Sometimes when I'm in one of my transient but periodic black moods I'll hear someone urinating in the bathroom that's a few feet from the door of my so-called office, I'll hear someone go in the little room and the door will close and after a few seconds I'll hear the typical sound of male urination, the sound of a stream of liquid splashing from a typical height, leisurely alternating between striking the side of the ceramic bowl and striking the standing water directly, a casual and even whimsically directed stream of piss, and in the throes of my black mood I'll think: This is really quite intolerable, at the moment I cannot stand being me, I loathe my brain and all the ways it betrays me, my animal brain with its ludicrously primitive ways, and now here I am forced to endure this aural offense, this intolerable mocking confirmation of my disgusting animal status, this ill-timed reminder of my own base nature, this deafening sound of fluid waste issuing from a fellow mammal's preposterous dual-purpose organ, impregnating the world with filth, waste exiting the body and befouling the world to the point where it seems this whole pissant little ridiculous planet must by this point be completely covered in animal waste, whole cities submerged in urine and buried under mountains of excrement, this toilet of a world, I cover my ears with my hands and hear only the idiotic metronome of my pulse, my ridiculous implacable pulse that by the same token could at any moment cease, for no discernible reason except the contemptible whim of nature, could simply cease and that would be the end, my silly life unceremoniously, pathetically terminated just as unfathomably and pointlessly as it began, an unfathomable and pointless life of pathetic pseudo-events and pseudo-experiences bracketed by unfathomable and arbitrary origination and termination events, and then after a minute or so I'll take my hands from my ears and the pissing sound will still be in full force, impossible!

A few minutes later the mood will pass, and then I'll feel ashamed and embarrassed about these thoughts, the memory of my inane inner torment, my silent tantrum, and I'll think, well, the saving grace is that no one knows, I may have my moods but for the most part I endure them privately, no one needs to know about my childish thoughts. And then I'll write about it and post it here for anyone to read.