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The Advantages and Disadvantages of Life at Sea

The letter read:

"Dear Sir or Madam,
We hasten to inform you that you, SID MAYERS, may have already won a sum of four hundred (400) dollars in our company sweepstakes. In order to confirm delivery of this
cash prize, please send a sum of fifteen (15) dollars, in cash, to the return address
provided on the envelope in order to confirm delivery."

"That's the third one this week," said Biscuit, "and the fourteenth this month."
I asked him why this was such a problem.
"It's no problem by itself, but it's one of life's many ways of constantly finding ways to irritate me. How else can you explain inflation, swine flu and spam e-mail?"
I suggested the economy.
"I'm fed up with this life, Ted. I simply can't take it any more. Sometimes I wonder if I should even bother putting up with it anymore.", said he.
I asked Ted if he was talking about suicide.
"Far from it!", came the reply,"I'm getting out of here, Ted, and you're coming with me."
And so, we decided that we would leave our old lives in South Punfitterdown and sail the seas together, having adventures on the open ocean. Just the two of us. For three months. This was going to be kind of boring. Biscuit, however, wanted "no part of me or my complaints" and promptly secured a boat from his questionable uncle in the Carribean. The boat, too, looked kind of boring, so we stuffed it with all of our earthly possessions, 600 bottles of water and a whole lot of SPAM. And we were off.
We didn't leave, really, we just drifted around the beach for a while as Biscuit and I tried to work the motor. When we were finally finished, we set sail for the charming little village of New Naillockbridgemouthbrook, which was a quaint little country town located east of Switzerland and north of Egypt in a country whose name we could not recall. New Naillockbridgemouthbrook was founded ten kilometres from Old Naillockbridgemouthbrook by the resistance fighters of a certain war. The resistance fighters did not choose to reveal the name of this war, as apparently their resistance was a failed one and they did not wish to cause themselves any further humiliation. New Naillockbridgemouthbrook seemed like a nice place to live, because over the years it had grown into a self-sustaining little country town, far from the hassles and worries of city life; it was the perfect place for someone as stressed as Sid "Biscuit" Mayers.
After maybe two weeks, we were getting rather bored. At first, taking a laptop computer along with us seemed like a good idea, but we soon realised that it was foolish not to take into account that a strong wi-fi signal would not be available in the Indian Ocean, and Minesweeper was beginning to seem far too repetitive to be a source of adequate enjoyment, after doing nothing but play it for several days straight. In terms of food, we were doing fine, except for the fact that we had devoured all the ham sandwiches we packed, and were now well into the tuna. This affected me the most, for I truly enjoyed ham before that fateful day. I quite enjoy tuna now, however.
After three weeks precisely, we begun fishing for food in order to stop depleting our food stores, as we had gone through all of our tuna sandwiches and had by then moved on to eating the tins of low-salt SPAM. Mind you, what I mean by this is the processed meat within the tins. Biscuit, by this time, had read each of the novels he had brought with him for the trip at least once, and had taken to reading comic books. Deadpool was always my favourite, but now I realize breaking the fourth wall isn't nearly as funny in a place where there's nothing to compare it with.
Nearly a month after we had first left South Punfitterdown, I fell off the port bow while fishing for mackerel, and was stung by a still-unknown organism. The next few days were unpleasant for the both of us, even more so when Biscuit pointed out it would be at least another three months before we were due to arrive at New Naillockbridgemouthbrook. Unsurprisingly, it was around this time that I began to question the wisdom of taking a long-distance journey by boat without proper medical supplies or a trained crew.
3.88 megaseconds after our original departure, New Naillockbridgemouthbrook seemed no closer than it had 1614 kiloseconds earlier. By this time, we had emptied our food storage to the point at which all that remained was a jar of pickled mung beans and six boxes of Rice Bubbles. Due to this, much of our diet consisted of fish and cereal grains, as neither Biscuit or I were very fond of mung beans. For entertainment, all we could do was play I Spy, which was quite enjoyable, given the vast selection of objects to be seen, such as "cloud", "boat" and "water".
A fortnight later, give or take a week or two, Biscuit told me something I couldn't help but think was familiar:
"That's the third one this week," said Biscuit, "and the fourteenth this month."
I asked him if he meant the seagulls.
"It's no problem by itself, but it's one of life's many ways of constantly finding ways to irritate me. How else can you explain starvation, scurvy and lack of Spam to eat?"
I again suggested the economy.
"I'm fed up with this life, Ted. I simply can't take it any more. Sometimes I wonder if I should even bother putting up with it anymore.", said he.
I asked Ted if he really was talking about suicide this time.
"Far from it!", came the reply,"I'm getting out of here, Ted, and you're coming with me."

THE END