[The dissipation of the electronic signal to begin receiving messages, and then 9 slow seconds of urban hiss, of waiting or hesitation, of cars on a rainy street, then]:
I [it’s my brother, I think] don’t know. I don’t know. Insert Plate No. 67 of Dore’s illustrations for Dante’s Divine Comedy here. It’s ice, I’m walking across ice, and all these half-disappeared faces are staring up at me. Am I supposed to want to help these people? Because all I’m thinking is if they sink down a little lower, we could fucking ice skate here.
I’m in my office. You know how my cube is, no, you’ve never seen my office have you. You never visit me, dadgum it to heck it. You never call you never visit. Okay, insert picture of 2 loose-tie-and-shirtsleeves playing water cooler roulette. Hey Bob did you see [x] on the tube last night? Naw, the missus had me doing [x]. That fucking bitch, blaw haw haw. Hey I hear Blenderson over in accounting, et cetera.
So there’s that like right around the corner all day, and then the way my cube is set up my back’s not to the entrance, praise allah, but my monitor sort of faces it, so if I’m working, air quotes, I have my head craned around and don’t ever see what’s going on outside. And this afternoon, this is after meetings, keep in mind, you Kevin: I had been in meetings, I hear, like, plastic. Squeaky plastic parts rubbing against each other. Cheap machinery. Wicka, wicka, wicka on the carpet. Something broken is moving towards me. I turn around and it’s a fucking Toy. Bear. On. Rollerskates. It skates up to my door and stands there for a second, and then it lights up and this tweaked-out electric noise in the shape of Jingle Bell Rock bursts out of it’s mouth, except worse because it sounds like this bear has taken a beating, and the Now The Jingle Hop notes come out in twisted sharp quarter-tones. Snowing and blowing up bushels of fun, now the jingle hop has begun. Like that. I just sit there, and it’s staring at me and lighting up and singing at me. Scariest thing I have ever seen in my life, and you were right there with me when Aunt Elaine threw up at Sushi Palace, boy-o. Ah, octopus roll, was it?
So I get up to murder it but Diane, this lady on the some other team swoops in and grabs it and gives me a tiddley-hee smirk and runs off. Oh, I wanted to throw a stapler at her. It is a Swingline. It is not without heft. Is it my job to be nice? Which one of us got the Upstanding Mensch genes, I forget, Mom used to say one of us got those and the other got, I can’t remember. The looks, ha ha. I once again beg you to win the lottery and get me outta here, big boy. I’m not long for insanity.
[6 seconds]
I forget. The bus is coming. I’m going to hang up out of courtesy to my fellow passengers, who don’t care to listen in to my cell phone conversations. They are merely jealous. My cell phone conversations are RuPaul on New Year’s Eve. Eye eee GLAMOROUS!
[2 seconds]
There’s this guy wandering around here with two bags full of pineapples. Where does this guy think he is? Hey mac, it’s December. Is he looking to party or what. HEY GUY DO YOU BELIEVE THIS WEATHER WE’RE HAVING? Whoops. Aiiighty, bus, gotta go. If you believe in heaven you better believe in more than one heaven, because I’m not spending eternity in one room with these people. From all of us, to all of you. From our family to yours.