The Shipping News, Redux |  How Did Good News Get In This Story?

In some parts of the world the living conditions of the local residents has shiftly only slightly from the time when fire was still under patent review. The swampier of these zones contain within the broad spectrum of the native biomass a particularly vexing parasite -- a tapeworm. When a pedestrian trods within its boggy homecourt the tapeworm latches on. It begins its burrowful journey from the sole of the offending foot, growing and chewing its way through the muscle mass in the leg, hip, and waist until its length rivals that of its host.
The only remedy in these primeval lands is to remove the tapeworm in its entirety. The extraction is performed by slicing an incision in the foot to permit access to the tail of the beast, draw it an inch or two outward, and slowly remove it by rolling it up with a stick as the guide. Roll, pull, roll, pull, bit by bit, until eviction is achieved. Great care must be taken, as the application of too strong a force will break the tapeworm somewhere within the host, dooming him (or her -- tapeworms are notoriously gender-neutral) to an agonizing death due to runaway infection from the decaying remnant inside.

Reading the previous e-mail from Despair when it arrived gave me a feeling that I would expect is similar to that felt by a tribesman laying on the dirt floor of a straw hut while hearing the shaman, in mid-tapewormectomy, mutter the equivalent in the local dialect of "Whoopsie". Except, instead of being sent to my ancestors on a divine wind driven by a wicked sepsis, I was going to be out another $35. You see the comparison. So really, what avenue was open to me if not the extended protocol of antibiotics we refer to in western culture as e-mail?


From: Brian Moore
Subject: Horribly, horribly misunderstood [Ticket #: 1016279]
Date: 7 May 2004 00:12:17
To: Despair Customer Disservice

No no no no no.

No.

Not since Ferdinand von Zeppelin opted to put the smoking
section on the Hindenberg next to the hydrogen tanks has
there been such a disaster on American soil. And even
that horror was mitigated by the fact that it a) killed
mainly Germans, giving us a head start on the war to come;
b) scorched off, however temporarily, a goodly portion of
New Jersey's crunchy shell of toxic topsoil; and c) did
not affect me directly or indirectly, and hence was hilarious.
But now -- NOW -- disaster touches me. And it's not a good
touch; it is a bad touch. NAMBLA bad.

Confused? Well, as an "educator" I realize that there is
no problem that cannot be made more tiresome by describing
it in detail. So, a short narrative:


I had placed on order two months ago: a desktopper, and
a notecard collection, which arrived in unusually timely
fashion. As a result, I was braced for karmic payback,
which I found upon opening the box: the desktopper, much
like a piece of anatomy I should REALLY learn how to kiss,
was cracked down the middle.

So naturally, being an American, I cried to the heavens
"WHYY-HY-HY-H-HYYYY!! WHY MEEE!! GAAAAAAHHHH!!!"
and then blamed someone else. Beyond expectation, the first
of your agents to respond was contrite up on hearing this,
and responded that a replacement was on the way.

After a few weeks of prison shower treatment at work, I
realized that i still had the will to live. This led me
to the conclusion that I had yet to receive a unsmashified
desktopper. So I fired off the e-mail of 4 May, to which
a clearly bored employee responded to promptly. I felt
a brief rush of optimism, thereby proving the dire need
I have for your product. And then, Ragnarok....

I find now that, instead of replacing my dead desktopper
(which I now find myself envying), but that you have
refiled my order -- which would be fine, except that you
failed to keep it on the q.t. from my credit card company.
So now, my desktopper is on its way, along with another
pack of cards, another set of complimentary calendars,
and another invoice.


And now we have caught up to the present in my tale of
woe. What to do now? At this moment the package in
question rushes ever forward to me, immune to any
entreaties to our respective gods who most certainly
do not exist. (All praise be to Baphomet.) Nor is it
beyond thought that I could use another box of notecards;
I have many friends who deserve to receive them, assuming
that the word "friends" refers to annoying acquaintances
who persist in telling me of their accolades, promotions,
and homestead breeding programs. I would be amenable to
being simply charged for the additional pack of cards,
and let your accounting staff nervously explain away the
cost of the replacement 'topper in their depositions.
That way, at least I wouldn't have to take the mortal
risk of going to the post office to return it. In fact
I'm open to almost anything to put this unpleasantness
behind us; let's face it, nothing stinks up the place
more than the whiff of a pile of unpleasantness long past
its prime. Except perhaps the distinct miasma of an open
field in Depression-era Lakehurst filled with smoldering
Teutons.

May Baphomet be with you.

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Brian D. Moore|
Ph.D. Research Associate|"The optimist thinks that this is the best
Rice U. Dept. of Phys & Ast|of all possible worlds, and the pessimist
6100 Main St.|knows it." -- J. Robert Oppenheimer
Houston, TX 77005-1892|
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