Mondo Goes to the Library

The most disgusting inmate in the Universe gets some Culture

It was Dorm inspection day, and Mondo found himself evicted from the dorm for the duration of the inspection. Since Mondo abhorred the great outdoors, due mainly to the affinity seagulls seemed to have for him because he smelled like ripe garbage, Mondo didn’t want to go to the yard. He had visited the gym, and found the experience singularly unacceptable, and he was banned from the game room in the Activities building. So poor Mondo had no choice but to go the Library. Dreading the walk to the Library, Mondo somehow had enough foresight to put on his chino jacket and a hat in an effort to protect himself from the seagulls and their byproducts.

Mondo made it to the end of the walkway leading out from the dorm, and was about to turn left towards the library when the first seagull noticed him and sent out a loud squawk alerting the rest of the flock to his presence. As the entire flock converged upon him, Mondo started to let loose with a stream of insults.

“Your Grandmother has webbed feet!” he screamed at the first gull that befouled his hat. Another bird was nearly frightened out of mid-air when Mondo bellowed, “Your Mother dates Barn Swallows!” two inches from its face. Mondo steadily increased his lumbering pace in a desperate attempt to escape the flying rats. He arrived at the Activities building relatively intact, albeit nearly covered with a vile, slimy covering.

The guard working the sign-in desk at the Activities building became frightened as Mondo approached. Beads of sweat broke out on the guard’s fivehead (he was going bald, and his hairline had begun to race towards the back of his neck), and by the time that Mondo had reached the desk, the guard was visibly agitated. Lunging for the pencil, Mondo hastily scribbled his name and as much of his prisoner number as he could remember, and headed for the Library.

Mondo entered, the Library emptied. “My, what respect,” thought Mondo as he watched dozens of people fling books, magazines and newspapers tin the general vicinity of the circulation counter and flee in stark terror, “I really appreciate the way people give me room to move around. But today? Well this just tops the cake! All these people returning their reading materials so that I can have a larger selection to choose from.” Mondo smugly concluded. The Library clerks all were suddenly very busy, deep in the stacks, except for one. This poor miscreant, who had just started working in the library, was frozen stiff with fright. As Mondo made his way to the circulation desk, he rubbed up against the wall in a futile attempt to clean the congealing guano off his jacket. This only smeared the droppings further into the jacket, and also permanently disfigured the wall. The Librarian just sighed and took out a stack of Work Orders. He knew that this would be a long afternoon. The rookie library clerk nearly fainted when Mondo leaned over the counter and asked him for some books.

“Make sure they got lots of pictures of animals in them,” Mondo grunted. The clerk became so terrified when Mondo’s legendary breath hit him that he wet his pants, but the intrepid clerk managed to stumble off toward the stacks to fulfill his task. Mondo stood waiting for a long period while the clerk was away, and started to reminisce. His idyllic thoughts turned to his childhood, the many hours he spent out in the woods behind his grandparent’s house, the wonderful memorable moments he spent interacting with the wildlife he found, and the deep embarrassment he experienced the first time he was caught with his grubby, sausage-like fingers tightly wrapped around the throat of one of his newfound “friends.” Mondo’s pleasant reverie was broken by the appearance of the clerk, who staggered under the weight of the stack of nature books he brought to Mondo.

Mondo greedily snatched the stack of books and lumbered off to the nearest table. Positioning two chairs side by side so as to give himself enough room to have a stable platform, as well as one chair for each cheek. He almost literally dove towards the book titled “Newborn Mammals of the North American Continent, an Illustrated Guide.” As Mondo rapidly paged through the tome, he noticed that his drooling was increasing exponentially, so he removed a bed sheet from his pocket and spread it down over his immense belly and over his lap. By this time, the Library was filling with flies, so the Librarian emitted another sigh, this one even more plaintive than the previous one, and handed two fly strips to the rookie clerk and instructed him to hang them directly over Mondo’s position.

Mondo watched the clerk with a combination of reverence and gratitude. Previously, he had believed that fly strips were a gift from the heavens, and he now realized that they were strategically placed by the staff and inmates of the facility. An observant person would have noticed that there were tears in Mondo’s eyes as he watched the clerk affix the fly strips to the ceiling. “I am constantly overwhelmed by the actions of my fellow inmates,” thought Mondo, “they seem to care so much for me, even going so far as to provide magic snack strips for me wherever I go.” Mondo raised his right hand to his right eye to wipe away a tear, and realized that he was, for once, reaching with his correct hand. He became so excited that he raised his left hand to his right nostril…

After Mondo had irretrievably soiled the underside of the table he was sitting at, he resumed his perusal of the stack of books before him. The Library staff skulked around quietly behind the circulation counter, trying to ignore the slurping and wheezing sounds emanating from Mondo. From the perspective of the workers, time seemed to drag, but Mondo was oblivious to the time. He was shocked when the P.A. announced that the Activities Building was closed. Mondo’s shifty, swine like eyes darted around. Seeing no one, he stood on a chair, deftly snatched the fly strips from the ceiling, and quickly rolled them up in his bed sheet. Smiling smugly, he gathered up all the books, except for one, which he shoved into his voluminous trousers. Fully satisfied with his haul, he dropped off the books, along with a newspaper he found on a table at the circulation desk. Turning to leave, Mondo felt a familiar internal pressure, and with a mighty blast transformed the circulation counter into a jumble of splinters and sawdust.

For the third time the Librarian sighed, although a bystander might have claimed that a whimper accompanied the sigh, and he dourly instructed two of the clerks to wring the saliva and sweat out of the newspaper and books. After an almost infinite quantity of coaxing, and the issuance of multiple pairs of rubber gloves to each clerk, the moist books were returned to the shelves. The newspaper was not so fortunate however, and had to be disposed of in a tightly sealed three layer plastic bag. Vowing to never allow Mondo into his Library again, the Librarian opened the first of what were to be many cans of industrial strength deodorizer, and called for a 55-gallon drum of disinfectant to be delivered to the Library immediately.

Turning from the phone, the Librarian was met with a throng of unruly clerks. Amidst the incoherent shouts and screams, he could make out a few intelligible phrases, and those phrases made his blood run cold. Glancing up, he saw Mondo approaching the ruins of the circulation desk with a Library survey form in his hand. “Hey, can I get a pencil?” grunted Mondo. Making a bold move, the Librarian delegated the job to one of his clerks and watched in amazement as the clerk waded through the pile of wood and handed the pencil to Mondo. Once that job was done, the clerk never looked back. He simply walked right out of the Library and was last heard begging a Sergeant to place him in protective custody.

Mondo scribbled for what seemed to be an eternity on the survey form, and proudly offered it to the Librarian wile loudly proclaiming, “I didn’t sign it because I want it to be anonymous, O.K.?”

“Sure, Mr. Dweeb,” said the Librarian, “thanks for the feedback.” Mondo turned for the door once again, and on his way out thought very highly of the Library and his pleasant experience.

The sound of shredding wood, clamoring voices and a deep, earth-shaking rumble alerted the guard at the Activities building entrance that Mondo was about to leave. Fearing for his life, the guard moved away from the desk, watched Mondo sign out, and move off toward the exit. From the corner of his eye, he saw a very haggard looking Librarian stagger out of the Library and collapse into a chair. The guard rushed over, and just as the Librarian’s eyes rolled back into his skull, the guard grabbed a rumpled piece of paper out of his hands. Glancing at it, he saw that it was a Library survey form. The only portion filled in was the comments section, and the comment simply read, “Strong smell of urine near circulation desk.”

Mondo was barely out the door when the seagulls began to swarm around him once again. “Your sister flies with Crows!” screamed Mondo as he hastily arranged his cap for better protection. Braving the storm of sky rats, Mondo plodded towards his dorm. As a large glob spattered his face, Mondo was heard to shout, “Your Mother has a hooked beak!”