Jar Jargonized By: Lance Holloway The day started out normal. I woke up at 5:45am and took a shower. Getting up that early took some getting used to, but I eventually managed to not suffer too much from the lack of sleep. The shower usually wakes me up. I dried off and got dressed. Walking down the hall I wasn't aware of the evil that lurked around the corner. When I turned the corner I glanced into the computer room. I saw that the modem light wasn't flashing. "It's working!" I shouted. Well, that wasn't the evil part. It's coming up though. The cable modem hadn't been working for the past week. So, I decided to use it while it was available. I turned on the computer and allowed it to boot up while I was fixing breakfast. I needed to check my email. The inbox will definitely be overflowing with messages. I sat down with my bowl of cereal and logged in. Sure enough my inbox was huge. Surprisingly a thread started on the mailing list about how stupid the gungans looked in "Star Wars: The Phantom Menace." Agreeing with some of the points mentioned I laughed at the descriptions. They were hilarious because they were true. Jar Jar did have ears that made Dumbo look normal. Now here's the horrific part. I heard something behind me. I turned around and saw that the Jar Jar action figure had liberated itself from its mint-condition, carded prison and managed to stroll into the computer room. "How dare yousa laughin' at meesa!" it said. "Good grief!" I thought. "I must still be dreaming." I rubbed my eyes. When I opened them, Jar Jar was on my desk. "Meesa no likin' bein' makin' fun of." I picked up the little action figure. He squirmed a bit. "This is just too silly," I thought again unknowing what was going to happen next. "Meesa teachin' you," the living piece of plastic said. He stared at me with those eyes poking above his head on short stalks. I was caught up in the gaze. As much as I tried, I couldn't break my eyes away from Jar Jar's stare. Suddenly a flash of light shot from his eyes to mine. I was blinded for only a fraction of a second. My reaction was to drop him, but I couldn't move either. I sat there staring at the figure. That's when I felt my eyes move. I saw my perspective shifting upward as it seemed my eyes were removed from their sockets. I could see from the corner of my eyes that my face has pushed outward. My mouth was almost like a duck's bill, although I could still feel teeth in them. My skin had also changed color. It was kind of orange. Like Jar Jar's. That's when I realized what was happening. "I'm turning into Jar Jar!" I screamed mentally since I still couldn't move my new mouth. I could feel my body moving into a new form. My head had seemed to stop reforming after the top of my head felt lower than my eyes. I could feel the large ears draping behind me. By then, I could see the skin coloring changes move down the arm to the hand, which was holding the action figure. I watched my hand as it reformed. My fingernails lengthened and my pinky seemed to retract into my hand leaving me with only four fingers. I couldn't see my legs for my huge mouth, but I felt them grow in length causing my needs to rise. Something changed with my feet, too. Fortunately, I wasn't wearing shoes. I still couldn't break away from the action figure. "Now yousa gungan," the figure said and wiggle his way out of my frozen hand. He jumped to the floor and ran into the hall. My arm dropped. I could move again. I reached up and felt of my head. As I feared, I felt short eyestalks and a large mouth. And those were large floppy gungan ears hanging from my head. "AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGG!" I yelled to no avail. I was a gungan. I ran to the bathroom to make sure. Sure enough, there was a gungan staring back at me. "Meesa lookin' like da gungan!" I said. "Oh no! Meesa speakalike da gungan, too!" My thoughts raced from one to another. I was a gungan! I couldn't go to work. Why me? Why couldn't I have made fun of Chewbacca? I was a gungan! Arrrggghhh! Finally I calmed myself down. I stared at myself in the mirror hoping it was all a dream. Make that a nightmare. An idea sparked. I pinched myself with the almost claw-like fingernails that I had. "Yeeouch! Thasa hurt!" Darn, that didn't work. What was I going to do? I can't go out like this. I can't even try to go to work. "Work! Meesa havin' to call in sick." I sprinted to the phone. I was pretty quick due to the long legs I now possessed. I dialed up my boss's number and listened while the phone rang. The phone receiver didn't quite fit my new face. My ears were too far back, and my mouth was too far forward. No one answered. "What a relief," I thought. "I can leave a voicemail and not try to talk my way out of going to work. "Click," the voicemail kicked in. "Hi. You have reached the office of Alex Bruss. Please leave a message after the tone." "Hiya, Bossness. Meesa...." I cleared my throat and concentrated. "This is Jar...er...Lance feel sick today. I won't be able to make it. Okeday?" I quickly hung up the phone. "Arrgg!" I yelled again. "Meesa no can talkin' right!" I searched the apartment many times trying to find that Jar Jar action figure. I couldn't think of any way to get back to normal. I have to find a way. "Meesa no can bein' gungan forever." Then a stupid idea hit me. Hopefully knowing it was stupid didn't mean that I was lowering to Jar Jar's level of intelligence. I went to the computer again. Fortunately, the modem was still working. I opened up the browser and searched for sci-fi conventions. Hundreds of links popped up. I could easily go to one of those conventions and sign autographs. All the convention organizers would pay lots of money to have a _real_ gungan. This would be great. Now, if only I can get George Lucas to sign over the copyright.