As the heat crept up his back and into his body, he gradually became aware of the fact that he was eating pepperoni from a plastic package. He heard the crumpling sound of the plastic as his hand, without direction, picked the pieces up and moved them into his mouth. From the taste, and the feeling in his stomach, he knew he had been standing there eating for some time. Like water melting from ice, he remembered getting the pepperoni from the fridge; his hands groping for the opening to the package. Walking to the heater, and turning his back to it.<\/p>\n
He continued to eat.<\/p>\n
What is that ringing noise?<\/em> It was a sudden sound. It stopped, and then started again. Oh yeah, the phone.<\/em> His feet moved, and he turned away from the warm heater and into the bedroom. The phone was on the floor. He bent to pick it up, and his hand clasped the hard plastic shell while his arm brought the receiver to his ear.<\/p>\n “Hello?”<\/p>\n Someone was intruding into his world. Another human voice – but was it human? How could he be sure? The sound came from the plastic thing in his hand. He supposed it was someone actually talking to him; this was the sort of thing you were expected to do. Talk to people on the phone. People, humans; other beings with thoughts and feelings of their own. He was aware of his own voice, speaking; his mouth moving, not to eat now, but to form sounds which whatever was listening on the other end of this intangible line would interpret as words, as speech.<\/p>\n When he put the phone down he couldn’t remember what he had said. The sounds – no, the words – he had heard floated in his memory like drops of blood in alcohol, slowly mixing; and slowly dying. Something about coming out after work for a drink, that’s all he could remember. Well, it might be a good idea.<\/p>\n A drink. He had a drink. Or maybe he went and got one after answering the phone. He couldn’t recall; and it wasn’t important anyway. The can was red, but that was only an after-thought. It was the same thing he always drank. Supposedly it had a sweet flavor, but he drank it like it was water, the taste hardly registered. Soon, the caffeine in the drink (the words “Code Red” bubbled to the surface of his mind, but they were lost; disconnected, devoid of meaning without context) would bring more thoughts, more memories to his mind. He’d be awake for a while longer. Best to be as awake as he could. And besides, it was time to go.<\/p>\n Keys in hand, jacket against the cold, he stepped out into the night. Just another day…<\/em><\/p>\n -Keithius<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As the heat crept up his back and into his body, he gradually became aware of the fact that he was eating pepperoni from a plastic package. He heard the crumpling sound of the plastic as his hand, without direction, picked the pieces up and moved them into his mouth. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[200,212],"tags":[104],"class_list":["post-70","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-my-life","category-stories-personal","tag-stories","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pimUj-18","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6286,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2025\/02\/14\/thats-not-how-you-do-efficiency\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":0},"title":"That’s not how you do “efficiency”","author":"Keith Survell","date":"February 14, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"I do not think that word means what you think it means.","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1637,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2009\/01\/10\/making-em-like-they-used-to\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":1},"title":"Making ’em Like They Used To","author":"Keith Survell","date":"January 10, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Well, it's been a little over a week now, and the verdict on the router-reset issue is: Linksys Wins! Since switching to the Linksys, I've had zero router resets and my Internet connection has been rock-solid. My Mozy online backup has been able to run each night without interruption, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "tech"","block_context":{"text":"tech","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"internet","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2009\/01\/internet.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":355,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2004\/12\/02\/ode-to-my-computer\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":2},"title":"Ode to my Computer","author":"Keith Survell","date":"December 2, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Ode to my Computer: A Poem by Keith M. Survell.","rel":"","context":"In "poems"","block_context":{"text":"poems","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/personal\/poems\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":367,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2005\/01\/23\/snow-snow-snow-snow-snow\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":3},"title":"Snow Snow Snow Snow Snow","author":"Keith Survell","date":"January 23, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Whee! That's a lot of snow out there! I went out last night, of course, in the middle of it all, just to see if I could. And I could. It was fun! I love AWD!","rel":"","context":"In "personal"","block_context":{"text":"personal","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/personal\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":695,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2005\/12\/29\/a-very-bunny-christmas\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":4},"title":"A Very Bunny Christmas","author":"Keith Survell","date":"December 29, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"You know you're a slave to your rabbits when they get more presents than you do.","rel":"","context":"In "pets"","block_context":{"text":"pets","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/personal\/pets\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5071,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2017\/05\/12\/behind-the-wheel-2017-mercedes-benz-c300\/","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":5},"title":"Behind the Wheel: 2017 Mercedes-Benz C300","author":"Keith Survell","date":"May 12, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Yes, that's right - I'm reviewing another C300, this time a 2017 model. But is it any better (or even any different) from the 2016 I drove last year?","rel":"","context":"In "Cars and Trucks"","block_context":{"text":"Cars and Trucks","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/cars-and-trucks\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2017\/05\/2017-Mercedes-C300-front.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}