Chauncey Hirose-Hulbert
English Cowell 9:30
Ritual Poem for Driving Stick Shift
1. Step in to an immense forest green truck with three passengers and one father.
2. Make sure the stick is neutral.
3. Depress clutch and turn key away from the driver, you.
4. Move the stick to the left and down.
5. Depress clutch.
6. Attempt to release the clutch slowly, but fail, jerk the truck in to motion, and watch from the mirror as all your passengers hit the seat in front of them.
7. Regain control of truck and try again.
8. Slowly creep around the lush weed field that is your personal freeway.
9. Depress clutch.
10. Move to first gear (one bump to the right on the stick from first gear).
11. Again depress the clutch while simultaneously slightly pressing on the gas peddle.
12. Fail miserably and hear the truck suffocate and stall.
13. Once your passengers have stop laughing in your face, try again.
14. Depress clutch.
15. Place the big toe from your right foot on the gas peddle while reaching with your left foot to let go of the clutch easily.
16. Meet only with disaster and hang your head in shame.
17. Give permission to your extremely nervous father to leave truck and allow the other people in the cab to touch solid ground.
18. Let father to consume some Heineken to dull his anxiety.
19. Grab air guitar with plectrum in hand, and play along with the lame song on the radio.
20. Once the predictable guitar riff they call a solo is over, call everyone back in to the forest green truck and begin round 2.
21. Go through steps 1-18 until your ideal goal of first gear is reached.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
SII Graded Post #1: Story Starter
As you go through school and life there are some people that make you feel weird inside; those strange people that make you feel like there going to stalk you some day. These people are everywhere. The wacko guy at work that talks to no one and makes you want to leave the break room if you see him coming. There are those kids at school, to deep for anyone to understand them. You know, the ones that use more that 5% of their brains unlike the rest of us. The ones you are afraid of talking to because your scared that you will make yourself look like an idiot. They are not fat, they aren't tall. They are so normal they blend into the wallpaper. Maybe they have glasses, light-dark hair, brown eyes; so normal; to normal for the rest of the population.
I have met my "creepy person" today for the first time at work. I am sitting at my small desk, alone in my cubical. My sad pathetic lunch consisting of a sandwich and some stale chips blend with the table. I type some random letter on the computer to fool the Catbert of my office I was doing something. Out of the corner of my eye I see him coming toward me. What do I do? I think to myself as his pigeon toed walk slowly carries him toward me. My eyes pass his thick rimmed glasses and on to his rainbow of pens he has in his pocket protecter. If he loses it maybe he won't kill me if I give him what he wants.
"Would you happen to have a napkin?" he whispered in a nervous tone.
"Yeah………um, yes I do." I try and so less creeped out then my face looked. I hand him one of my wilted blue napkins from my New Year's party I had.
"Thank you very much." he responded; his voice had a controlled nervousness to it, like he broke the ice on a first date. He began to walk slowly back to in cubical down the hall. Like he was expecting for me to say something.
"Would you like to have the rest of your lunch with me?" my mouth said before I could stop myself. What am I doing?! I just asked the 35 year-old creepo in my office to have lunch with me.
His paced quickened to his cubical and returned in a moment to join me in my 6 x 6 hell hole. His old left over pizza looked better than my limp sandwich. I force myself to make small conversation till Mr. Catbert came back to tell us lunch was over.
" Why did you decide to go into programming?"
"If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."
. . .
I have met my "creepy person" today for the first time at work. I am sitting at my small desk, alone in my cubical. My sad pathetic lunch consisting of a sandwich and some stale chips blend with the table. I type some random letter on the computer to fool the Catbert of my office I was doing something. Out of the corner of my eye I see him coming toward me. What do I do? I think to myself as his pigeon toed walk slowly carries him toward me. My eyes pass his thick rimmed glasses and on to his rainbow of pens he has in his pocket protecter. If he loses it maybe he won't kill me if I give him what he wants.
"Would you happen to have a napkin?" he whispered in a nervous tone.
"Yeah………um, yes I do." I try and so less creeped out then my face looked. I hand him one of my wilted blue napkins from my New Year's party I had.
"Thank you very much." he responded; his voice had a controlled nervousness to it, like he broke the ice on a first date. He began to walk slowly back to in cubical down the hall. Like he was expecting for me to say something.
"Would you like to have the rest of your lunch with me?" my mouth said before I could stop myself. What am I doing?! I just asked the 35 year-old creepo in my office to have lunch with me.
His paced quickened to his cubical and returned in a moment to join me in my 6 x 6 hell hole. His old left over pizza looked better than my limp sandwich. I force myself to make small conversation till Mr. Catbert came back to tell us lunch was over.
" Why did you decide to go into programming?"
"If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."
. . .
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