I thought I'd repost this blog for general information (my first blog ever at blogstream actually). This repost is in response to a reference in my thread on abortion... more specifically, a reference to the fact that I am in the last year of my PhD in Neural Engineering at the University of Michigan. It was remarked that a PhD could be slighlty intimidating. I think if you read the story of how I got to be where I am at, you'll understand why I find the thought of being viewed as intimidating because of my academic status to be profoundly amusing. I think most of you will find the story rather remarkable, if only as a possible sequel to the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off!"

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I am currently entering my 5th year as a PhD student at the University of Michigan. How I got here, however, is a rather odd story.

I was originally accepted to U of M somewhere in 1992. I was offered a scholarship, and things were looking good. Unfortunately, I've always been the type of kid who never shows up to class... and it caught up to me my last semester of high school. I flunked religion at the Catholic school I was attending, and didn't graduate – to this day I describe myself as a recovering Catholic.

Things got even more interesting, as they don't offer religion in summer school. Apparently U of M expects you to actually graduate from high school to go to college, and they revoked my prior acceptance. I had to attend Andover High School for a half year to graduate (they required I took at least 3 credits from the school to get a degree from there). I took History, Drama (which I loved), and retook a Pascal class I had already aced at my prior school.

Having not learned my lesson, attendance got me again - I flunked the history class, despite getting 'As' on all the tests. The last thing I remember my history teacher saying after he had informed me of my failure was "that reminds me, I have to go down to the office and tell them."

Immediately after talking to my history teacher, I went to the school counselor to get into History for summer school - where the counselor told me I couldn't have flunked history. He'd seen my diploma in the school vault, and if you flunk a class, they won't make the diploma. He went on to inform me that the diploma is a legal document... once you have it, you're a certified graduate. He rather condescendingly told me that if I had really flunked, the teacher would have put a hold on my diploma. Apparently, if you flunk the semester you are suppose to graduate, the teacher is suppose to notify the office not to make your diploma. My history teacher's rather ominous parting words suddenly echoed through my mind. Oh shit!

Seeing an opportunity, I asked for my diploma then and there, making up some story about going away on vacation and therefore missing formal graduation. The counselor informed me that he'd give it to me, but I had to go to the library to pay off a 10$ fine before he'd give me the diploma. Unfortunately, I had no money on me, and I realized that by talking to my history teacher, I had unwittingly given him a reminder to come to the office to put my diploma on hold.

Leaving the office, I ran into a friend of mine in the hallway. I asked him for $10, but he didn't have it... so I quickly filled him in on what was happening, and he agreed to go stall my history professor while I ran home to get money (later I found out he actually started a fake fight with another friend of mine in front of the professor to stall him). I don't think I've ever taken such liberties with the posted speed limits in my life. I got home, but there was no money, and nobody was home. Dejected, I was about to leave the house when my sister Tracy came home. She gave me the 10 dollars, and I again sped off to the high school (in retrospect, I may still owe her the 10).

I paid off the fine at the library, and sprinted back to the counselor's office. Apparently the history teacher hadn't made it to the office yet - but now the counselor was trying to talk me out of missing formal graduation. I believe the conversation went like this:

Counselor: "Don't you want all the pomp and circumstance you've earned with your diploma?"

Me: "I don't care if it comes with a cheeseburger and fries, but I need the damned diploma now."

The counselor gave me my diploma - just as my history teacher walked into the office. I tore out of the office and I drove home to wait for my report card, not knowing if having the actual diploma would really mean anything. Two weeks later my report card arrived - with an S in history, meaning the class was satisfactorily completed, but with no grade given. Three month later I was enrolled in Central Michigan University – and my SATs and ACTs were still good enough to get me a Centralis Scholarship.

I lost the Centralis Scholarship the first semester at CMU for not meeting the academic requirements. I joined a fraternity, and almost never showed up to class. Again I did well on the tests, but back then most Central classes had a policy of lowering your grade one full grade for every missed class after 3. I had flunked most of my classes by the third week. The best I could pull off was withdrawing from the classes or talking to the teacher to get an incomplete – but at the end of the semester I didn't complete enough credit hours to keep the scholarship.

I remember my first report card vividly. My Dad glanced at it – and very confused – asked me why my report card said World War II for my grades. I remember lowering my head and answering sheepishly "Withdrawl, Withdrawl, Incomplete, Incomplete."

Thus began my Central career – I lost my scholarship and had absolutely no clue what I wanted to be. Having grown up in a family of engineers (my father, 3 older brothers, and 2 older sisters are all engineers or technicians), it was simply assumed I would follow in my family's footsteps. I had shown the aptitude growing up; strong skills in math and science coupled with an overriding curiosity about how things worked, but to me something about conventional engineering never quite fit. I wanted to be a writer – I wanted to be President. Perhaps more importantly, all engineers were dorks. Whatever the reason, the only real goal I had upon entering college was not to become an engineer.

Unfortunately, I soon discovered that the average academic institution does not offer "Not Engineering" as a major. Undaunted, I began a four-year search at Central Michigan University for what I believed to be the perfect major. Along the way, I changed my major more times than most politicians change their stances on relevant issues (needless to say, one of my forays was political science). However, each of the majors I tried held the same drawback as conventional engineering for me; my sole motivation would be the banal accumulation of money rather than contributing to society as a whole. Although I maintained my grades (usually by bullshitting my way out of the attendance requirement – I still never made it to class), I slowly became more and more interested in life outside of the classroom. The feeling of helping others that I had found lacking in the classroom I discovered in organizations like Big Brothers/Big Sisters and in other charitable causes. Still disheartened by my inability to find a career, I eventually stopped making the effort to con the teachers out of the attendance requirement. I failed every class my fourth year at Central, and then took a year off from school to wait tables and attempt to find a new direction for my life.

During my year of waiting tables, I had my first encounter with serendipity. Serendipity came in the form of a petite, frail brunette named Renee who had dated my brother Tim when I was 13 or so. Renee was smart, opinionated, stubborn, and entirely too good for the fate destiny had dealt her. Renee was born with Cystic Fibrosis. Somehow an old picture of Tim and Renee had gotten in one of my drawers, and when I saw it I remembered the pain that Cystic Fibrosis caused both Renee and my brother as she valiantly struggled against the disease. Right around my 14th birthday, Renee lost her battle against Cystic Fibrosis when her lung collapsed under the weight of the excess mucous that had built up during one of her many bouts with pneumonia.

I decided right then and there that a worthwhile career would be to help people like Renee. Over the course of the next year, I learned as much as I could about the disease. In the library, I learned about monogenetic disorders and the successes of gene therapy in treating disorders like S.C.I.D. Outside of the library, I waited tables to save up money to go back to Central and retake my failed final year. In the fall of 1998, I re-enrolled in Central Michigan University with the single-minded goal of becoming a bioengineer to help others like Renee. I got 'As' in all of my classes, and got my GPA up to a 3.51. One year later, I transferred into Arizona State University, majoring in Biocellular/BioMolecular/Biochemical engineering.

Over the course of the next three years I maintained a 3.96 grade point average, won ASU's Distinguished Senior award, along with several other awards and scholarships. I also found out one very important piece of information – I absolutely hated my major. I spent most of my time watching lines grow on a computer or titrating crap. Completely fed up, I was ready to take my degree, get a "Joe" job to pay the bills, and try my hand at writing or stand-up comedy in my free time.

One day the professor in the lab I was working in started asking me about my plans for the future. She started suggesting graduate school – she thought I had a good chance at getting a fellowship. I had never thought about graduate school, and to be honest, the idea of more schooling after my experiences seemed repugnant. Still, she convinced me to go take the GRE, which is kind of like the SAT for graduate school. She told me she could get me in to take it immediately, but I needed to get the score now to make all the grad school/fellowship application deadlines.

With little preparation, I took the GRE and completely rocked it – I'm probably the worst student ever in a classroom, but for whatever reason I always test well. Based on my performance at ASU and that score, I won a Whitaker Fellowship. A Whitaker Fellowship is an all expenses paid PhD – you get your tuition covered, you get $20,.000 a year to live off of while you attend school, you get $1500 to spend on a computer, travel to conferences covered, etc. Perhaps more importantly, as you are free to the professor that takes you on in his/her lab, it's basically an automatic ticket into ANY grad school in the country: MIT, CalTech, Johns Hopkins… you name it.

So here I was with a golden ticket to grad school, and absolutely no desire to take another class ever. I started visiting schools and talking to professors when I ran into Daryl Kipke at the University of Michigan. He heads the Neural Engineering Lab there – they work on brain machine interfaces. If you don't know, for a brain machine interface electrodes are implanted directly into the brain, and the electrode recordings (and stimulation) of electrical activity are used to drive machines. By manipulating these recordings, a paralyzed patient can control a robotic arm or a cursor on a computer screen by simply imagining movement. Using these electrodes to stimulate, one can cause a blind person to see (a camera takes in a scene, which is then converted into an electrical stimulation pattern by the electrodes in visual cortex), or a deaf person to hear. To use an analogy from one of my friends in lab – we are at the ground floor of building "The Matrix" from the Keanu Reeves' movie. I'd never head of anything so cool (yet tech dorky) in my life. I didn't know this crap was possible, until I saw an implanted monkey control a robotic arm simply by thinking.

At the same time, I found out my Dad was going to need a quadruple bypass. The decision was made for me – my parents live near U of M, and I needed to be near them. I took the fellowship, enrolled in U of M, and started working on brain machine interfaces.

I vividly remember my first day of orientation at U of M.  The dean told us to take a good look to our left and right at the students next to us.

Dean: "You thought you were hot shit at the college you came from ?  All of these students got 4.0's and fantastic GRE scores from the top programs. They aren't impressed!"

I immediately raise my hand: "Uh, I actually flunked out of high-school and Central Michigan; I'm pretty impressed!"

I thought it was funny when he immediately asked his secretary how I had gotten in the room. 

Since that day I've gotten my masters in bioelectrical engineering, and am hopefully one year away from getting my PhD. More importantly, I absolutely love what I do – and I think I'm very good at it. I just got a first-author paper published in the Journal of Neural Engineering in March, and should be submitting my second in the next month or so. This was never the way I thought I'd get in print, but, well – I still like to write on the side 

My Thoughts on Abortion

 

I’ve wanted to write down my thoughts on the abortion issue for a long time, in the hopes of generating a rational discussion of the subject.  I’ve started writing in my head or on paper numerous times, but each time I’ve stopped because I am afraid of the possible backlash.  Despite the fact that I often take controversial stances, in many cases I write these things solely for the sake of starting controversy or being funny.  I truly like and respect all people; I don’t like participating in contentious arguments.  Unfortunately, the topic of abortion is one of the most polarizing extant; I am pro-choice (or anti-life, as the pro-life sect wants to paint their opposition), and many of the people who disagree with me think my position makes me a murderer.  I feel enough social peer-pressure that I am extremely uncomfortable voicing an opinion that to many puts me on the same level as Charles Manson.  That being said, I truly want to hear from both sides of the argument, in order to make an honest assessment of my own position.

 

My understanding is that the majority of the pro-life group believes that life begins the instant a sperm meets an egg.  This is usually (but not always) predicated on the concept of a soul - the formation of a zygote is a divine event in which God has helped create the miracle of life, bestowing a soul on this aggregation of dividing cells.  Abortion is considered a termination of this life, and a direct affront to God’s will.

 

The pro-life community is divided with respect to abortion in cases of rape and incest.  Opposing abortion even in cases of rape or incest is often regarded as an extreme view.  This has always struck me as odd; if you believe that life begins at the meeting of egg and sperm, and is a divine event, opposing abortion in cases of rape or incest is logically consistent.  Although one of the baby's parents is an unmitigated bastard, the child itself is not culpable for the actions of the parent.  Would you feel more justified in killing a two-year-old if you knew that the father was a rapist?  The pregnancy may be a hardship for the woman, but who are we to question the wisdom of an omnipotent and omniscient God?

 

Rearing a child is not considered to be an issue among pro-lifers.  The widely held view is that there is an overabundance of families begging to adopt a child and not enough people giving their child up for adoption.  Adoption is always considered a viable option, and therefore the pregnant woman need only truly be burdened for nine-months.

 

I do understand these positions, and I respect these beliefs and the people that hold them.  That is why it is hard for me to voice opposition.  The pro-choice group considers the opposition narrow-minded zealots; the pro-life group considers their detractors murderers.  Which downside sounds worse to you?

 

That being said, I am currently Pro-Choice.   Here are the reasons:

 

1.  I don’t believe the meeting of a sperm and an egg is the moment life begins.  Using the “I think therefore I am” Descartes test, a zygote, or blastomere, is not conscious.  Instead, I think of each zygote as a potential life.  Similarly, I consider each separate sperm and egg a potential life.  Taken only a little bit further, the same logic that decries abortion would also promote rape to “create life”.  If the rape victim becomes pregnant, wasn’t the rapist performing God’s will by this logic?

 

I don’t think there is a moment ‘life’ begins, it is a slow process that takes place as the fetal brain grows and eventually develops the capacity for self-awareness.  Because each zygote is a potential life, abortion should never be undertaken thoughtlessly, but is a far cry short of murder.

 

2.  I don’t believe in God, or the concept of a soul.  As a result, defying the will of God isn’t too much of a problem for me.  My beliefs are heavily influenced by the following two ideas: 

 

a.       The thought of an immutable and unchanging soul being plucked from heaven and instilled in a collection of cells sounds a little like a fairy tale to me.  I’m not the same person I was yesterday, and I am greatly different from the person I was ten years ago - I have no inherent, constant soul.  I’ve studied too much science, too much reality to believe this.  I’ve seen an addiction make my brother, who was a very good person without drugs, become a completely different individual.  I am a developing conglomeration of chemicals and neural synapses that is entirely different on a day to day or year to year basis.  I do, however, believe in a structured society and working towards a general good.

     

b.      Even if there is a God, we take an active part in changing our environment every day.  The argument that abortion flies in the face of God can also be applied to immunizations, the practice of medicine, etc.  Invoking the will of God seems like a huge cop-out to me.  This is an argument made by people still at Williams Perry’s first stage of intellectual development:  simple dualism.  Dualists believe there is an absolute right and an absolutely wrong in all cases, as assigned by an all-knowing authority figure.  I don’t believe morality comes from a God.  Morality comes from consistently making thoughtful choices to help the greater good… and sometimes these choices aren’t black and white.  God is functionally irrelevant in my conception of morality. Anybody who needs a God to reward them for ethical behavior and punish them for behaving poorly is akin to a child.

 

3.  The idea that there is a multitude of families clamoring to adopt babies is a fallacy.  At the moment, the number of families willing to adopt a newly born WHITE baby exceeds the supply.  The odds of being adopted if you are a minority baby, or worse, a minority child, are precipitously lower.  And this is the case while abortion is legal.  If every abortion instead lead to an unwanted birth, even the supply of white babies would greatly exceed the demand.

 

As adoption would not be an option for the majority of these children, what would the quality of lives of these children be if they were brought up by a parent who would have chosen to have terminated the pregnancy if it were legal? Or instead brought up in an already greatly overburdened child-service system? These are unfortunately questions for which I don't really have answers.  I have to wonder though... if every pro-life advocate was forced to adopt a chilid, would they remain true to their convictions?

 

4.  My suspicion is that having a child now is usually at the expense of another child down the road.  A woman who has a child when she is 16 in a financially and emotionally strained state is less likely to have another child in a financially and emotionally secure condition.  In some cases, this is a reduction in the quality of life for the second child.  In other cases, the second child simply isn’t ever conceived.  Having a child does not affect just one life; it affects a multitude of lives (siblings, relatives, the parent’s, society, etc). 

 

Perhaps the most famous (or infamous) example of unwanted children negatively affecting society was in the book Freakonomics.  In this book the author, Levitt, did a study demonstrating a marked reduction in violent crime that was strongly correlated to the onset of legalizing abortion in every state.  While I have seen articles refuting Levitt’s methodology, I can at least understand why this might logically be true.  It is a social fact that children brought up in disadvantaged households have a higher propensity towards crime.  Legalizing abortion decreases the number of children born in disadvantaged households, and puts less of a strain on resources for the remaining members of the household.  It is easy to see why a reduction in crime may be logically connected to legalized abortion. 

 

Similarly, in areas where overcrowding is already a serious problem, additional children can lead to disease, hunger, and death.  Advocating abstinence to solve these problems is unrealistic.  Overcrowded and financially repressed regions are the places where unwanted pregnancies run rampant.  At some breakpoint, based on pure biological statistics, the addition of one baby to an overcrowded population inevitably leads to a compensatory death.  How do we outlaw abortion as an option in these areas?          

 

5.  Outlawing abortion doesn’t prevent abortion.  Instead of getting safe abortions under a doctor’s supervision, pregnant mothers often attempt to abort the babies on their own, or in rogue doctor’s offices under unsafe circumstances.

 

6.  And perhaps my foremost reason to be Pro-choice… I don’t believe in legislating other people’s beliefs in areas I consider grey.  This is a fundamental selling point of freedom of religion in America to me, and a tenant of democracy in general.  As I consider the morality of abortion grey, I don’t feel anyone has the right to legislate the behavior of other people based on their own moral standards.  And yes, I understand that we habitually legislate based on morality in cases where the issues are deemed morally black and white.    

 

These are my current thoughts, please – people on both sides of the debate, let me know your opinions.  I very much want to understand both sides in the context of these issues.  And I am open to change. 

A bunch of years ago, my friend Josh and I made a gentleman's bet. Inspired by seeing the South Park movie, we decided to both write a sketch. The rules of the bet were simple; we were both to write the most offensive sketch we could think of, while still being funny. We would then read our sketches to each other and decide a winner. After reading Josh my sketch, he immediately conceded the bet.

The winning sketch is below, which is so over-the-top offensive, I highly recommend you do not read further if you have delicate sensibilities. This is not for the faint of heart, and remember, this was for a contest to write the world's most offensive sketch. To give you a general idea of how far this goes, the central premise is baby raping. I always had this in mind as a 'Kids in the Hall' skit. I envision Kevin Mcdonald playing the priest, Mark McKinney playing the Frechman, and Dave Foley as St. Peter. The voice of God is Bruce Thompson.

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The Baby Raping Skit

 

A priest, a Frenchman, and Mother Teresa are waiting in the line to get into heaven.  The Frenchman is the first in line of the three, followed by Mother Teresa, and then the Priest.  The Frenchman is dressed in a grossly stereotypical Frenchman’s outfit:  A tight fitting turtle-neck shirt with green and bright purple alternating horizontal stripes, tight black pants with a black belt and black shoes, all set off by a jaunty purple beret, slightly askance.  The Priest and Mother Teresa wear the traditional Catholic attire for a priest and nun, respectively.    The Frenchman has the habit of periodically playing with the ends of his pencil-thin, curly, mustache. 

 

The surroundings are barren; the floor is covered in a foot or two of white smoke, which continues out as far as the eye can see.  At the front of the line is an ordinary “build-it-yourself” desk, equal in quality to the desks typically found at a Meijer’s or Home Depot.  Seated at the desk is St. Peter, replete with large, white wings.  St. Peter is looking over an oversized book, presumably the names of the lucky few who will get into heaven.  Behind the desk is a large cast-iron gate, already open partway.  About ten feet from the side of the desk is a thick, dark, smoky mist.  Flashing lights periodically emanate from the mist, and the wails of damned souls can be heard coming from its depths.  Peter can be seen briefly talking to each individual at the front of the line, who he then directs through the gate or into the smoky mist.

 

The camera pans in, focusing on the Big Three.

 

The priest appears to be slightly nervous, constantly moving around and fidgeting while staying in line.  In an attempt to settle his nerves, the priest tries to start up a conversation.  Mother Teresa’s head is bowed, and is deeply engrossed in saying the Rosary.  A little intimidated by Mother Teresa anyway, the priest decides to talk to the Frenchman.

 

“Hard to believe we’re finally here, eh?” the priest asks the Frenchman in a warm, friendly tone, while sticking his head out from behind Mother Teresa, speaking loud enough to make sure he gets the Frenchman’s attention. 

 

At first, the Frenchman begins to look around to make sure the priest isn’t talking to someone else.  Realizing that the priest is attempting to engage him in conversation, the Frenchman sighs and rolls his eyes slightly.  In a completely over-the top French accent, the Frenchman replies over his shoulder without enthusiasm: “Yez, I must ahdmit I did not exzpect to be here so soon!”

 

“So - you a little nervous about getting in?” the priest asks, shifting his body weight back and forth from foot to foot.

 

Frenchman:  “Non!  I can honezstly say I lived a life zat would make any good Fraunnchman proud!“

 

“Well, good for you… good for you!” the priest responds with mock enthusiasm.  The priest goes silent for few awkward seconds, and then adds “I bet you’d be nervous if you were in my place in line, though!”

 

“Why woud my place in ze line matter?” queries the Frenchman in a partially irritated, condescending tone.

 

“Don’t you see who is standing in front of me in line?” the priest replies quizzically. .  “That’s Mother Teresa!”

 

Mother Teresa briefly looks up from her Rosary and over her shoulder at the priest, and then returns beatifically to her prayers. 

 

Frenchman:  “And why do you care if you are behind zis Mother Theresa?”

 

Priest:  “My God man, don’t you know who Mother Teresa is?”

 

The Frenchman merely shrugs his shoulders. 

 

Priest (the priest’s voice begins to take on hints of outrage): “Started the ‘Missionaries of Charity’?  Dedicated her life to selflessly helping the poorest of the poor?”

 

The Frenchman shakes his head.

 

Priest (getting even more agitated):  “She won the Nobel Peace-Prize for Christ’s sake!  Following her in the line into heaven is like going on after Sinatra!”

 

The priest closes his eyes and deliberately blows out a deep breath.

 

Priest (quietly to himself):  “God, I wish I could just take a peek at Peter’s book.  I figured I was a shoe-in as a priest - just my luck to be caught behind Mother Teresa!”

 

A few moments of silence pass before anyone speaks again.  Seemingly out of nowhere, the Frenchman interjects:  “Your Mother Theresa, she was good then, Non?  But she is nothing compared to a Fraunchman!”

 

“Really?” the priest responds sardonically. “And what exactly did you do in your life that was so great?”

 

Frenchman (swells his chest with great pride): “I waz a raper of babies!”

 

Priest (looking both puzzled and very concerned):  “Uh…you lost me two laps in there, Chief.”

 

The Frenchman, noticing the priest’s sudden change in behavior: “Oh, I am zo zorry.  My English, she is not very good. You muzt have mis-understoud me!”

 

Frenchman (speaking deliberately):  “When ze baby is bad, we like to give ze babiez a good raping!”

 

Priest: “I still think I’m missing you here.”

 

Frenchman (even more deliberately and speaking with his hands for emphasis):  “To keep ze baby from doing bad… we like to have sex… with the baby… against its will.”

 

Frenchman (jovially, while changing pitch in stereotypical ‘French’ manner for emphasis):  “At least, we like to think it’s against the baby’s will.  After all, it iz just a baby… ”

 

Frenchman (throwing his hands up in the air while laughing to himself):  “Who can tell?”

 

Frenchman (with a conspiratorially hand next to his mouth and a ‘French’ snort):  “Maybe ze baby likes it a little, Non?”

 

The camera focuses in on the priest, who looks appropriately shocked and horrified by this revelation.

 

At this point, the camera pans away from the Big Three, and there is now an empty gap between Frenchman and St. Peter’s desk. Noticing the gap, the Frenchman quickly scurries up to St. Peter’s desk with Mother Teresa and the priest trailing behind.  As the Frenchman, Mother Teresa, and the priest approach the desk, St. Peter tilts the book on the desk in front of him up slightly, revealing only the two words ‘Danielle Steele’ on the front cover.

 

The priest is now standing shoulder to shoulder with Mother Teresa, arms crossed in front of him, looking very smug as St. Peter confronts the Frenchman.

 

Peter (somewhat sheepishly):  “I’m a little ashamed to admit it, but we haven’t been paying that much attention to earth the last few millennia or so.  I really have no clue who has been good or bad.  I’ll tell you what… I’ll just go ahead and ReauxShamBeaux you for it.”  Author’s Note:  Reaux! Sham! Beaux! is the French version of Rock, Paper, Scissors.  

 

Priest (alarmed, looking considerably less smug):  “WHAT!?!?”

 

Peter (slapping his closed right fist against his left palm three times, while counting out loud): “One, Two, Three, SHOOT!!!”

 

Peter quickly tosses out his pointer and index finger for the universal sign of ‘scissors’.  The Frenchman, a split second afterwards, desperately throws out his right fist for ‘rock’.  The Frenchman’s eyes briefly meet Peter’s in a silent question.  In answer, Peter nods over his shoulder to the gate to heaven, and then shakes his head in affirmation.  The  Frenchman gleefully strolls through the partially open gate.

 

Completely furious at this point, the priest steps directly in front of Mother Teresa and barks angrily at St. Peter:  “WHAT IN THE BLOODY HELL WAS THAT!?!?”

 

Peter (nonplussed):  “What in the bloody hell was what?”

 

Priest (yelling):  “YOU’RE A FRICKING ANGEL!!!!  YOU’RE OMNISCIENT!!!  HOW THE HELL DO YOU LOSE AT ROCK, PAPER, SCISSORS!!!”

 

Peter (slightly chagrinned):  “To be completely honest about it, we're omniscient and omnipotent, but we're not really all that bright!”

 

Priest (still screaming, letting out each word like it was an individual explosion):  “YOU… COMPLETE… UTTER… IMBECILE!!!!”

 

The priest takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.  Then speaking slowly as if to a child: “You – can – see – the - future!  All you have to do is think about whatever your opponent is going to throw next… Rock, Paper, or Scissors… and throw whatever will beat it!”

 

Peter (excitedly):  “That’s a great idea!  Who’s next in line?”

 

Mother Teresa steps forward without saying a word.  Peter counts to three and throws Scissors; Mother Teresa throws paper.  Peter gives the priest a quick wink as Mother Teresa head sags and she walks off dejectedly into the black, smoky, wailing mist to the side of Peter’s desk.  The priest turns away disgusted for a moment from St. Peter desk, groaning while placing his head in his hands.  His hands start to shake uncontrollably, and the priest begins to make a primal, guttural sound.   Suddenly unable to hold back his frustration and longer, the priest leaps over the desk and starts throttling St. Peter.  The scene slowly fades to black.

 

As the lights come up again, the desk, the gate to heaven, and the people have all disappeared.  All that remains is the floor thick with smoke, the priest, and a very bright light off in the distance.  The priest is looking directly into the distance light, which bathes his face in a veritable nimbus of light. 

 

Priest (in a contrite, pleading tone):  “Thanks for agreeing to speak with me, God.  Look, I’m really sorry about strangling St. Peter back there.  I just went a little crazy.”

 

The priest waits for briefly for an answer, only to be met by silence.  He pauses for a moment, and then continues speaking.  Notably shaken by the lack of response, he begins to ramble, in part to himself.

 

Priest:   “It’s just that, well, this is all a little ridiculous - nothing at all like I was taught to expect.  You let that French Baby-Raper into heaven for the love of God!  I know we’re suppose to turn the other cheek and all, but I figured baby-raping was a definite ‘go to Hell, directly to Hell, do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars’ sort of offense.”

 

Priest (building to a crescendo):  “And you sent Mother Teresa to hell…  Mother Teresa!  She dedicated her whole life to helping others.  She deserved better than that.”

 

Priest (shaking his head, and turning around to walk away from the light, while speaking dejectedly):  “Well, I guess you’re not really here.  There’s nobody here to listen to me, is there?”   

 

The priest takes a few steps away from the light, when an overpoweringly loud voice with a distinctly French accent responds, causing the earth beneath the priest to tremble violently:

 

GOD:  “THIS MOTHER THERESA OF YOURZ, SHE WAS GOOD, NON?  BUT NOT ENOUGH BABY RAPING!!!”

 

 

 

 

As a sequel to my previous blog, where I started a story for others to finish (check out NW's excellent alternative ending in the comments section of the first blog), I am now posting the middle of the story. I'll post the end in a few days. The beginning has been altered somewhat in order to lead into the middle more logically. I've included the revised beginnning as Chapter 1. Let me know what you think, and feel free to continue writing the story and repost it from either the beginning or the middle.

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Chapter 1 – The Beginning

 

As much as I hate to say it, it was a dark and stormy night.  I’ve always hated that opening to a story; it’s so overused it's now cliché.  What’s worse, it’s redundant.  Unless you live in the part of Norway or Alaska where ‘day’ can last for six months, dark at night is pretty much a given.  If you happen upon a ‘bright and sunny night’ in say, downtown Seattle, chances are you are heading for your local place of worship to prepare for the impending Apocalypse.  But I digress... let’s just say the time was late evening, the weather was crappy, and I was very, very late.

 

Late is a relative term.  For some people being late means one second after the time they had promised to arrive.  I don’t understand those people. To me late has always been a more dynamic concept, depending heavily on what you are suppose to be there for, how many minutes have passed since you were supposed to be there, who will notice your arrival, and how many of your stock excuses for being late said individuals have already heard.

 

In this particular case, I was supposed to be at my girlfriend’s apartment for her birthday.  I was supposed to be there when she got off work at 8 p.m.; the time was 10:30.  At this point in our relationship, Sharon had heard every conceivable (and some inconceivable) excuse for my habitual tardiness.  I think by any definition, I had kissed ordinary run-of-the-mill late bye-bye about an hour ago.

 

The other thing I had kissed bye-bye an hour ago was my patience.  I definitely was not in the mood to get caught behind Mrs. Hershfelder at the entrance to my girlfriend’s apartment complex.  Mrs. Hershfelder was a five-foot, eighty-pound lady who was somewhere in the neighborhood of two hundred years old.  Her floral print dresses hung very loosely off her bony frame, and she made the Walter Matthau character from ‘Grumpy Old Men’ seem like Mary Poppins by comparison.  The rain had made her current dress, a particularly gaudy pitch-black number with bright yellow flowers, stick awkwardly in places.  Coupled with the black plastic garbage bag she had draped over her head to protect her precious auburn-dyed hair from the rain, I got the vague impression of a flamboyantly-gay, midget Grim Reaper.  At that moment, she was carrying two separate oversized bags of groceries, one in each arm, while awkwardly trying to place her key in the lock to the door at the front of the apartment complex.

 

“Let me help you with your bags, Mrs. Hershfelder.”  I offered as politely as I could manage, trying to take one bag from her arm.

 

“Keep your damn hands to yourself!”  Mrs. Hershfelder responded defiantly, shaking off my helping hand.  “I didn’t need your help to raise 3 kids, and I certainly don’t need your help to get in my own building.”

 

As fate would have it, she next proceeded to drop her keys, now slippery from the rain, onto the ground in front of the door.  When she bent over to grab the keys, a gust of wind took hold of the garbage bag on her head and blew it directly into my face.  She made a few vain attempts at picking up the keys, still holding her groceries as if to prove a point. 

 

“For the love of God!” I muttered to myself, throwing off the plastic bag in disgust.  My small modicum of patience now exhausted, I unceremoniously grabbed her keys from the ground as she continued to fumble about.  In one deft motion I stepped in front of her, unlocked the door, and flippantly tossed her keys over my shoulder without looking.  I quickly opened the door partway, slid through the opening, and allowed the door to slam shut behind me, leaving Mrs. Hershfelder outside the building.  She didn’t want any help...

 

As I bounded up the staircase to Sharon’s apartment two steps at a time, I racked my brain for a new excuse for being late.  I was pretty sure that beating my roommate Tommy in NHL 93 on Sega for the 15^th straight game (my personal record) and losing track of time wouldn’t fly very well.  Realistically, I had only one shot:  She was a nurse, and she was always getting stuck at work four or five hours past her scheduled shift.  With a little luck, she was caught up in the emergency room, and would never know how badly I had screwed up.

 

Reaching the top of the stairs, I pulled out my lucky quarter out of my jean pocket, gave it a kiss for luck, and screwed up my courage to knock on the door.  Good old lucky quarter - you’ve never failed me.

 

Midway between my first and second knock, the door briefly opened three inches.  I caught a quick glimpse of my very angry girlfriend, and then the door was vehemently slammed shut in my face.

 

“Not Good…” I muttered ironically to myself, quickly turning around to whip my lucky quarter down the stairwell as hard as I could.

 

I believe I caught the first glimpse of what would soon change my life in the middle of my throwing motion, soon enough to realize what I was about to accidentally do, but too late to stop it…

 

 

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Chapter 2 – The Middle

 

Mrs. Hershfelder had finally made it up to the landing to her apartment down the stairs from my girlfriend, still valiantly struggling with her two bags of groceries.  Quickly taking into consideration the very narrow stairwell, I immediately realized the likelihood of my hitting Mrs. Hershfelder with the quarter based on my current point of aim was unacceptably high.  As Mrs. Hershfelder was already unlikely to be politely predisposed towards me for leaving her out in the rain, I had serious doubts about her ability to take a quarter hard off the chest philosophically.  In order to avoid the impending disaster, I desperately tried to change my point of aim at the last second to the ceiling above her head.

 

I remember my baseball coach, in a fit of pique over me walking three straight batters one inning, once angrily declaring “The safest place to be when you’re pitching is wherever you’re aiming!” I suppose a logical corollary to that statement is “The worst place to be when I’m throwing something is wherever I’m trying to avoid.”  By raising my point of aim, I had successfully avoided hitting Mrs. Hershfelder in the chest, only to viciously bounce the quarter right off of her temple.

 

The next sequence of events happened like it was in slow motion.  Stunned by the quarter to the temple, Mrs. Hershfelder staggered backwards, coming dangerously close to the precipice of the first stair leading down from her stairwell landing.  In a last ditch effort to help, I frantically bounded down the stairs towards her three steps at a time.  Yet again, my almost mythical lack of physical coordination was working against me.  By my third downwards stride, I lost my balance, and started hurtling out of control down the stairway.

 

Mrs. Hershfelder regained her own composure to avoid falling down the stairs, only to have my sprawling body give her a shoulder check that would have made Bob Probert proud.  She was knocked off her feet into the air (I weigh 220 pounds on a good day), and thudded into the wall face first with her arms and legs spread wide.  In the process the grocery bags were dislodged violently from her grasp, sending cans of Campbell’s Tomato soup everywhere, making a horrible racket in the process.

 

My momentum carried me down the second flight of stairs leading from Mrs. Hershfelder’s apartment landing, and I arrived at the bottom of those stairs in a facedown heap.  I briefly heard the sound of someone tumbling down the stairs behind me, and distinctly heard the horrible crackling sound of bone breaking.  As I lay there prone on the ground something landed on top of me, knocking the air completely out of me.  Oh dear God, please don’t let that be what I think it is! 

 

Mrs. Hershfelder’s groan, coming from within a few inches of my ear, confirmed my worst fears.  How in the world could this get any worse?  As if to answer my silent query, I heard the sound of footsteps treading ominously down the stairs to the scene of the debacle. 

 

“JONATHAN JACOB – WHAT IN THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!?!?”  I heard in the unmistakable sound of my girlfriend’s normally dulcet voice.  Apparently Sharon had heard the veritable explosion of loud random noises coming from outside her apartment, and had reconsidered her decision to stay behind closed doors.  At that moment, I couldn’t help but notice that my lucky quarter had landed heads up roughly a foot from my rather precarious predicament.  Worst damned Lucky Quarter EVER!

 

“John, you’d better have a good explanation for…” my girlfriend’s voice trailed off into a stunned silence.  Ah, that pause can only mean she just rounded the corner to look down the second set of stairs.  Core meltdown in three… two… one…

 

 ”OH MY GOD!”  Her voice must have gone up two full octaves in pitch.  Ah, there it is!  Then, with a note of deliberate calm, “Mrs. Hershfelder, are you alright?”  Oh crap, Sharon just went into nurse mode instead of losing it - Mrs. Hershfelder must look pretty bad.

 

Under normal circumstances, Mrs. Hershfelder has a grating nasal voice that can be heard from the neighboring apartment building.  On this occasion, her voice was barely more than a weak whisper in response:

 

“I… I… can’t feel my legs!”

 

Immediately after speaking, I could feel Mrs. Hershfelder’s body go completely limp.  My stomach dipped suddenly to the left and then attempted some sort of a barrel roll.

 

“It’ll be alright,” I attempted to calm myself.  “Sharon’s a nurse; she’ll take care of everything.”

 

The next thing I knew I was looking into Sharon’s adorable blue-green eyes.  She had dropped down to the ground to look me dead in the face.

 

“John, I don’t have time to yell at you right now,” She started in the almost patronizingly matter-of-fact voice of the professional nurse.  “Mrs. Hershfelder is unconscious on your back, and may have a spinal cord injury.  I’m going to run upstairs to call 911.  Listen to me very carefully, this is very important… UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES are you to move AT ALL!”

 

I had been dating Sharon long enough to know that when she used that tone of voice, there was no arguing with her.  Unfortunately, in the process of beating Tommy at Sega hockey, I had finished a 7-11 Super Big Gulp.  I don’t know the size of the average bladder, but I’m pretty sure it pales in comparison to the sixty-four ounces of caffeine goodness that is the Super Big Gulp.  What’s worse, Mrs. Hershfelder’s weight was pushing the floor directly into my bladder.  The strain was already beginning to be unbearable.

 

“But Sharon…”  I began lamely.

 

Sharon cut me off before I could get out a second word.

 

“Damn it John, if you move you could paralyze her permanently!”

 

Properly chagrined, I decided that under the circumstance I would have to wet myself if worse came to worst.

 

While Sharon hurriedly made her way up the stairs back to her apartment to call 911, the cell-phone in my pocket began to happily beep-out a digitized version of the theme song to TV’s ‘The Jeffersons’.  As my right index finger was already touching the button to turn on the speaker-phone option through my corduroys, I decided to risk the small movement of pressing it on.

 

“John!” a tinny version of Tommy’s excited voice began.

 

“Yes?”  I replied in a defeated tone, letting out a sigh in the process.

 

“Dude, John, you would not believe the day I’m having!”

 

“Oh really?” I replied sardonically. “Try me…”

 

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A friend of mine (well, ex-girlfriend/current complete mind-%!$#, yet another story for another time) recently reminded me of the beginning to a story I once wrote... she wanted to read the end of it. I remember starting the story with no real idea in mind, I just wanted to write something, so I started writing. I wanted to see if the story would take me anywhere. I got only so far before I got stuck.

It's now about 5 years later, and I've rewritten what I remember of the beginning. I've also written my own version of the middle and end (nothing like a 5 year break and some life experience to relieve writer's block), but I thought it would be fun to just leave the beginning for the moment.

There is a standard writing exercise where one writer starts the story, and then hands it off to another writer to stimulate creativity. I'm handing this one off to whoever wants it; I'd love to see what they come up with. I'm specifically thinking at least my niece Amber will give it a shot. I'll post my middle/ending after I get hers.

The Story

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As much as I hate to say it, it was a dark and stormy night. I've always hated that opening to a story; it's overused to the point of being cliché. What's worse, it's redundant - unless you live in the part of Norway or Alaska where the day can last for 6 months, dark at night is pretty much a given. Let's just say the time was late evening, the weather was crappy, and I was very, very late.

Late is a relative term; for some people being late is 1 second after the time they had promised to arrive. I don't understand those people. To me, late has always been a more dynamic concept, depending heavily on what you are suppose to be there for, how many minutes have passed since you were supposed to be there, who will notice your arrival, and how many of your stock excuses for being late said individuals have already heard.

In this particular case, I was supposed to be at my girlfriend's apartment for her birthday. I was supposed to be there when she got off work at 8 p.m., the time was 10:30. At this point in our relationship, she had heard every conceivable (and some inconceivable) excuse for my habitual tardiness. I think by any definition, I had kissed ordinary run-of-the-mill late bye-bye about an hour ago.

As I bounded up the staircase to her apartment two steps at a time, I wracked my brain for a new excuse. I was pretty sure that beating my roommate Tommy in NHL 93 on Sega for the 15th straight game (my personal record) wouldn't fly very well. Realistically, I had only one shot: She was a nurse, and she was always getting stuck at work four or five hours past her scheduled shift. With a little luck, she was caught up in the emergency room, and would never know how badly I had screwed up.

Reaching the top of the stairs, I pulled my lucky quarter gently out of my jean pocket, gave it a kiss for luck, and screwed up my courage to knock on the door. Good old lucky quarter… you've never failed me...

Midway between my first and second knock, the door briefly opened three inches. I caught a brief glimpse of my incredibly angry girlfriend, and then the door was very vehemently slammed shut in my face.

"Not Good…" I muttered dryly to myself, quickly turning around to whip my lucky quarter down the stairwell.

I believe I caught the first glimpse of what would soon change my life in the middle of my throwing motion, soon enough to realize what I was about to accidentally do, but too late to stop it…