Curiosity killed the cat. But let's be honest, it's the 21st century, who hasn't killed a cat these days? Hell, even Michael Vick probably has more TKO's on cats than Curiosity as of late. Now, there's something to be said for specialization, but to make an entire career out of killing only cats? Being the cold-blooded killer that it is, you'd think that Curiosity would have a little more of a blood-lust than to be satisfied with the same old "Cat" and Pony show year after year. Everyone knows that you can only kill so many cats before that Christmas-Morning excitement starts to fade, and no matter how many ways you try and come up with to skin the cat, the magic is lost.

Curiosity can lie to you and me, but it can't lie to the economic Law of Diminishing Returns. Which, without getting too technical, means that curiosity is bored and getting hopelessly more so with each curious cat that bites the proverbial kitty litter. What curiosity needs, is a new demographic to prey upon. A particularly eligible candidate being, in my opinion, the guy who can't seem to mind his own business on the Subway.


What is it with people having to know everything i'm doing? Why do they have to see the book i'm reading, see what song is playing on my iPod, see what i'm jotting down on a note...? Like this guy today. Evidently, I was the book he just couldn't put down, and he wasn't happy just to judge me by my cover either, or browse the pictures. No, he wanted to read me word-for-word, highlighting and jotting down notes in the margin as he went.

I had a very small, let's say size 12, word written on my left hand, and he kept tilting his head and adjusting his glasses trying to read what i had written. Everytime I moved my hand to adjust my grip on the handrail, his head would follow, and when i put my hand behind my back to get him to stop, his head just craned around to follow it. It didn't seem to bother him that all the while I was staring blankly back at him with an expression that begged, "Can I help you?", or that i was relentlessly performing the macarena with my hand so that he couldn't read it. But by this point, he was so enthralled with this little brain teaser, and had committed so much energy to the endeavor, that nothing was going to deter him. Did this guy have such terrible writer's block and was so desperate for inspiration that he was stooping this low for material?

"C'mon man...I got nothin', nothin'! Just gimme a little peek at your hand..just a few letters?"


Sorry buddy, but unless you're publishing a Grocery List or a coffee table book entitled "To-do's of the World", you're not gonna find much inspiration on my HAND.

Incidentally, the word written on my hand was "FLOW". Now, don't wear yourself out trying to deduce what it might mean, it's cryptic for a reason. I don't like people reading things i write on my hands, which is why i don't write things like "hey silly, don't forget to feed mr. snuffles" or "remember to buy Laguna Beach season 3 on DVD at Walmart". I especially hate it when people spin their head around a full 180 degrees to see what's written on my hand, squint their eyes, and then read it aloud as a question.

Well, maybe I would owe you an explanation if I had written it on YOUR hand, but I didn't, I wrote it on MY hand. So don't worry about it; I'm the one who's going to get ink poisoning, not you.

Now, if I had written "Ask Me About" above the note, like one of those buttons that grocery store cashier's wear, then I would only have myself to blame. Or if I had screen-printed the note on the seat of my pants, like those pants that girls wear. I mean, those are just begging to be read, and read again. But people don't even ask the CASHIER'S about "discount days" or "our banana sale" when they DO wear those buttons, so why then do they ask me about what's written on my hand when I clearly have given them no reason to believe I would like them to do so?

You show me one single cat that deserves to have Curiosity knocking on its door more than this guy on the subway, and I'll skin that cat myself. Maybe like Danny Glover, Curiosity is just "getting too old for this sh*t". I mean, look at Curious George. How on earth has he escaped curiosity's vengeance all these years? Call me Ishmael, but you know he's just gotta be Curiosity's White Whale.

Maybe the job is just too big for one poor noun to handle. If Curiosity could recruit some help from the likes of other nouns such as Voyeurism and present participles Meddling and Snooping, I have no doubt that we could see the death toll rise to levels we haven't seen since Pandora lifted up the cover to peak inside that magical, little box.

But the problem with words is that they're lazy sons of bitches. They'll kill one day and then take the rest of the week off to play Mad Libs. I guess we're just going to have to accept it that "Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words will never harm you..."

unless you're a cat.

I can't believe Curiosity is just going to stand idly by and let this happen...

Posted by V.I.Pierce Comments