I know some of you are unaware of what I do for a living… the rest of you are well aware I work at a FedEx Office. Technically this is true, but I’ll admit a lie of omission. I wish I could tell you more, however management has informed me that legally the most specific thing I can say about my job is that I build copiers.
Now for COMPLETELY UNRELATED REASONS, I have determined it has become important that my loved ones and I develop a secret shorthand to determine the difference between me and, let’s say, an “exact double hell-bent on replacing me who’s using my life as a cover to begin its eradication of mankind and conquest of earth.” Again, this has nothing to do with my job “building copiers” or the good people at FedEx Office.
I know you are thinking that this new safety system is to prevent my “clone” from killing me and replacing me or possibly all of you, key politicians, generals, and thought leaders in its pursuits to rule the earth. That’s not what I am saying at all. In fact, I want it on the record that I am not saying this has anything to do with “clones.”
If anyone even mentions the words clone and FedEx Office together I have been informed they will be sued for slander. Maybe I am referring to a diabolical evil twin I have always had but never mentioned or a spy wearing a billion-dollar replica mask of me, pod-people aliens, or a crocodile in a wig. It doesn’t matter. What matters is if you see two of me in the same room and the gun slides to you, this is a foolproof system of fifteen questions you can use to determine which of us is real and which is my evil double.
Questions for yourself:
1. Does my intuition feel like I know which is the real one?
2. Are there any visual differences between the two? For instance, a missing scar or one happens to be a colorless black and white copy.
3. Is one of the copies two-dimensional?
4. Is one of the copies folding its hands into blades and cutting the other to shreds?
5. Did this have anything to do with FedEx Office? Legally, no.
Now that you have properly assessed the situation, it’s time to begin your interrogation of us. To make sure we are as prepared as possible we need to assume this impostor will have access to all of my memories, beliefs, and fears. Which is exactly what we will use against it with these foolproof questions!
Questions for us:
1. Which one is the real you!? To which I’ll say, “He is.” See what I did? It’s pretty clever. A double will likely try to convince you it’s me. But to rule out the possibility of a very honest double keep asking these questions.
2. Where and who did you lose your virginity to? The copy will say in my college dorm with Beth Sanger. A lie I have told all of you and so many times I believe it. The true answer is, “At the South of the Border amusement park with a methed-up fireworks salesmen in the stairwell of a giant sombrero.”
3. How would you feel if I burned this stack of papers? If one of us yells, “Don’t burn my family you filthy HUMAN!” that could very well be a good indication it’s not me.
4. What’s your darkest secret? “That I got drunk on prom night, ran over a drifter, and my close friends and I hid the body,” is what the copy will likely say. I know I told you all, through tears, that this happened to me, but it’s actually the plot of the iconic 1997 film I Know What You Did Last Summer. A film I spent my prom night slowing down looking for nip-slips.
5. DOUBLESAYSWHAT!?! It’s imperative you say this very quickly to confuse it. With any luck the double will say “What?” and you can shoot that life-stealer right between the eyes. Of course between the eyes is a figure of speech. With this double’s anatomy aim for the elbows. It’s where what we will call its “heart” lives.
6. Why is there a clone of you? We will both say, “Whoa, who said anything about clones?! I hope you aren’t implying this has something to do with my job at FedEx Office because that’s slander!”
7. How did we meet? On second thought, I’d rather not answer this one. My memory isn’t what it used to be and our meeting might not have left the impact on my life that it has on yours.
8. How’d you get the scar on your right testicle!? Trick question. I recently removed my testicles for this very question.
9. Favorite Spice Girl? Posh.
10. Where did you graduate college? You’ll expect the answer to be Claremont College, but I actually never graduated. When the school found out I was using my copier repair degree for certain illegal genetics experiments they kicked me out. Also, I was selling Adderall.
But before you ask any of these you can always try to throw a bucket of water on us or spray us both with a hose, just to rule out if one of our biochemistries is “toner based.” Water should clear the problem right up.