Story the Second

You really want to know why I look so funny?

It's pretty simple. Like all great stories, it happened.

I didn't apply myself, and my brain ran away.

Slipped right out of my head one night, walked away on the two halves of the cortex, the cord like a tiny dancer with ridiculously swollen legs.

My mother always warned me that this would happen, in her never-breathy Estonian accent, the aural equivalent of a mind-numbing Priit Prämcartoon. "Son, eef you do nut stup reeding you mental junk fuud, you mind weel run way!"

Well mom, jokes on me, as they say.

I'm not sure I understand exactly what happened. One minute I'm having a pleasant dream about life as a centaur, chasing down an ice cream truck. The ice cream woman get out and gives me the cheapest ice cream sandwich they have.

At that point, I see my brain in my dream. He looks over to me and says, "Listen here now. You've known how to lucid dream since you were five. You spend all this time chasing down ice cream trucks. For heaven's sake, you're a neurosurgeon. Why don't you figure out how to save some lives, rather than wasting away your time fiddling with horse hooves."

"You're one to talk!" I yelled back, "always making me daydream or forget important things. Where were you with Melissa's birthday? Sure dropped the ball on that one, didn't ya!"

Obviously frustrated, my brain exclaimed, "That's it Harold. I'm leaving you. I'm not having this conversation again. Good bye."

And with that, he woke me up as slapped me from inside, slid out my left ear, and walked off.

I didn't sleep a wink that night. Still haven't. Apparently you need the melatonin to get on a regular sleep-cycle. The drugs don't have enough oomph to put me to sleep, so I lie in bed in a stupor.

But living without a brain, it's really not too bad. Adjusting was hard at first--I would forget the time or continually try to walk through walls like some poorly programmed NPC AI character. Of course I couldn't continue to work as a neurosurgeon. Hospital HR told me their on-retainer psychiatrist Ted banned me from working--I suppose he was worried I would experience too much mind-envy while working under the dura mater. Instead, the hospital has me working in the janitorial department. Ted mentioned in his assessment that it wasn't anything personal, but that the hospital couldn't be liable for consequences of what he framed as "domestic disputes."

Oh, there's no animosity anymore. I understand he's gone off to do wonderful things. Found a cure for astigmatism and for male-pattern baldness. We both knew he is destined for great things.

I write him every once in awhile, but all I ever get in return is a lousy autograph or a letter from his publicist. It's like he's completely forgotten where he came from.

But he did add me a friend on Facebook, so that's something. Maybe I'll tell him about the songs I put on MySpace. I doubt he'll care. I'll just autopoke him instead. Ah, Facebook.

Well, that's it. I'm going to get a sandwich now. Goodbye.