War on text

Oh, yes, you love your phone, don’t you? I know you do, because every time your brain shits a thought, no matter how inane, you send me a text. “i’m growing a beard!” And I’m eating a bean; so what? So you fire off a siren in my house? Please. You are growing a beard, not a beard of bees. It doesn’t warrant you writing me a text, any more than it warrants you smashing a brick through my window or setting my parents on fire.

Oh, but this is the way, isn’t it? This is what “we” do; we work, to make money, to buy credit, to send messages like “just to let you know i eat cheese by the wheel now”. So, whatever. You’re an idiot; what do you want from me? My sweet mother fucking time, clearly, but why?

When my friend Crystal sent us a message, saying, “i’m not able to talk right now because my cat has pissed in my face”, I realised there is a time and place for text messaging, and, yes, a cat pissing in your face is probably one of them. But the following messages (and understand: these are actual text messages transcribed verbatim from my mobile) are times when it simply is not.

do you have my copy of ghost?

Come again? Do I have your copy of Ghost? Well, frig, I don’t know. Do I have your Mentos? Do I have your grotty toothpick? Do I have an olive pip you spat out in my house three weeks ago? The fact is I did have this person’s copy of Ghost; of course I did. Everyone who knows me knows that my house is erupting with exactly this kind of inane shit. And that’s exactly my point: IT’S GHOST. One, I more or less live within farting distance of you; if it mattered, you could more or less ride here in your wheelie bin. Two, you’ll get your precious DVD-R back at whatever time I can be arsed flicking it at you. And, three, sweet Christ, if you actually need it any sooner than that — if you actually need to watch Ghost — then get back on your mood drugs, go tell MySpace and stop wasting my damn time.

i’m waving at you right now
(was preceded by, “i’m leaving now”, “i’m on the tram”, “i’m near the door”, blah blah blah)

Ta for the director’s commentary, but then, I have my eyeballs, don’t I? And here’s a little tid for the record: they will actually spot you if you persist in waving your giant man-hands in my face, just as they would spot a tank trying to mow me down or a rabid dog being launched into my face. And here’s the thing: me spotting your frantic paws at short-range will take, I don’t know, a mo? Two mos? How long do you think it will take for me to drive my fist through the endless pit of crap in my handbag, just to locate the phone, just to locate the message, from you to me, that basically says “look up”?

i’m running five minutes late

Shit, it’s a good thing you told me; Christ knows, if anyone comes to my house a second later than the prescribed time, I bolt every conceivable entry point, brick up all my windows and put bullets in their head.

if you have any problems, call me

No kidding. If I have a problem, I should call. Frig. I DO learn something new every day. No, seriously, gee willikers. What else? If I want a wee, should I go? If I pong like a turd, should I bathe? If I’m growing a beard, should I text everyone? What if I’m eating a bean?

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