BALTIMORE—Sighing in exasperation and repeatedly checking the clock as he completed a number of menial tasks, area man Alan Stover confirmed Wednesday he had spent a long day at work waiting until he could finally go home and be lonely. “It’s so annoying having to be here in the office doing all this tedious paperwork when I could be sitting there all alone in my empty apartment,” said Stover, telling reporters he was “counting down the minutes” until he could at long last go home, stretch out on the sofa, and just feel hollow inside for the rest of the evening. “By the time I get out of the afternoon meeting and finish all these spreadsheets, I’ll be lucky if I can still putter around my apartment, eat leftover takeout in front of the microwave, vacantly scroll through Netflix, blearily mutter ‘time for bed’ to myself, and fall asleep before I have to start the whole thing over again tomorrow. God, it feels like five o’clock will never come.” At press time, Stover was reportedly frustrated after his evening plans were ruined by a text inviting him to a bar for a friend’s birthday.

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