We've Got a Whiner!

Owen seems to have succeeded in his endeavor to quit smoking. Huzzah! Things are looking up. It's been something like three months now, and he acts normal and seems stable. Best of all, no more $100 cartons of Camels. No more stinky smell or stained fingers. No more sore throats. But on the other hand, he's got a meager social life and NO hot girlfriend.

This lack fuels a silent rage teeming beneath Owen's seemingly innocuous smile. He doesn't feel angry, and he doesn't show it. He actually feels pretty good, kind of numb-like. But Owen is a mangled half man-beast inside, screaming for freedom from his worldly domain, crying like a banshee at the moon, slaying children in the night. Owen is the true son of Cain (if Cain had a child with the Hulk and the Boston strangler), both superhero and super-villain. I've seen it with my own eyes.

Yes behind that boy's sheepish grin is a thousand-degree pit of acid that threatens to boil over, at any time. That acid rage has been growing since his birth, slowly getting hotter and hotter. Owen pretends he can manage it. He takes a lot of TUMS. He pretends everything's OK. But I've seen it with my own eyes. He once came in second place in a man-sandwich-eating competition. He also recently came in second place in a two-person Risk game. That incredible boiling rage threatens even the bravest souls, and when Owen doesn't win, he just whines and whines. Like he's about to boil over.