an idea that you think is right, but there's no way to know for sure.

But you have to stop this. You have to snap out of it. I know deep down you're worried the same thing is going to happen to you. After all, you don't have a you around to listen. Even if you did, you have proof it won't help you.

Anyway. Snap out of it. Take some action, instead of being afraid all the time. Like I was. Like I am right now. I lost my chance, but you have yours. Don't let it slip away from you. Snap out of it!"

Just then, our food showed up. I opened my burger, just to make sure. They put pickles on it! That would not stand. I went back up to the counter. Brian nervously looked around to see if anyone saw me get up. Then he got self-conscious about being so self-conscious, and realized he was staring at me.

So he started staring at some random girl.

Book #2: Chapter 12 - Meat Sauce

nospam@example.com (NN) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:51:08 -0500

I live at 515 Magnet Missile Lane. My name was John George Stevenson. This is not a change of tense. I'm just talking about the past and the present at once.

It was about month three of my coma when they dumped me into a bathtub full of macaroni. The psychic healer deemed it necessary to replace my essential starches. My spirit guide thought it was a terrible idea. "No man will recover through such actions," he said. "You cannot awaken because of a large amount of pasta. No matter what kind of pasta, little one."

I was on a train. It had been painted bright lime green, and we were heading north toward the hills of Massachusetts. I was carrying a purse full of enemas and the head of a sad clown named Benito Radiatore. We were twenty five miles outside of Baltimore when the cheddar began to take hold. "I AM THE TRUE KING OF ALL MEDIA!" I shouted. But no could hear me because I was in a coma.

The world didn't exist. I was in a lime green boxcar, and the world simply no longer existed. The universe was a railroad car wide. By proxy, two horses put together. The width of the universe was two horses' asses.

A bum in the opposite end of the boxcar looked at me. He smiled a three tooth smile. He wasn't crazy or anything. He just had bad hygiene. Also he was homeless. He said something about my being in a coma, and how it related to an inner struggle for my immortal soul between demons and Newtonian physics. Possibly something about letting go. And everything happening for a reason. I didn't really understand. The math was too complicated for me.

Sometimes I wonder if power line towers get lonely at night and cry. I bet if they did they'd electrocute themselves. Then again, maybe electricity can't really kill them. But maybe it hurts. Maybe they're in constant agony with no way to die. Kind of like coma patients.

I was reading a book. It was called "How to Win People and Influence Friends". I didn't agree with the methods it espoused. Five years later, it would be covered in urine. But I didn't know that yet. How could I? I couldn't predict the future. Even after the coma. I kept reading the book though, because I wanted to take my mind off the chemo.

"Hmmm, yessss, his starch count is rising. Rising! RIIISSIIIIING!" Shelley looked at the psychic in a questioning way. Which is to be expected. Anyone not questioning such a person might get themselves arrested. In a just world, at least.

I still have to blame her, however. It was her idea to hire such a moron. I guess she was desperate to wake me up though. Whatever. I wouldn't have done it. Rule 60. Do not dip an unconscious person in pasta.

I was being assaulted from one direction by particle physics, and another by starch-icle nonsense. That was the end. I couldn't stand this. I stuck bananas in my ears.

My spirit guide nodded his solemn approval. Then, he grabbed his blue duffel bag, took out an orange, and peeled it. The orange was a symbol of death.

I guess having bananas in my ears increased my potassium, which solved the problem putting me in a coma in the first place. Lack of potassium, and pancreatic cancer.

I don't remember but I'm told I woke up and punched the psychic in the face. Then I started yelling at everyone that "the demons are stealing my centrifugal force". Which everyone knew wasn't possible, because demons only eat kinetic energy.

Anyway, when the psychic woke up, everyone told her she slipped and fell. She sued the hospital for millions.

I'll never forget when I finally woke up. I went and changed my name. Then I ate some waffles. Then, I went to see Shelley. She was wearing the most beautiful dress I'd ever seen, in the brightest shade of orange that ever existed. In the kitchen was her new boyfriend. She introduced us. They looked pretty happy together.

I'm not sure why she left me for him, especially when I was in a coma. A coma that was induced by the doctors to save me the pain of the severe chemo, by the way. It didn't work, and I still felt it all. I just couldn't move. I guess they tried their best.

I guess she figured I'd never wake up. Or maybe she just thought I wouldn't live through it. Or, maybe, she was just a bitch.

Then again, that wasn't the last of her and me. No way. Not by a long shot. That was just the beginning.

By the way, the waffles were fantastic. I was going to order an orange juice, but I decided against it.

Book #2: Chapter 11 - The Book of 'Job

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:01:00 -0500

"I'm going to blow my brains out." Andy, aka Handjob, was not having a good day. He had to show a potential design to the managers, and in the meeting in front of 10 department heads, Henry said the vertical lines reminded him of dicks.

"Look at that, that looks like a dick, you got a little black line at the top and everything, that right there is a urethra man, you really want our customers trying to use the website while they're thinking about dicks?"

Depends what kind of website you're running.

A couple of years earlier, I had a dream that I would get married to this girl I loved; this girl named Shelley. Then a couple of years later, the girl named Shelley decided that dream was a pipe dream. I didn't help her decide. In fact, I was pretty much against that decision. I felt the opposite - that the girl named Shelley shouldn't stomp on my heart and leave me to figure my life out all over again. Try to start trusting people again. Then try to find a girl named Sarah or Amber or Tiffany or Britney who could spend their lives with a guy named Meat.

I found out later that the girl named Shelley didn't decide to stomp on my heart all on her own. She had help from a man named Joe. Joe Something or other. Maybe it was John. Or Sanford. It doesn't matter. His name wasn't important.

What was important was that he was my replacement. I guess he was better than me.

Stop. I already know what you're thinking, because I was thinking it before I wrote this. "Oh this whole thing is just about some girl. Love of his life or whatever bullshit. Who cares? If I wanted a romance novel I would have bought one." Well, it's not. It's not even an anti-romance novel.

This book is about Shelley like the War in Iraq is about September 11. Or like how President Clinton's impeachment was about a blowjob, or about lying under oath. (It was about a chance for a majority Congress to get rid of a popular minority President. Kind of the opposite of today, where the majority Congress refuses to try to get rid of one of the most unpopular Presidents of all time, despite evidence that he should have been gone four years ago.) Or like how Donnie Darko is about time travel. (It's an It's a Wonderful Life through God's eyes, or: How I learned to stop worrying and not destroy the universe I created due to humanity's fuck-ups.)

I'll go ahead and tell you the ending though: I'll never get over the girl named Shelley, and move on to a girl named something else. She was It, and not in a weird way or anything. If I'm gonna do this life thing, I'm gonna have to find another girl just like her. That's pretty much all there is to it. That'll be the end; I'll have to give up. Then again, I am by nature an extreme pessimist.

Maybe it won't be so bad. Maybe I'll find another nice girl named Rachel or Ashley or Delilah. Maybe I won't spend the rest of my life alone. Maybe I'll just bone them while I keep wishing I was still boning Shelley.

Isn't that romantic?

Yeah. Maybe it will happen soon. And maybe they'll start up the impeachment hearing.

Then the criminal trial. Then the sentencing.

Here comes the bride.

She's got a killer body, legs that won't quit, and an ass the size of Montana. I know I was supposed to end the chapter on "Here comes the bride". That was the perfect ending. The kind I always go for. That emotional impact, the rush, the adrenaline that hits you right before we smash cut to black. But I'm not going to do that this time. Here comes the bride, all dressed in white. Here comes the bridge, I'm gonna jump off. Wahoo wooo! Eat me motherfuckers! Mother buckers! Suck my nipples! I'm gonna doooo iiiiiiiiiit riiiiight now hey it's my decision

The bride was justice there, see. The bride is going to be an old maid!

This book is outsider art. Not because I'm not one of the culturally elite, but because I'm an outsider.

Do you ever get the feeling like you're watching somebody? Like time has slowed down, and they're about to crash headfirst into oncoming traffic and you're just watching and watching and waiting for the impact

you could stop it but it would make you vulnerable

it would make you

so you don't do it you won't do it traffic traffic taffic taffffffyyyyyyyyyyyy bang bang

Where the hell is my other tooth??

I had a dream about a Motel 6. Shelley was there. She drank a glass of water out of one those five cent plastic cups they give you. Suddenly she started vomiting blood on the carpet. I tried to help her but it wouldn't stop. It just wouldn't stop. It was all over the room. She was all over the room. She split into a million pieces. A million little pieces all over the hotel room I charged to my MasterCard. A million little pieces of the girl I loved.

They're going to charge me for cleaning up her intestines.

I had to put down a deposit. I'm going to lose it. I'm going to lose it here. They're going to charge me for this. Vomit. Vomit. Vomit vomit. I woke up in a pool of vomit. The room was spinning. It was all over the floor. I had to stop it. I had to stop this.

No more. This is it. This is the end. It's all vegetables from now on. Vegetables and water and bread. And soda, I like soda. Vegetables and bread and soda and ice chips and meat and cheese and potato chips and chili. Vegetables and bread and soda and ice chips and meat and cheese and potato chips and chili and a new career. A new. Fucking. Career! That's it! I've had enough! I have to change something or I'm gonna leave! I'm gonna leave myself for good! You want that to happen! ?

You an ignant ass mafucka mafucka. Shit, boy. Don't call me boy, mafucka. Suck it! Suck my fuckin celery! Suck on them shits! Change my goddamn career! Change my MOTIVATION. SOMETHING OR OTHER. WHATEVER YOU GET THE POINT. CAPITAL LETTERS. BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE LETTER Q. THE Q STANDS FOR QUIT. THE LATER Q. LAQTER.

Shit.

That stopped making sense. Stop making sense !!!

Smash cut.

I mean. Star wipe.

Star wipe. Star wipe! I SAID STAR WIPE ASS WIPE!

86: Never let a friend's eyes wander.

We were in a fast food restaurant, and Brian was staring at a girl's ass because he was terrified of being himself. The girl's enormous boyfriend noticed, and he didn't appreciate it.

I didn't notice until it was too late. I was stuck at the counter.

Rule 25: No pickles.

They had disobeyed Rule 25. It would not stand. It would not fucking stand!!

You should never let your friend's eyes wander. Especially when he should be thinking about dicks. Do you want to watch your friend get beaten to death because he's afraid of thinking about dicks?

Stop. I know what you're thinking. "I'd rather hear his bitching about his woman problems than hear about this gay shit", "thinly veiled homoeroticism". Sorry, but you're the problem. You're the reason Brian was scared of himself. Too afraid to talk about it. He didn't know how to act.

You're the reason I almost watched him get beaten to death in a fast food restaurant. I didn't deserve that. He sure as hell didn't. Then again, Andy didn't deserve to sit through a meeting while hearing his header graphics compared to "big-ass dongs", and then try to use the bathroom while a guy is sitting on the sink eating a Mars bar.

"Hey there Handjob, hurry it up, shake it more than twice and you're playin with it"

Chew chew chew

Brian tried to be someone he wasn't, and it brought him nothing but pain, and problems. The thing is, he knew no one would accept him for who he was. So he figured he at least had a shot at pretending. I thought the same, so I tried it too. It didn't work for me either. She still left me for somebody else.

That's the difference between him and me. We both thought we only had one shot. He just gave up first. I haven't had the chance yet.

Choo Choo Choo

I was on a train a few years ago when my name was something I don't really remember, and I sat next to this guy. He was about my age. I was staring out the window when he came on. All the other seats were full, except the one next to me. I was thinking about Shelley or something, even though I still wouldn't convince her to be with me for about four more years. He quietly came over and asked if he could sit next to me. I nodded without looking at him.

I was busy.

Later, I called my friend something or other, I forget his name since we haven't spoken in years, and yelled at him for a while. I don't remember what about. I think because the train was late and he was waiting for me.

Anyway. The guy that sat next to me - I think he read a book the whole time. I don't think he wanted to be there. I know for sure he wanted to be alone. He looked pretty depressed.

Or maybe it was just me. I don't know.

I wonder how he's doing.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club, Chapter 11, The Book of 'Job

Book #2: Chapter 10 - Three Corners

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:00:00 -0500

I fell asleep once. It was amazing.

In my dream, I lived in Nebraska. Not the state of Nebraska; a house shaped like Nebraska. I think it was in Wyoming, but it didn't come up. It was so boring. It was like time was moving backwards twice as fast as it normally does. Then, I went to Three Corners. That's the place where Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming meet. It was the most deserted literally place I'd ever dreamt of. It was so beautiful. Too beautiful. I couldn't handle it. I put a gun in my mouth.

So, whatever. I have some rough dreams sometimes. Like the time I dreamt that I didn't have a penis. Oh, I didn't dream I was a girl. I just dreamed that my genitalia disappeared. My family ran away, and I sat in my room all day drinking iced tea like the alien overlords were coming to not really do anything to us but ban us from drinking iced tea, and I had to go to the bathroom, more and more and more, until I almost died. Suddenly I woke up, realized I had to go to work at my crummy tech support job, and I almost died. Then, I got to work, realized I had to go the bathroom, or "use the facilities" as they say back east, for real. And almost died. But then I got caught on a call with some old lady who didn't know how to single click a mouse and I wet myself. A couple of minutes later, I almost died. Later, I went to the bathroom and dried off my tears.

That afternoon, I wanted to die even more. Then suddenly I remembered it was Friday, so I drove fifty miles, bought myself a burger and a sundae, then went back to my apartment and got completely fucked up on Wild Turkey and Hawaiian Punch. The next morning, I threw up some aspirin I took between having a dream about having to shave Michael Chiklis' nugget pouch and having a dream about building a bridge to nail Paula Poundstone. But when I got there, she was gorgeous and wanted to buy me a cabin in the woods. I was grossed out because I was expecting her to look like herself, so I threw up all over Interstate 75. Five minutes later I threw up in my bed. Ten minutes later I took some more aspirin. Six hours later, I went and ate some sausages, and spent the rest of the day watching Bob Ross.

When I was a kid, I always watched Bob Ross when I was hung over. Wait, that's no good. I'm hung over now, I think. No. I was trying to say I used to watch Bob Ross when I was sick.

I watched Bob Ross a lot.

I implied I was crying because my job sucked, not because I couldn't hold it in anymore, cause I totally could and so I totally did. I sort of wanted to though, because I felt like I would finally fit in among the other people who acted like four year olds. Four year olds get such a bad rap. They probably don't even wet themselves either. They do throw tantrums sometimes, and I'm pretty sure they don't know how to use a spell checker. Though that's probably mean too. Four year olds know better than that.

I worked with a guy who killed himself. I probably could have stopped him from doing it. I almost died. It was so goddamned embarrassing. I swear I almost died. Most people were horrified that they didn't do anything either. But they didn't almost die. One guy I didn't really know said "hey, at least we outlived that fucker!"

I almost died. Then, I almost killed him. I was 1 for 2 that day.

Mrs. Stapleton heard him and gasped. She went through all the motions, holding her hand to her mouth, patting her blue hair, tugging on the tails of her rumpled old blouse. I took off. I'm not sure what else Mrs. Stapleton said. It probably involved paperwork. Mrs. Stapleton wasn't her real name. Actually, I don't remember her name. We called her Mrs. Stapleton because she always wasted all the staples.

The other day I tripped over the yellow pages. Earlier that day, I tripped over my words in front of a person I'd never met before. Later that afternoon, I fell up the stairs. In my head. Ten years earlier, I fell up the stairs for real. Eight years later, this guy I knew killed himself. Ten years later, something interesting might happen. Ask me again in ten years. I'll know more then.

I had another dream. I took a trip with Nicole Kidman to the outback. The real one, not the one downtown that serves cold baked potatoes. The one where a bird of paradise flew up my nose. It was all freaky and blue, and then red; the drapes were okay but somebody had put in hardwood floors. Anyway, you probably wouldn't want to hear about it. It gets kind of suicidal and ranty at the end.

A couple of years back, I worked with this guy. He killed himself. His name was Brian.

Brian Reynard.

My name was Motorbike St. Francis.

Brian Reynard told Motorbike St. Francis he was thinking about killing himself, but Motorbike didn't listen. Motorbike thought that was just how people coped with life sometimes. By talking about getting rid of theirs.

A couple of years back, I wanted to check out the real Three Corners. It wasn't beautiful. It was the middle of a field somewhere. You couldn't really get to it. There was a cow in the way. It was bad. There were cow pies, and wheat grass. And electrified fences. It was bad. It was not beautiful.

I still put a gun in my mouth.

Rule 91: Don't go to Three Corners.

Dreamt. Dreamed. Dreamt. Dreamed. Dreamted.

You ever feel like somebody donkey punched you while you were asleep?

...Yeah, me either.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club, Chapter 10, Three Corners

Book #2: Chapter 9 - Dingleberry Bunghole

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 20:30:00 -0500

"I'm going to blow my brains out." It's a common refrain I hear from people that call me. I do technical support for managers in my company. And I write and maintain computer programs. And sometimes, if I have to, I'm an amateur suicide counselor. I have to reassure them. "Well, I don't think you want to do that. The printer's just out of ink."

"Will you fly out here and shoot me? I think they'll approve it."

"I .. no, I can't do that."

They wouldn't approve it. Even if all they had to pay for was the bullet. And they were the life insurance beneficiaries. They would never approve that.

Sometimes I wonder if the people making these statements are sincere. I just work to afford rent, internet service, and pudding and tacos and stuff. I don't want to have feel guilty for the rest of my life because some middle manager didn't know how to fix their email.

My phone rings again. It's one of the them. One of them. She's about 65, and the kind of lady that you know probably has a few grandkids and tells their parents to leave them alone, they're just being kids, bakes them pies and stuff.

"Hello Dingleberry, how are you?"

"Um, alright, how about you?"

"Well, I'm about to shoot myself in the head. KAPOW!"

Basically, I think that if your job drives you to tell your coworkers about your impending suicide, you should leave it. No job is worth that, no matter how much you make or extra vacation days you get. Or health insurance, vision, 401k. Sick days. Maternity leave. Paid holidays. I can see why people would be driven to suicide for paid holidays.

"Yeah so you just, change that setting and that'll take care of it. …"

"OH MY GOD IT WORKED! You're my savior! Next time I see you, I'm going to have to bring you some cookies!"

Sounds great. "Thanks for saving my life Jesus. Here's some oatmeal raisin cookies my grandkids didn't like." Thankfully she was 500 miles away, and I never had to meet her.

My coworker walks in. His name is Brian, and he's in way over his head. Not work wise, but in regards to... working here. He can't handle our supervisor. Then again, neither can anyone. I might also mention that Brian is openly gay. Not that there's more than two or three things wrong with that. Four, tops. One thing wrong with it is that our supervisor, whose name is Henry, can't help but bring it up on a daily basis. The second thing is that Brian isn't very comfortable discussing it. The third thing is that Brian's family hasn't spoken to him since he told them.

Our supervisor's name is Henry, and he is a strange, strange man. He walks in the door.

"Alright you bitches, let's get this shit developed!"

Brian stares at me, wide eyed, and goes and sits back down in his cubicle. His first instinct is to run. My first instinct is to be a dick.

"Well, we were working on it, but we were taking a break. Since we got here two hours ago, and you're just showing up"

"Yeah yeah, you bitches, just get me this client site by the end of the day or I'm gonna stick my balls on your face"

Five hours later, we have a problem with the website. "Alright who broke it?! I'm going to rape whoever it is that broke it!" As you might guess, Brian did it. And can't figure out what to do. He runs in my office, in a panic. Sometimes I think Brian believes he's really going to get raped.

"Dude! This thing was working five minutes ago, and I tried to upload the changes, and now it won't show up!"

"Well, let me take a look at it..."

Two minutes later it's fixed and Henry never finds out about it. In fact, he's busy eating a Kit Kat in the bathroom, and singing "Don't Stop" by Fleetwood Mac.

Henry never thinks about what he's saying. In fact, he doesn't really mean anything by it. Nor does he consider who he's talking to when he says it. He is, basically, just retarded. And lacks any sort of internal censor. He thinks the IT world is a men's locker room. But he wears a tie to work, even though we can wear jeans. He wears the same Hawaiian shirt every Casual Friday, and natch, he eats candy bars in the bathroom while combing his hair.

We had a new graphic artist start the next day. He seemed like your typical young IT guy. The art version; the "I have Illustrator memorized but don't know what an integer is" version. Henry was not his supervisor, but Henry came in and we introduced them.

"Hum um, hi Henry, this is our new graphic artist Andrew. Oh um, do you prefer Andrew or Andy? This is the software development manager Henry Asquith".

"Andy's fine, good to meet you Henry, how are you doing today?"

Rule 78: Don't ask Henry how he is. He'll think you're talking about his genitals.

"I'm doing it long and lazy, me on bottom and your mom on top! Ha! Shit man, I gotta go to this fuckin meeting with the exec with the tits, hey nice to meet you there Handjob"

".............um

what was that about"

"That, Andy, is the craziest sane person you will ever meet."

Everyone in the department - except me and Brian - called Andy "Handjob" for the rest of his tenure with the company.

He lasted about two months.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club, Chapter 9, Dingleberry Bunghole

Book #2: Chapter 8 - Prairie Fire

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 20:00:00 -0500

My sock just moved. I swear to God, my sock just moved. Fuck you, it did. Fuck this. I fucking hate life. What am I supposed to do about this. I'm terrified. I can't take care of myself. When everyone is gone, what am I going to do? Who is going to drive me to the mechanic? To the doctor? The dentist? Who is going to make sure I'm ok? I already wonder what would happen if I hit my head in the bathtub. If I got stranded on the interstate. Who would I call? Who's going to come and save me? So far, it doesn't seem like anyone is going to. Or that much of anyone really cares.

I mean, they'll say they do. You ask a person if they care about someone else they know, of course they're going to say they do. They wonder what they could have done if that person dies. Commits suicide. Gets set up into looking like they committed suicide. Perhaps by a rogue sock. Some other inanimate object that springs to life. That hates them. Hates the way they go about the day. Hates the way they carry themselves.

What if objects around your apartment could come to life. What would you do then? Would you feel safe at home? Would you line up your quarters, to break the curse? Sometimes I make sure the salt and pepper are next to each other, so they don't get lonely. Then I wonder if they're mortal enemies. Maybe they're going to conspire to give me bad luck for the rest of my life. Maybe that's where it comes from. Once upon a time, maybe I insulted the wrong window blinds. Yelled at a loaf of bread that didn't deserve it. Broke a perfectly good pencil in half out of spite.

Sure, thinking that lifeless objects are watching you is probably a pretty crazy idea. But a lot of crazy ideas have turned out to be true. I know this one is just a weird product of some compulsions. Like how I feel like jumping off a cliff if I walk near one, or pushing someone into traffic when you walk down the street. Driving over them just because they exist. The scary part is, I know everyone else could be thinking these same things. Maybe one of these days, they'll take themselves up on the offer. I try to duck behind light poles, and stay away from steep cliffs and sharp edges. But one of these days, man. One of these days, some crazy guy is going to give up trying not to be crazy.

So, once upon a time I lived in a shack in the woods. My name was Walter Riverbottom. I didn't get my name from living in a shack in the woods, or wanting to live in a shack in the woods. I decided on it beforehand. Actually, when I went to live in a shack, my name was still Armistread Hossennfeffer. A couple of months after I went, I ventured back to the city to change my name. I did so, and went back to my shack. To find myself, figure out my life. Whatever you want to call it. Four or five months. It got really old really fast.

Anyway, I used to go scavenging for berries in the wilderness. I didn't need to, but it was something to do. It turns out finding yourself is really boring. One time, I accidentally stumbled into a herd of deer after twisting my ankle on a hike. The mother came up to me, looked at me for a minute, and left. I went back in the other direction as fast as I could, and sat down on a fallen tree for a few minutes to rest my ankle. She suddenly came up behind me, carrying a pair of only slightly worn moccasins. They were a couple sizes too big, but I thanked her and she snorted and went back to her children.

I really don't want to know how she got them.

Another time, I tripped on a big tree root and hit my head on a rock. I woke up with a sore head that was also wet, with a squirrel hissing at me. I guess he splashed some water on my face from some plants nearby. Or something. I'm not quite sure, how he managed it, but he kept poking me, and shaking a plant. Then when I sat up, he ran away. Well, thanks squirrel. Wherever you went. I hope you got some acorns. Or whatever squirrels really eat. Who knows.

The real reason I went to live in the woods was I was sick of being watched. There's this fundamental force in nature that seems not to affect anyone but me. All hours of the day, it feels like a million eyes staring into me. A million alien beings from a parallel universe; a universe that is watching me. Maybe they have my best interest in mind. Maybe I'm their savior. Maybe I'm their anti-christ, the devil. Maybe I was born to destroy their universe and I'm the only one that knows about it. Maybe I won't even realize it when it happens. Until it's too late. But maybe it'll be a good thing. Cleaning out a bad dimension. A prairie fire. Fusion, supernovas, comets, entropy, nebulas, strings, black holes, wormholes, heavy water, and yours fucking truly.

If I got stranded on the interstate, like I fear every time I get on it, I'd sit there for hours and hours, and eventually some serial killer who's looking for his next victim will come along and take off with me. Nobody around to help. What are the squirrels going to do? Throw a nut at him? That's not going to help. Serial killers are nut-resistant. That's the worst case scenario of course. The best case is that I walk miles and miles home - I've done it before - and try not to get hit. I call for a tow truck I can't afford, and a towing guy that hates me takes my car to a mechanic that hates me, overcharges me, doesn't fix it, and it all happens again. Meanwhile, I miss a couple days work since I don't have a way to get there. I get fired, catch a cold, get an infection, gangrene, a horrible pain in my back. Can't go to the doctor, I die. And the aliens and their eyes rejoice.

Then, a couple of days later, after they flag my car a few times, they'll take that away too. And all that will be left of me will be memories of people that don't really notice me; don't know me. Don't know how crazy I really am. Just think I'm some kind of crazy they've conjured up; some kind I'm really not. Memories.

Memories, and the words that I'm writing right now. So, you see, writing is really about immortality. If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. I think about killing myself an average of three times a day. But truthfully, I'd like to stick around for a while longer. I'm trying as hard as I can. I promise. I'm trying really hard to not be crazy at all.

None of that can happen. It's not supposed to happen. That's not how this plays out. It can't be. I didn't come all this way. I didn't come all this way for this to happen to me. This can't be happening. I can't be alone like this. Not anymore. It has to stop. But I can't stop it.

It's not supposed to happen like this.

I moved back into an apartment after a while. It's a step down, but I've gotten used to it. But still, I don't like to meet new people. I don't trust them. They don't have my interests at heart. They might help out, if they could. If they felt like it. If they weren't preoccupied. But they won't, really. I don't know how to meet new people. They won't like me, and I don't trust them. Really, most times I'd rather take my chances with the deer and the squirrels.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 7 - Tuesday the Salesman

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 19:30:00 -0500

My name is Tuesday, and I am a sales representative.

I sell encyclopedias. More accurately: I attempt to sell encyclopedias, but I'm never successful anymore. I've been working here for five years, and things have just gone farther and farther downhill. When I first started, things looked bad. But management promised that they had a strategy for turning the business around. It turns out that strategy was to pretend that nothing was changing. The fingers-in-ears business strategy. That one's a classic, since it always works.

Our main customers these days are big libraries, luddites, and morons. The libraries keep us in business, because they feel obligated (or maybe they are obligated, I don't know how a goddamned library's funding works) to keep buying our books. The luddites and morons just help me pay the bills with my commission. At least they used to. Now, they tell me their grandson or neighbor kid is going to "download the internet for them" instead.

As you might have guessed, we can't compete with the internet any longer. We update our information once a year. The internet can update every five seconds. And internet sites are - mostly - free. And I've seen some journals that do update that often. But the journals? They're mainly about boyfriends and cutting one's self, or how much someone's job sucks and how they want a new one. I'm aware of the irony of my saying this here. However, our encyclopedias are about more general topics than these things. At least, so far.

And yes, I saw these sites during work hours. I haven't seen any, ahem, competition of ours. At least at work. That's like drinking a Pepsi in the Coke lunch room. Minus the public caning. And the horrible hamburgers. (My half sister used to work at a bottling plant, and I ate in their cafeteria once. Yuck. Or should I say, attempted to eat there once, and went to a TGI Fridays after I left. The drinks were nice and fresh though.)

I use my time during the day browsing news sites and hoping something happens that I can feign interest in. Not to anyone else, just to myself. I need something to make myself believe that I'm accomplishing something during the day. To be honest, I don't know how I still have a job.

In the evenings, I browse job sites; looking for something I could apply for. A new career. Something to really jump start my dreary, dead on arrival life. But I just don't have the kind of experience companies are looking for. Apparently cold selling books over the phone isn't an in-demand skill right now. I can't imagine why not.

Funnily enough, Wikipedia doesn't have a careers section.

I checked. From home.

One day, I actually talked to a guy named "Meat". At least that's what the database said his name was. That was one of the days I pretended to work. I think the CEO was in the office for once. Or something. I don't really remember. I got really fucked up that night.

Anyway, this Meat guy - the guy on the phone said he was that guy, but he said his name was "Hickory". We got cut off just as I was trying to figure out what he was talking about when my coworkers were playing "wrestle each other instead of cold calling people because no one has purchased a set of encyclopedias since the early 90s" and knocked the handset out of my hand. I called him back - not because I thought he would buy, but because his names were the most interesting thing I had seen in our office for a couple of months.

The most interesting thing before that was when a bird got loose in the building and they sent us home, with pay. It took them three days to get it out so I had a mini vacation and watched a bunch of kids' movies. I think the most interesting thing that happened before the bird was somebody brought some day old donuts in. Something like that. It might have even been me. It was too long ago for me to remember.

Later, Troy, the non-knocking the phone out of my hand but still wrestling coworker, broke his arm by getting mosh-pit-rammed into a desk on the other side of mine. It moved the desk a few feet, and took the cable routing channel between us out with it. I was stuck the rest of the week with no phone or internet service. I used the time to read the "E" book. It was really boring. Especially the obviously biased article on encyclopedias. I wanted to read about Entourage, but we don't carry pop culture articles. Too dynamic and frivolous.

Troy was fine. He used his broken arm to sell five full sets over the next few weeks to dumb, sympathetic grandmas.

Motherfucker.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 6 - Horizontal Rule

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 19:00:00 -0500

Is this guy laughing on the train reading a really funny book, or is he demented? I haven't decided. Maybe he's a serial killer. Maybe he has your wife stashed in his basement right now, next to the bones of his fifty other victims. Maybe she won't stop screaming, so he's going to have a little ... fun with her.

Or maybe Tom Clancy writes really hilarious novels.

I always hated my name. "Meat VanHousen". That's the dumbest name I've ever heard. Never mind the fact that some ancestor changed it from Van-Hauser or Van-Heusen or whatever to escape being a war criminal. I'm named after a damned dead animal carcass.

My name right now is "Hickory Accordion". I saw it in a music shop.

I'm just screwing with you. I made it up.

Last year, my name was "Motorbike St. Francis". Two years before that, it was "Armistread Hossennfeffer". The extra n is silent.

You see, I've changed my name on my birthday every year since I was eighteen. I decided that I was finally an adult, and it was finally time that I could decide how to live my life. And, so, I could decide what my own name would be. The problem is, everyone that knew me before then always refused to call me anything but "Meat".

He has a blue duffel bag with him. Blue duffel bags are always bad news. They've always got bloody knives or bloody clothes or time bombs in them. Bloody time bombs. Maybe some kid's hands in there ... maybe even a copy of some right wing political humor rag ... maybe some clothes from the gym. Or a melon-baller. A book detailing every event in my life so far ... "2PM: Hickory wakes up. 2:01PM: Hickory uses the restroom. 2:02-2:04PM: Hickory explores himself sexually" ...

Two years ago, on a dare from my friends - who paid me 1000 dollars after I went through with it - I changed my name to "Dingleberry Gaylord Bunghole". That was the dirtiest name the judge would let me use. A couple of weeks later, I got a job as a helpdesk monkey. Telling idiots to turn on their monitors, plug the printer in instead of hitting it, that sort of thing.

But I always had to answer the phone "This is Dingleberry". So everyone started calling me "D" at work. Except for a few salesmen (aka assholes) who liked to call me "Dingle" - or "Dingle-dogg" - and the old lady in payroll who never realized the word she was saying ("Good morning, Dingleberry, quite hot outside isn't it"), and my family, who kept calling me Meat.

For a while now, I try to think of good rules to live by. The world is pretty stupid sometimes - most times actually - and so I pretend that I can make up rules for good living. The trick is, there can never be such things. Sometimes I try to come up with an opinion I have about a subject, and I decide that I'm both for and against it. That both sides are equally good, and it just depends who asks whether I say I like it or I don't. It never works though, because no one ever asks.

But despite any of that, and despite not living or abiding by most of my rules, I still have a rule list. I'm not going to show it to you.

Rule #1: No one but me can ever see the whole Rule List.

This is the most important rule, because if anyone were to read the entire list, they might go crazy. More importantly, they would be able to see how I live my life, and I can't have that happening. It has to remain a mystery, or somebody could figure me out.

Rule #2: The Rule List is an original creation, copyright Meat VanHousen aka Hickory Accordion, etc.

Those two are the only rules I never break.

Rule #58: If I'm not horizontal, I'm not happy.

If I'm asleep, I don't have to deal with the world. That's the only time I'm ever happy: when the world doesn't exist. Armageddon is a beautiful concept. But in practice, it wouldn't work out. Some assholes would still be able to keep going, and squirting out new monsters. Somehow. Assholes would find a way.

Assholes are humanity's cockroaches. Except they don't scurry when you turn the lights on.

Roaches are cool like that.

Rule #47: Wal-Mart is forbidden. None shall enter.

I break this rule about once a week. Sometimes twice if I forget something, or I run out of cookies.

I'm tired.

The crazy kid that shot all those people - he wrote a horrible story about a horrible guy that had the personality and the name of some horrible Guns ‘n Roses song. It was like he transcribed it. I find that to be pretty messed up. He wasn't original enough to even make up an asshole out of thin air. He had to steal one from somebody else.

Right now, in the back of my mind. I have like fifty, maybe sixty ideas for brand new assholes. Sure some would be amalgamations of real life assholes that I've met over the years. Probably a couple of salesmen squished together. But I wouldn't copy them from anybody. That would make me an asshole.

I hate destiny. Fate. Whatever. I don't believe in it, but it keeps trying to get me to believe in it. Offers to take me out for ice cream, buy me a new dollhouse, that kind of shit. I keep wondering if there's a song somewhere about a guy named Meat. Maybe the song ends with him getting stabbed to death on a train. I hope that song doesn't exist. And I hope no one ever writes it.

In fact, I'm adding a new rule.

Rule #133: No one shall ever be allowed to write a song that ends with my horrific death

I would go to sleep on the train, but I don't trust the guy that keeps laughing. Actually, I don't trust much of anyone. I trusted Shelley for a while. But she ended up breaking up with me and .. well, let's not get into that. Let's just say I don't trust anyone. Especially here on the train. I don't think I can fall asleep here.

I'll never be happy if I have to ride the train. I'll never be happy on the train.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 5 - Meat the Protagonist

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 18:30:00 -0500

Tuesday, the sales rep, calls me back and expects me to just sit and listen to him go through his entire spiel. I put up with it for five or ten minutes - I lost track of time since Montel was on - and finally I'd had enough and just said I'd go ahead and order. Then we got cut off and he didn't call me back. Maybe it was his lunch break. Maybe he just didn't want to have to talk to such a pathetic excuse for a grown man anymore. I put my peanut butter sandwich back in the microwave and sighed.

I hadn't heard from Shelley in two or three weeks, so I went in to work to see what was going on. Turns out they were launching the X8 rocket that day and no one had bothered to let me know. That was ok, I guess. They were pretty busy and all.

I saw her standing on the opposite end of the tarmac, so I walked myself over using leg power to say hi. She glared at me, and turned back around. Everybody else in the department looked at us, and then ignored me too. I guess they're all still mad about my promotion. I don't see what the big deal is. I worked pretty hard for that promotion, and then I got it.

You see, my name is Meat. My parents were die-hard, to the bone, strict anti-vegetarians and so they named me after their favorite thing in the world. My mom's second favorite thing in the world is diamonds, and my dad's is titties, so it could be a lot worse. I count my blessings, such that they are.

They had a going away party in my honor a few weeks ago. I wasn't at work that day, and hadn't been for a while, but when they heard I was the one that was going to take the trip to the moon they had a party to celebrate.

As you can tell, the rocket left without me.

I'm back at home now. I sure could use a shirt that fits. This one doesn't. But I do have some. The ones that do fit, they're dirty. I know I'm unemployed now and I have plenty of time to do laundry, but I don't feel like it. I'm unemployed now. My name is Meat, and I’m deep. I like old school Elvis Costello, I read Dave Eggers, I listen to obscure podcasts, and I’m unemployed.

I need to go start my tea for the day, so I have something to drink that doesn't taste like my life. Nothing. Fear. Spikes. I found a bit of a pop-tart on the ground. I hope no one ate it. I can smell the distance lurking outside and it smells painful, like an old knife. Like a washing machine dumped in 1979 outside a creek bed by someone who you never knew existed.

I wonder what happens to all those people who dump their appliances in the forest.

Like a dirt road that leads to two more dirt roads, one that leads to a grain elevator haunted by the ghosts of a million dead corn kernels, and another that leads to an empty field where there used to be a dream of a big mansion that all the farmer's children and all the farmer's children's children could live in and be happy. It's such a tragedy what happened.

But I won't dwell on it. I wasn't around to do anything about it.

Did I mention the rocket exploded? The guy they hired in my place? He died. Pretty spectacularly. As it wasn’t the explosion that got him.

My tea is done. It could use some cream.

But on top of it all, I'm lactose intolerant.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 4 - Dead Men Walking

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 18:00:00 -0500

The other day, I realized that I am a zombie.

I woke up and had a blueberry muffin, like I always do on Thursdays, when suddenly there was a knock on the door. It was Old Man Peters. He was complaining that my daughter had parked her car in his space. The problem was, my daughter was dead. She hadn't died very long ago. Or even a few days earlier. And she didn't suffer. Because as it turns out, my daughter was never born at all.

He was gravely concerned that there was a green 1998 Dodge Neon parked in his parking space, registered under my name, which I had never told him as we were never properly introduced. Hello, my name is Motorbike St. Francis, and I'm an alcoholic. Nice to type words at you.

Even though Mr. Man Peters didn't have a car, he might have the notion to order one on a whim from an online dealership that is being built on the outskirts of Match.com , and he would thus need to park his vehicle in his assigned tract of land that, should the government decide to build a business bypass, could be taken from him at any time for fair market value, which as it turns out is not very much for land you don't own.

I lost my train of thought. Oh yes, the muffin. It was rather dry and boisterous, smelled like raspberries, and tasted as if it was composed of earthworms. As I discovered several hours later after I threw it up, there had actually been a few earthworms baked into its center. As well as a used condom wrapper. Though I must admit, either of those items could have been ingested by myself during a different incident later tonight.

Before that happens though, I should describe to you the long discussion I had with my pillow the other night. It turns out that he wants to travel to Europe and see the sights. Maybe backpack for a year until he decides what he wants to do with his life. Settle down in Seattle or St. Paul, Minnesota after that. The sky's the limit. If you're young, don't have many responsibilities, have dreams about seeing the world, and you're a blue flannel pillow, you can go anywhere you want. Short of traveling into space or the air, because pillows can't fly or rocket launch themselves into space - as of the writing of this publication - and thus why I mentioned earlier that said sky is in fact the upper limit, so to speak, on interplanetary travel by home furnishings.

For example, a spare water faucet would not be able to visit the van Allen belt, unless it happens to be hired by NASA in the near future. But as I hear, they have a hiring freeze. And he was designed in France so he would probably have to be really top notch to get a government job. Built in filter, gold plated. Something along those lines.

Anyway I am worried about him. He will be gone from my life for at least a year or two, but since he wants to live in places I would barely want to visit I doubt he will be back. I'll probably never see him again. What happens to people you never see. To you they're gone forever. They're almost dead. And after so much time passes, it's like you can never see them again. But you never got to really say goodbye.

And if you do ever perchance meet them again, it won't be the same. They're a ghost in the machine. The person you knew is gone. Replaced by a replica. Their shadow. They're gone. They're zombies.

Did I ever tell you about the time my daughter went to the playground? She would ride all the animals, and I would push her for hours in the swings. But she really loved the slide. She would spend hours and hours sliding down, yelling "look at meeeeee!" and climbing right back up. All the other kids didn't share her enthusiasm, but that was ok. I could always tell all the other parents were jealous. Even though she had never been born, she was happier than their kids seemed to be. She didn't get in trouble in school. She didn't get diagnosed with manic depression or colic or have this throbbing pain in her side that isn't really a disease and never goes away. She seemed to be pretty happy really. By comparison.

I hope the yen is doing well, relative to other world currencies. I feel bad for it I guess. And the broccoli farmers. Their jobs are hard. I wonder if they like StarCraft. Maybe they have to farm other vegetables so they're not so destitute. Tobacco maybe. I wonder if they sleep ok at nighttimes. I guess I should write my congressman to see if he is doing anything about the problem.

Anyway, thanks. I'll be here all week. As I said before, I am a zombie, and the undead tend to hang around for a while until they finish up whatever it is they're here to do. I mean, we're here to do. Eat brains, visit art museums, donate to the Red Cross and such.

I would like to own a painting depicting a planet where donut holes are sentient, and people don't have to be dead to seem happy.

Goodbye.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 3 - Recapture the Rapture

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 17:30:00 -0500

So, last week the rapture happened and everybody died.

They made us get in two lines. I was in the right one. These hoards of people seemed to be stretching on for eternity. But obviously that's hyperbole, because there haven't been an infinite number of people who have lived.

Everyone refused to acknowledge the situation. I was the only one seemingly concerned about where we were going, and what exactly was happening to us. Most everyone was making small talk, mostly about how cold the weather had been where they lived before they died. A few people were yelling about whether invading Iraq had been a good idea or not. I think I heard some Germans talking about sausages. But whatever, I didn't speak German. They could have been discussing bathroom porn.

I had been waiting for two or three hours. No one had said a word to me. I seemed to be the only person preoccupied with my surroundings. Except for a middle aged man in the other line. He was wearing a brown tartan jacket with those elbow pad things, and a grey hat that didn't match anything but his beard. He had crazy eyes, and he was using them to look around at everyone nervously, like he was sure he was going to hell. Occasionally he would look in my direction. I just pretended not to notice.

Suddenly, we had passed through a gate and I saw a guy in a white robe to our left. He was carrying a clipboard, and every ten seconds or so he would look at it, and tap on the side of it with a pen. But he wasn't making any marks.

So I decided to ask him what the deal was.

"Hey, are you like, St. Peter?"

"No, St. Peter is fictional. My name is Harvey."

"So Harvey .. what line are we in here? You uh, you get my drift?"

"Oh. OH. Right. Yeah, there's just two lines. It's just to make the lines shorter. You're all getting into heaven."

Suddenly everyone in both lines stopped talking, looked at us, and let out big sighs of disappointment. There were a few sighs of relief, but mostly everyone was upset that everyone else got to go on in. They wanted their line to be the good line. So then they just resuming talking about their weather.

"Ok Harvster. Can you um, explain life or the universe or whatever?"

"Oh. No. I'm just a temp. They don't tell you that stuff until you sign a non-disclosure and non-compete agreement."

"...Oh. So you're just checking the list and crossing people off, or what?"

"Well, I think I was supposed to be. But all they gave me was this time table of activities. They forgot to give me a copy of the list. They always do shit like that man, they just assume I know all these bullshit rules like it's supposed to just pop in my head by osmosis or whatever? Shit. I don't even think this thing is right. It says we're having tacos for lunch today at noon, but Wednesday is always meatloaf day. And you know, they always do this crap to me. One time I was supposed to meet this guy at the main gate right? But it turns out he got sent around back and got lost somewhere. Then that stupid ass Ken sent him to gate 5. And everybody knows gate 5 just leads you back to the middle of the forest in Indonesia. What a retard. Seriously, I don't know how he keeps his job sometimes. Like, the other day, he"

The line wasn't moving. And Harvey the Heaven temp was prattling about his coworkers for what seemed an eternity. The bearded man in the other line had removed his hat and he was brushing his hair back with his hands. I had to wonder who he was primping himself for. Maybe a long lost relative. Maybe his wife who died a few years ago, and left him to live in a big house by myself.

Maybe he just thought he needed a haircut.

Suddenly the other line took off. And we were left standing there. For hours? Minutes? It's hard to say. I mean, it's easy to say "minutes", but it's probably not true.

"...And that's why they won't even let me take a break without telling the boss first. I mean seriously, I know I'm just from an agency but I can go to the bathroom by myself.."

"Yeah great. Anyway. Why isn't this line moving? Dude, don't you at least know what this place is like? Tell me. I mean, was any religion right? Did we all lead good lives? Or was it meaningless?"

"Oh that. Turns out both the atheists and the Christians were right. Jesus is the son of God, but God is a flying spaghetti monster. And I totally met them the other day. Nice enough guys I guess. But then I went out for Italian at lunch right, cause I got this craving? Well you know the good place is allll the way across town and I was five minutes late and of course that bitch Ken totally told on me and they docked me five minutes! I'm so sick of that guy, really"

So, what he was telling me? Humanity was made in the image of pasta. I guess I can live with that. Or, exist with that, since we're all dead.

I got to the front of the line after .. I'm not sure how long. Time was no longer of the essence. Anyway, I got to the front of the line and it turned out St. Peter was there after all. And just him. He was just alternating lines - at least, he was trying to alternate lines - and letting people in. After they filled out the proper W2 forms and contracts, of course.

There was a fifty foot tall sign radiating white light. It said "WELCOME TO HEAVEN. PLEASE MERGE."

But all the people in the left line just kept cutting in front of us.

No one would speak up. Everyone knew it was wrong. But they just didn't want to get involved.

They just kept talking about how cold it had been.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club

Book #2: Chapter 2 - This is a Secret Blog Entry You Cannot Read Because We Had a Run-In Once and I Dislike You Actively

nospam@example.com (rushoffailure) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 11:56:00 -0500

"Would you like a chocolate covered pretzel?" *smile smile*

"HELL NO I DON'T WANT NO ASS PRETZELS"

These mall sample cronies always give me these dirty looks. I just don't understand it. They've got some kind of malfunction; probably a major one. If I didn't know better I'd say they're trying to poison me with snack treats. Wait a minute. If what my teachers said in elementary school is true, I don't know any better. And I might possibly be the antichrist. Be right back. Gotta call poison control.

I wonder if in the Book of Life, there's like this mad face next to my name and a big "SEE ME" in red ink. I wonder if it has a copy of my permanent record. "Anti-religion. Condones health care for all people, except fetuses. IQ too high, difficult to teach. Wouldn't eat pumpkin seeds. Doesn't like watching kids threatened with a beating for not being able to count"

One time I swallowed an apple whole just to see his reaction. His reaction, for those wondering, was to choke me. And then he started rambling about New Line Cinema. I didn't really follow along as I was unconscious at the time. Something about elves, and musicals.

The other day I took my computer to the Geek Squad as it was acting sort of "funny", I believe is the technical term. Not "Jim Carrey" funny. More "Colin Quinn" funny.

I had set my wallpaper to a picture of myself giving a thumbs up with my name in 128 point Impact, and I threw in some rainbow stars for good measure. A few pinstripes, but they were obscured by the unicorns.

I did this so I could tell my computer apart from the others when I came back. But all they did was laugh at me. It got pretty heated and at some point the police were involved, but at least now there's no horse porn pop-ups every ten seconds. Now, I only see horse porn at 6 pm weekdays, which I believe is a much more acceptable scenario.

Speaking of bestiality, I don't watch American Idol.

It is one of my secret goals in life to visit a banana farm. I have been dying to find out exactly how they shrink them down and get them in those candy machines at buffet restaurants. I think I'll schedule a week's vacation for later this year when they're in season. Maybe I can visit a soda bottling plant at the same time. I've always wondered how they harvest all the bottles. It's probably some kind of electric collar like they use on cows.

I think Thom Yorke and Les Claypool should collaborate on an electronica album. They could probably win at least two Grammy nominations, and Lady Sovereign might call it "mad dope".

I would buy an audio book of Christina Aguilera narrating Catcher in the Rye. I would pay upwards of fifteen dollars for this item. You may share this fact with whomever you choose. It is a personal choice I have decided to share with humanity.

Labels: A Book for Oprah's Book Club