Walter's Stupid Vacation Analysis

Walter’s Stupid Vacation by William Hrdina
Every commercial starts the same way.
The core concept has remained unchanged for nearly two decades. The formula works, there’s no reason to change it. David Tierney locked down every patent related tohisprocessintheearlieststages,sohe’stheonlygameintown. Themarketing department feels very little in terms of pressure.
The commercial starts with a man in a lab coat, sitting at a desk. The man is David Tierney himself. His hair is slicked back and neatly combed, the opposite of its normal, wildlydisheveledappearance. Hewearsasuitandtieinsteadofaraggedt-shirtand jeans. His face is shaven and clear of its normal two or three days of stubble. David cleans up well.
He looks directly into the camera and

Walter did his best to keep an open mind, but he couldn’t help feeling like he had signed up to get himself voluntarily lobotomized. The morning they were supposed to leave, he contemplating refusing to go. He would send her off alone. Kate refused to entertain the idea and the next thing he knew the plane had landed and he stood in line waiting for his turn to get ‘the procedure.’
The week went by quickly. And, as promised, Walter felt completely restored to normal intelligence once he went through the procedure reversal process.
Walter’s experience differed from Kate’s. She had a great time and remembered it that way. She didn’t bother spending a minute of her stupid time struggling with her reduced intelligence. She just relaxed and went with it. Because she didn’t have any problems the real world would present to a stupid person, she got to enjoy all of the benefits and none of the drawbacks. She remembered the time with a fond nostalgia.
Walter, on the other hand, mostly felt freaked out. While he had his intelligence reduced, he enjoyed himself a great deal. But when he thought back on it, he felt disquiet. He remembered the way his thoughts seemed to dissolve from his fingers. He simply lacked the ability to think and contemplating it gave him