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      _____________       _/_/     | | \ \          _/_/     _____________
     |  ___________     _/_/       | |  \ \       _/_/       ___________  |
     | |              _/_/_____    | |   > >    _/_/_____               | |
     | |             /________/    | |  / /    /________/               | |
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     | |                                                                | |
     | |      c   o   m   m   u   n   i   c   a   t   i   o   n   s     | |
     | |________________________________________________________________| |
     |____________________________________________________________________|

  ...presents...                   mE t0o!@#$
                                                         by Mogel
                                                         01/01/1996-#307

             __///////\ -cDc- CULT OF THE DEAD COW -cDc- /\\\\\\\__
               \\\\\\\/  Everything You Need Since 1986  \///////
  ___    _   _    ___     _   _    ___       _   _      ___    _   _      ___
 |___heal_the_sick___raise_the_dead___cleanse_the_lepers___cast_out_demons___|

     Enter Generic Angst Statement #1: Humanity is cracking to pieces.

     "What to do?  After all the youthful hope has passed, reality always
shines on a human being's insignificance - and it's like a slap in the face."
So deeply ponders the white upper-middle-class suburban guy before he turns on
his CD of NWA's gangsta rap full blast.

     The white upper-middle-class suburban girl nods her head in agreement.

     "How can someone believe something and not even challenge it?" she
wonders.  She opens her well-packaged three-dollar box with eight little pieces
of cheese and crackers.

     "Who am I?  Why am I here?"

     "Who knows.  Why do you care?"

     "Don't be rude."

     "I'm not rude."

     "Don't you care?"

     "No."

     "Oh, just... fuck off!"

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     Moments pass.  Days pass.  Years pass.  Lives pass.

     I sat on my windowsill with the window wide-open today.  Freezing cold
temperatures and they're pouring into my room.  I didn't even care.  I was
so angry at everyone around me.  Nobody understands me.  Maybe she'll
understand.

     "Is nothing sacred?" she asked me.  She asked me... she's talking to me!
No matter how old you get, sometimes girls will make you feel like a little
boy.  I melt when I talk to her.  My emotions and thoughts get swirled up.  Is
this when obsession kicks in?

     I wonder if she knows.

     "Be careful," my friend said.  "I hope you don't get hurt."

     The snow-covered buildings move and contort.  The frosty air's almost
unnoticeable natural sound of static is addictive.  I saw the world as a giant
brick wall.  There I am climbing  some big cliche'd ladder and there are my
friends on their own ladders.  So many ladders, but how many rungs are
important?  How many can you take out before a ladder splits in two?

     "Everything I say is better and more important than what you say."

     "Just fuck off."

     Most of my thoughts that entire day by the window were about why people
think.  Eventually you get pulled in some direction you don't want to go, so
you shut down.  You're full of dead thought.  You know that you're tired of
thinking when all you think about is ways of how NOT to think anymore. 
Anti-think.  But it's not working.

     Dramatic pause.

     Do I love her, or am I just emotionally starved?

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     Enter Generic Angst Statement #2: Everything has been done before.

     "Then why bother?" Generic Angst Poet asks.

     "Because we must," replies my Generic Hero that will never exist.

     "There's not an original thought left.  Originality has become an art of
concealing your sources."

     "Unmotivated people have always declared that all the ideas of their
current time were the end-all and be-all.  The world will be proved wrong as we
synthesize.  All you can do is learn everything that has already been thought
and use it to pull in some new direction.  There are virtually infinite ideas
that no one has ever found yet.  It's exciting.  I'm ready to find the most
original and revolutionary thought anywhere."

     "Me too!"

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     I think too much.  I need to just shut up and enjoy myself.

     Is this really a date?

     What am I doing here?  The Angst-O-Meter rises.  Maybe I can write an
"alternative" song about it when I go back home.  There's her door.  Look at
the picture of Elvis.  Look at the word "Peace."  So simple.  So meaningful. 
That's the best message ever.  Damn, what cheese.  People will find deep
philosophical meaning in a turnip if you let them.  Fuck that.

     I knock.

     "Come in."

     I wonder if she knows.

     Her room is a mess.  She smiles.  She's on the computer.

     She's been on her computer a long time.  I've obsessed like that on the
computer before.  Wait, that's the understatement of a lifetime.

     "Sit down, I'll be off in a sec."

     "Okay."

     Isn't it obvious?  Of course it's not.  I'm the retarded master of hiding
what my emotions are.  I want to grab her and throw her on the bed.  I want to
recite horribly bad poetry to her and look up at the moonlight and hear a
string section in her closet.  I wanna hold her.  I wanna love her.  I wanna
call her "baby" and sing Peter Frampton songs to her.   My life is trapped in
an episode of _Sweet Valley High_.

     "Wanna go eat?"

     She turns her head to respond and I see those eyes.  Some girls are so
beautiful it's disgusting.  She's one of them.  It's funny how the deeper you
stare into the eyes of a girl the more you feel ultimately hopeless.

     You stare into her with that feeling of hopelessness and you catch a
glimpse of yourself back.  It makes you queasy.

     Now it's time for a commercial break.

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     "This t-file is lame."

     What's wrong with you?  What's your problem?  Is this file too boring for
you?  Not enough talk about sex?  No big exciting things happening?   Why don't
I list a thousand redundant jokes about _Star Trek_ or college life or
computers?  I'm sure those would be a real hoot.  You can stand in lines, or 
you can read between them.

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     Enter Generic Angst Statement #3: Everything sucks.

     "I hate everyone," proclaimed the youth.

     "Me too!" agreed his friend.

     "I hate this world."

     "Me too!"

     "Everyone is stupid.  The whole world sucks because people are stupid. 
You, me, and everyone.  I'm fuckin' tired of it."

     "Me too!"

     "Nobody really listens to anyone else, unless it fits into their own
little picture of the world."

     "Yeah!"

     "Today's youth is full of this corny bullshit rage.  They get mad at mommy
and daddy for giving them a bedtime, so they scream and holler and declare
themselves rebels against society and other buzzword random institutions.  Am I
the only one that sees how stupid everyone is?  This pisses me off!  I'm... I'm
gonna... I'm about to explode!"

     "Me t0o!@#$!"

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     "'Just fuck off'?" she asked.  "Why'd you write that on your door?"

     "It's the way I feel sometimes.  I don't wanna talk to anyone."

     "You're pretty anti-social sometimes, huh?"

     "Fuck off.  No, wait.  I didn't mean that."

     If I'm not into escapism, what am I doing typing this right now?  I gotta
talk to her.  I gotta tell her.

*** emmanuel has been kicked off channel #hack by Mogel (Just fuck off)

     I gotta tell her.

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     Enter Generic Angst Statement #4: Everything is random.

     An old man walks in the park.  He sits on a bench, flips open his tattered
notebook, and begins to write.

     "I see insignificance in everything," he scrawls with his Bic.  "All my
life I've heard people say to make your life have meaning.  Your life needs to
make its mark.  People treat conversation as petty in the big picture.  The
people you see on a walk around town all have the potential to be your friend.
You need to connect."

     He raises his head for a moment to look around the park.  Night is
beginning to fall.  He sees no one else.

     "One day you realize you don't know anyone and you're a lonely old man. 
Then, when it's too late, you realize _that's_ the meaning of it all.  That's
why you're supposed to go through all the nitty-gritty events that life throws
at you.  To grow and develop.  The more you experience and think, the more
you're ready for death.  I wish for it, but I'm not ready.  I've failed."

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

     "I think I'm going to call her," I said to myself, eating lunch alone. 
"Oh shit.  I haven't talked to her in a week."

ATDT PLEASE BE THERE

BUSY

A/

BUSY

A/

RING

RING

RING

CONNECT BAD MOOD

     "Hello?"

     "Hi.  Uh, it's me."

     "Hey!"

     "What's new?"

     "Not too much.  Been running around like crazy this week.  How come you
haven't called me?"

     "Uh, I've been... uh, busy too.  I'm sorry.  It's shitty that I didn't
call."

     "What have _you_ been up to?  You actually go to class this week?"

     "Yeah!  And lunch too.  Amazing but true."

     "Me too!"

     Ugh.  I've gotta tell her.

     "I've been writing a lot.  I'm working on a real off-beat
story-like-thing.  It's more personal than I've ever done before."

     "Great.  Lemme read it when you're done.  What's it about?"

     "It's sort of made up of little random stories.  If I do it right it'll
have a theme about what goes through a lot of people's heads and sort of
explains why people might act like they do."

     "But of course all the things everyone says are actually your thoughts,
right?"

     "Well, they were my thoughts at one point.  Maybe not now.  It's all sort
of a growing process.  I'll throw in some neat recurring ideas and feelings and
it'll be inter-mixed with a love story as the ultimate symbol of 'angst'. 
Heh."

     "Wow.  Sounds pretty rad."

     She said "rad."  Teehee.

     "Hope so."

     "Maybe when you're done you'll have people screaming in praise, 'Mogel
is the spokesperson for his generation!  His words are so true!'"

     "Haha.  Yeah.  They'll say 'Mogel!!  I HAVE PAIN.  mE t0o!@#$'"

     "Well, is there anything else?  If not, I gotta run to class.  I'll call
you when I get back."

     Now's the time.  Tell her.  Do it.

     "I, uh..."

     I wonder if she knows.

     "I'll talk to you when you get back."

     "Byebye."

NO CARRIER

  _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

ATDT I'M OBSESSED

RING

RING

CONNECT HOPE

     "Hello?"

     "Hi.  Uh, I love you."

     "I know that, dummy."
     .-.                             _   _                             .-.
    /   \           .-.             ((___))             .-.           /   \
   /     \         /   \       .-.  [ x x ]  .-.       /   \         /     \
 -/-------\-------/-----\-----/---\--\   /--/---\-----/-----\-------/-------\-
 /         \     /       \   /     `-(' ')-'     \   /       \     /         \
  WORLDWIDE \   /         `-'         (U)         `-'         \   / WORLDWIDE
             `-'                     .ooM                      `-'     _
      Oooo                                                            / )   __
 /)(\ (   \           Copyright (c)1996 cDc communications.          /  (  /  \
 \__/  )  / All rights reserved.  Award-winning CULT OF THE DEAD COW \   ) \)(/
       (_/     is published by cDc communications, P.O. Box 53011,    oooO  _
  oooO         Lubbock, TX, 79453, US of A.  Edited by Swamp Ratte'.  __   ( \
 /   ) /)(\                                                          /  \  )  \
 \  (  \__/        Save yourself!  Go outside!  Do something!        \)(/ (   /
  \_)                      "THE COW WALKS AMONGST US"                     Oooo

