Screaming Monkey Vengeance

Last week, my office was rearranged. The powers that be wanted to certain people working near certain other people, so most everyone was moved. We were assured that this had nothing to do with any individual’s personal hygiene, though the fact that I now work in a sealed room is somewhat suspicious.

I’m just kidding. I don’t work in a sealed room. There are lots of fly strips though.

I was actually pretty excited about the move, as I was going to a nice area near a window and would be sitting with the other writer on the project, whom we’ll call Wilber. Wilber’s a good guy and we get along well, so I imagined we would have a great time in our corner, slinging one-liners and generally having more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

NOTE: I don’t understand why a barrel of monkeys would be fun. I mean, if I was a monkey and I was stuffed into a barrel with a bunch of other monkeys, I would not be happy. There would be a lot of clawing and biting as I established dominance and then I would begin the long, slow process of molding my fellow monkeys into an elite fighting force. We would then break out of the barrel and wreak screaming monkey vengeance on the people that stuffed us in there in the first place. So no, not a lot of fun.

‘Screaming Monkey Vengeance’ would be a great name for a band.

However, it is my sad duty to report that there has been a disappointing lack of hi-jinks. I envisioned that Wilber and I would have wild, crazy, ‘I Love Lucy’ style adventures. We’d be crawling through air ducts. There would be pie fights, mistaken identities, driving cars while blindfolded. We would somehow end up dressed as nuns and flying a plane full of contraband onions into Guam while neo-Nazis tried to thwart us.

You know, hi-jinks.

Mainly, we just work. I type. He types. Sometimes we go to meetings. There’s lots of typing. Needless to say, it’s been a colossal disappointment.

I’ve taken to just randomly announcing things, in the vain hope that something wacky will happen.

Just today, I announced I was eating an apple.

“I’m gonna eat an apple,” I said.

“Lovely,” Wilber said. He didn’t even look over.

“It’s important to eat plenty of fruits and vegetables,” I said.

“Uh-huh,” he said, as he continued typing.

“I’m done with my apple,” I said a minute later.

He didn’t respond.

I threw the core away and went back to work. Wilber didn’t notice the heavy sigh. Tomorrow I’ll tell him in great detail about the carrots I’m eating. If that doesn’t work, I’ll start bringing in other foodstuffs. Granted, he may eventually try to murder me, but at least something will happen.

Cheers,
-Jason