“This Black And White Photo Of Me Should Be Enough For You To Take This Opinion Piece Seriously”

LOOK at me. Observe how my eyes stare directly into your soul. Calculate how many more books I’ve read than you. Read every sophisticated phrase I craft into my copy and succumb to my scrupulous opinion, for you are nothing without people like me.

By now, you already know this is one of those serious broadsheet style pieces that people like you share to appear smart. You’re reading some proper thought-out conclusions so don’t even dare trail off without fully reading every single word – I know what you’re like.

You are mine now, for the next five minutes at least. I liken reading my portentous musings to a Sisyphean task, not that you’d know what one of them is. Or maybe it’s a Bromdyllic knot. Or maybe I made that up. You’re too thick and lazy to check, and even if you did, who’d believe you if I was making it up? My photo is too hubristic.

I’m a proper writer who says fancy things. Not some two-bit hack rushing to meet a word count. No sir, I take my time, occasionally leaving my desk to walk around my study with one arm of my spectacles in my mouth while airing a pose of deep thought, making sure to let everyone who passes my street-facing, curtain-less window know how incredibly studious I am. Of course, they already know. They see my packed bookshelf, my decanter half full with a dark red scotch, my mysterious demeanour. They know the kind of social stature I radiate, and soon, so will you.

Look at you now; intrigued by my intellectual jargon and cunning grammar while blissfully unaware I’m needlessly deploying semi-colons right there; not that you would have known. There, I did it again, just as you checked the scroll bar on the right to see how much more you must read. Bless your little heart for trying – you will need a nap after this, you complete and utter muck savage. You are intellectual coleslaw, my brain is a priceless Fabergé egg.

Concluding now, your vocabulary and worldview have been enriched. A rapprochement between my wisdom and your ignorance has been reached. You’re welcome. And now, my opinion (full of logical fallacies) on that important subject you were previously unable to comprehend is all yours, packed neatly into a four-hundred-word article for you to valiantly defend online.

Go forth and share, my mules, for I am the black and white knight of the scribe.