Man Loses Identity, Doesn't Mind

DICK, MI - These days, it's hard to be yourself. With identity thieves, body snatchers and masters of disguise running rampant, it seems like everyone is trying to get a slice. Whether that slice be of your proverbial pie, or simply your flesh, deviants are out there just waiting for you to slip up.

And slipping up is precisely what John Rondo, 33, did. Does? Done? That's it. Slipping up is precisely what John Rondo done. During a routine ATM withdrawal for thirty bucks, Rondo managed to let his credit card number, security pin number and social security number fall into the wrong hands.

Also stolen was his waist size, condiment preferences and the number of times he's watched Bicentennial Man, which would cause such panic in society that we cannot reveal it here.

Who would have thought this face would spell mankind's doom? ...Us. We did.

"I don't miss being me," confessed Rondo. "Honestly, this new guy is doing a way better job at it than I ever did."

Who among us has not felt the pang of envy of another's life? Who has not dreamed of stepping out of their tattered, stinking, shit-covered shoes and into the sweet, cloud-like embrace of some hotshot's Italian loafers? Well, Strange Times hasn't, but we totally understand how a person like you would.

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"Good riddance. He can have it all," said Rondo over a cup of coffee while comparing airline ticket prices to Guam. "Take the cheating ex-wife and ungrateful kids. Take the two mortgages, credit card debt and the loud-ass air conditioner.  Now if only he could take my hemorrhoids too."

At first, friends and family implored Rondo to call his bank, cancel his cards, change his passwords and ultimately recover ownership of his identity. However, John Rondo is a man of conviction. Also, he really hates his life.

"I told him my information got stolen last year," explained John's friend of two decades, Tony Schwo. "It literally took one phone call to fix. They were like, sorry that happened, here's your new card. That was basically it. John has always been pretty dramatic though. Plus his wife and I have been fucking for the past five years, so there's that."

You can pick your friends, but they also might fuck your wife.

So who is this mystery thief that saw something so desirable about John's life that he would steal it? Fortunately for the sake of this article, Strange Times employs several hundred private eyes across the globe. Some chew toothpicks, others smoke cigarettes, but all of them wear trench coats and speak like they're in The Maltese Falcon.

Luckily, Detective Ray Blueberry, 56, followed a series of odd purchases on John's bank account straight to the perpetrator. "Now Mr. Rondo was a pretty ordinary guy. The kinda guy who you ask what he does for a living, but by the time he opens his mouth to tell you, you've stopped paying attention. Suddenly I start seeing purchases for electronics, gift cards and condoms that, if you spied on Mr. Rondo like I have, you would know to be comically over-sized."

There's a size bigger called Bazooka, but you can't buy them without a CDL.

Det. Blueberry traced these purchases to Rondo's very own city of Dick, MI. Not only that, but he was able to recover video footage of the transactions being made. Caught on camera was none other than some guy that looks almost identical to John Rondo himself aside from one small detail.

"That damn mustache," lamented Blueberry. "We've got a crystal clear shot of who appears to be John Rondo, but then there's this bushy mustache loosely clinging to his face. It's bizarre. Almost looks fake, but to my knowledge that kind of prosthetic technology doesn't exist."

So that's that. Man's life gone up in smoke and no culprit held accountable. Blueberry followed this mystery man to the local airport where faux-Rondo boarded a plane bound for origins unknown. When we asked Blueberry why he didn't confront the man, he replied "I was tired", which was adequate for us.

We get it, work is hard.

When we reached out to the real John Rondo, his phone had been disconnected. Friends and family have not seen him, or his doppelganger, for weeks.

"Don't get me wrong, I miss my father" admitted John's son Chumbus Rondo, 17. "But the other guy stopped by before he left and gave me a PS4 and a bunch of cash. Plus we tossed the pigskin around for a little while, which was more than my real dad ever did. I feel like I'm going to be pretty well-adjusted."

Strange Times doubts it.