Friday, May 31, 2013

Congratulations on Ignoring Your Accountant's Advice!



“This is a terrible idea.”

It won’t be the first time he says that sentence, but it will be the last time you hear him.  Filling out your detailed 1040 and its accompanying documents, you’ll make a “shooing” gesture in his general direction, one he’ll ignore, one that’ll permit you, in your head, to block out all the sounds he’s making with his dumb fat mouth.

This won’t be the first time you’ve done this.  When you first decided to buy a bouncy castle, you did it then.  When you summarily purchased a fleet of bouncy castles, you continued to do so.  When you bought a large tract of land to display and store those bouncy castles, you had to do it extra hard, especially since the taxes on that land were so high.

But now, as you lie on your taxes, as your accountant stands up and leaves the room, as you carefully determine exactly how big the fake farm you’re imagining your bouncy castles sits on will be so that you can maximize your deduction without drawing too-too much attention, you’ll wonder, for the first time, if you should actually listen to him.

The thought will skitter at the edge of your consciousness, a bleary, halting thing.  It will nearly interrupt your careful paperwork completion.  But then the dumb part of your brain, the part that once did a write-in vote for Pat Buchanan in a local election in a state he may have never even set foot in, the part of your brain that thought it was a good idea to order a wife from the Ukraine a third time, after the first one died and the second one ran away, the part of your brain that considers cheez from a spray can a froot, this part of your brain will override all others and force you to make a serious error on your paperwork.  This error will make the government owe you a considerable amount of money, make you responsible for a large amount of corn that never existed, and make your impending audit a sure thing.

If your accountant were to sign off on this tax return, he’d lose his certification.  But since he left, you won’t have to have that conversation with him.  Instead, you’ll proudly sign, declaring to the government that you prepared this return all by yourself, without any help from a grownup who, say, understands the tax code.

The part of your brain that we mentioned earlier will reward you for doing so well by playing the theme from the classic cult television series Batman on an endless loop inside your head, driving your dopamine levels way, way up.

Congratulations on Ignoring Your Accountant’s Advice!

Thursday, May 30, 2013

Congratulations Polite Crack Fiend!



When the man in the tuxedo walks past you, you’ll know you’ve hit pay dirt.  You’ll stumble to your feet, steadying yourself on a nearby drain pipe to ease the process along.  Then you’ll begin your shtick, clearing your throat before politely requesting:

“Pardon sirrah, have you a dollar to spare?”

The man will act as if he didn’t hear you, which will lead to you tugging ever so gently on his sleeve.

“Beg pardon, sir.  I seek funds for crack cocaine.  I’d lie to you and claim that it’s for food, but such a gesture would be tremendously ungentlemanly.”

The man will pause for a moment.  A smile will creep across his face.

“What would you do for fifteen dollars?” he’ll ask, the bulge in his pants already taking shape.

“Felatio it is!” you’ll cheerily announce, extending your hand to the man in the tuxedo for a quick shake before you guide him to the alley.  Once there you’ll begin tepidly conducting oral sex upon this gentleman.  As he nears orgasm, you’ll stop, remove a straight razor from your pocket and slit the gentleman’s throat to the spine.  He’ll die gurgling.

“Terribly sorry,” you’ll murmur at him as you collect his clothes.  You’ll give him a quick kick on your way away, then trundle off to sell his possessions as politely as possibly overjoyed to have more money to give to Manuel, your crack salesperson.  And what’s more, you acquired these funds without ever losing composure or resorting to bad manners.  A capital day overall!

Congratulations Polite Crack Fiend!

Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Congratulations on Finding Something New to Pierce!



Lips, eyebrows, nose (each side), ears.  Dermal anchors in your chest, cheeks, and forehead.  Your nipples, your clit, your labia.  All of them pierced.  You travel exclusively by train or speedboat, you hate your father, and you’re pretty sure you’re out of things to pierce.  Well, you were pretty sure this morning.

But by the time this afternoon rolls around you’re going to be singing a very, very different tune.  And the name of that tune will be “Shove That Sterile Instrument Through the Skin Between My Vagina and My Anus.”  That’s right, today you’re going to join the ranks of people with pierced taints.  It’s going to hurt tremendously, ruin sex for you, and bowel movements are going to generate an impressively disproportionate risk of infection for the next few months.  It’ll decrease soon, but remain higher than normal for the rest of your life, thanks to the holes in your body where shit can get stuck.

Upsides will include being able to tell people you have a pierced taint and being able to relate to Courtney Love on a very specific level.

We’re not sure those things qualify as upsides, come to think of it.  Ah well.  Enjoy your pierced taint!  If you ever have a child, be sure to remove that piercing before you enter your third trimester.

Congratulations on Finding Something New to Pierce!

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Congratulations on Learning Just How Worthless You Really Are!



The coin will slip into the slot with a satisfying snickt, and then the hands will begin to move.  Down to the surface of the counter, which will be only a few inches above the start of the glass enclosure the plastic gypsy sits within.  You’ll rest your hand on the stick just in front of where she once clasped her hands and say:

“Tell me my future.”

The gypsy will sit still for a moment, as if contemplating just how to respond to this question before blinking her plastic eyes once and opening her mouth.

“You have no future.”

You’ll wait patiently while she leaves space for a dramatic pause.  Gypsy announcements of this kind often have them, you’ll know from experience, and after such a delightfully ominous announcement, you’ll be positive that this particular gypsy has got a golden follow-up out there.  That’ll make the disappointment all the more thorough.

“Your life will be a series of uninterrupted half-measures, relationships strung together without marker or meaning.  By the time you realize just how ill conceived the path you’ve taken with your life is, you’ll be sitting there, nearing middle age, still doing data entry while your novel goes not only unpublished but unfinished, unwritten, and unread even by your own eyes.  One night, you will sit down with a bottle of wine and begin to read your own story, the story you speak about endlessly even today.  You will not read more than ten pages before you decide that writing simply isn’t for you.”

The machine will pause again here, blink twice, then continue.

“You will consider taking your own life, but you will decide that something good may come if you do not.  You will lack both the conviction and the singularity of vision to follow through with such a simple and effective plan for improving the world.  And no good will come of it: your life will end others, simply by presenting itself.  The unpleasant truth of the world will never dawn upon you, and when you die it will be alone, in a hospital, unable to recall your own name.  The only thing you’ll know, deep in your marrow, is that you have wasted your life with a thoroughness and singlemindedness that is almost impressive.”

With this the gypsy’s eyes and mouth will close.  Her hands will raise so that they touch the elbows on her alternate arm.  The lights lining her case will dim and you’ll find yourself walking away, feeling vaguely dissatisfied without knowing why.  You’ll decide not to bother getting the ice cream you came to the boardwalk for in the first place, instead opting to head straight home, eat ramen and watch Downton Abbey.   The next day, you’ll head in to work unfazed.

Congratulations on Learning Just How Worthless You Really Are!

Monday, May 27, 2013

Congratulations on Losing Your Virginity During that Tornado!



When the alarm sounds you’ll be in detention.  That means there will only be you, Naomi and Mr. Gonclin to sit and stare at one another, horrified, as you try to figure out how to evade the impending storm.  You’ll be the first to remember that the school has a tornado cellar, stocked with water, blankets: “All the comforts of home,” you’ll say with a confidence that you’ll wish you’d had days earlier when Naomi asked you if you “were a faggot” and you responded by pulling her hair as hard as you could.

Unfortunately, this will remind Mr. Gonclin about the existence of his ferrets.

“My ferrets are at home!” he’ll shout before throwing the key to you and driving back to his home at full speed to rescue his ferrets.  Gonclin will, of course, die horribly in the impending storm, but his ferrets, having hidden themselves in a series of tubes where the storm would never think to look, will be fine.

This will leave you and Naomi together, staring at one another in detention.

“This sucks,” she’ll say with a flip of her hair.

“Yep,” you’ll shoot back, opening the door to the school’s storm shelter and holding it open for her.  She’ll pass through without thanking you and then you’ll follow behind her. The two of you will then make yourselves comfortable underground.  You’ll get water for her, find some crackers and some cheese in a tube, and put a blanket on the stone floor for her to sit on.

“You’re a pretty nice guy,” she’ll mumble at you from under her bangs.

“Thanks, I guess,” you’ll mumble back around a mouthful of crackers.  She’ll smile and watch you chew the crackers patiently before pouncing on you quite literally, hurling her body at yours like a bullet and pinning you to the ground where she’ll savage you with her lips.

In minutes she’ll have your pants off, her top off, her pants off, your top off, in that order.  The shelter, despite being stocked with most amenities, will be located in the basement of an abstinence only sex-ed school, so there will be no condoms.  The sex that ensues will be sudden, violent, and unprotected: a slippery, pleasant, hasty, too-hot series of smacking sounds and brief wonder by the light of an electric lantern.

“That was your first time, wasn’t it?” she’ll mumble with her hand on your chest after you’re done.

You’ll nod blankly.

“Not mine,” she’ll reply, curling her leg around yours and letting a laugh trickle out from her throat.  “I know you’re not a fag now, right?”

You’ll laugh in response and awkwardly curl your body around hers in a manner that you hope approximates affection.

She’ll let you rest, but not forever.  The storm will last a long while, and Naomi, broken or whole or some measure between the two, won’t want for ideas of how to pass the time with you in that storm shelter.

Congratulations on Losing Your Virginity During that Tornado!