My life is awash
with conditioned responses, and like the other six dwarves, I'm
not happy. Anything I've done seven times will jump out from me
as the trigger is pulled: I'll go to type 'fun' (as in I'm not
having ___) and end up typing 'fuck, I'll go to type 'spare' (as
in ___ me your petty insecurities, woman) and end up typing
'spank'. (Well, maybe that last one is more Freudian than
Pavlovan... Is anyone here too young to know the difference? Arf
arf) If my life is nothing more than a bunch of conditioned
responses to conditioned questions from others, then what's the
point of anything? It's even spread from the mental to the
physical: the question of straining my wrist while drumming was
answered with the unbelievably clichéd answer of wrist-strain. I
mean, what is with that? Can't I come up with anything more
original than that? Why not ankle strain? I'd be a lot prouder of
that than just straining my wrist; imagine going
crazyassmonkeydancer with my wrists and then my ankle just gives
up? Completely unconditioned. Completely original. Completely
marvellous.
I usually like
conditioner though; it's what makes my hair look so good, and
brings my pathological vanity spurting out like a rancid boil on
the top of my head (the result of a misguided pasta experiment).
Conditioner will fuck me over at nearly every available
opportunity, and yet I always go crawling back to her warm
inviting arms, in the hope that this will be one of those
wondrous moments when my hair looks absolutely perfect with no
effort whatsoever. Take the meds, and back to the conditioned
responses.
What else but
conditioned responses can explain why when you were but a little
girl cleaning the cellar and your step-mother caught you having
sex with rats, she made you peel all the skin off your body seven
times, in order to remind you to not do it again? She couldn't
have been evil, with a penchant for a specific number; that's too
obviously satirical. No no no, she was trying to condition you to
believe that inserting rodents inside parts of your body is in
some way taboo in polite society. So strong was your desire to
rebel against society, that she needed such a strong response to
frighten you away from who you truly wanted to be. It's sad in a
way. I bet the rats enjoyed it, and now all they have to look
forward to in their mundane lives is moving wherever they are
told to by the great big stately pleasure dome in the sky, or
perhaps one day being captured and ground up into bite-size
pieces to fulfil their destiny as the active ingredient in most
conditioners.
Once you've used a
bottle of conditioner once, it's never as good is it? It never
smells as good, it never makes your hair smell as good, and it
sure as cow sugar on goose shit doesn't let your hair cascade
perfectly on your shoulders like the sky falling in to crush us
all, and leave us shattered, bleeding and in immeasurable agony.
Perhaps the active ingredient in conditioner isn't rats, but
perfume. If I ever get to be as rich as some rich guy, and don't
need to spend all my money on whore's for my clinically depressed
friends who are looking for something to drag them out of the
mire of their conditioned lives, like rats in a laboratory maze,
with nothing but Cinderella to comfort them... If I ever get to
be that rich, then I'm gonna try conditioning my hair with
perfume. If that doesn't work, and doesn't make me go (more)
bald, then I'm gonna buy loads and loads of bottles of
conditioner and only use each one once. My militant vegematarian
lesbian wife (she's gotta be rich too. I fully intend to marry
for money alone) can go out and bury the rest, saying a prayer
for the rats if she happens to be of religious descent, or just
pondering on the futility of this life of conditioned responses
if not.