Congratulations on Acquiring a Pair of Olivia Thirlby's Underpants!

The NSA has had to deal with some pretty serious budget cuts ever since the Department of Homeland Security emerged to soak up funding and do its best to make our country alarmingly similar to Iran in its stance on civil liberties. As a result there are few incentives for you to protect America aside from a smug sense of self-satisfaction and freedom from the constant threat of decimation which exists in all American intelligence agencies.

So when the order comes down that someone has to shoot a bunch of terrorists with akimbo style pistols and disarm a nuclear bomb in the middle of East L.A. there are only three volunteers: you, a Mexican guy named Steve who has family in the area and Cheyenne, a female agent with a chip on her shoulder and everything in the world to prove to the brass.

Suffice it to say they’ll be denied and you, an alcoholic thrill-seeker who happened to be born white and middle class, will be given twenty minutes of firearms training and parachuted into East L.A..

While there you’ll almost instantly be accosted by a group of Latino gang members, most of whom are actually UCLA students from various departments who happened to be well armed thanks to their affluent parents and living in East L.A. in a rented flat together to have a “cultural experience.” It’ll be dodgy at first, but you’ll do a quick impromptu rap session and win them over in record time in order to enlist their aid in defeating the terrorists.

Mean streets of Beverly Hills or no, these kids love America and hate terror as much as the next fellow and they’ll all but jump for joy when you ask them to help you shoot people. Unfortunately, they’ll be woefully poorly trained and the vast majority of them will die from bullet wounds during the ensuing dockside shoot out.

But their sacrifice will give you the time you need to jump through the air and fire blindly the way the government trained you, which will prove surprisingly effective. You’ll handily kill all of the terrorists and only be shot about three times (luckily the training program also encompassed gritting your teeth and dealing with the pain, otherwise you might not have made it).

After the shootout and a hasty bit of work with wire cutters and a very informative field manual you’ll pick up your lone surviving ethnic companion, a young man named James whose father teaches film studies, and the two of you will drag yourselves to a police station to declare your mission accomplished.

James will be held for six hours before being released into his parent’s custody and you’ll be held for two days on suspicion of intent to purchase narcotics from a minor until the NSA shows up and informs them that you are, in fact, a government agent and they’d very much like you back.

After that your wounds will be treated and you’ll be flown coach back to D.C. where Obama will give you a handshake and your choice between a box of cupcakes and a set of decorative soaps. You’ll take the soaps and thank the President, and he’ll smile, splitting the box of cupcakes anyways with you because he’s classy that way.

It will be two weeks later when you receive a package with his name as the sender. You’ll have been sitting at your desk wishing there was another opportunity for you to kill or be wounded for your country, just so you can feel something again, when your boss drops the package on your desk.

“Sorry this took so long,” he’ll say, exhaling a long plume of smoke from his cigarette because the NSA is rough and tumble and still lets people do that shit in their office. You’ll nod your thanks and open the package.

Inside there will be a brief note, reading Thanks for taking three for America. Then under that there will be a pair of slightly used underpants and an autographed picture of established young actress Olivia Thirlby.

You’ll simultaneously feel kind of dirty and kind of honored that she decided to give you her underpants. You’ll also be a little bit weirded out that your country has stopped giving out medals for being wounded in lieu of soliciting patriotic young actresses for their underpants, but you’ll still take them. You’ll feel a little dirty, but you’d hate to insult her. And your wife will love the autographed picture.

You won’t be sure whether or not you should tell her about the panties, but we suggest that you give her the full rundown. That way she won’t think that you were cheating on her during your two day absence with the terrorists, because trust us, that’s exactly where her head is going to be at if you don’t do some serious damage control.

But hey, it’s your marriage. Either way, Congratulations on Acquiring a Pair of Olivia Thirlby’s Underpants!