The Great Sael Adventure 1
You go to open a can of cat food for Phil. You can't seem to open it up all the way. You set it down anyway, and Phil comes over to eat it. You leave him be, and go about your daily activities, but find yourself being distracted before you can finish. You look around the ship and notice half-swabbed decks, half-eaten meals, half-climbed ropes, and half-dropped drawers. No task, no matter how simple, can be completed. No teeth can be finished brushing, no pee can be finished peeing, no sleep can be finished sleeping, no argument can be finished arguing, no sail can be finished sailing, no fish can be finished fishing, no bottle can be finished bottling, no drink can be finished drinking, no butt can be finished wiping, no itch can be finished scratching, no sex can be finished sexing (tbh no one was starting either), no bread can be finished buttering, no scream can be finished screaming, no letter can be finished writing, no nail can be finished picking, no hole can be finished plugging, no room can be finished cleaning, no loop-da can be finished looping, no mouth can be finished gagging, no candle can be finished lighting, no science project can be finished being judged—little Timmy and Samantha simply wait for hours, standing, waiting to be judged, and no one ever comes to judge them, and they just stand their with their papier-mâché volcano, small and sad and wrinkled, only waiting and never knowing the outcome of their work and never doing any more work ever again as they simply pass the time in pre-pubescent obsolescence—in short, no science project can be finished sciencing.
This life is a test with no final question.
This life is a hang nail that keeps on pulling with no release.
This life is a set of movie theater previews with no movie in sight.
This life is sauteeing garlic and onions without ever turning brown or translucent.
This life is experiencing the sweet nectar of beginning infatuation but never getting a kiss.
This life is dipping your toe in the swimming pool without being able to determine whether it is too cold or not but never developing the courage to go any further in.
This life is that moment when you slap dat ass with your hand so hard but your hand is just touching dat ass and you never get to see it jiggle or how many times it jiggles.
This life is piping-hot lasagna just out of the oven, so hot it would burn the roof of your mouth and prevent you from eating any solid food for weeks and it never cools down it is always so incredibly very hot the danger never fades oh my word the temptation of the pain calls to you.
This life is twirling surreally long angel hair pasta around the Fork of Injustice, watching the infinitesimally small layers of wheat-based carbohydrates and tomato-byproduct sauce slowly, cylindrically stack around the tines, growing in size as you realize your plate of pasta is always full, being fed by an unseen mass of dough through a pasta extruder, fed raw initially but which is cooked and covered in sauce as it arrives at your plate, only to be twirled as one more round around your Fork of Injustice.
This life is blowing your nose into an infinitude of Kleenex, working your way through boxes and boxes of lotionless tissues, scraping and chafing and scarring your nostrils as the phlegm refuses to clear from your nasal passageways which additionally begin to fill with tiny paper pieces, torn from the very material with which you had hoped to stem the flow of phlegm from your body to the outer world, never being able to be rid of every last booger or even the main one which made you start blowing your nose in the first place.
The crew are tired, angry, hungry, constipated, thirsty, horny, insatiable, half stinky, half shaven, and half dressed.
Hop (the skipper) (who moonlights as a tightrope walker) hasn't been able to play a game of hop scotch.
Chuck (the ball handler) has only been able to provide a half-effort ball job—he threw a juggling ball into the air and it never came back down again so he can't move on to the next step in the juggling sequence. Also—we know what you were thinking, and you're right—he's the reason the crew is half horny.
Rufus (the game player) has been working on the same Sudoku puzzle for sixteen and a half years (this is actually totally unrelated and has to do with the fact that Rufus is TERRIBLE at Sudoku).
You remember... you haven't fed Phil for a while.
This life is a test with no final question.
This life is a hang nail that keeps on pulling with no release.
This life is a set of movie theater previews with no movie in sight.
This life is sauteeing garlic and onions without ever turning brown or translucent.
This life is experiencing the sweet nectar of beginning infatuation but never getting a kiss.
This life is dipping your toe in the swimming pool without being able to determine whether it is too cold or not but never developing the courage to go any further in.
This life is that moment when you slap dat ass with your hand so hard but your hand is just touching dat ass and you never get to see it jiggle or how many times it jiggles.
This life is piping-hot lasagna just out of the oven, so hot it would burn the roof of your mouth and prevent you from eating any solid food for weeks and it never cools down it is always so incredibly very hot the danger never fades oh my word the temptation of the pain calls to you.
This life is twirling surreally long angel hair pasta around the Fork of Injustice, watching the infinitesimally small layers of wheat-based carbohydrates and tomato-byproduct sauce slowly, cylindrically stack around the tines, growing in size as you realize your plate of pasta is always full, being fed by an unseen mass of dough through a pasta extruder, fed raw initially but which is cooked and covered in sauce as it arrives at your plate, only to be twirled as one more round around your Fork of Injustice.
This life is blowing your nose into an infinitude of Kleenex, working your way through boxes and boxes of lotionless tissues, scraping and chafing and scarring your nostrils as the phlegm refuses to clear from your nasal passageways which additionally begin to fill with tiny paper pieces, torn from the very material with which you had hoped to stem the flow of phlegm from your body to the outer world, never being able to be rid of every last booger or even the main one which made you start blowing your nose in the first place.
The crew are tired, angry, hungry, constipated, thirsty, horny, insatiable, half stinky, half shaven, and half dressed.
Hop (the skipper) (who moonlights as a tightrope walker) hasn't been able to play a game of hop scotch.
Chuck (the ball handler) has only been able to provide a half-effort ball job—he threw a juggling ball into the air and it never came back down again so he can't move on to the next step in the juggling sequence. Also—we know what you were thinking, and you're right—he's the reason the crew is half horny.
Rufus (the game player) has been working on the same Sudoku puzzle for sixteen and a half years (this is actually totally unrelated and has to do with the fact that Rufus is TERRIBLE at Sudoku).
You remember... you haven't fed Phil for a while.