The Unnatural Progression of Bizarre Behavior
February 11, 2001
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Best Comedic Entry |
In the beginning there was Terry, and Terry found that he could not sleep without television.
And the television's light was void and formless, turned down to dark, and the quiet sounds of half-muted dialogue washed over the deep folds of blanket-wrapped sleep. And he found he could not sleep with live television, for he spent time listening and not unplugging his mind, and so many nights did he toss and turn until he placed The Hunt for Red October in the VCR and dozed before Alec Baldwin had time to get coffee from James Earl Jones.
And it came to pass that one day Terry said "Lo, these many years have I been wearing out my VCR in my nightly slumbers. I shall make an audio recording of the movies that lull me to sleep, and thus be sated."
And so Terry made many tapes. In the case beside his bed dwelt his new sleepy idols, named Dune and Night of the Living Dead. Many times did these tapes and more besides keep him company.
It came to pass in the latter days that he went away to college and had a roommate, and this roommate didn't mind this bizarre behavior. The roommate was wise to fit the gray hairs on his head, and could not easily hear the tapes anyway.
The friends and relatives who shared Terry's orbit would ask him "Come unto my house, and sup at my table and sleep in my guest bed, for this is the way of our people." And Terry despaired, thinking "How shall I sleep in this strange house without Clue?"
A messenger came unto Terry in the form of a quiet voice that said "Fear not, for thou hast a microcassette recorder. An hour's worth of audio canst thou carry, but no more lest they think thee mad. Easily canst thou secret an episode of Babylon 5 in thy clothing."
And in the final days, Terry moved into an apartment and bought a computer. Thinking himself grand, he thought "Who hast like unto this setup? For many are the virtues of the TV tuner, that I may listen to television without television screen." The circle closed upon itself in his thought, and he said again, "Lo, these many weeks have I been wearing out my VCR in my nightly slumbers. I shall render television audio into MP3 for playback."
Casting his eyes to and fro over his collection, he decided to try an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, for he said "This is my favorite, and Q and the Borg in the same episode kicks ass."
Ever greedier did he become, creating MP3 files of three more episodes, so that he did have three full hours of audio (and not four, commercial breaks being an abomination to be weeded out). In his madness, he turned his eye to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and in the fullness of time there was the entire first season on his hard drive, taking up a scant 300 MB of space, for low was his bitrate.
And one day, toiling in the field, he did hear an inner voice say "Ye cursed! Silly art thy ways! Too much effort have thee expended, for thou hast now almost twelve hours of audio, and yet thou hast never slept so long."
And Terry, in his meekness, said "Variety, Lord."
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"A" is for Alibi Sue Grafton |
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