Last chance!
Last chance to submit a request to the picture meme!
Last night's caller-of-the-night was special. I'm not quite sure what the operator said to him before he was passed to me, but he was screaming into the phone and obviously on the verge of a coronary. I could picture him throttling the handset with both hands white-knuckled, arms stretched forward to full length, and mouth wide as he shrieked, spraying spittle. Purple-faced. My screen was pulsating in time with the vein in his forehead. It was surreal. And this is what he said to me:
Screamer: WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?! HAVE YOU EVER SEEN CLEOPATRA 2525??
Me: ...er...
Screamer: THAT SONG IN CLEOPATRA 2525, THAT'S WHAT'S HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!! MACHINES ARE TAKING OVER! I CAN'T TALK TO A REAL PERSON ANYMORE! AAAAAHHHH!! ARE YOU REAL?
Me: I think so.
Screamer: WHY CAN'T I GET IN TOUCH WITH A PERSON?!! AAAAHHHH!!
And so on. I thought it was interesting, though, that he would reference a really bad sci-fi tv show, whose only redeeming quality was the scantily-clad women who featured in it (this fashion trend being the most plausible characteristic of the show), as support for a technologically saturated reality. Well. I use the term "reality" loosely, because clearly this guy's grasp of it was tenuous at best. But still. Fascinating.
Last night's caller-of-the-night was special. I'm not quite sure what the operator said to him before he was passed to me, but he was screaming into the phone and obviously on the verge of a coronary. I could picture him throttling the handset with both hands white-knuckled, arms stretched forward to full length, and mouth wide as he shrieked, spraying spittle. Purple-faced. My screen was pulsating in time with the vein in his forehead. It was surreal. And this is what he said to me:
Screamer: WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?! HAVE YOU EVER SEEN CLEOPATRA 2525??
Me: ...er...
Screamer: THAT SONG IN CLEOPATRA 2525, THAT'S WHAT'S HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!! MACHINES ARE TAKING OVER! I CAN'T TALK TO A REAL PERSON ANYMORE! AAAAAHHHH!! ARE YOU REAL?
Me: I think so.
Screamer: WHY CAN'T I GET IN TOUCH WITH A PERSON?!! AAAAHHHH!!
And so on. I thought it was interesting, though, that he would reference a really bad sci-fi tv show, whose only redeeming quality was the scantily-clad women who featured in it (this fashion trend being the most plausible characteristic of the show), as support for a technologically saturated reality. Well. I use the term "reality" loosely, because clearly this guy's grasp of it was tenuous at best. But still. Fascinating.