Panic Room

The LW thinks I am a history nerd.  I like to think I am more of a history buff, but at this stage of my life it is splitting hairs, and I can live with being a nerd.  One of my favorite topics to read about is World War II.  I enjoy reading everything about it, and find it all interesting.  A great author from that era is Corrie Ten Boom, as she recounts her time during the war in occupied Holland.  They had a secret room in their house that they used to hide Jews trying to escape the Holocaust.  
 

The Striblings have a similar room in our house, only we call it The Panic Room.  And though I know I probably should not be divulging this information to the general public in case the Democrats allow the Nazi’s to come back to power, I have a hard time not writing about it.  It is a place I dread, yet could come in handy one day.

I don’t want to give away too much information, but it is called The Panic Room for a reason.  It is tight, dark, and scary, and only good for dust mites, the boogie-man, and bad children.  The entrance is just tight enough that I can squeeze my head through but my enormous pectoral muscles get hung up and prevent my diaphragm from expanding.  Then I can’t get a full breath and the panic sets in.  Hence, The Panic Room.  This is compounded with the fact that in order to gain access, I must be on my hands and knees on a very hard floor.  It is an extremely awkward angle- my back is flexed in a strange yogo pose and rotated to the point that if I sneeze (which is likely due to the dust mites in the immediate vicinity), I will blow something out and have to be hospitalized. 

I, sadly, have just enough claustrophobia to make me break into hives and freak out should I ever get my entire body in.  I would never make it in there, and the Nazi’s would discover us immediately.  Then, we would have to shoot our way out, and our only hope of survival would be superior
fire-power.   

But, every now and then, I have to get into the Panic Room, and I only do it as a last resort.  The kids can get into it easy enough, and think it is fun climbing around in there.  I send them in whenever possible so I don’t have to dip myself in chicken fat and squeeze in. 

But, every time the television is on the fritz or our stupid DVD player decides it needs to be rebooted, the LW sends me back there just to watch me sweat.  I hate and fear it, and am beginning to feel the same way about the stupid DVD player and the stupid company that built it.   It happened last night. 

The baby sitter did something to the DVD player and it was frozen.  Little Win’s favorite movie was in there (Train Crazy Kids).   All of the kids were already asleep and in bed so they were no help.  The LW wouldn’t let me wake them up to come and fix things for me.  So, I dove in. 

The first place I went was the flashlight/ battery drawer.  In it, we have about 25 flashlights, most of which do not work, and about 100 batteries of various shapes and sizes, that do work and are rapidly burned through. 

I grabbed the fourth flashlight I could find as the first three were dead.  That is part of the beauty of a family of four children who refuse to turn them off when they are done using them to ward off the monsters in their bedrooms.  As an aside, I think the batteries in my house growing up lasted for 12 years.  I used them judiciously and rarely had to replace any.  The fact that my children burn through them like match sticks both irks and confuses me.  But, that will have to be the subject of another story. 

I then girded my loins, stretched, and prepared to battle my inner demons. 

I was immediately struck by the number of cords I saw once I torqued my body through the narrow opening.  There was no way of knowing which cord was which, and I was in no mood to unplug every cord and plug them back in to experiment.  They were all plugged into a space bar with one easy switch.  No brainer!  All I had to do was hit the switch, turn it back on, and I was good to go.  But I had a decision to make.  We were recording The Bachelor at the time.  If I flipped the switch and gave into to my myriad issues, I could get out quickly and safely.  But, I would also have to deal with the wrath of the LW for messing up her program.  Or, I could wait patiently for the program to finish, and repeat steps one through four, and start over again. 

I went for Plan A.  Sometimes it is just better to ask for forgiveness than permission.  I would rather deal with Bachelor disappointment than freak out and wake up in the fetal position under the kitchen table.  I also knew she would get over it.  I mean, where is she going to go?  We have four kids for Pete’s sake!  She can sputter all she wants, but at the end of the day, though she is a beautiful woman, our children have brought her stock down a little.  My own stock is not that high, now that I think about it.

Plan A worked beautifully.  Though we find the Bachelor spellbinding like a wreck on the side of the highway and lie if people ask if we watch it, the LW’s evening viewing pleasure is not predicated on watching every moment of it.  She was fine, even if I was braced for a worst-case scenario.  I only had to gain access to the Panic Room once.  And, Win is now happily watching Train Crazy Kids for the 60^th time.  All things worked out for the best. 

Poor Dining

We are slowly moving down the road of growing a family instead of adding to it.  We know this because of  the milestones we pass along the way.  As the LW and I, mostly the LW, have been knee deep in pregnancy, nursing, diapers, and various starts and stops throughout the last 10 years, milestones are a big deal in our house.  Potentially the biggest for us at this stage of our development is moving away from diapers.

Our 4th and final child is a handsome young lad who usually responds to the monicker of Win.  He is a blond 2 year old who is into more mischief and trouble than the other three children combined.  He played a large role in us deciding we did not want to add any more faces around the dinner table.  We love him dearly but he is a handful.  He is loud, challenging, chases his siblings around with various weapons, and makes his older sisters cry on a regular basis.  But, he is also loved, and probably the favorite among the three other kids.  They cannot get enough of him.

We are in a season of potty training with Win, and it is more than a little difficult.  He just doesn't seem to want to get it.  Case in point:

The Stribling Clan loaded up all of our beach equipment in, on, and around the family truckster and headed to the beach for a long weekend.  About halfway down I-16 we pulled off at a Zaxby's for dinner.  All kids like chicken, so we thought this would be an easy stop.  And they did.  Each child ate more than their fair share of nuggets, chicken strips and fries all dipped in the special sauce.  The trouble started when the three older children, and one friend's child who was riding with us, began screaming hysterically.  Win, smiling ear to ear, is standing in the middle of the aisle, in a pile of poop.

Imagine the LW's shock and dismay to witness this scene in a public forum.  Win is not satisfied with merely pooping in a restaurant, he wants to track it all over the restaurant, too.  He is not interested in just soiling one section.  He wants to have the place condemned and force it to be shutdown due to his personal health code violations.   A kid a couple of tables down from us turned green and just about passed out in his plate of chilli cheese fries.  I felt bad for him, until I realized what my job was about to be.  We then begged/ threatened the kids to calm down, scooped up Win in such a way that we would not get contaminated, and scooped up the poop before the restaurant knew it needed haz-mat suits for uniforms.  It was terrible.  Not only did the stress level skyrocket instantaneously, but we also just did not feel like we could clean our hands enough to return to the dinner table.  There is just not enough hand-san in a bottle to give you the comfort level you need to move forward at certain times in life.  The whole thing just left us feeling sick, and completely unsatisfied.

So, all that to say, that was a top 3 worst dining experiences to date.

The Big House

When I was a young lad in high school, I found myself on the wrong side of the law.  Now, the reasons for this arrest are trivial at this point, and there is no use in reliving them in this forum, but suffice it say that my youthful exuberance and indiscretion landed me in jail for a night.  This was not jail like you see on The Andy Griffith Show where you walk in under your own recognizances, let yourself in and out of your cell, move the doilies around and hang out with Barney.  No sir.  This was big boy jail.  Downtown Atlanta.  At night.

Imagine a young man, at the age of 18, on the cusp on manhood, having been arrested after a formal dance.  He is in a full coat and tie (none of which fits as it is all hand me downs), barely shaves at this point in his young life, and has no idea what he has just gotten himself into.  The only thing he really knows is that A- he is in a heap of trouble, B- man are his parents going to be mad, and C- holy catfish are they really throwing me into the back of this van, cuffing me to this enormous black man, and expecting me to get out of this van in one piece?  I have seen the movies.  I know what happens to preppy boys in jail.  It ain't pretty.  It is like a really bad version of the Crying Games, which was a really bad version to begin with.

After going through the finger printing process, the picture taking, and waiting, I was put in a holding cell that was approximately 40 x 50.  There were probably 100 men in there, one of whom was white.  He was large, in a shirt that was too small, and passed out under the urinal in the corner, which apparently no one used.  I think all my fellow inmates just peed on him, or wherever they happened to be sitting at the time.  I have cleaned a lot of diapers and wet beds, but I have never smelled such an overpowering stench of urine in my life. To this day, I have a hard time smelling my kids pee without retching.  It was like a wall of urine smell that was so bad I preferred to hold my bladder than relieve myself in there.  Plus, I couldn't reach the urinal with the big white dude on the floor, and I did not want to take the chance of peeing on him and making him mad or being the object of someone's wrath in a place I did not feel I belonged.

This holding cell had a bench that was bolted to the wall that went all the way around it, stopping only when it got to the vicinity of the urinal.  The wall where detainees over the years had leaned against was dirty, but more importantly, it was worn.  And by that I mean, the place on the wall where people leaned back and put their heads against it had all the paint worn off, all the way around the room.  It was like a dirty stripe of brown on a wall that was a dirty brown to begin with.

Sidenote- we have some friends who have children with cystic fibrosis.  They sanitize everything, and have a hand sanitizer squeegee in both cars, in their pockets, pocket books, and every room in their house.  I think if they were to see one of their kids in this cell, they would just cash in their chips and request a new child.  It would just be too hard to de-germ them.  Back to my story.

The only other thing of note in the room was a pay phone in the corner opposite the urinal.  Upon seeing it, I immediately saw my freedom, at least for a minute.

I looked around the room, scanning my fellow scofflaws and ne'erdowells, to make sure it was okay to use it.  I am not sure why I did that, other than to say that I was already in a boatload of trouble, I certainly did not want to get in any more.  I casually walked over to the phone, because as we all know, you never hurry in the slammer.  You never want to show vulnerability or weakness.  That only breeds violence, and that is one thing this preppy boy from Buckhead did not need.  So, in such a way as to draw as little attention as possible to my person, I shuffled my penny loafers in the general direction of the telephone, acting as nonchalant and cool as possible.

My plan was working great, until I finished dialing and was awaiting further instructions from the operator.  My eyes were downcast when they caught sight of a rather large pair of bright red, shiny, dress shoes.  They were connected to an extremely large man, dressed head to toe in a red satin tuxedo, complete with a hard red hat with a shallow brim trimmed in lace, that went all the way around his head.  He made me think of the Kool Aid guy, only this dude was a pimp, muscular as opposed to fat, black, scary, and tall.  He did not have to say much.  All he had to do was look at me like I was an idiot, tap one of his red shoes a time or two, and wait for me to hand him the phone.  Which I did in short order.  The phone, at that point, became his.  Apparently, he had a rather prosperous business at that time of night and needed to check on his employees. 

At that point, I pretty much thought it was hopeless.  I was never going to be able to call my parents, explain the wrongful situation in which I found myself, and be extricated from the premises.  But, that was not to be the case.  Apparently, there was a Good Samaritan incarcerated with me who took pity on my lowly station in life, and threw me a line.

What I did not know about this area is you could leave the cell, and go to another cell down the corridor if you so desired.  It is simply a block of identical cells and you are allowed to move about freely from one to another.  They are all gross, some just grosser than others.  I think everyone congregates in the least gross one as possible. 

This Good Samaritan took me across to the hall to an identical room.  It was significantly less crowded but smelled worse, if that was possible.  In fact, it was much worse, and hot, which is probably what made the smell worse.  That is why the previous room I was in was overcrowded.  But, it had a payphone that was not being used, so I snatched it up greedily.

This time, I did not shuffle my way to the phone.  I walked briskly to it, picked it up, and made a collect call home.

What you do not know about me is my parental situation as a youth.  My parents were married for 39 years before my father's passing, but they were an interesting pair.  In the case of an emergency, you absolutely did not want to get mom.  Especially if it was after 10:00 at night.  It didn't matter if you came into the house with an armload of orphans you just saved from a burning building, mom was not made for late night emergencies.  It would be significantly worse if you were in trouble.

Well, this evening I was able to make my phone call.  By having a pay phone in the cell, we could make as many collect calls as we wanted.  Hollywood, it turns out, did me a disservice by convincing me that I had one phone call and one only.  Who knows what else they erroneously taught me?  I dialed my parent’s number, and prayed for dad to pick up.  He didn't.  Mom answered, did not accept the charges, and promptly hung up the phone.

Imagine my surprise to finally get to a phone, have the ability to use it without the threat of being beaten with it, only to have my own mother hang up on me.  In jail!  It was and remains an all time low.  But, I was not one to be easily deterred, so I dialed again.  This time dad answered.  He automatically knew what the trouble was and soon had me out, post haste. 

Just because I was out of jail does not mean that the lesson was over.  I had a lot of "community service" hours ahead of me in the neighborhood.  But, thankfully, dad did not make me wait around in jail for a day or two to teach me the error of my ways.  The police did a decent job of scaring the hell out of me.  They saw me coming a mile away and knew they had easy pickings.  I wouldn't be surprised if there are a few who remember the incident and still laugh quietly to themselves from time to time. 

My Brother in Law Chep

I have a jackass brother in law.  Aren’t most brothers in law jackasses?  Even if they weren’t and you were very close, would you admit it?  Doubtful.

I have one particular brother in law who can build anything.  This is my sister’s husband Chep, not the LW’s younger brothers.  Chep calculated and detail oriented.  He is also full of great ideas, and has the ability to build whatever he is dreaming up.  It is a great combination of skill sets.  It is sort of like having your very own Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor in your back pocket.  Very handy.

Case in point: I was blessed to grow up with a lake house in north Georgia.  It is a lovely mountain retreat that holds countless fond memories for me.  The cabin I grew up with has been torn down, but was replaced by a much nicer house.  There are approximately 67 steps from the water’s edge to the door on the back of the house, on an almost 45 degree angle.  So, it is fairly steep.

Chep thought it would be a great idea to build a water slide through the woods to the water.  After all, between the two families we have 7 children, and it would be entertaining for them, and would be fun for adults to participate in as well.  He set about his construction, and before you knew it, he had a fully functioning water slide through the woods from the base of the house to the water. 

And, I have to admit, it is quite the engineering feat.  He thought up the design and built the entire thing almost entirely by himself.  It is awesome, even if he is a jackass.  Where he falls short is his math in calculating velocity, speed, and angle of trajectory when it is a related of his inventions. 

Those problems were soon to raise their ugly heads.  This is where Tim Taylor takes over from the Chep I have grown to know and love, and incidentally, why he is a jackass.  The ramp at the bottom of the slide is just that, a ramp.  Were I to build it, which I could not, I would have made it flatten out so that as you came off the slide, you would skip across the water until you came to a gentle stop.  Not Chep.  He actually turns the ramp up a little so that it launches the rider up, sending said person out over the water for a landing 15-20 yards away.  And the slide, being in the side of a hill, goes straight down to the water.  There are no turns.  Did I say it was steep earlier?  It is.  Chep did not factor in the velocity of the individual on their downward decent, the compression factor as the G forces crush the rider into the ramp at the bottom, or the distance the rider is launched from the slide. 

At first it was awesome, and the ultimate thrill ride.  We made every kid on our end of the lake who tried it cry uncontrollably.  Then, I made my fateful, and final trip.  I am not sure how it happened, but my angle of trajectory was off, so I went hurtling through the air at maximum speed as though I were standing straight up and down.  My feet hit the water with such force and impact that when they hit the water, the rest of my body pivoted and slapped me down face first.  The money maker was unharmed, but I broke at least 2 ribs, and have not been down it since. 

All of Chep’s other inventions are awesome, and put him in a play ground all his own.  But this devilish invention plunges him to the murky underworld labeled "Idiot Family Members" from which he will likely never escape. 

Marathon Training

I like to consider myself an avid runner.  It is one of my favorite activities on a day in day out basis.  It is a quick and easy way to burn off some steam or get some exercise.  You do not need a gym or any special equipment, outside of a pair of halfway decent shoes.   And, I find it therapeutic.  I have never done a marathon, and I do not run any crazy distances.  But, I run several times a week, which keeps me sane and decently in shape. 

Last year I decided to run a half marathon.  Not a problem.  It was in January in California, and I had plenty of time to train for it.  I ran all summer at my normal rate and pace, and just figured I would pick it up in the fall and winter.  It was not long until it got cold outside, and I was relegated to running on a treadmill.  It turns out I am a fair-weather runner, and I get board running on a treadmill.  I went so far as to purchase a new pair of running shoes, hoping it would give me the added boost of wearing something new to keep me interested.  I should have listened to my father when he told me that the joy of owning something new quickly fades.  I soon found myself extremely board, and quit running.  Completely. 

Part of my problem is that I still think of myself as a young athlete who can pretty much accomplish anything.  I figured, hey, I am 38 years old.  I can run 5 miles without getting hurt.  I can just add another 8.1 to that and be fine.  I had never run 8.1 miles, so I don’t know what I was thinking when I thought I could just add it on. 

The weekend of the race arrived, and I found myself completely unprepared.  Outside of my nightly ice-cream maraton diet, I had not trained.  I found myself drawn to the lovely siren’s wail of In-N-Out Burger upon my arrival, so had gorged more than once at that fine establishment.  Hollywood has done me a disservice by telling me that it is always sunny and warm in California, even in January.  It is not.  And, I don’t really have any running clothes, per se.  My shorts are more of a basketball cut athletic short than anything else, and all my t-shirts are cotton. 

I went out the day before and bought some athletic long johns that I am sure have a much cooler name now than long johns.  I also bought some light weight gloves and a warm hat.

Then, I got up at the crack of dawn, and proceeded towards the starting line.  I would like to think that I at least looked like I knew what I was doing, but my long basketball shorts and stupid looking long johns and the fact that nothing I had on matched probably took some of the intimidation factor away from my fellow competitors. 

Finally, they fired the gun, and I was off.  I knew enough to pace myself, so I assumed a nice pace and off I went.  I noticed that my legs started hurting around mile 4.  By mile 8, I was in a decent amount of pain, and by mile 12, I was hobbling.  Old women and idiots wearing costumes with capes were passing me. 

I had the good sense to know that if I stopped there was absolutely no way I was going to get that train started again.  I was in a tremendous amount of pain.  Everything hurt.  My legs were cramping in every way possible as I limped the last .1 mile across the finish line.  Then, to top it off, some joker thought it would be funny to run power cables across the finish line under one of those rubber runners that has a ramp on both sides of it.  It is only a half inch high, if that.  But, it was enough to trip me up and almost prevent me from crossing the finish line.  I managed to limp across before I came to a complete halt.  A race organizer ordered me to move on so I would not be in the way of people finishing after me, but I couldn’t.  I just had no gas left in the tank and I was pooped.  I finally managed to start moving again, albeit slowly, away from the pileup I was causing.

Then, to make my agony complete, we had to hurry to our rented Crown Victoria (sweet ride I know) and get to the airport to fly back to Atlanta.  That was a long and painful walk, only to be folded into an airplane seat for the next 4 hours.  Suffice it to say, the next 7 days, were not my most comfortable.

High Church

When I was a slightly younger man and had the margin in my life to get dressed up for church, it was not uncommon for me to be seen in a Seersucker suit in the summer time.  Nothing says southern gentlemen like a Seersucker and white bucs.  It is sharp, and I can safely say, that I looked sharp in it. 

On this particular Sunday, we had gone to pay a visit to the in-laws on Lookout Mountain.  The church my in-laws attend is very nice, and its congregants typically dress well, the men in coats and ties.   And, it is the same church the LW and I were married in, and the church she grew up in, so it always fun for us to attend.

We only had one child at the time, so it was a no brainer to get dressed up, including him, and still manage to get to church with a couple of minutes to spare.  Clothes little boys wear in this neck of the woods are often ridiculous.  They have snaps and buttons and folds galore, which can be very disconcerting in the case of an emergency.  In this instance, our son was still in diapers, which hind-sight being 20-20, were a size or three too small.  He had what I like to refer to as a pooplosion. 

I am not sure how an enfant does it, but they poop so violently and with such force that it explodes out each fitted leg of the diaper, and up the crack in his butt right up his back.  This time, it was like a car bomb exploded.  It went down both legs to his shoes and up his back to his collar.  You couldn’t get away from it.

Being a mostly capable husband, I gave the LW a look of sheer panic, and started to hand the baby to her.  She immediately gave me the, “Oh hell no!” look with her eyes and facial features, and shooed me out of the sanctuary.  Apparently she was in greater need of Jesus that day than I was.  That soon changed.  Fortunately, I had the foresight to sit close to the door, so it was a quick exit that went mostly unnoticed. 

I carried Junior at an arms length with our effeminate diaper bag slung over my shoulder in the least immasculating way possible.  We went down the stairs to the nearest men’s bathroom, to determine the extent of the damage.  Everything he had, without exception, was unwearable.  Younger parents I am sure are more than a little familiar with a nursing child’s poop.  It does not smell terrible, but is sticky and stains everything it touches a light brown.  That is what this was, only in mass quantity. 

Men’s bathrooms are generally poorly equipped for changing, and this old school church was no exception.  That is usually a good thing because it keeps me from having to do a lot of work.  All I have to say to the LW is, “Sorry.  Nowhere to change him in there.  You’ll have to take him to the ladies room.”   I had no where to lay Strib down, so I tried to hold him in one hand and remove the offending articles of clothing with the other.  It was akin to holding a greased pig in one hand, while all the time trying not to get any grease on my person.  That didn’t work, so I ever so gently laid him on the floor and continued to clean.  Fortunately the floor was clean, or at least it was at this point.  It was not long before I had run out of baby wipes and had moved on to the hand towel roll above my head.  The hand towel was not very absorbent, ultimately smearing and pushing around more than it was cleaning up.  At this point, I am covered in baby poop, have it on the floor, both sleeves, the bottoms of my shoes, and my nose is beginning to itch, and I could use a little more Jesus, and a little less kid. 

I finally gave up, turned on the warm water in the sink, and plopped him in.  That worked great until he started to enjoy the bath and splashed nasty water all over the place.  Then, once I had him mostly clean, I had to use even more towels to dry him off. 

I finally emerged, well after the conclusion of the service, with an empty diaper bag, a naked baby, and a ruined Seersucker suit.  I have never revisited that bathroom, simply because I know what we did to it.  There is no way, absolutely no way, the custodial crew was able to clean it to my satisfaction.  To this day, when I am attending church there and I need to use the little general’s room, I bypass that bathroom and find one that is as far away from it as possible. 

I walked outside and handed Strib to the LW, took off my own clothes, put my white bucs in a plastic bag, then in a paper bag, in the trunk, and sat in the car with a cloud over my head.  Everyone, with the exception of us, had long since left, so me standing in the middle of the road in my boxer shorts was poor form, but acceptable.  All my mother in law and the LW could do was laugh and enjoy my misery.   My mother in law still can’t talk about it without bending over double and laughing at me until she can’t breath.  I hope they enjoyed the service, and prayed for me.

Stupid Freshman

Freshmen in college are not known for being highly intelligent.  In fact, I think it is safe to say that they are known more for their stupidity and poor decision making than anything else.  Enter Strib on his first day of college freedom.  He is the baby boy of Jim and Carole Stribling, who along with his older sister Paige, was given an emotional sendoff to the rest of his life.  They cried.  Strib did not.  He was ready to spread his wings and exercise his lack of intelligence.

There was a rather odd tradition at this particular institution of higher learning that included streaking across campus, ringing a bell that was about 180 years old, and streaking back.  What a novel idea!  No one had done that before, at least this year.  Well, our hero, who considered himself somewhat of a trend setter, wanted to be the first.  He grabbed a couple of his buddies and ran outside full speed in his birthday suit.  It was dark out, which helped.  Tie that in with a total lack of clothing except for his running shoes, and he was aerodynamic and fast.  It was not long before he outpaced his naked brethren and was running alone in the moonlight, free as a bird, the wind whipping through his hair.

The only light that late summer night was the streetlight above the belltower.  This should have been our hero's first clue.  But he was not to be deterred as he ran full speed!  Due to his lightening fast speed, he reached it first, grabbed the rope, and started ringing as though he had never rung a bell before.  But, it was a moment of glory did not last long.  Our hero looked over to see the campus police sitting on the hood of his squad car, patiently waiting for me.  It was like the scene from Smokie and the Bandit, where Jackie Gleason is sitting on the hood of his squad car waiting at the exact spot where the Bandit shows up. "What we have here is a complete lack of respect for the law!" Only, in this case, I was no Bert Reynolds, and he was Jackie Gleason.  Without saying a word, this police officer opened the back door and motioned for me to get in.  I, not being completely stupid, obliged.

My friends at this point, still encased in the cover of darkness, saw the activity in front of them, and had the mental acuity to abandon the midnight raid and hide in the bushes until the coast was clear.  

The kind police officer, then gave me a free ride back to my dorm, sirens wailing and lights flashing.  I will not swear that he was driving below the speed limit, but I will promise you that it was a long ride back to my dorm, which was not far away.  I am convinced to this day that he did that on purpose.  By the time we arrived at our destination, there must have been 150 students standing outside on the steps, waiting to see what the fuss was about.  Holding my head high, ignoring  the blank stares, snickers, and awestruck faces, I walked confidently through the crowd (which incidentally parted like the Red Sea) picked up my clothes, and walked right up to my room never wanting to emerge from that dark cave of shame again.

But, I did emerge, and enjoyed my fifteen minutes of fame as I became a bit of a folk hero.  It did not last long, as my story was soon over shadowed by the next freshman who did something extremely stupid.   But, that was a spotlight I was more than happy to share before I exited the stage.