The staircase needed painting, he knew that. But so did many other things. Where would one start. You would have to paint the entire place. No use to have some floors bright, clean and new, when others had the scuff marks of a thousand soldiers. In fact this house might have been owned by soldiers during the civil war. The middle portion of each step had been worn down to a perfect bevel. At times it was dangerous. It did, however, create character. There is a market for this type of house this type of décor – faux hippy. Or rather expensive hippy. Some would see it as hippy chic others as simply someone whose taste has not yet developed past Renovation Hardware. As if the bevel was not enough, shaker, the white paint had scuffed of the middle of each stair revealing true hardwood. This appeared almost so obvious as to make Morrison believe that someone had purposefully removed the paint in certain spots. Surely the heavy shoes of 100 years did not create this.
As he rounded the last two stairs, Morrison caught himself thinking about things ended this morning, wondered if he had been too distant. He was known to be selfish with his thoughts, only concerned of whether they were organized or not. Pushing through the screen door the familiar sound of the rubber and steel latch clicked behind him. Morrison thought to himself that he probably could not describe the sound of the door latch or even be capable of purchasing a new one if he had to.
What if the latch breaks…What size is it…how big is the rubber stopper. Should I measure it, Should I get a spare one just in case.
There it is again, damn I need to get a hold of this.
Morrison was self diagnosed years ago with a severe case of self questioning.
I am sure there is a more scientific word for what ails me, but I am sure that more scientific prognosis comes with an even more scientific drug for which we have no idea as of yet the long term effects, having said that, we have spent 30 million on advertising this year so we are fairly confident that the general public will not read the scientific literature, or even understand it for that matter. Therefore it is our duty to remove the need for science and just make money, remove the need for the average person to read a boring science journal that uses scientific words.
The sun slammed into his eyes. Turning his head down and shutting his eyes he grasped for his sunglasses. His eyes watered as he rubbed them. As Morrison fumbled with his glasses he titled his head just a bit to see if this was an ordinary sun or if North Korea had replaced it with Uranium. It was still the same sun. But North Korea was the new problem. Morrison had been working for the last 3 years studying the psychological profile of North Korean President Km Jong-il. It was contract work and in Morrison’s mind it was definitely a government funded project. Although he was not to know this and why would he it did not matter to him where he got his money from. Everything is government – either regulated or profited. His media analysis work won him some impressive accolades. Which were not important but gets you good seats at restaurants on 52nd street. Kim Jong-il was one crazy dictator. He was so infatuated with old Hollywood movies that he had 50 military analysts watching ebay on any given day looking for memorabilia. He had amassed one of the largest movie set furniture collections outside of 20th century studios. While interesting in a plastic- follywood way, Morrison’s media analysis was a bit more tactical than this.
In University Morrison studied computer science and English. An absurd combination that destined him to answer the phone at some information help desk. Yet somehow he found a way to make it interesting. He was always capable of that. He developed a theory that people could be manipulated more by trash media outlets than by the so called professional media sources. In 2006 this theory held no water but as the internet exploded and traditional media lost it’s hold it became apparent that it was not traditional media that lsot its hold on the public but rather the public who lost control over their perceptions of what constituted verifiable media. Millions of people had become so addicted to reality television shows that communities and housing development sprouted up all over the wold dedicated to living and preserving certain reality shows. Morrison was at the forefront of understanding this phenomenon. He understood and predicted that the future was actually being televised. So it was that Morrison was offered a substantial contract to study Jong-il’s and media matrix. A term Morrison coined that suggests that we are not influenced by just one type or form of media but rather a very complex matrix of media confluences. The backers of the contract wanted Morrison to analyze the media psyche of Jong –il so that the they could make movies that would gradually change Jong-il, make him believe that America was not so bad. It was obvious that contract was some sort front for some shadowy part of the American intelligence apparatus.
It was this morning that Morrison was presenting his preliminary findings on another subject of investigation Kathy Reichs – a 33 year old single mother of 3 small children – who apparently fell into a media induced living coma. Reichs followed the tv show ‘living to die’ – a reality tv show about the wealthy people who put their parents in old age homes so that they can be more free to spend their money and not have to look after their parents – that she opened an old age home and is convinced 15 families to give their parents to her. Morrison was asked to study Reichs case and determine what triggered the living coma
