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ARTICLE 135: mandrew FEBRUARY 2005 last night i went out to see a band play at a small rock club. this is not too interesting because bands are usually not very good! but as i was standing in a ridiculous crowd of local hipsters with pants that were too short for their legs, i happened to look over. out of the corner of my eye i saw a person that looked exactly like me! i almost dropped my two dollar cup of water in shock! the man i saw on the other side of the club had the exact same balding pattern as me, exact same glasses, exact same beard, and even a crappy blue t-shirt on!! i stared at him for twenty or thirty seconds because i could not think to do anything else. finally, he broke eye contact, and i dropped back into reality. standing there, i tried to figure out what to do. the man-who-looks-like-drew (let's just call him mandrew for short) must have known he looked just like me, otherwise he would not have stared at me! i thought i should go over and talk to him, and that he might be pretty awesome. then i stopped. wait, i thought, what am i going to say to mandrew? "hello mandrew, i happened to notice you look exactly like me!" and we couldn't be friends, people would talk to us about being twins if we were out somewhere. plus, it would be way too weird to look over and see yourself sitting there, talking to yourself. once i knew someone who got in a horrifying car accident that broke his nose. before they fixed his nose, the doctor asked him, "do you want to see your brain?" and before he could respond, the doctor held a mirror under his nose. somehow, his nose had broken in such a fashion that he was able to look up through his nasal cavity and see part of his brain exposed there, a small chunk of grey matter looking back at him. seeing mandrew was disturbing in the same exact way. when i first heard the brain story, i imagined myself walking around outside, and coming up alongside my house, and peeking in through the living room windows, and seeing myself sitting at the computer desk. i get a little bit freaked out when i think about that even now, and i was especially terrified of my simulacrum appearing from across the room in a dark, sweaty, loud rock club. i couldn't handle the pressure so i pushed my way through the crowd and out through the front door of the club. this is the sort of thing that happens in a nightmare! i thought. quickly i checked to make sure i was not falling, or naked, or on fire, to make sure it was not a dream. after a moment i confirmed that i was standing on two feet outside of a crappy club with a high cover charge, so i was definitely still in real life. phew. after driving home, i consulted the world's largest unchecked reservoir of stupidity: the inter-- uh, i mean, the world's biggest completely accurate information resource: the internet! INTERNET, how can i find mandrew, why did this happen to me! i am looking at myself inside my own house so WHERE DO I LIVE?! i typed frantically for hours, pausing only to think about the mandrew incident and shiver a little bit. finally, i found what i needed: JOHANNA'S ART. ( http://www.johannas-art.com/ ) this site does not appear to be a catch-all solution to any and all existential philosophy problems, but it does offer something perhaps far more important: PORTRAITS OF YOURSELF WITH STEVIE NICKS. i emailed johanna herself with a picture of myself, and told her, JOHANNA this is a subject of great importance! you must draw me next to stevie nicks! i must have the drawing immediately, i will pay whatever costs are necessary! if mandrew really is a simulacrum of myself, he will attempt the same thing, and we will be united through this scottish artist of light and beauty! then, we can email each other from a distance to discuss how we look alike, without getting freaked out. now all i have to do is wait! me and stevie nicks are gonna sit here, right on this watercolor beach, side by side, and we won't get up until we solve the eternal mystery of mandrew. (back to the writing index page)