Category: Uncategorized

Dear Steven,

I was asked to make a presentation today. It’s always nice to be wanted. I was asked to talk about the use of cleaning products in the work place, a topic that you know I hold dear to my heart. I spent a lot of time making the slides. I wanted it to be perfect. Just the right balance of pictures and text. The perfect presentation. Just enough animation to make my point, but not so much that people would be put off. I was up all night. It was a wonder … a true beauty to behold. And I memorized the speech as well. I had jokes, anecdotes, thought provoking points. It was exciting, funny, emotional. You name it, it was in the speech. You’d be hard pressed to find a better speech in any TED forum or university lecture hall. It was one of those things that are so good, you can say, “Ok. I can die now. My life is complete.” I got to the hall early. I didn’t want to get anything wrong. I found the computer they had set up and loaded my presentation. It all worked. I checked it twice. Then I sat down and waited for everyone else to come in. We started. We sang some hymns first. I hadn’t expected that. A lot of people were crying. Other people talked. I was really nervous and didn’t listen much. Then it was my turn. I set all my cleaning products out on this strange table and got going. It was a flop! Nobody laughed at my jokes. Not a single person! Even the one about how the TV shows were wrong and you could clean up blood from a crime scene! Then they dragged me out. I wasn’t even halfway through. Somebody kept yelling something about “fun-eral”! I mean, what is a “fun-eral” anyway? I didn’t have any fun! They threw my cleaning products at me and I never even got my USB back. All that work! Not going there again.

Your friend,
Kevin

Dear Steven,

I saw an alien today! Wait. I know what you’re thinking! You’re thinking it’s going to be something stupid, like a car, or a microwave. But it was real! A real alien! I saw it! I was walking home from the post office and I heard it rustling behind the recycling bins at the edge of the park. You know the ones? Clothes, bottles, cans, plastic, stuff like that. I get a lot of my clothes there. You know? The one I got stuck in for five days last summer. Well, I heard the alien rustling behind there. It was looking for something. Now, to be honest, my first thought was that it’s probably a raccoon, or a dog, or something like that. But, then I thought of ET! Have you seen it? There’s that scene where ET makes a spacephone out of the trash and things he finds lying around Eliot’s house. You remember? Well, I thought, it must be that. So, I crept closer. I got really close. I lay down and squeezed myself under one of the bins. I got covered in some pretty yucky stuff, but that’s nothing to an explorer like me. I got so close. I could almost reach out and touch it. Black it was. With white bits. The end of its tail was white. And one of its feet. It had four feet. It was so alien! Furry. I guess it came from a cold planet. It was about a foot tall. Then it saw me, hissed, jumped about four feet over a wall, and disappeared through a bush. I bet its spaceship was through there! You should have seen it jump! There must be lower gravity on the planet it came from! Awesome. Not a bad day!

Your friend
Kevin

Dear Steven,

Have you ever wondered how fast the wheels on an office chair can go? Well, you don’t have to wonder anymore. It is 82 miles an hour. I did the experiment for you. You’re welcome. Although, in all honesty, I didn’t really do it for you. Or in the name of science, for that matter. No. I rolled into town on my office chair to save the rubber on my new shoes. Then, while gazing in the window of a kitchen shop, I somehow got the straps of my backpack caught on the back of a bus. Unfortunately, (or fortunately for our experiment) it turned out to be an intercity bus that traveled on the highway. Also unfortunately, (or fortunately) the driver had a heavy foot. So, how do I know the speed? The police pulled us over after about an hour and a half. “Do you know how fast you were going? 82 miles an hour! Here’s a ticket. Oh. And by the way, there’s a guy on an office chair that’s been following you for the last hour and a half. ” The bus driver unhitched me. The bus and the police drove off. It took me two days and nights to get the 103 miles back home on my office chair. Still, what an experiment, hey?

Dear Steven,

I was in the toilet today, doing what you do in the toilet. You know? Training Robert the Squirrel to flush after himself. I was sitting there and my attention got drawn towards this bright, shiny nut on the top of the pipe. It was almost hypnotic. I could see everything in the room reflected in it and it looked so cool and perfect. I wanted it. You know what I mean? I wanted to have it in my pocket so I could hold it whenever I’m stressed. You must have things like that. So, I put Robert back in his cage and went to get my wrench. I knew I was going to have to be careful because I didn’t want to scratch that fabulously shiny surface. I took off my underpants and gingerly put them over the nut, then applied the wrench. It took more power than I would have imagined. I pulled, strained, grunted, and “pop”, it came off! And I had it in my hand!! A glorious memento! There was one thing that I hadn’t considered though, which, with hindsight, should have been the first thing I thought of. The nut was holding back a large volume of high-pressure water. I’m writing this four hours later and it still hasn’t stopped. It’s almost worn a hole through the ceiling. I guess I could call a plumber to fix it. But, they cost a lot of money. And, anyway, it’s not my house. You should see this nut! It is incredible!

Your friend,
Kevin

Dear Steven,

I plowed my first field today! I know! I’m pretty impressed as well. I was eating my cornflakes when I had the strongest urge to go out and plow something. I’d never done it before, but I had a good idea that you needed oxen. And a plow, of course. I had no idea if they even have oxen here, but I remembered there’s a petting zoo in town for the next week. It’s on that bit of open land next to the bank. You know where I mean? They didn’t have any oxen, but they had a donkey and a sheep. So, I “borrowed” them. Ha ha. I thought it would be harder, but all I had to do was hold out a bag of carrots and they followed me. Nobody even noticed! Then I needed a plow. It had to be sharp and it had to be heavy. Luckily, I just happened to have my wheelbarrow with me. I knocked the front wheel off and used a rock to hammer the frame into a kind of sharp point. I filled it with bricks to give it weight, then, with a bit of rope I found, we were good to go. The donkey was better at pulling than the sheep. He seemed to have more of a knack for it. The sheep was more interested in the grass. Before we started, I’d had an image of me riding the plow, like a gladiator on a chariot, but I ended up walking in front of them doling out carrots and grass. Still, we had fun. And we plowed! How many people can say they have plowed a field? Well, it wasn’t really a field. It was the 14th hole of the golf course. And we didn’t get to plow much because they called the police. But, still, we plowed!! Yeah! And the donkey and sheep liked it so much, they don’t want to leave! What an awesome day! A plowed field and two new pets. I’m going to call the donkey Floyd and the sheep Big Red!

Your friend,
Kevin.

Dear Steven,

I got stuck on the bus again today. It seems to happen every Wednesday when I go to see the Colonel. We meet up every week to talk philosophy and play a quick game of Twister. He has bad arthritis and the beginnings of Parkinson’s disease, so I usually win. But, I haven’t seen him for seen weeks now because I keep getting stuck on the number 47 bus. I should have learned after the first three times, but it just keeps happening. The problem is my skis, you see. I can get on the bus with them, buy my ticket, and then walk down the aisle because I am going in a straight line and I’m being careful. But, when I sit down, they get tangled under the seat in front of me and I cannot get out. It doesn’t help that the ski boots are so stiff. Every week I’m stuck on the bus until it gets back to the bus yard and the driver can help me out. It was seven hours last Wednesday. The bus driver said I should stop wearing skis when I get on the bus. He said it’s a stupid thing to do. I told him I have to practice for our skiing holiday this winter. He said there is no point on any skiing holiday where you would have to wear your skis on a bus. But, he would say that, wouldn’t he? He’s just annoyed because he has to help me out each time. He says that he won’t stop next week if he sees me in skis. He will though. He has to.

Your friend
Kevin

Dear Steven,

How was your day? I made a ladder from spaghetti. I’ve been wanting to clean all the fallen leaves out of my rain gutters on the roof for ages now, but I don’t have a ladder. I thought about going to buy one, but I don’t want to spend $30 on something I will only use once or twice a year. So, I thought, why not use stuff I already have in my house? I pulled out everything that could be fashioned into some kind of ladder from my drawers and laid it on the bed. Thinking logically, I narrowed it down to socks, shoelaces, and spaghetti. I ruled out socks pretty quickly because I only have one pair and I needed to wear them. I have many more pairs of shoelaces, but if I wasn’t going to use the socks, I thought it would be unfair if I used the shoelaces. I didn’t want my shoes to think I favored the socks. Obviously! That left spaghetti. There I hit on the first of two problems: I only had 200g of spaghetti. When boiled al dente, it is quite strong, but not strong enough to make a ladder out of. I was going to need a lot more spaghetti. The second problem was that when I wound the spaghetti into ropes, it just slipped loose. I was going to have to let it dry. My mission began. I went to the supermarket and bought 40kg of spaghetti. I carried it home in a wheelbarrow. Then I set to boiling, winding, and drying. It took two more trips to the supermarket and 5 days, but I made my ladder. It was strong and it reached to the roof! Impressed? I was. I set it in the garden, climbed to the roof, realized I didn’t actually have any rain gutters, smashed the ladder up and watched TV.

Your friend,
Kevin

Dear Steven,

I had an incredible urge to see how many M&Ms I could fit in my mouth today. Do you ever get those feelings? Something you just have to do? Like when you just have to buy only black shoes every day for a week? Or when you just have to go to Tanzania? So you just go? Do you know what I mean? Well, this was one of those feelings. I just had to do it. So, I bought twenty of those little bags. I didn’t think I’d be able to fit in more than three or four, but it’s better to have more and not need them than to need them and not have enough. Am I right? … … drumroll … … Eight!! Yes, you heard me right! It turns out I can fit eight packs of M&Ms in my mouth at once! Eight! I bet that surprised you. It surprised me too! I couldn’t close my mouth but they stayed in. I had this thick chocolatey drool running down my chin. It went all down the front of my new suit. Ruined it. But, eight packs! Nobody else in the bank seemed as excited as I was. Maybe it was because I couldn’t talk properly. I just kind of groaned at people with chocolate pouring out of my mouth. The security asked me to leave in the end. I never did get the loan I went in for. Oh well. Still, eight packs!! I bet you couldn’t do that!

Your friend,
Kevin

Dear Steven,

I finally got around to putting the wheels back on my rollerskates. I think you were right. They are much easier to use when they have wheels on. And they don’t scratch the floor as much. Not that it was my floor. I mostly used them at the supermarket. Anyway, the wheels are back on now so I can rollerskate everywhere. Which seemed like a really good idea. But, as you probably know, I live at the top of a hill. I opened the door and – whoosh – I was at the bottom of the hill. If that ice cream truck hadn’t been there, I don’t think I ever would have stopped. So, then I had to get back home. I couldn’t skate. That’s just not possible. No one can skate uphill. At least that’s what I learned at school. In geography class. But, they did teach me what to do in the case of fire. Drop and roll.  So I did that. I dropped and started to roll uphill. But that’s hard. I lay on my back instead and wriggled. It’s lucky I was down low because several trucks drove over me. Left shoulder blade, right shoulder blade, left shoulder blade, right shoulder blade. It took me three days and nights but I made it to the top of the hill. Turned out it was the wrong hill, though. I took a taxi home.

Your friend,
Kevin