I went to an assembly at school today, and during the course of drifting off, noticed a piece of paper on the ground. Being the bored, curious, easily-amused lad that I am, I picked it up.
What I picked up could quite simply be the most evil creation ever.
A red, square piece of paper, with numbers on the side. “Just a ticket,” I think. “Left over from some old raffle.” But as I went to crumple it up and throw it at my friend’s head, my eyes fell upon three simple words written in the center:
“KEEP THIS COUPON.”
Immediately, my hand stopped. I tried to throw the ticket away, but just couldn’t bring myself to do it. Something about those three words written in all caps has bound me to this scrap of parchment!
I know that the raffle this coupon was from is long gone, and yet I still can’t get rid of it! It’s commanding me! It’s taking over my life!
I can’t stop thinking about it. Throwing it away should be so…easy. But the ticket won’t let me! Instead, I was forced to put it into my wallet, where it now sits!
I went to the assembly to fall asleep, not become entangled in some horrible battle of wills!
Damn you, ticket number 4268887! You weren’t even a WINNER! GIVE ME MY SOUL BACK!
I feel for you Jester. I myself have been cursed with Allen wrenches!
Yes, nearly ten years ago I had the misfortune of assembling a drafting board. The instruction booklet was poorly translated from the original Japanese and warned me:
"Importance is that you MUST retain allen wrenches for future possible."
I was struck by it’s Zen riddle-like tone and startled by the it’s dire warning. I soon found that I could not bring myself to throw out Allen wrenches for fear of risking “Future Possible”.
Now I dread assembling anything anymore for it seems like every new gas grill, bookcase, lawnmower I get – everything comes with a new allen wrench! The collection has grown to the point where it has spilled out of my tool box and now commands a drawer of it’s own. They trouble my sleep with their random jingling and fill me with strange dreams of standard and metric fittings. Not a day goes by that I don’t prey for Allen wrench thieves to take my burden from me.
Sorry, Jester, but you’re not normal. I say this after years of administering raffles in which at least half of the participants give me the piece that says “Keep this Coupon” while they hold on to the piece that says “Ticket.” Maybe the manufacturer should print the words a little bigger so that there’s no confusion.
There is another cryptic message below “Keep This Coupon”. All it says is “Rogers”. This is printed in much smaller, un-capitalized font.
Now, I am confused. The lack of punctuation between “KEEP THIS COUPON” and “Rogers” implies that only a certain Mr. or Mrs. Rogers is to keep the coupon. This fills my mind with thoughts of what horrible things must have happened to Rogers, since (s)he obviously did NOT keep this coupon. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have it.
Or perhaps, I am to KEEP THIS COUPON until this Rogers person arrives, and alleviates me of my burden. Could it be that this is a test, and I am being screened for some new cult?
But the greater possibility is that “Rogers” is the name of the person behind this evil, evil creation. My mind cannot picture what kind of horrible person could do this to someone, though. Is Rogers some dark wizard, bent on ticket-spawned world domination? Or an evil genius, whose only goal is to spread his influence throughout the globe? Or could it be that he is SATAN himself?! After all, the ticket IS red!
Whatever the answer, I only know that Rogers is the key. If I wish to release myself from the burden of the ticket, I must go on a quest to locate Rogers, be he friend or foe. Only then may I be free.
It’s obvious that they are not caught under the ticket’s spell because they have neglected to read it. If they did happen to glance at the words, they would no doubt be bound immediately by its soul-sucking power.
I don’t suppose you’d have one that would fit my kitchen faucet? We have our own Allen wrench drawer, and not one of the little suckers fits. I always have to go borrow the “golden” Allen wrench from my mother when our faucet handle gets loose.
Sometimes I dream that the legendary Allen himself will come to my door and claim my drawer full of Allen wrenches, leaving in their place a single glorious Golden Allen Wrench.
I can see it in my mind’s eye – glowing like a sunset, the sounds of angels singing in the background.
J. Listen to me, honey. I’ve got your answer…and the most amazing thing is that it actually makes sense (all things considered).
If this coupon is so valuable (I don’t doubt you), you have to know that this ‘rogers’ person is panic-sticken, searching the gym for it at this very moment. In order to free yourself and set the universe to rights, you must return this coupon to the very place you found it. You must do it. More than one life hangs in the balance.
And don’t worry. It’s going to be all right.
As for the Allen wrench thing…I don’t know. It frightens me. I’m going to count my wrenches right now.
Reminds me of those signs on the sign of the road stating “DO NOT PASS”. Well, if you’re not supposed to pass the sign, why the HELL did they build all that road after it?
It’s clear to me that Inky and Omni have a problem. I offer the following 12 step program, and hope that it will help them in their addiction. (With apologies to Bill W. and all of his friends who have been helped by the real thing)
We admitted we were powerless over allen wrenches - that our lives had become unmanageable because of our need for them.
We came to believe that a Mechanic greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity, or at least help us organize our tool boxes better.
Make a decision to turn our kid’s birthdays and Christmas mornings over to the assembly of bicycles, scooters, and U-Assemble furniture.
Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves, and discovered that using the right size allen wrench really does matter after all.
Admit to our wives, to ourselves and to our kids the exact nature of our longing for hand tools.
Be entirely ready to have our wives clonk us on the head or even hide the remote when Bob Vila comes on TV because of all these defects of character.
Humbly ask our wives for the remote back, and change it to the PBS station so she can watch The Frugal Gourmet instead.
Make a list of all persons we had borrowed tools from, and became willing to return them all. Even the power tools. And the extension cords.
Buy replacement tools for those people whose borrowed tools were lost or damaged, except those that went out and got better stuff already.
Continue to take personal inventory of the tools in the shop, and when we have too many, admit it.
Seek through constant study of infomercials, package instructions, and those Shop-Smith demos in the mall for just the perfect set of Allen wrenches, so that the clutter in the tool box can be reduced or eliminated.
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we will try to carry this message to Allen wrench addicts everywhere.
The convaluted world of Allen wrenches is it’s own reality, and your not allowed to know the rules. If you have Standard, you’ll need metric. You have sectagonal, you’ll need pentagonal. And even when you think you’ve planned for every contingency you find yourself needing a specialized bit.
Only the mystical Golden Allen Wrench fits all needs.
Last night I fell asleep to The Wall. I dreamt of hundreds of gigantic wrenches marching by. Then this guy with the name ‘Allen’ embroidered on his shirt asked me if I had my coupon.
I didn’t.
He said I should have saved it. Then he stamped the word ‘rogers’ on my hand.
So I think from that we can deduce the obvious. I have no life.
BTW, I think we have eight wrenches. Should I go buy more?