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I am bored. I am bored with this place and this desk and this carpet. The desk is old and has "character" because it is heavy and made out of a tree that doesn't grow in nature anymore and I am supposed to like it more than, say, the fake-wood desk I could buy from Wal-Mart for $49.99, but I do not. I would rather have the fake-wood desk covered with the fake, wood-design contact paper so I could play with edges and peel it up, piece by piece, over time. The carpet has a unique design, delicate swirls of red and pink and black and it comes from a country where the people don't speak English and was made by someone who probably slaved night and day in a tent in the desert, or at least in a hot factory on the bad side of Chicago, while they put this beautiful rug together, but it is also boring and I think I would rather walk on shiny black linoleum tiles that never need to be waxed.
There are books around my desk written by people with impressive sounding names and the insides of these books are filled with substantial words like Cataclysmic and Calamitous, words that sound like they could get up off the couch and kick my ass should I come in and interrupt their cartoon watching time after work. I think the words in these books could actually drink me under the table if given the chance, and maybe kick my ass in pool too. But these words are still boring because the cartoons they watch are perverse and shocking in that over-the-top, grossly violent and overtly sexual kind of way. Sometimes I think I'd like to see Cataclysmic and Calamitous watch a pornographic cartoon in front of the kids as they are enjoying a satisfying after-school snack of Oreo cookies and a glass of 2% milk. I'd like to see the porno staged in one of those George W. Bush, No-Child-Left-Behind inspired "charter" elementary schools where the "older" and dumb yet street-wise fifth grader who can already grow a beard becomes enamored with the newly graduated, idealistic teacher who is both "youngish" and nimble and wants to save the street-wise fifth grader from the harsh streets of some heathen place like New York City, or Durham, North Carolina. But then I think this would also be boring because it seems like something I've already seen or been told about as a recent dream from a friend of mine who shall go nameless because he's currently serving in the Marine Corps as a Special Op in Afghanistan and I wouldn't want to put his security clearance in jeopardy.
Sometimes I think I'd like to take Cataclysmic out for a Budweiser or a gin and tonic and then maybe take him to bed. My feeling is that Cataclysmic has a tiny penis. I think the chip he has on his shoulder is a dead give away. Most of the words I've ever met who had such an immense hatred for the human race and a ready desire to punch a complete stranger in the face usually had a tiny penis. I'm making generalizations and I probably shouldn't do that but I'm bored and I don't really care about what I should and shouldn't do. In fact, I think I'd like to start simultaneous relationships with both Cataclysmic and Calamitous. Maybe we could have a threesome. Maybe Calamitous could play the part of the psychiatrist and tell me what a mess I've made of my life lately and give me some good advice on how I should go about fixing it; maybe he could be a judge, watch me go down on Cataclysmic and then critique my performance: That was a nice twisting half gainer, but you made too much of a splash upon entry so I'm giving you an 8.
Maybe Cataclysmic, Calamitous and I could form a synchronized diving team and compete for the Olympic gold. I think I look good enough in a bathing suit to cinch us a hefty endorsement deal. I think the three of us could stand a real chance in the 3-meter springboard event, but not the 10-meter platform, because I still have that persistent case of acrophobia. I was hoping one day to replace my fear of heights with the fear of loud noises, or at least add it in, because the fear of heights is just so common and I thought that an acrophobia/acousticophobia combination in a synchronized diver might just win the hearts of the American psyche. But I'm told the fear of loud noise is more common in pets than humans and anyway it would all still be boring unless I came up with something really intriguing, like a fear of chickens, or German culture. Only thing is, I'd have to convince the Olympic Committee into letting me compete in a bikini. You have to acknowledge your limitations: I just don't look good in a one piece.
If the three of us could just find some redneck girl from the Ukrainian team to whack one of us on the knee or the head with something original, like a yard stick, or a rolled up newspaper, that would be choice. And in front of a camera crew, even better. But it couldn't be too scripted. It would have to look spontaneous. There are just too many of those sentimental Olympic stories out there already. It's hard to compete for air time against a beautiful Romanian gymnast with a blind mother or a 139 pound multiple-world-champion Chinese female weightlifter who can snatch 250 pounds while simultaneously dealing with the emotional pain of a cancer stricken sister on her deathbed.
But even with the threesome and the fake-wood desk from Wal-Mart and the shiny black linoleum tiles and the porno and the gin and the Budweiser and the pool playing and the synchronized diving, I would still be bored. I think Cataclysmic and Calamitous would eventually leave me for some other boring words like "deserted, wet streets" and "patches of green, green grass covered with dew" and "dim streetlights" that "buzzed and crackled" in the night and then maybe Cataclysmic and Calamitous would get together with these words and make a sentence, or better yet a short story set in California in the 1960s involving poor and uneducated itinerant farmers enduring poverty and depression. Maybe there could also be a grandmother and a social worker. Or maybe they could form a sentimental poem about teenage love in which they compared falling in love to drowning in the ocean or their lover to a giant wave slamming down on them or a rip tide slowly pulling them under. Maybe they could both drown together like two virgin lovers fated to never consummate their love; maybe I could stand on the shore of a secluded sandy beach and watch. Maybe at sunset the sky would alight with the color of their love and my feelings of boredom would be replaced by empathy and a melancholy sadness that would inspire me to greatness.
Or maybe I could just stay bored and drink Budweiser alone while I watch Cataclysmic and Calamitous compete without me. Maybe it would be better for the team if I just stayed home and went to bed early, which sounds like the most boring thing of all but has a certain appeal if preceded by at least four shots of Jack and followed by one strange sex dream in which I capture gold medals in both the shot put and the long jump. Then maybe a passionate if not slightly misguided Canadian from the equestrian team might run across the infield of the arena wearing nothing but a placard that said: WAR BAD. And that right there would make all my years of hard work and self-sacrifice worthwhile.
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