I was sitting in the bar the other day, like that's a shock, when someone tapped me on the shoulder. It was Jimmy, and I like Jimmy, so I asked him what he wanted. Jimmy, he wanted to know why I wrote. What I got out of it besides a paycheck, a handshake, and some fucking lack of day job? Not that he didn't understand that the keys to universal power are numbers one and three in that list, but still.

And I wanted to give him a glib answer. I wanted to laugh it off and be pithy and fuck shit like that. But I like Jimmy, as I said, so I took some thinking time and found an honest answer.

I have kinda fairly destructive tendencies. Not a shock, but bear with me. I keep 'em contained, though, by fucking up my imaginary friends.

I mean, seriously, think about it. I get to make people up and then do horrible things to them, and at the end of it all someone pays me for it and thanks me. It's like being paid to go to therapy. How the fuck don't more people realize this?

Just last week I had to finish up a piece about some guys. Whatever, look, it doesn't matter. What matters is that I was in a bad mood last week. I really didn't want to deal with shit. My TV broke, so I kicked it in just to see what that would look and feel like. I've always wondered, having seen it on TV so many times, ironically enough. Except then I had broken glass everywhere and got glass in my fucking foot and... look, last week was bullshit.

But I had some work to do. So, I came down to the bar, and I took it all out on some poor fictional fuck who got in my way, metaphorically speaking. Was his ex-boyfriend putting his cock up against a wood sander just me working out the pain in my foot that I caused myself? You bet your ass it was!

So I write, and I write, and I get all this shit out so that when I look up I can be human again. I guess we all have hobbies, right? I just ain't sure that the cocksucker in the corner that plays the harmonica all the time does it to make the stabbing behind his eyes duller. Then again maybe he does. Maybe he does.

... No, he doesn't.