“The most annoying, condescending thing that friends, fans, journalists, and people from my previous life would do,” he remembered, “is tap me on the shoulder and say, ‘Enjoy the ride.’ As if the five of us weren’t completely aware that fame can be a fleeting thing. It was like, fuck you. Enjoy the ride being an accountant.”
(Ted Allen of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy via The Vulture)

Larry Feinman enjoyed his work as a certified public accountant for only two years before the high-flying lifestyle of late nights in the V.I.P. conference room at H&R Block and the endless dinners of broiled chicken, green beans, and a baked potato got to be too much for him. “He was flying high,” remarked his high school friend, Anthony Kiedis, a singer in a band, “but like Icarus, he flew to close to the sun, and his wax wings melted, and he fell into the ocean, and he died. Larry died.” Larry died at the age of 45 by choking on his own calculator.

Dana Kern’s life as a bag girl in a grocery store checkout line was a dream come true, until it turned into a nightmare. It had seemed that she was living a charmed life, moving quickly from bag girl to head bag girl in only five months, but the responsibility of the job and the respect of her peers proved that if being a bag girl in a grocery store checkout line corrupts, being head bag girl in a grocery store checkout line corrupts your head. “She was surrounded by yes men until the woman went crazy,” says Princess Caroline of Monaco. “She was always shouting things, just crazy things. ‘AISLE SOMETHING!’ And shouting them at the top of her voice! How are you supposed to–it’s not human. She was not human.” Princess Caroline of Monaco insists she has never set foot in a grocery store. “I know what is a good influence and what is a bad influence. There are only so many things the human mind can take before it shatters.”

Eric Laastrom’s family moved from their native Sweden to Ameria when Eric was only a child, and he quickly rose through the grades at school to become a high school and then college graduate with a diploma. Afterwards, he took a job as a research librarian at a small public university. In very little time, he burned bridges with his friends and family. “He was always claiming that no one understood him anymore, that life as a research librarian was too different,” remembers Colin Ferrell, a fellow immigrant. “I said, brother, I want to know your world. Just show me. I can handle it. But he just stopped returning my calls. He stopped returning everyone’s calls.” It’s an all-too familiar story in the research librarian community that continues to hold such a fascination for a majority of the American people, despite the numerous stories of tragedy and heartache, but Eric’s story comes with a surprising twist. Says Mr. Ferrell, “major fucking heroin addict, that guy.”