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We Can Stalk Them for You Wholesale

Date: 12-May-2008/19:04+3:00

Tags: , , , , ,

Characters: me, them, woman

I was in traveling with my parents and we had stopped in at a hotel. We had a strange situation of bringing a lot of things in with us--like towels and cups--and I was a bit concerned that the hotel might think we had stolen the stuff. While I waited for them, I watched a TV talking about how there were checkpoints where officials were confiscating objects that were at all illegal, like jewelry that contained Ivory in it.
The news showed pictures of a country where everyone looked nearly identical--and kind of like rapper Ludacris. I wondered whether this country was where the confiscations were happening, or if it might be relevant to my family where they'd be looking at our cups and towels.
Then an advertisement came on where a woman was advertising a stalking service of some kind. It came on and said "I know where you've been," and said my name. Somewhat surprised, I thought it was going to narrate a true detail. But it said something random about how I'd been in Tucscon Arizona... then she laughed and said "I was wrong, right? Of course I was. I can't keep up with you 24 hours a day, I have a job. That's why there's (service name)."
Note Email can use this gimmick. If your name is jim.bob@gmail.com, then an email in your inbox might say "Jim Bob, I know what you did last summer..." because it's only using information from your address to generate your name. The ad went on to say all the varieties of stalking they could do for you.
A little while later I was in the middle of a rather extended chat where I'd realized I'd talked to the person as if they were someone and then talked as if they were someone else and they answered questions to both. So I was confused about who I was talking to and why I was so confused about it. This snapped me into lucidity:
me: "Wait a minute. Who are you?"
them: "That's a very good question, since we've been talking for quite a while about stuff. You should have thought it was a little weird how much I knew about you. I am Driver."
me: "Driver What"
I felt bad because that didn't sound very friendly, and also because there was no question mark. Yet I perceived without looking up that some woman was coming into the room who might distract me from getting more information.
me: (to woman) "BE ABSOLUTELY QUIET."
woman: (mocking, angry) "Be quiet, do what I say, blah blah...whatever."
She gladly went away.
me: (to Driver) "Sorry about the missing question mark. I only mean to say that a name like Driver didn't help me--you'll have to give me more background to understand who you are."
Then I noticed that the chat program I was using had several panels on it. It was clearly a chat interface, but didn't have the names of people--besides "Driver" (which was the name on the panel I was using) there were others labeled things like "Defendant". I tried to continue to watch the conversation with Driver but it began to accelerate wildly, and interspersed with lines of ordinary text there were yellow "Warning!" dialog boxes about some kind of problem.
As I was waking up I saw a screen full of videos where a man with a name sort of like "Cary Doyle" was on tons of channels. He was talking about something along the lines of ending intellectualism and just having sex. Couldn't tell if he was pro or against this, but I had information that a lot of people were watching the video simultaneously.
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The accounts written here are as true as I can manage. While the words are my own, they are not independent creative works of fiction —in any intentional way. Thus I do not consider the material to be protected by anything, other than that you'd have to be crazy to want to try and use it for genuine purposes (much less disingenuous ones!) But who's to say?