This is what hell feels like.

The mirages have started. Everywhere we look, we see phone guys. As we crawl through the office on our hands and knees, our information-parched limbs too weakened to function, we claw and grasp and shout desperately at translucent figures of Pacific Bell technicians strolling through our hallways. We reach out; they disappear. Those bastards.

Seventeen days without the Internet? That's hard. It's consistently difficult to stay amused, and continue my former high level of procrastination. It's a daily struggle.

Day One. Today is moving day. Our offices are nothing but plain white walls, empty black desks, and cardboard castles begging for an onslaught. There's plenty to do; I don't even bother hooking up my laptop. We unearth someone's tiny stereo and crank up music, singing along as we line the walls with shelves, unpack tapes, and cart empty boxes into the hallway. No problem.

Day Two. I'm locked out when I arrive, because nobody has keys to the office yet. I sit outside on the nappy carpet and eavesdrop on the small office next door to the writers' suite; it's the only room on the floor that doesn't belong to us, and I instantly begin to feel sorry for them, because we're not exactly demure neighbors. But, out of good will, we choose today not to hang the dart board on a wall we share with them; instead, it goes over the spare desk, with the scoreboard hanging on Lisa and Jessica's door.

Day Three. It's Halloween, and most of Santa Monica Boulevard is being closed off for tonight's parade, which we'll attend, as we can park for free at work and trip out the front door into the melee. I steal a giant poster of The Rock and hang it on my office wall, followed by a bunch of other related memorabilia and a corkboard. Much of the day is spent arguing with editors over who owns the halogen lamps and ugly striped Ikea chairs, but finally, we get to work at about 4 p.m. By which I mean, we start drinking.

At 5:30, Jessica and Lisa notice that, during our dart games, their office door somehow got locked. With their purses and costumes inside. No one's around, and we don't have phones, so Kevin and Jim take Rick outside and give him a boost in through the window. He scrambles inside and unlocks the door. We cheer, and keep drinking; at 6:30, Jessica and I change into our Naughty Catholic Schoolgirl costumes -- which aren't so much naughty as they are mildly troublesome -- and Lauren shows up, so we hit the street for more boozing.

Day Four. We receive the following "memorandium" at work: "It has come to our attention that certain people in the office have taken to exiting the building through the window. This is not acceptable. Please refrain from doing this, regardless of the circumstances, because it is unsafe. Thanks, Production Management." Bored, we fire back with one of our own: "It has come to our attention that there are no Internet connections or telephones in this office. This is not acceptable. Please refrain from denying us this, regardless of the circumstances, because it is unsafe. Thanks."

Day Seven. It's not Beer Friday, but we're going to drink anyway. There's not much else to do. Scott draws a picture of a person trying to climb out the window; we print "Not an Exit" underneath it, photocopy it, and place one on every window on our floor.

Day Ten. Still not Beer Friday, so we'll go with cider today instead. Everything's supposed to arrive today, but of course, it doesn't. Just how long does it take to hook up telephones and flip the switch on some sweet Internet power, anyway?

Day Twelve. Sweet mother of Jeebus, this is ridiculous. All this endless work is making me insane. We've just resorted to making our list of the top five celebrities we'd be allowed to sleep with if we were married. This list causes a lot of consternation, mostly because a) nobody can decide, b) Lisa refuses to narrow hers down beyond thirty, and c) Winona Ryder is on Craig's. This appropriately scares us.

Day Fourteen. We've broadened the game. Now, it's a week of hot sex -- one person each night, with a backup person in place and then a bullpen of people who are ready and able to step in at a moment's notice. This takes an entire day, naturally, filled with highly intelligent debate. I'll paste my chart at the bottom of this entry. Excerpts from the day's conversation include:

• "Oh, I'd totally sleep with the Tasmanian Devil, if he wasn't a cartoon character." -- Lisa
• "Can I have the entire cast of Band of Brothers on one night?" -- Heather
• "I want Ron Livingston on Monday so that we can watch football together. But� wait, do you think Ron Livingston likes football? What if he doesn't? Shit! Then what?" -- Jessica
• "Wow, you two are whores. I'm a crazy whore, but you two are still whores." -- Lisa

Day Fifteen. Telephones! Real, tangible telephones that work, and stuff! We spend twenty minutes calling each other just to prove that our dialing skills are still superior. Then, we watch all our episodes in a marathon. I finally make a Notre Dame wall in my office that's way cooler than the one in my old room; five minutes later, I'm still bored.

Day Seventeen. Rock bottom, surely. At one point, a hallucinating Jessica tried to plug Rick into the Ethernet port on her computer. For fifteen minutes, we sat in silence, too weak to speak. Too bored of each other. We've talked ourselves dry. We've played with the office dogs, thrown countless games of darts, drank and drank again, badmouthed a lot of famous people, badmouthed a lot of unfamous people, and eaten countless long lunches. We've missed Winona Ryder's guilty verdict, Joshua Jackson's arrest, J.Lo's silly engagement, and you know, a bunch of important worldly shit.

Tomorrow. We're supposed to get DSL. Finally. Pray for us.

We are secluded. We are lost. And most tragically, we are forced to work.

A pox on Pacific Bell.

Fantasy Sex Camp

* Okay, here's the hot list� I'm not sure I can explain all these choices, but hey, some of them are obvious (hello, Vaughn from Alias).

Pump-Drunk Love: My Fantasy Sex Camp

Sunday:Taye Diggs
Back-up: The Rock.

Monday: Michael Vartan
Back-up: Bradley Cooper

Tuesday: Scott Speedman
Back-up: Zach Braff

Wednesday: Colin Firth
Back-up: Hugh Grant

Thursday: Ewan McGregor
Back-up: Orlando Bloom

Friday: George Clooney
Back-up: Goran Visnjic (Luka on ER)

Saturday: Hugh Jackman
Back-up: Damian Lewis (Major Winters on Band of Brothers) or Ron Livingston (Office Space, Band of Brothers)