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08/30/26   
We'll put this sword away when you tell us where the monkey is

I Bought This Memory

by Winston C. Mars
bio/email
January 12, 2004
I bought this memory at Walgreens,
it was discounted heavily.
With it implanted I settled back
to enjoy my reverie.
But to my dismay I soon realized
why this memory had been spurned.
It was of eating a stale club sandwich
whose mayonnaise had turned!

I took it right back for a refund,
but the Chinese clerk he protested.
He asked for proof, by way of receipt
for the memory I'd injested.

I searched my pockets to no avail.
I checked again, but again failed!
Nowhere was it to be found.

I scanned the scene,
and checked in-between
my sneaker and the ground.

But it was gone.
Goodbye, so long!
Sayonara, it turned to vapors.
Somehow somewhere,
vanished into the air.
"I'll see you in the funny papers."

I tried my best
to prove in jest
that I was the one who had bought it.
"Aha!" I voiced,
"The rye bread was slightly moist,
like someone had coughed on it."

"And the pickles, they stank
like something quite rank
and the ham—the ham was like rubber.
The turkey was raw
and the cheese was so blah,
like crusty, stretched-thin whale blubber."

But the clerk didn't buy it,
wouldn't even try it.
He just smiled and shook his head "No."
Without the receipt
I could have shit to eat
and he wouldn't mind it at all if I'd go.

As I stormed out into the rain
the image haunted my brain:
That clerk's grin hung in breathless fixation.

It was clear I'd been played—
the memory cleverly overlaid
over my memory of the receipt's location!

Damn you, Walgreens. You can keep your lousy four dollars.


Quote of the Day
“Get out of my way, you're crapping up my genius, dumbnuts.”

-Ayn Randy
Fortune 500 Cookie
All of those great things we said were going to happen to you last week? Yeah, sorry, we had you mixed up with your brother. You're fucked. Try parking your car at the far end of the lot and walking this week: everyone finds the way you jiggle when you walk highly amusing. Your friends and the packaging aren't lying: that's not toothpaste. Did you really think you were going to get away with naming your son Pringles? This week's lucky ass creams: Vaseline Intensive Hair, Ditch the Itch Ultra, Smooth Movers Hibiscus Scent, Baby's Ass in a Bottle, Johnson & Johnson No More Flaming Mass of Ground Hamburger Hemorrhoid Salve.

Try again later.
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