Before you start reading this entry, I feel I should warn you that it is stupid, and that you will double over in pain from the stupidity, and your sleep will be troubled for a fortnight, filled with stupid dreams, and all your children will be born stupid. If you have a cat it is already stupid, but that doesn't mean you should feeding it.
A SHORT POINTLESS STORY THAT GAINS IN TIME, SO FIVE YEARS FROM NOW YOU'LL SLAP YOUR FOREHEAD WITH THE HEEL OF YOUR PALM AND SAY "OH, I GET IT! WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT YEARS AGO? I WOULD HAVE EMAILED THAT GUY TO TELL HIM HOW MUCH I ENJOYED THAT STORY OF HIS...TOO BAD SILICON-BASED COMPUTERS WENT OUT IN THE CYBERFLESH REVOLUTION OF '07 AND THAT ANTIQUATED DEAD METAPHOR OF CONNECTION THAT WE CALLED THE INTERNET - HA! HOW NAIVE WE WERE! CIRCUIT BOARDS SCREECHING AT EACH OTHER OVER PHONE LINES! - FOLDED IN ON ITSELF AND EXPLODED INTO THE LIVING AETHER OF THE INTERWOVEN MIND, THE ONE, THE ALL. IF I WERE MORE THAN A LOWLY NUTRI-SLURRY DRONE I WOULD LEND OF A PORTION OF MYSELF TO THE CENTRE AND FIND THE BRIGHT, PULSING TUBE OF THAT AUTHOR'S IDENTITY AND FOLLOW IT DOWN INTO HIS MIND-NODE. THEN I'D TELL HIM THAT I REALLY ENJOYED HIS STORY, AND THAT EVEN THOUGH AT THE TIME IT SEEMED POINTLESS AND ENGINEERED SOLELY TO IRRITATE PEOPLE WHO'D COME TO HIS WEB SITE EXPECTING A FEW LAUGHS AND A MILD DIVERSION, I GET IT NOW, AND YOU KNOW WHAT? IT'S PRETTY FUNNY".
Salazar stepped briskly down the hallway, brushing peanut butter cookie crumbs off his rumpled shirt with one hand and holding the manuscript in the other. He was so excited, so buoyed up in the spirit by the overwhelming decency and mentally nutritious content of the manuscript that he could not recall which hand was doing the brushing and which was doing the clutching, which caused him several times to clutch his shirt and brush the manuscript. Salazar slowed his pace, troubled by his confusion, uneasy in his soul and unable to remember whether he wore a moustache. What else could that thing on his upper lip be? Salazar took a further step and stopped altogether, unable to explain the hair on his lip, the pattern of his tie, the pressed pulp of the manuscript's paper. All that helpless reconstitution, he thought. Why now? he asked, and although he stood still he felt that he was floating back through an invisible tunnel. What was that manuscript, and who wrote it, and who brought it to me, and why? He dropped the pages, watching as they whipped away down the tunnel. Goodbye, said Salazar, goodbye. You'll make a lovely galley proof. There was no one to love me and now it's too late. Perhaps there was a memo, but I didn't read it. I didn't pay attention when the memo was making the rounds, I didn't intitial it, and this is my punishment. Warning! Said the memo. Failure to read this memo will result in melancholy and disintegration. Please initial next to your name to indicate that you have read and understood. Oh well. It's probably for the best. I should have been an efficiency expert.
THE END
Now that, you'll have to admit, was damn funny and a good read, and you're wishing it was a serialized novel so you could have the pleasure of reading it over many many installments. I mean, Salazar - what a name, hey? What an intriguing man this Salazar is. He's a hero for the new century. You can't see this in the story, but he has a gun tucked in to the back of his slacks that can take down an angry bison. I didn't want to mention it earlier, because so many people are prejudiced against gun owners, especially against gun owners who walk around the workplace with a weapon poking from the waistband of their slacks. Let's be honest - if I told you right away that Salazar was brushing peanut butter cookie crumbs from his shirt and clutching the manuscript (aren't you curious in the least bit about the content of that manuscript?) and shifting his weight as he walked to accomodate the gun in his pants, you'd have a different view of him. You wouldn't be so quick to accept his melancholy, his flight along the invisible tunnel. You'd think: why doesn't he just pull out the gun and fire off a few rounds to calm himself? He does do that, but I didn't mention that bit. And since we're being honest with each other I should tell you that he's not actually brushing crumbs of his shirt but firing randomly into a crowd.
And that manuscript? That was an autographed photo of Harrison Ford. Well, it's a photo of Richard Dreyfuss, but it's signed by Harrison Ford. You think that's absurd, but here's what happened. Salazar bought a copy of a publicity still from American Graffiti on Ebay, having been told by the vendor that the photo was a group shot and that Harrison Ford could be seen in the background, his face partially obscured by the brim of his Stetson. When the photo came in the mail it turned out to be a picture of a grinning Richard Dreyfuss in white against a hot pink background. How he got Harrison Ford to sign the photo or even shake him briefly from his living-dead stupor (did you see him mumbling and stumbling at the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards? Is he on meds? Is Calista Flockhart draining him of his precious life energy?) is too complicated to go into here. Anyway, I'm sure you're imagining that Salazar found the dishonest Ebay vendor and descended on his workplace, shooting wildly and clutching that damned memorabilium, and that he himself was fatally wounded. Come now - that would be a bit obvious, wouldn't it? But that's what happened.
