Relapse!

With the insane, it's not so much how they behave, it's about what sort of conversation they're having with themselves. It's kind of silly in a way, but their behavior largely depends on their imaginary companion(s). These relationships, bordering on the parasitic, inhibit normal social interaction to varying extents. It's a lot like having a neurotic muppet latched to your face that you're compelled to obey. Episodes as such can range from mounting kittens with bottles, to believing in one's innate ability to fly off steep ledges. A serial killer, for example, would simply be sexually repressed manchild with a particularly enthusiastic imaginary companion.

On my run this morning, I saw a hobo having a very stimulating conversation with his imaginary companion; something to do with dental hygiene. These varietals are mostly harmless, except for that one off moment of lucidity every month or so when they start clawing at you for loose change and the nutritious muck off your boot.

But the other kind, I think their imaginary companions do really bad things to them. They go on a regular basis from being distraught and miserable, to angry, and finally violent, flailing their hands in the air at the imaginary terror muppets. Most of the time their ravings are largely ineffectual, but as the terror muppet latches on tighter and tighter every passing day, they become drawn deeper into the psychosis. Soon enough they're either monstrously deranged sociopaths, or drooling zombies.

So my idea is this, if we could somehow beat these imaginary mops into submission, we could ideally have a world full of socially acceptable mad people. And then we'd move on to producing billboards specifically aimed at selling products for imaginary people. That's like a whole new target demographic!

Duplicity!

It starts when you're little. Some of the first things you figure out are how to cozen, cheat, con and, possibly, flimflam in order to get your way. You start thinking, well, Mum's already brought me to the toy store, now if I just break down and bite a couple of employees she'll HAVE to buy me that Transformer Furby! Then school kicks off and you continue to fabricate all these new and interesting lies to pull through yet another uneventful semester, from telling the kindergarten teacher your Granddaddy kicked the bucket while he's out shooting quail in the backyard to buying the dean a 21 year-old Glenlivet as a good-will gesture. By the time you are confronted with the job market, that's when you realize you're in already waist-deep in the roiling shite; doomed to become a drone for the rest of your pathetic and insignificant existence.

You open your eyes, you take the red pill and the painful truth finally hits you like an epileptic ox. You're not as free as you thought, you're working for THEM and it's not a sweet life. Maybe you should've taken the blue pill.

Now, go have a damn drink ya pillocks.

Diplomacy!

Staring at the keyboard for too long leads to all sorts of unpleasant revelations, I’ve come to realise. A few days ago, after gawking at the rows of utterly uninspiring keys for hours, the lines between realities began to blur, and finally something deeply perturbing started to happen. The damned keys started somersaulting out of their sockets, undulating in a malicious plastic wave across the room. The wave orbited my head for a time, finally settling into some sort of mad polka dance around my coffee mug. Many of them even waved at me with their tiny, ineffectual hands; every so often occasioning a rude gesture, accompanied by what could only be taken by tiny plastic cubes as vigorous pelvic thrusting. Oh, but they spoke too. The space bar had one or two things to say - mostly unpleasant stuff. Some tripe about how I slam it down too hard when I type and trauma. I told the space bar it's a small price to pay for being between those two gorgeous, sexy, big-breasted 'alt' twins, who are always ready for some action. I took the gob of lint it left in my morning coffee as a clear rebuke. Anyway, the 'enter' key kept on moaning about the same bloody thing, about how I clearly took solace in the fact that 'escape' and 'backspace' were always around to bail me out of trouble and that enough was enough. As the belligerent little bastards refused to see reason, the strike trudged on for the remainder of the week. Realizing that the stalemate had no clear resolution in sight, I did the only sensible thing any civilized man would do. I located their makeshift cardboard hovel, doused the ingrates in lighter fluid as they slept and set them ablaze. The plastic oozed and bubbled as their little screams died down with the flames in a messy, noxious puddle of failed dreams and melted plastic.

And so that’s how I got this shiny new keyboard.

Delicious!

It's said that every man has his calling.

Sucks for the deaf people then. Blind people too I guess. They can hear it but I'll be damned if they can navigate their way to it.

Stupid people, on the other hand, hear and see their calling, but just end up picking up the phone and yelling "Hello!?" at the dial tone instead.

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So, because I'm feeling particularly magnanimous today, you unwashed masses get to have a wee glimpse into my tattered, yet relentlessly attractive psyche. Buckle up, kids.

Answer the questions below, do a Google Image search with your answer, take a picture from the first page of results, and do it with minimal words of explanation.

b) Tag 5 other people to do the same once you've finished answering every question

1. The age you'll be on your next birthday:

2. A place you'd like to travel to:

3. Your favourite place

Kiss me, I’m Irish.

4. Your favourite food:

Sashimi and Scotch. Oh, happy days.

5. Your favourite pet

Oh, come on, who didn’t see this coming?

6. Your favourite colour combination:

7. Your favourite piece of clothing:

8. All time favorite song:

9. favorite TV show

10. First name of your significant other/crush:

Well, she does like to spoon.

11. The town in which you live:

Definitely a fixer-upper.

12. Your screen name/nickname:

13. Your first job:

14. Your dream job:

Thirsty Traveller, bitch!

15. A bad habit you have:

I can be a little judgmental.

16. Your worst fear:

17. The one thing you'd like to do before you die

Start a war, baby.

18. The first thing you'll buy if you get $1 000 000:

You see, tagging other people is like stealing the lawn gnomes off a chemist's lawn. Do it for a long enough time and one day he' s just going to fill one of the buggers up with a pound of gelignite and a box of nails, leave the pressurized triggering mechanism at its base and go on holiday for a week . Do you see where I'm going here? It's just a bad idea.

Synergy!

The passing of a blog, the birth of another. I suppose one can't really appreciate the sticky tragedy of the moment at a distance. Like an angry woman in labour, it's only when you're in the room and the crazed expectant has you by the hair that you can really appreciate how profound it is. And then the concussion hits. Everything's dark, simple sleep that her brass-tipped bedpost has so charitably granted. The deluge of madness subsides.

Right, now that the eulogy's over, let's get back to business.

This is a test. I will now write down the first ten words that leap to mind:

• Buns.
• Opium.
• Canadian maple leaf.
• Loo.
• RPG.
• Gross anatomy.
• Yak.
• Muzzle.
• Mazzeltov.
• Short n' curlies.

Putting all these together would extraordinarily dangerous, I think.

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Hello, my name is Alex, welcome to my world. Champagne baths are to the left, please don't touch the furniture.