‘Twas the night before finals, when all through the house, no electronics were stirring, not even a mouse. The paper was stacked by the printer with care, in hopes that an essay soon would be there;
My roommates were nestled all snug in their beds, while visions of ski-slopes danced in their heads;
And I in my PJs, with laptop in hand, had just settled down for a long, one-night stand,
When right on the screen there arose such a clatter, I leapt from the couch to see what was the matter.
But back to the screen, my eyes dropped so fast, I clicked on the browser and checked out the cache,
When what to my baggy, bloodshot eyes should pop-up, but an ad “Straight from Bill Gates”-too good to pass up! With a little old graphic, so lively and quick, I knew from the flash, it must be Spy-Nick.
More mbps than a Pentium Eight, he Google’d, and Yahoo’d and linked products by name:
“Now iPod, on Xbox, now Kanye, Madonna!
On Pfizer! On Civic! On King Kong and Narnia!
To the top of the market! To the top of the Earth! Now downsize, and outsource, and slash away first!”
So up to the desktop, the products they flew, with links full of toys and Spy-Nicholas, too.
And then, in a tinkling, I heard in the drive, a whizzing and whirring as if it were alive. I drew up the cursor, started clicking around, and down the main menu Spy-Nicholas dropped with a bound.
He was drawn all in pixels, every hair and each stitch, and his clothes were all customized by Abercrombie and Fitch.
His viruses-how they twinkled! His spyware-how merry!
With offers so sweet, I had to be wary. The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth-and if clicked, it then promised “Free whiter teeth!”
He had a round face and a big, round hiney that, with the “right pills,” would soon be just “tiny!”
He was happy and plump, a right jolly old elf, so I cursed when I saw him, in spite of myself;
For with a wink of his ads and a twist of his links, I knew right away this was going to stink!
Not designed to spread joy, he went straight to his work, and corrupted my files, then blinked with a jerk,
And laying his digit-hand on my start menu, with a horrible crash, my laptop began to reboot.
I sprang to the wireless connection to see
If a copy of my essay there would still be.
But I heard Spy-Nick say, ‘ere the whole thing shut down, “Merry Christmas to you! Go buy an Apple right now!”