I'm Only Sleeping

Piss off, commune readers. Omar Bricks is here to say one thing and one thing only: leave me alone so I can get some decent shut-eye for once in my goddamned life. You can take all of your beeping handheld devices, your whistling noses and your popping knuckles and shove them right on up your creaking asses as far as I'm concerned. I've had my fill of late-night motorcycles, tuba practice and Montel for hearing impaired neighbors. I have no time for clocks that tick, toilets that run or drug deals gone bad out in the hallway. I need sleep, and I need it now.

This misadventure started out innocently enough, with a marathon of Friday the 13th movies on basic cable two nights ago. I figured I'd watch the first few movies and then call it a night, but I'll be goddamned if they didn't just keep on playing them in order, all night. And I kept telling myself I'd just watch one more to find out how they were going to off that homicidal Canadian once and for all. But no matter what, that moose-eating asshole kept coming back, kind of like Adam Sandler. The next thing I knew it was five in the morning and Jason was still dulling his meat cleaver on oversexed teenagers. I had no choice but to set the VCR to tape the rest and head off to work.

Needless to say, yesterday at work was an exercise in futility, as I spent most of the day just trying to avoid overhearing what happens at the end of Friday the 13th Part VII. Wearing a motorcycle helmet all day made it difficult to get much done while I was here, but the important part is I avoided any potential spoilers. Despite a dull headache and the early onset of sleep-deprived hallucinations, I finished the series on video last night and managed to get in a game of air hockey with a giant ground sloth before I laid down for a much-needed siesta.

Unfortunately for both he and I, a bird that sounded exactly like a car alarm had recently moved into the tree right outside of my bedroom window. And of course, he was sounding his call loudly all night last night, possibly in an attempt to attract a Lexus. Evolution had gifted him with the ability to dodge small arms fire, but left him ill-equipped to deal with the spray of a fire extinguisher, thankfully. This was good for the neighborhood, too, since then I didn't have to cut down the tree. But this whole ordeal took up the better part of the night and contributed to my current miserably sleepless situation.

To put it simply, Omar Bricks needs some serious downtime and delay is no longer an option. I don't care if you have tickets to the Knicks, the Kinks or Gladys Knight and the Pimps. I'm not interested. I don't want to see the new mudding tires you put on your truck or to preside over the baptism of your child. And I'm certain your new piercing is the best ever, but regardless I ask that you kindly blow it out your ear.

I don't know how I can state this any more clearly. The furniture I piled up in front of the door doesn't seem to be getting the message across. Nor has the car battery I wired to my doorknob. Instead, I'm kept awake by an endless procession of bandage-handed do-gooders asking if I know my doorknob is smoking. I wish I had a taser gun.

Blowdarts! Yes, I thought blowdarts were the answer too, until Red Bagel woke me up to ask if I knew anything about the pile of unconscious bodies with bandaged hands outside my office door. At least he let me borrow his taser gun.

But the thing they conveniently don't tell you about taser guns is that after you taser someone, they don't go away, they just lay there and moan loudly for hours, which is almost as bad as them asking where the copy room is.

It looks like I'm going to have to fake a medical quarantine to get any serious sleep today. Sending out for couple of rows of rhesus monkeys and some lab equipment to set up in here ought to do the trick. Then, glorious sleep! If anybody needs me for anything, kill them. Check back in a few days, and bring donuts. Bricks out.

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