ORLY?

Patrick burst through the front door of his home, huffing and puffing the entire way. Slamming the door shut behind him, Patrick hustled past the living room, and vanished into his bedroom. In his haste, Patrick had succeed in knocking over the family's mahogany end table, their precious ming vase, their case of cherished hummel figurines, and his sister, Polly-Ester in the process. Normally, Patrick's gasps for air would have been a case of his nerves crying out, in fear of his parents inevitable discipline, but on a day like today, none of that mattered to Patrick.

It was yesterday evening that Patrick had done something he had believed to be incredibly bold, something he had never done before. The normally sheepish Patrick was often described as well meaning, good natured, kindhearted, and giving, but as cowardly and unconfident as the French. It was Patrick, yes, the very same Patrick who oftentimes was so timid that he actually had made it a routine to ask his mother's permission to make a bowel movement, who had done something so daring, and so uncharacteristic, that his asthma had gone into overdrive.

Patrick choked back his anticipation long enough to enable the dialup modem on the computer. With trembling hands and baited breath, Patrick slowly opened the internet browser, and logged into myspace.com. As his account details slowly loaded before his eyes, Patrick could literally feel his heart stop, when his eyes shot down, and focused on his current friend total. Just as he had hoped, his total was now up to 2.

Patrick let loose a girlish shriek of delight upon seeing the number, but quickly calmed himself. Breathing heavily into his lunchbag, Patrick solemnly repeated modest thoughts in his mind. After all, it was just a number right now, and until he clicked the link to see who exactly his new friend was, the number could represent anybody. Slowly, Patrick talked himself down, and began filling his head back up with his trademark self doubt. Patrick had lulled himself into the probability that the new friend was only another pornography robot, as had been the case six times before. Now that he was fully ready for his rejection, Patrick clicked the link.

What greeted Patrick was the shock of a lifetime. His throat clenched shut and his eyes began to water. The fear and reality of the situation was far too much for poor Patrick's fragile emotions, and with a whimper and icky gurgling sound, Patrick passed out.

Banging his head loudly and painfully on his own keyboard proved to be nature's alarm for Patrick, as he sprung back to life upon impact. He read, re-read, and read again the information that was presented to him, hoping that somehow it could possibly sink in. He scanned the tiny picture again and again, wondering if it could be real. Patrick pinched himself on his own flubbery arm, and still, the link remained. He knew it was real, that all of this was real. It was true. Patrick was now friends with all of the golden girls.

Patrick wandered through the rest of the week in a daze. Carrying the same inbred puppydog look on his puss, Patrick's daily routine, which had once provided him all sorts of diseases to run from, and eye contract to avoid, now seemed dull, and meaningless. The school classes in which Patrick had normally feared so greatly, had now lost their edge. Patrick had even begun to feel hatred and contempt for school in general, and even toward his own family, for interfering and hogging precious time that could be spent nurturing his friendship with his new favorite girls.

Throughout class, all Patrick could do was doodle ideas for glitter text icons on his assignment sheet. And Patrick's parents began to worry themselves about his recent defiance against them, claiming that he was taught different in St. Olaf, followed by a maniacal laughing fit.

Patrick's obsession reached it's boiling point, when shortly after finishing carving 'P+GG 4EVR' on a heart into his desk, Patrick noticed another link on his page. This link was regarding a new comment that had been left for him to read. Patrick fumbled with the mouse, but managed to click the underlined text, revealing the first comment from his new best friends. Patrick's eyes hummed with joy as he read his 'Thank you for being a friend!' welcome banner again and again. Patrick's pride was soaring at this point. He had never imagined that he, a ten year old boy, could somehow become best friends with the four women he grew up idolizing.

As he wiped the tears from his eyes, Patrick had realized that the golden girls had taken the next step in their relationship together. While he himself had asked to be their friend, they not only accepted the offer, but thanked him for the invitation. Patrick had never felt so wanted in his life, and was truly grateful. Patrick knew deep down that he had to do something very impressive to meet the standards of the glorious women, and as he went to bed that night, Patrick dreamed of the possibilities.

The weekend had finally come for Patrick, and he could not have been more excited. He nervously paced his bedroom back and forth, trying to build up the strength to ask his beloved golden girls to their first online edinner edate. As Patrick chewed down his nails to the cuticle, he suddenly realized his foolishness.

What was I thinking? Patrick thought, realizing that the certainly would not accept the invitation if he asked them wearing his plain old boring outfit.

Patrick marched off to the bathroom and began his grooming techniques. After four hours and much hair product, Patrick emerged, clad in a full three piece suit, penny loafers, Oakley sunglasses and a slicked-back pompadour. Patrick took a deep breath as he walked to his monitor.

Patrick mouthed be confident again and again to himself as he opened his myspace inbox, and began to author his request. Patrick only managed to type out:

"edate 4 us, letsgo LOL sorry! JK OMG I U GUYZ,"

as his nerves got the best of him. Wiping the sweat off his brow, Patrick felt that he had gotten his point across as he sat down and eagerly awaited their reply.

Minutes turned to hours as Patrick waited patiently. As boredom began to set in, Patrick found solace in lighting a vanilla candle and trying to play his Six Degrees of Estelle Getty game in his mind, but as hard as he tried, Patrick could not help but be disappointed. The candle huffed out and, like his dreams, went out in a puff of smoke.

Lying in bed that night, Patrick could not help but agonize over the possibilities that could have caused his snubbing. He knew how busy the girls must be, but try as he might, Patrick could not conceive that they could not take time out to answer the request of their new best friend. Unable to sleep, Patrick decided to investigate.

As Patrick browsed the girls' page, he couldn't help but notice how many friends the girls had. Patrick had figured that they would probably have more that just him as a friend, perhaps an uncle or someone else, but was shocked to see over four thousand friends on their list! As Patrick browsed through the listings, he started to become uncomfortable with the amounts of whorish women he was seeing. Patrick knew about the oftentimes promiscuous behavior of Blanch, but he had never imagined the girls actually being friends with a woman who listed her activities as 'mixing the milk in with my coco puff.'

It was then that Patrick noticed something very familiar. There it was, the same exact friendship banner on I Luv BooBZ's comment page that he had received. Patrick noticed the date was from yesterday. The girls couldn't have forgotten about him in just one week, could they?

Patrick felt very confused and disturbed at what he had seen, and he felt that, as a friend, he deserved some answers. Realizing, that for whatever reason, the girls were not to privy on answering their messages on myspace, Patrick planned on going right to the source.

"Hello. Lifetime, television for women. This is Abigail speaking," a friendly voice greeted him.

"Yes. May I speak to the golden girls please," Patrick responded. There was a long, awkward pause, followed by what appeared to be a muffled giggle.

"I'm sorry...what was your request again?" the woman asked.

"The golden girls please. I understand that they may be busy, but please, let them know this is urgent," Patrick whimpered into the phone, biting his lip nervously.

There was again a long pause, followed by a series of button clicking. Suddenly, the woman's pleasant voice was replaced by an angrier, manly voice that sounded like Tom Waits gargling asphalt.

"Senior VP George Peterson here," the voice chimed in.

"You...you're not the golden girls," Patrick replied.

"No sir I am not, now how exactly are you trying to reach?" the man asked.

"THE GOLDEN GIRLS" Patrick said, a little louder and clearer this time, because obviously, the man was dumb.

"Dorothy, Rose, Blanch, and Sophia, the stars of your biggest show. DON'T TELL ME YOU DON'T KNOW WHO I'M TALKING ABOUT."

Sadly, the man had become annoyed by Patrick's request, and had hung up on him midway through his question. Patrick was now very concerned at the health and well being of the girls.

Had somebody hurt them? Why didn't that man know who they were?

Patrick's mind then quickly flashed back to the mysterious woman's profile who had buggered he way into the girls' lives. Patrick wondered if she had gotten to his girls, and shuddered at the thought that they might somehow be in danger.

Fueled by jealousy, anger, and confusion, Patrick revisited the woman's page and decided that even though it was the middle of March, today would be HIS independence day. Patrick did not exactly know what to say to this mysterious woman, but he knew he wanted answers.

Patrick tore into the woman with his scathing letter, calling her, among other things, the "queen of the meanies," "someone who should take a long walk off a short pier," and "a stupid n00b who totally got pwn33d."

Adding to his online assault, Patrick decided to kick it up a notch by attempting to freak her out even more. Patrick knew from reading her music interests section that she was a big U2 fan. So, to match her morbid game, Patrick devised his own plot, to make her think that he had Bono's toe, and would trade Bono's life, for the safety and well-being of the girls.

As Patrick hammered down the enter key with his fist to send the letter, he knew he needed a way to cope. Patrick angrily picked up his can of rootbeer and crossed out the 'root' portion, thus allowing him to shotgun his 'beer'. Six cans later, it wasn't enough. Patrick turned to his box of crayola crayons, and began holding them in his lips like that of a cigarette. He was chainwaxing through all sixty four colors fast, and was down to burnt sienna when the bright blip of 'new message' caught his attention.

Patrick angrily clicked the mouse and looked at the response.

"Dear Patrick,
ummm....dude u need to calm down, ok? that page is a page i made cuz i thought that show was funny. i dont have them in my basement like you said, and i really dont know what you were talking about bono for but seriously how did you get my name cuz your not cool unless ur hot."

Patrick's heart shattered. All along, he knew it couldn't be true, and he wished that he just listened to his gut instinct to begin with. He was a fool to think that the golden girls knew or cared who he was, and he really, REALLY wished now that he had not cut off his toe to use as the fake Bono toe bargaining chip.

MEANWHILE....

"You don't think he suspected anything, do you?" Blanch asked nervously.
"Nah. I think we really threw him off of our trail with that awesome response. I bet you really made him feel stupid," Dorothy responded.
"I just hope they don't hurt Bono!" Rose said.
"Will you all just shut up?! It's just a stupid kid. He won't look into anything further. With any luck, he's terrified of computers now. So let's all just go play some shuffleboard, alright?" Sofia announced.

All four women nodded in agreement on the idea, as they all headed out, chuckling and bickering on their way to the boardwalk.