After twenty DamnPortlanders pranks, I retired the idea a week ago while it still had steam. It was only going to go downhill, and the last one was bombastic enough that it made for a thrilling conclusion to the entire venture. So now I am moving on to four new projects for 2006 that don’t specifically involve pranks or LiveJournal, but hopefully will be engaging, and I will post about them as they unfold.

The novel I’m working on these days has long, comical passages that I’m writing in a vacuum. I am not showing pieces to anyone just yet, and I am awful at describing episodes to people to gauge their reactions. The pranks series helped give me a sense of what’s funny, what’s not funny, and what’s just plain weird. The novel does not have pranks in it, but I’d like to think it feeds off the same energy.

The odd part is that now that I am dedicated to not posting hoaxes in DamnPortlanders any longer, the pranks keep coming to me. I can’t just throw a switch and turn them off.

So here’s one last one, for good measure. The only DamnPortlanders who will ever know about it are the ones who read this journal. Here goes:

Hey DPers! Did anyone catch the story on Fox News 12 during the last round of sweeps about the illicit sex ring based out of those big, raucous DocuShred trucks that are always parked along corners downtown? The reason I mention it is because there’s one outside my office right now, and it’s noisy as hell and rocking like crazy. I was shocked to find my co-workers knew nothing about it, even though I’m pretty sure it was also a Willamette Week cover story.

To recap, the trucks are not shredding documents at all. Instead, their interiors are velvety luxurious, stocked with a wet bar, and fully soundproof. They serve the booty needs of some of Portland’s top corporate movers and shakers, which is why the trucks are always rocking (wink-wink). Just once, I would love to be around when the 15 minutes are up and some sheepish suit tries to sneak back into his office building. With all the media coverage, I am surprised this is still going on.