Something immensely weird and probably intensely evil happens in your immediate vicinity. Your reaction? �So was that before or after the succubus molested me? The first time, that is.� �Hey�my computer hasn�t crashed all day. Weird.� �And that, children, is why we never read from books bound in human skin.� �That was . . . so cool. Can you do that again?� �That�s an awful lot of slime to clean up.� (wet ripping sound) �Hey! Gimmie my skin back!�
Pretend you�re back in high school. Seriously, this is therapy. Anyway, you�re back in high school, and you�ve just been scorned by someone you think is smoking, flaming hot. How did they do it? �I�m sorry, but I�m already seeing someone. Give me fifteen minutes to break the news to them, and I�ll be back.� �I�m sorry, but I�m already seeing someone. I�m flattered, though.� �Oh, you were being serious? I can never tell. No.� �No! NO MORE POETRY!� �Ewww, no!� (scream) �It isn�t human! IT ISN�T HUMAN!� (leads a lynch mob against your lonely castle)
Yippie! You�ve gotten accepted into the college you wanted to! But wait�what�s the catch? No catch, I�ve got a scholarship. Wait�oh, damn, I have to maintain a 1.0 GPA! I�m going to be in debt till I�m forty, at which point the mortgage will start sucking me dry. All my classes are at eight in the morning�and one of the instructors answers to �Mr. Ventilator�. I didn�t get into the honor�s program. Somebody already has it in for me, and I haven�t even gotten there yet! Mom and Dad say the money ain�t there. I�m going to be eating a lot of Ramen. �Mr./Ms. Potential Test Subject�Welcome! We were pleased to hear of your willingness to become a subject in the Jeckyll/Hyde Formula 309 trials . . .�
Well, you�ve finally gotten to college�only to find that your roommate has some . . . unique . . . hang-ups. So, what amusing/infuriating anecdotes are you going to be able to tell your family back at home? You would not believe the size of the fridge they brought�and it�s filled completely with beer! Ah well, as long as they�ll share . . . It ain�t like Ramen is kosher; so why does he have to use thrice-distilled water and dishes that have been purified by sanctified flame? My room has become a haven of brand name non-conformity. Maybe I should invest in Hot Topic. Why does he keep opening the blinds? There�s nothing outside but the light . . . I�m sure that there�s a completely innocent reason for the dark stains on the carpet. Dammit, I wish that he�d stop harvesting my organs while I sleep.
Whew! You�ve finally made peace with your roommate�he/she�ll curb the extremes of their idiosyncrasies, and you�ll put down that machete. Unfortunately, all that time you spent warring with them distracted you from your studies. Now exams are here, and you haven�t studied a lick! How does it go down? The instructor announces that the essays have been removed from the exam, and have been replaced by the multiple choice questions �Who is your favorite instructor? and �What is cheese?� I�ll throw in a couple of all night cram sessions, bum the notes off some friends, whatever�it sucks, but I�ll do fine if I work hard enough. I maintain my solid �C� average. On to another semester of disaffection. I�ll brood, or write about brooding, or brood in the company of friends, and I�ll almost forget about the exams in the midst of my bitching. I�ll get through somehow, though. You get the notes, you cram like you�ve never crammed before�but it just ain�t clicking. Maybe you�re in a hardcore science class, maybe the neurons took too much of a caffeine/ethanol battering and just stopped firing�whatever it is, you�re screwed. The medical trials you�ve been participating have transformed you into a berserk fratboy (yes, females too) and you�ve been on a drunken rampage since about a week before exams began. You finally come to, a week into the new semester, naked and covered in jell-o--in another state.
Okay, enough with memory lane. So I ask you . . . Monkeys? Yes! Yes . . .? No. No . . . (sigh) I got hyenas, instead. Rabid hyenas.
And finally . . . if you had one wish, what would you use it on? Something that would help someone other than just me. World peace, or a cure for cancer, or something. Something extravagant, or daring, or just plain exciting. I don�t get enough of that in my life. I don�t know. Maybe I�d make it so that anyone on TV would have to speak the complete and literal truth. That would make watching car commercials funny. And CNN. For it all just to go away. To be able to go through high school again�this time with the power to make enraged raccoons burst from people�s eyes. For the cops to stop beating me.