Sunday, May 31, 2009

A Surprise for a Boy


You’ve maybe seen bags, or sacks, think I like sacks better, in dollar stores promising mysteries for both boys and girls alike.  As a kid, the gimmick worked, you’re damned curious about the contents of the bag, and certain they’re worth well more than the measly $1 price tag would suggest.  Paper bags, usually reserved for holding your packed lunch, became somehow suddenly cooler and more desirable than cotton candy or that weird sensation you felt when at the public pool you’d stand against the vent that shot out a constant stream of warm water against your genitals.


Well, the mystique is gone; behold the contents of the marvelously mysterious surprise bag…


A deck of playing cards that’d already been opened and sort of smelt like those secretive poker games seen in movies played in the backroom of Chinese restaurants in New York where crime deals are birthed.  The cards themselves feel ancient, the paper coarse, as if once handled by Henry II, Duke of Bavaria, in-between revolts and attempted throne usurping.


The pencil doesn’t do much for me.  I don’t have a sharpener lying around the apartment; so, it’ll have to serve some other purpose.  It has random words on it, including “WAY COOL!” which ironically is its complete opposite.


This eraser reminded me of the purplish blue prehensile tongue of the okapi.  I find this correlation to be troubling but I’ll leave it be.


I found something to do with the pencil.  It makes for a perfectly fine cat-poking tool!


This one is really confusing.  I mean, is this a cookie cutter?  I think it is, but I’m not really sure.  And why is it in the shape of a fish?  Don’t get me wrong; I’m a huge backer of aquariums and the exotic allure of the deep blue see.  But, a bunch of fish-shaped oatmeal cookies?  Show me the young boy who desires a fish-shaped cookie cutter and I’ll show you an alien in a child costume playing you for a fool.


This one’s really lame.  For starters, they don’t glow, not at all.  Secondly, it seems a bit dangerous, even with a printed warning, to encourage kids to put something so small and potentially dangerous into their sugar-sated mouths.  I suppose you could take your newborn into a rave and his mouth would glow faintly while the bad techno ruined their delicate ears as you danced and ate pills with Fernando and a couple of his friends from Biology 112.


This bag was surprising.  Surprisingly awful!  I think I’ll go play with my cat now.

Overall Grade: D