Since I know you were all worried...

The pair of nasty underpants in my alley is gone. This will
make my pedestrian travels much less fraught with horror,
true, but it also raises interesting questions. What happened
to them? Did their owner return in the dead of night and spirit
them away? Did someone else? Why would anyone do that?
Why would anyone pick up soiled underwear that didn’t be-
long to them? Good samaritanism only goes so far, I think.
Or did they stick to some car’s tire and get carried off to parts
unknown? Did some hibernating squirrel awaken and drag
them down into its warren?

There are more troubling questions, as well. Were these filthy,
poo-coated underpants ever really there at all? Or were they
just a mirage? Did my subconscious somehow create them?
Why would my subconscious do that? What is the significance
of seeing enormous, fouled men’s underpants that don’t
actually exist? Should I seek professional help?

It seems to me that the presence of these underpants, as nau-
seating as that was, is still preferable to their absence. Who
would have thought that?