Article: 178931 of talk.bizarre
From: nj@birch.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Narciso Jaramillo)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: welcome to writer's block
Date: 02 Dec 1994 07:41:48 GMT
Organization: Word Wranglers, a division of General Antics GmbH
Lines: 54
Message-ID: <NJ.94Dec1234148@birch.CS.Berkeley.EDU>
Reply-To: nj@cs.Berkeley.EDU (Narciso Jaramillo)
Status: O


So I'm sitting here, trying and failing to fail to suck, when I start
to doze off at the keyboard.  As typically happens when I fall asleep,
I begin to hear snatches of conversation which turn into little
scenes.  In this case there seem to be two rather morose and scruffy
young men working a discount store of some sort.  As the daydream
becomes more visual, I see a big sign:

			NEWBERRY'S IDEA STORE
		BARGAIN BASEMENT -- ALL IDEAS 99 CENTS

The walls are lined with warped wooden shelves painted unattractive
shades of dirty white.  The shelves hold rows and rows of cheap
plastic jars, each labelled with a sloppily-lettered length of masking
tape.  It's impossible to figure out what's in the jars without
opening them, since the plastic is nearly opaque; and the labels are
complete nonsense.  Most are mere jumbles of letters, numbers and
punctuation marks, while a few bear phrases like SPOON ROLODEX,
GENERAL STATICS, IF ROBIN WILLIAMS WERE MY PENIS, and SQUID OVER
PODUNK (EXPRESS--NO MISHAWAKA STOP).

While I'm looking around, trying to take this all in, I catch a little
of the conversation between the two store workers, who seem to be
named "Vishnu" and "Brahma":

V: I guess we'd better unpack the next box.
B: I'm bored.
V: Come on.  Where should I put B3!PrfP?
B: Put it next to the last jar you put up.
V: Okay.  Where should I put #R IpN:ARy 662?
B: Put it next to the last jar you put up.
V: Okay.  Where should I put SEAT THICKENER II: THE NEXT GENERATION?
B: Put it next to the last jar you put up.

This goes on for quite a long time.  

Eventually I realize they aren't going to say anything interesting, so
I continue looking around; and there, on the other side of the store,
is a very large sign that reads:

		      IF THIS WERE MAGIC REALISM
		    YOU'D HAVE AN EPIPHANY BY NOW.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Tell me, Sigmund, what does this mean?
> It means you liked to lick your feces when you were little.
My own?  Not someone elses?
> Yes.  Autocoprophagia, a division of Autoeroticism, Inc.
I like the sound of that.

-- 
	    God does not play dice with the universe; he plays go.
Narciso Jaramillo ... nj@cs.Berkeley.EDU ... http://http.cs.berkeley.edu/~nj/