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Writing » 2004 » September

Items marked with are personal favorites.

Not to harp on this, but…

…I suck at a lot of things. Financial planning, for example. Yet I have never felt a need to announce that I am going to continue sucking at something for FIVE MORE YEARS!

Awesomeness Redux

Mr. Awesomeness Monologue

for OdM 09/24/2004

Whoever introduces me asks the closest sitting female audience member what their name is, and then loudly repeats it so I can hear, and then asks them to hold the resume.

I am introduced – I jog onto the stage wearing a suit and tie…and a ratty sheet as a cape. I yell backstage…

No need to thank me, screaming mob, that man won’t be talking loudly on his cell phone any more!

Awesomeness, Deactivate!

I remove “cape” and hang it up somewhere – I approach the female audience member.

Alrighty. You must be [her name]! I’m glad you made it. I’m Mr. Awesomeness, nice to meet you. Sorry about all of that, I don’t usually like to deactivate my Awesomeness in front of people, but I thought it would be even ruder to remain Awesome while interviewing you. A lot of people find it pretty…intimidating.

(I pull up a chair.)

Is that your resume? Thanks. So…I see you’ve been working as an administrative assistant for quite some time. Good, good. Lots of experience in office environments. Microsoft Word and Excel, good. 80 words a minute, really? Now THAT’S awesome! Ha ha! Sorry, I can’t resist sometimes.

Hey. Do you smell apple pie? It smells GREAT! Where IS that delicious apple pie? Oh THAT’S right…FUCK!

I crumple the resume as I scream. Beat. I look distant for a bit, and then come to, examining the resume.

I don’t mean to be too anal, but you might want to think about bringing UN-crumpled copies of your resume next time. Anyhow, I can tell you right off the bat, this position will be very different from any other personal assistant jobs you’ve had. This job has unique duties, because I am a unique individual. I call myself Mr. Awesomeness. I am a self-described superhero. I work out of this office, but I’m basically out and about most of the time, trying to fight crime. Doing my best. Doing…what I can.

I do not possess any ‘powers’ in the traditional sense. I do like to refer to ‘Awesomeness’ alot, but that’s mostly just to psyche myself up. So if you take this position, you’ll have to put up with me blabbering about Awesomeness quite a bit! I apologize in advance. Let’s see. I don’t have a superhero outfit really, but I will occasionally wear the Awesomeness Cape, which is a soiled bedsheet I tie around my neck. Again, that’s mostly just to psyche myself up, provide a little flair when I think it’s necessary. Um, what else. You’ll probably see me on the news often, mostly in a negative sense. People just aren’t used to seeing a regular guy like me fighting crime. And what’s worse, the media and the public and the authorities often don’t agree with me on what crime IS in the first place. For example, not everyone would agree with me that talking too loudly on your cell phone on the bus is a grave crime punishable by severe Awesomeness. By which I mean punching. So yes, sometimes the media will portray me as an ‘Attacker’, or ‘Thief’, or ‘Blabbering Defecating Lunatic’, among other things. Like I said, people don’t always get me.

So before I outline the basic job requirements and duties, let me just give you a quick rundown of my origins. Every superhero has an origin, and I’m no different. It might help you understand me a bit better. Would you like a Snapple? Toblerone?

I begin to eat a Toblerone.

My origins don’t involve Gamma Rays or plummeting to Earth in a spaceship to escape my homeworld’s destruction, or getting bitten by a radioactive spider, nothing like that. Don’t I wish. No, my origins are much more mundane. In June of 1992, while adding a deck onto my house in Lake Ronkonkoma, I accidentally shot myself in the face with a nailgun. Six times, right up the left nostril. Why six times? Well, the first nail must have triggered my grip reflex or something, because before I knew it I’d emptied the entire cartridge of nails into my brain. This had two main long-term effects:

ONE – I became Mr. Awesomeness, a man dedicated to fighting that which he perceives to be crime using the one power at his disposal…Aweseomeness.

TWO – I have recurring olfactory hallucinations during which I:

a) smell apple pie,

b) get very angry because I suddenly realize there really isn’t any apple pie and that I’m only smelling it because there are six nails in my brain, and then

c) completely forget that I ever smelled the pie or got angry.

So don’t be alarmed if I do that! It’s just those six nails talking. Talking to me always. (sigh)

My powers: like I said, none. Save the power of Awesomeness.

What is Awesomeness? Well…Awesomeness is all around us. It protects us and binds us. There is a bit of Awesomeness in every moment. When a dog sticks his head into a cereal box, and then walks around with the box still on his head, for example, that is Awesomeness. There is Awesomeness in the sigh a woman makes when she first realizes you’re a really top notch kisser. There is Awesomeness in a man who just threw his candy bar wrapper on the ground being punched in the throat by a man in a suit wearing a soiled sheet as a cape who is screaming “Awesomeness Now!” And so on.

Pull out a filthy scrap of paper.

I wrote myself a letter:

(read) Dear Mr. Awesomeness,

You’re doing an Awesome job. Keep it up. Hey do you smell that ah fuck.

Sincerely,

Mr. Awesomeness

What are my weaknesses? My “kryptonites”, if you will? Well… guns. Knives. Falling from a great height. Falling from a moderate height. Large dogs. Medium dogs that have not been raised properly. Not getting enough sleep, or enough to eat. Bee stings. Being underwater for too long without some sort of breathing apparatus. Getting hit by something fast and heavy. Poison. Electricity. Fire. Exposure to the elements. Too much of a particular drug. I could go on.

What else. The basics. I need you here at 9am sharp, tied to that small section of train track in the pantry, every morning. It’s how I start my day. Screaming is a plus if you’re up for it. I’ll untie you, carry you to your cubicle, and then I’ll be off. You’ll get used to it, there’s plenty of twine in the cabinet. Don’t go nuts and tie yourself down too tightly, because like I said, I’m just working off of my natural strength. No super powers. Now that I mention it, the whole ‘I Have No Super Powers’ thing will be a big factor in our day-to-day working relationship. So – give me ample transit time in between meetings on my calendar. The only ‘Super Speed’ I have at my disposal is my trusty Vespa. Confirm appointments with me please! Don’t assume I can read your mind. Because I can’t. That would be a super power, and I have none. There are menus in the filing cabinet – you’ll be expected to use my credit card to order me lunch every day. I need food, just like everyone else. But not bread or pasta. I forgot to mention bread and pasta in my list of weaknesses. What else? Oh yes. Reptilion. It is very important that you do your best to prevent this guy from finding me. If he calls, “Mr. Awesomeness is out”, got it? Try to stear me clear of the supervillains in general. Except for Captain Dastardly. He’s like me – no powers, just a soiled sheet. Sometimes I like to tussle with him. Anyway, let’s go take a look at the Awesomeness Cave while I tell you about the benefits package.

[still a work in progress but should be fun]

hot-rods and whiskey

I’m there baking hot. Flat-out in the sun, my guns pumping 225 ten times with a howl. Wash down my workout with vultures and asphalt. I’m all hot-rods and whiskey. The distance to me is measured in musk, mullet flaired-out beneath my “Pembrose Cashews” trucker’s cap. I am enveloped in gawks when I strut – from the cab of my road mongrel to the door of any burger hole. My ripples gleam and bulge when I flex, crests of muscle crashing upon shores of sawed-off denim. They’ll scare a coyote. But now – just baking hot. Flat-out and 225 howling. Awash in dust and diesel. Cigarette butts and steel-toed grunting. I am so totally all hot-rods and whiskey.

[clapsmatter]

Thank you! That one’s called “Hot-Rods and Whiskey”. This next one is called “Your Sister Is Not A Christmas Ornament”.

Does she look happy? She’s crying, Jack. Get me the footstool.

Thank you! I’ll be at the bar signing copies of my book Poetism: A Sense-ology.