We all love Slim Jims, the intensely salted tubular meat snack promoted by the dearly departed Macho Man Randy Savage and very much not by our cardiologist. I, for one, know that I love Slim Jims a little bit too much, considering how much I have compromised my once-thriving career as an executive for Anderson Bevel Smith, the third-largest advertising firm in Idaho, for even just a bite of those savory, delicious, incredibly addictive pieces of mechanically-separated chicken and miscellaneous beef.
1. The first terrifying, career-destroying incident happened one previously ordinary afternoon. My healthy lunch of a chef salad with low-calorie French dressing on the side had not sustained the necessary energy for a hard day of pitching risky ad concepts to my boss, ABS Vice President Oliver Bevel. Thinking quickly, I pulled a Slim Jim out of my emergency snack drawer and snapped into it. Before I know it, a grotesque figure reminiscent of a giant Slim Jim slammed open the door of my office, slapped me twice, hard, threw the papers off my desk, and screamed “EAT ME” before leaving as quickly as he had come.
Unfortunately, he apparently also slapped ABS Vice President Oliver Bevel on the way out, which was blamed on me.
2. The next time, I had a big presentation for Grover Bits, Sesame Street’s latest hit branded breakfast, and I was nailing it. I could see it in the eyes of those fat cats from the Children’s Television Workshop, I had them. To punctuate my closing line of “those kids won’t know what Grovered them,” I pulled out a Slim Jim and snapped into it. Immediately, that grotesque figure smashed through the boardroom window, raining glass everywhere across the clients, many of whom suffered minor injuries, and landed on the table. After he kicked the President of the Children’s Television Workshop in the balls, he rappelled out the window, screaming “EAT ME.”
3. After my inevitable demotion, I was understandably depressed and indulged in a number of vices. Eventually, my near-constant huffing of model airplane glue drove my wife and children to leave me; when I was informed that Jake’s Hobby Depot would no longer be seeling me glue, the fumes finally cleared and I knew I had to get them back. But before I could do that, I indulged in a little Slim Jim snap, and wouldn’t you know it, that motherfucker popped out of a garbage can behind Jake’s Hobby Depot and stabbed me with a Bic pen.
4. This one was a dream, so I don’t know if it counts. But I was in the office, but it wasn’t really the office, you know? Anyway, I snapped into a Slim Jim, and then the Slim Jim became him and he became everything around me and I was in Hell and I woke up screaming “EAT ME.”
5. At this point, I had fallen apart. I was wandering the halls of my office at Anderson Bevel Smith like a ghost, reduced to delivering the interoffice mail, like an animal. People avoided me. Slim Jims were my only friend. Snapping into them was my only respite. At my lowest, I snapped into one and he smashed through a wall and I burst into tears just at the thought that at least he was there for me. But when he saw me sobbing, he slowly backed out of the room without a word. Even he was freaked out.
6. However, I’m happy to report things have improved. The last time I snapped into a Slim Jim, I was ready. He burst through the ceiling tile of Anderson Bevel Smith and was about to scream in my face, his eyes filled with the malicious fire of the damned. I grabbed him and snapped his neck with the strength of a thousand righteous men. I may never be the same and I will never be welcome in the offices of Anderson Bevel Smith again, not least of which because I am currently scheduled to be executed by the State of Idaho in three days.
But I did what I had to, and I pray God has mercy on me for the Slim Jims I have snapped.