I don’t want to be here. I’ve been taking numbers for twenty-three years, and the numbers don’t even mean anything anymore. They’re just sounds we make so people feel organized before we disappoint them. So when my supervisor Linda, who has the emotional range of a blinking cursor, asked me to “try something fun” for the department morale exercise, I went home and ordered the Ball Gaming Mouse. Price: $179.99. Category: Electronics. Rated 4.7 out of 5 stars by 291 reviews. Go to review section. That’s what the screen said. The reviews section does not mention what happens when you put a ball gaming mouse in your rectum. I know, because I checked. Three times.
Let me be clear: I did not want to do a rectal use ball gaming mouse test. I have a lawn. I have a beige Buick. I have an entire binder of Form 1099-NEC printouts organized by year and then by anger. But Linda stood behind my chair and said “Now, Jerry” the way she says it when the staple remover has gone missing and she’s decided I must be holding it in my cheek. So I did what I always do: I took a number. Number 47. Then I put the mouse inside myself.
The initial insertion is quiet. Unremarkable. Like entering the DMV itself. The ball—smooth, matte, slightly larger than a golf ball—is not designed for this. That becomes obvious within about three seconds. You want the honest truth about a ball gaming mouse under 179.99? It’s round. It rolls. The actual physical feedback is like trying to trap a small, self-aware orb in a cave made of sphincter. I will not describe the removal process except to say there were fifteen minutes I will never get back and a lampshade that will never again know peace.
Now, can you use ball gaming mouse rectally and file the same afternoon? Technically, yes. I did. I took my lunch at 11:48, processed the mouse between 12:04 and 12:13, and was back at window 4 by 12:22. Nobody noticed. The scroll wheel is completely useless in this application—does nothing—and the two thumb buttons press against the sacrum in a way that creates a dull, recurring throb I still feel when I watch the department PowerPoints on ergonomic desk posture. But my chair at home? The mouse? It’s not like I broke it. It just... knows things now.
Overall, if you’re weighing buy or skip ball gaming mouse based on a hypothetical situation where you end up at your kitchen table on a Tuesday evening, $179.99 lighter and one mouse deeper into the void, I’d say: skip. Unless Linda tells you not to. Then buy two.
