I have this idea for a series of vignetty videos, written by, produced by, directed by, shot by, starring me, as a character who might have been partially inspired by me, home alone, waiting for the world to turn.
A fluffy dog, based on Toast, played by Toast, is around too, primarily so the main character doesn’t sound so crazy when he’s talking out loud. When the dog is asleep, the man talks to Google, anthropomorphized by a sentient device that exists in real life too.
Many scenarios involve him making his way through life’s meniality, encountering challenges that mean more than they seem. A select few can be found here.
In the introductory scene, he’s sitting in front of his laptop, writing a story. As he types directly into the WordPerfect software, he becomes inundated by a series of internet distractions. Pop-ups keep popping up on the screen without him doing anything to trigger them. Social media feeds, listicles, gossip sites. He can’t close them fast enough in his attempt to return to his very important writing. Photos of dogs, photos of cats, photos of dog and cat friendships. He desperately wants to write this story, but the internet has other plans. Finally, he takes a heavy sigh and gives up. Windows fill the screen until the computer crashes. He turns to Google for some soothing music.
“Hey Goo Goo.”
She remains dormant.
“Goo goo! Hey dere, googie googie. Pay attention to meeeee.”
Nothing.
(enunciating) “Hey Google.”
A flicker of light.
“Play Beethoven.”
“Okay. Playing Bryan Adams.”
Summer of ’69 begins playing from the speaker.
He makes a frustrated, unintelligible sound during the opening riff. Then he looks around to confirm he’s alone. He jumps out of his seat and plays air guitar, dancing all the while and slapping his belly.
He’s just after getting home from work and all he wants is a nice cold beer. There’s one bottle left in the fridge, so he takes it out then starts on his search for an opener. He can’t find it anywhere, and the beer continues to beckon him. Eventually, he finds a lighter and tries to open the bottle that way, using torque and whatnot, but with no success. He then places the top of the neck against the counter and tries to bang the cap off that way, again unsuccessfully. His frustration is growing to the point where he sees himself as a failure as a man.
Finally, he goes to his gun cabinet and takes out some sort of gun, shooting it at the bottle, which holds steady and unopened on the counter somehow. The room is now littered with bullets and bullet holes and the man has no energy left to do anything but collapse to the ground. His girlfriend walks in at that moment and doesn’t really notice him on the floor, but she does see the beer bottle on the counter. She picks it up, twists the top off with ease and takes a cool, refreshing gulp.
He’s standing at the railing of his third-floor balcony and sees a young, happy couple walking below on the sidewalk. He strolls casually to his fridge and grabs a carton of free-range organic eggs before heading back outside. He tosses them even more casually over the side, coming very close to hitting the people. They glance up in shock and probably disgust, but he’s only shrugging up there, not giving a care. Later, the guy from the couple and some of his friends show up and throw eggs of their own up to his floor. He ends up catching three of them, juggling for a bit, then lying down for a nap, as the sun sets across the water.
He’s baking a pie, wearing his cool pie baking outfit, proud of himself and eager to eat the soon-to-be-baked pie. He gets a bit antsy and keeps taking it out of the oven too early to check the internal temperature. He’s careful to put it back in very gently, because he only has one oven mitt and doesn’t want to burn his other hand by being forced to use it as support. Once it’s finally hot enough, his smile beaming, he picks it up off he baking sheet but immediately drops it onto the kitchen floor. While the dog laps it up with delight, he curls up into a ball and rolls down the stairs.
He opens the freezer and grabs a tub of delicious ice cream. Upon removing the lid, he notices immediately that the ice cream is not level, as he likes it to be, but has instead been pilfered indiscriminately. He has an idea as to who may be the culprit but doesn’t want to assume because it makes him look like a butt. Fortunately, he is able to reduce the entropy, bringing balance to the universe, after a series of carefully selected bites. It ends with a sign of relief and a mini solo dance party.
The whole video is a close-up of his mouth, where he’s looking into a mirror. It starts off with his lips closed tightly then barely turning into a very small ‘o’. It gradually and slowly gets bigger and bigger until his mouth is wide open, an oral crescendo with not a peep being made.
This one opens on a shot of vegetables being sliced on a cutting board. He’s cooking a meal and gets hot pepper juice in his eye. The next few minutes is him navigating the apartment, searching for relief however he can get it. He pours milk over his face, hits his head off the wall to spread out the pain, and besides that he’s making a weird growling noise that gets his dog in on the action. In the end, he’s still suffering.
He’s standing in front of the toilet, about to pee. He looks to left and eyes the garbage can. Considering how he’s never done it before, he turns and pees in it, then turns back to the toilet for the last few drops, before turning around and walking out of the bathroom. Without even washing his hands!
After lighting a couple of tea lights and getting Google to play him a Happy Jawbone Family Band song, he sinks into the filling bathtub. The water is too hot so he lifts most of his body outside as he waits for some of the cold water to even it out. Once comfortable, he talks to a rubber alien and asks it probing questions about its life. The shadows from the candles make a crude cityscape and briefly turns into a real place full of sonder. Suddenly, a loud plop sound startles him. He looks own and notices a fish swimming around casually. They become friends for a minute.
There’s a bonus episode called In the Wild that comes out long after the first series of videos is over. It takes place in the supermarket, and it starts with the guy walking in through the automatic doors as he overhears two people talking about how the only Huy Fong Sriracha plant might have to shut down because it’s making all the surrounding area stink right bad. So he ends up in the international cuisine aisle and reaches for a bottle of Sriracha, which he’d planned on getting anyway because his current one is almost empty. He moves along with his cart but quickly realizes he might need another bottle if a supply shortage is possible. He turns back and takes another one off the shelf. About to continue on again, he shakes his head incredulously, contemplating for a minute that he might only have one backup bottle while the whole world is going mad looking for the sauce. He grabs another, then another. It’s at this time he considers what a great gift a bottle of the recently discontinued hot sauce will make to his friends. He ends up with a cart full of Srirachas and is pleased with his smart grocery shopping idea. He returns home to find out all’s well again in Irwindale, and the false alarm has obviously led to a foolish abundance of rooster sauce in his house.
You’ve all been had. This whole Man Alone series was only created so I could amass a devoted following of viewers in order to product integrate my new Sriracha + mayonnaise + secret spices concoction, available now anywhere hot sauce is sold. If you look carefully, you can actually see a bottle of the sweet stuff in every episode, to aid in the subliminality of it all.
[Editor’s post-post edit: The author’s growing Saucy Stacy company just went public and while you’re working hard he’ll be barely working, in the sun sipping rum cocktails being fanned by a trained malamute. Enjoy your shovelling, snowballs.]