I’m always thinking about the future, be it two weeks from now or in many, many, many years from now – a time when the period two weeks from now, also known as spring break, will be cheaper, faster and more efficient, and one needn’t worry too much about hangovers and venereal diseases. A future where one can go on vacation without going anywhere. Read on.
Anonymous 1
Would you like to be interviewed?
About what?
Spring break!
Oh, OK. Hi, spring break.
What are you doing for spring break?
I’ll tell you after I light this cigarette.
How long does it take you to light a cigarette?
All of spring break (lights it). OK, spring break. I am going – hold on, this could be incriminating. I’m going to go up to Seattle because my sister is throwing a Basque dinner party, where we’re going to drink red wine and eat a lot of Basque food and then I’m going to go hang out at my parent’s house and watch a lot of the Disney Channel.
Oh.
“That’s So Raven!” Have you heard of that?
“That’s So Ravin'”?
Yeah. It’s a really good Disney Channel show.
“That’s – So – Ravin'”? Oh, “Raven!”
They are – oh god, can you not put any of this in your interview. R-a-v-e-n. I’m hoping there will be a marathon on. I want to kill some brain cells.
Why do you want to kill some brain cells?
Because I’ve accrued so many this past term from doing so much homework. I need to even out the playing field.
Have you ever seen the movie “Total Recall”?
No.
Well, in that movie, instead of going on real vacations, people get memories of real vacations implanted in their brain.
Memories that they’ve had?
No, not memories that they’ve had, memories that they would have had, had they experienced these experiences. The experiences are implanted in their brains.
Wow.
If you could get a memory implanted in your brain, an ideal spring break, what would it be?
Um – can I think about this for two seconds?
OK. One one thousand, two one thousand.
OK, I’d go to the Serengeti in Tanzania, Africa, and I’d run with the zebras and I’d also spend half the trip in Egypt and I’d like someone to take pictures of me with a scarf around my head – not like that! Not racist!
Not racist? How is wearing a scarf racist?
Not a burka, like a scarf to protect me from the sun sitting on a camel in front the pyramids in some black and white photos so I could show people and be like ‘look at my cool vacation.’ But actually I wouldn’t get the photos if it was in my head.
That’s right.
I could describe them to people though. I could say that I left the photos on the plane or something.
Or you could have special cables going from your brain connected to a printer but they would have to like open up your skull.
I’m OK with that.
But they’d have to shave your head.
I’d want it to look like Natalie Portman.
Really? But then they would say “That’s not you, that’s Natalie Portman. Where did you get this? Off the Internet? You’re such a liar!” Do you really want to be a liar?
(Laughs.) Oh man, am I supposed to have a response to this? If someone said to me that I could choose my doppelganger – I looked like her first! She copied me.
Fair enough, good enough. How’s that cigarette?
Want one?
Nah, I got my own.
Is this interview over?
It could be.
When is this being printed?
Tomorrow.
Sascha Burchuk
So what are you doing for Spring Break?
I’m going to Breitenbush for three days, I’m going to stay in a cabin and soak in the hot springs and stop being stressed out.
Where is Breitenbush?
It’s kind of in central Oregon, I think it’s by Salem, I think it’s in the Mt. Hood National Forest.
That’s sounds like fun?
It’s going to be good.
Are you going to do any hunting?
Um – no.
I heard you say you were hung over, are you going to be hung over when you come back?
No, I’m going to be detoxified.
Um – uh – I was wondering if we could get a little spring break cheer going on like right here – will you show me your breasts?
No.
I don’t have any beads or anything but if I had some beads to give you, well,would you?
No. (Laughs.) I used to live in New Orleans, no.
What if I gave you some lint?
Lint? Maybe if you gave me some ‘lint-balls,’ those little chocolates they sell at Plaid Pantry, then maybe. But you’d have to give me a whole lot of lint balls.
How many?
Uh -270.
Why 270?
I don’t know it just seems like a good number. It’s divisible by nine.
It is? I’m really bad with math.
Nine goes into 270 thirty times.*
Have you ever seen the movie “Total Recall”?
No.
Well, OK, it was based on a short story by Philip K. Dick. The premise of the movie is, there’s this travel agency people go to. But it’s not just any travel agency. You don’t actually go anywhere, they just implant memories of going somewhere in people’s brains.
Now, if you could have a memory of going somewhere on vacation where would it be and what would you do?
I would probably want to ride camels through the desert on the way to Cairo to see the pyramids in Egypt.
What if there was some employee who worked at one of those places who really didn’t like their job and planted a bad memory of that in there. Like, say y
