The rock that sits in my stomach.

"Hi my name is Linda, and while she asks you questions, I am going to shave you!"

I should have known that this random sequence of words being uttered to me was the start of a really, really bad day.

Then again, that patch of hair on my right knee was really starting to bug me...

The worst part about getting surgery is the repetitive questions that are asked to you, mostly being, "So, Sean...what do you do? How did you do this?"

"Yeah, random nurse...sometimes I just plant awkwardly with my full body weight on my right leg to see how MUCH of my Meniscus I can tear at one time. I then repeat the process over and over, until I am lucky enough to see people like you who can ask me repetitive questions. My name is Sean, and tearing meniscuses is what I DO!"

Then I realized answering sarcastically to someone that is basically in charge of your life, while you are unconscious for the next 3 hours is probably not a great idea.

As annoying as some of these questions were, my favorite by far was, "What side are we operating on today?"

"Um...shouldn't you KNOW that? Pardon me for feeling a little un-easy...but you're getting paid for this. I think it's the least you can do to know the correct knee you are going to be cutting open."

Yeah, the side we are operating on today is GET ME THE HELL OUT OF HERE.

After a brief tyraid involving me, the BearClaws robe that they make you wear, and some elderly people as casualties to my brief manic streak, peace was restored and they were able to operate on my RIGHT knee...which was also my correct one, thank allah.

Before that, the nurses made a comment on my resting heart-rate. It was 40, and basically what they said was if I were an elderley person, they would be fearing for my life. I couldn't tell if that meant I was in really good shape, or if that meant I was wearing adult diapers. Turns out it was a little bit of both. I guess it just DEPENDS. GET IT!?

Next, a very short man was my anasthesiologist, and the nurse kept dropping hints and jokes about our very apparent height differential.

"It's nice to have a TALL man around here for once," she would say, and jokingly punch him in the arm.

"Pardon him for being a little SHORT with you...he's just having a bad day."

"Hopefully this isn't a TALL order for you to administer drugs to this young man on such SHORT notice."

I decided now would be a good time to stop laughing, as I looked at this man and he appeared that he just wanted to absolutely tear the IV's out of my arm and challenge me to a right-legged-hopping contest that he would UNDOUBTEDLY win because his right leg is healthy and able, but he was obviously also a Leprechaun, and everyone knows leprechauns are excellent when it comes to jumping contests.

The rest of this story gets a little fuzzy because I was under the influence of anasthesia gases, which ALWAYS smells like a mix of carrots and Sprite. Don't believe me? TRY IT.

Anyway, the leprechaun man proceeded to ask me what side they are operating on, and I told him, "Hearts, Stars and Horseshoes, Clovers and Blue Moons, Pots of Gold and Rainbows..."

Instead of saying "And me Red Balloons," in his undoubtedly thick Irish accent, he instead looked at me, and gave me the finger.

That's the last thing I remember before I woke up in the recovery room, and the truth of that story is debatable but if you ask ANYONE who was there, I bet they will recall it just like I did, because anasthesia is awesome.

As awesome as anasthesia might be, knee surgery in itself is actually the OPPOSITE of awesome.

I never knew this before, but getting a knee surgery actually advances your age by at least 50 years. I went into the operating room as a 19 year old with a resting heart rate of 40, and I left as a 69 year old grumpy man who cant walk on his own or control his bowel movements.

It has now been about 60 hours since my surgery itself, and I have yet to have a successful bowel movement, and just about 20 minutes ago, my mother came into the room and uttered the most depressing phrase I have heard in a while.

"You get one yet?"

"No, Mom."

"Well...you want some prunes?"

"No, Mom. I ate 17 this morning."

"Well, do you want me to take you for a walk?"

Good. Now I was not only feeling like I was 70 years old, but I was also feeling like a DOG.

A DOG WHO CAN NOT SHIT.

After about 13 prunes, and a half-mile walk that took about 15 minutes, I still feel like all the food I have eaten in the past 2 days is sitting like a rock in my stomach. A rock that will eventually be pushed out in a very, very painful fashion. A rock that may or may not be being pushed out AS I WRITE THIS. MMMWAAHAHAHAHA.

Seriously though. That would be awesome. I am currently flipping back and forth between little rascals and Man v.s. Wild, I am feeling terribly intimidated by Alfalfa's masculinity and Bear Gryll's mobility and ability to survive through ANYTHING.

I would like to see how he would do nearing 72 hours without a bowel movement, and being force-fed prunes, and crutching for distances up to ONE HALF MILE. ON CRUTCHES!? You're right, he'd probably do fine. But I am taller than him, and my right knee has less hair on it than his.

The House That Bent Me Over

What do you get when you combine three 14-hour-days, a handle-bar moustache, and 17 tubes of caulking!?

A really fuckin' good time!

I have started painting houses lately, in an effort to make money in this shit-show of an economy. Work isn't exactly easy to come by, so I have officially decided to essentially be a sweatshop worker for the summer. The only difference is that those lucky bastards probably don't have to see a paintbrush. Right now, using my bloody fingers to construct a sneaker sounds awfully appealing.

Ok, you're right. It's not THAT bad. I am getting paid, and as far as I know, I am not the subject of any broken labor-laws...yet.

As Bob Marley blasted from the iHome, and assured me to "Not worry about a thing, because every little thing is gonna be alright," I had to turn the corner around the re-painted, and re-painted, and re-painted side of the house with way too many nail-holes to stare that iPod straight in the face and say, "Thanks, but no thanks Bob. I beg to differ."

Turns out every little thing was not going to be alright, but it got me to thinking about the last time I heard that song, it was the part in "I Am Legend," and the dog dies in Will Smith's arms before it becomes a Zombie-Dog. Then I remembered I cried during that part. Alot.

And for those of you who have not seen I Am Legend, sorry for ruining it for you, and welcome to 2009.

The contrast between the peaceful reggae, and the sheer exhaustion experienced from over 40 hours of work in 3 days was too damn ironic to even acknowledge at the time.

Perhaps fittingly, the iHome was on shuffle, yet insisted on playing this damn song over and over, mocking me in the 85 degree summer heat, as the dust clouds clogged my nostrils, and the sun blistered my newly-shaved head.

Standing a sure 18 inches off of the ground with the aid of an A-frame ladder, with my knees wobbling like I was staring down the slope of Mt. Everest, a tiny voice catches my attention.

"I like to catch Caterpillars. I caught a Caterpillar. These Caterpillars are big, are they? I have good balance, do I? Look at my Caterpillars, will you? I have big feet, do I? It's hot out here, is it?"

Without looking, I was wondering if it was Yoda talking to me, with such peculiar grammatical habits, but it turns out it was a young girl. The daughter of our client with an affinity for caterpillar's, and a callous disregard for using conjunctions properly.

She was 4, I am a writing major, and it was a long, long, long day(s).

It all sort of clouded into one long day, and I lost all concept of time, and all patience regarding...EVERYTHING.

I knew that I had hit rock bottom when their adorable daugters were telling me about the grasshoppers they caught, and the only verbal reply I could think of was, "I....DON'T....CARE!!!!"

I was able to supress my anger, and then their father strolled along, like he always had done, standing a strapping 6'4, 235 and a handle-bar moustache that would make Tom Selleck jealous.

"This nail-hole needs to be re-caulked," he said.

"Yeah? That's weird, because I went over that. 3 times. You're house was poorly constructed, and you are asking me to do the work of the contractors. I am sorry, wood cracks. Splits happen. Imperfections are a part of life, just look at your moustache. Now, I appreciate your suggestion, but I am going to continue working. Oh, and if you spent as much time inspecting your house for nail-holes as you did teaching your daugter grammar lessons, we would all be better off. Good day."

Ok, I didn't actually say that. I just bit my tongue as I thought about how I looked in the garage and saw that this man had enough guns and ammunition to win a war for a third-world country. This is not to mention the fact that he could easily snap my neck into 6 different pieces.

So, I said, "Okay, I'll go over it."

It was the strangest contrast of things. This man was easily one of the most intimidating people I have ever come across, but he was also genuinely nice. Just a very cool, nice guy. A very cool, nice guy who happened to be paying thousands of dollars for his paint-job, and wanted it done right.

He also HATED nail-holes, but who doesn't, really?

"These nail-holes need to be caulked."

Yeah, I got that the first 3 times.

"Mommy doesn't like the paint," said the 4-year-old un-filtered truth teller. Kids say the darndest things.

I found myself in a familiar position, on a ladder, scared to death, with a 4-year-old barking orders to me, telling me about how she likes to make mud-pies, and the fact that, "truthfully Sean, you are doing a SHITTY job on this house."

She never said those exact words, but she may as well have.

My co-worker asked the girl if she likes the paint.

"Yeah. But mommy doesn't. Nope, nope she doesn't."

Too bad mommy writes the checks, not her daugter.

"I write the checks, do I?"

Don't worry, about a thing...

Throughout the job, I disregarded the song, and chose to worry, more often than not, about every little thing. Because every little thing was the farthest thing from alright that I could comprehend.

"Mommy say's the Bob Marley song is misleading."

Seaney agrees.

We ran out of paint. We spilled. I spilled. I painted, sometimes on places that shouldn't have been. Sometimes too much, sometimes too little.

We caulked, until our fingers turned blue, or white, or green, or whatever paint was around.

I can't count on my fingers and toes how many bugs just sat in the pool of fresh paint brushed against the face of the house, dying in the toxic substance, but even worse...I can't count how many bugs died by drowning in the pool of my own sweat on my chest from the longest 3 days of my life.

I watched the bugs withering away in my bodies natural air-conditioning, and again, I found myself envious of their current state.

"You missed a nail-hole up here," said the man that could end my life with his left index finger...without the assistance of his small army of weapons.

"I'll get it."

It was so hard to hate the customer. The customer was always right. The Customer was always picky, and the customer always hated nail-holes. He HATED nail-holes.

It would have been easy to hate the customer, but he really was nice. They were all nice. Very nice people.

He would come outside while we caulked, and painted, and he would talk to us like a fellow college student.

He would have been so EASY to hate, but he made himself likeable, accessable to our 19 year old sense of humor.

He periodically threw out words like "fag, pussy, shit, fuck and cock," that made him seem alot more hip than he probably was.

"College is for pussies," he would say.

"You missed a nail-hole," he would say. Far too often.

He made jokes about our bosses sexuality, we laughed, we disagreed with the Bob Marley song.

"Mommy can't believe you guys are still here. Aren't there some sort of labor laws being broken?"

We genuinely hoped so.

All in all, we wrapped it up last night, as the sun had set, and porch-lights were our only guidance.

Porch-lights from the deck that we didn't get around to staining. Not enough time.

"Mommy says we are just going to do the deck ourselves. Because you guys are taking so damn long, are you?"

As we packed up the last of our undoubtedly insufficient supplies, 3 bodies piled into a small red-pickup. One of them about 8 inches taller than the rest, and undoubtedly less qualified, we shook hands with the handle-bar moustache. Partly excited that we finally finished, completely exhausted and overwhelmingly estatic that we never got to see the ammunition up close, I recieved that HARDEST handshake of my life.

It's like he thought about every nail-hole we missed, every sploch of white we had to re-touch, every year of college education we were about to get, that he never will have, and transferred that sheer agression into one handshake.

As I heard the bones crack in my right hand, and my knuckles shift to a whole new position, I couldn't help but hear an eerily soothing sound in the background.

Don't worry, about a thing. Because every little thing, is gonna be alright.

As we rode off into the sunset, I realized what we just did wasn't quite the Holocaust, but at the time, it felt damn close.


But hey...we're getting paid.

"Mommy says she's glad those painters are gone, is she?"

If you PRETEND to like this blog, you WILL!

Two days after I finished my first year of college, I checked my student E-mail to have a new message sent to every student regarding graduation.

The message was titled "Safe Rides Being Offered Graduation Night."

I read into it, and saw that the community was reaching out to make sure there was no drinking and driving on the night of graduation, and everyone gets home safe. What they failed to mention was the peculiar nature of the ride home:

"The service will be running from approximately 9pm and then continue throught the night. To contact the ride service, call 962-5022. Please note that this is the Loveland's Funeral Home answering service but if you tell them you need a ride, they will dispatch a vehicle to pick you up."

That's right.

A funeral home service giving rides to drunken college kids.

Allegedly* in an effort to retain business in this slouching economy, Loveland Funeral Home actually charged 10$ per decimal point that the graduate was above the .08 legal limit.

As some would expect, this led to some problems.

College Graduate: Yeah, um, I'm gonna need a safe ride home...This is Loveland Funeral Home Service right?

Grim Reaper: Yes...yes it is. Just exactly how many have you had tonight?

College Graduate: Oh, I've only had a few. I'm fine really...I was just playing it safe, ya know?

Grim Reaper: (Disappointed sigh)

CG: Well, I mean...I'm pretty tipsy. Um...one more thing, are you guys gonna send a Hearse or what? I mean it's kinda weird that this is a funeral service turned taxi-cab for drunk college kids, ya know?

Grim Reaper: Look, KID, don't question our process. Now get back to drinking, and call us when you have a REAL PROBLEM. MMMMWWWAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

(Silence)

This conversation may or may not have ACTUALLY taken place, but if you can't find the humor in it, then you have no pulse, and you are most likely the Grim Reaper...in which case I would like to apologize for patronizing you on my internet-diary. Please don't steal my bones.

In the last 3 days, I have come to the conclusion that packing isn't that fun, and that re-packing, and packing again is less fun.

However, there is something relatively joyous about leaving college. Reflecting fondly of the times shared, the annoyances, the laughter, it all comes together in one fabulous collective memory.

Everyone is much nicer in the last 2 days of college, mostly because everyone is elated to not see eachother anymore, so subsequentially, everyone is nice to eachother.

Everyone is nice to eachother, because they hate eachother, and don't want to see eachother for the whole summer...so they're nice to eachother.

Once this starts making sense, that's how I know I've officially become a bad person.

I promised myself that I would not fall into this trap, but in the home-stretch of my first college year, I found myself being NICE to people.

PEOPLE who I do not LIKE.

But I was nice to them...because I didn't have to SEE them anymore...which makes me a BASTARD!

Then I took a step back and realized that all great friendships are started by PRETENDING to like the person that will soon become your "friend".

Once you pretend for so long, you can actually fool yourself to like the person, even though you DESPISE THEIR VERY EXISTENCE.

If you are reading this, shaking your head, rolling your eyes, and rubbing your tummy, stop rubbing your tummy, cuz that's weird. And stop rolling your eyes because YOU KNOW THAT YOU DO IT TOO...SO STOP PRETENDING...YOU PRETENDER!

This is not to say that we do not genuinely like our friends, this is just to say that at first impression, we are all cynical assholes who write internet-blogs, so we must pretend to like eachother, in order to eventually ACTUALLY like eachother.

It's science, really.

And if you refute science, you are Satan, and you should stop reading this blog right now, because if you are satan, and you are sitting at a lap-top, chances are it is a Mac, and you are burning and cursing it, because you are hot, and you are satan, and Mac's are very expensive...so stop that. Stop that right now.


In hindsight, I am now successfully moved out of "heaven," AKA "the dorms," and in an odd way, I miss the lingering stench, the Rockband at 4 a.m. and the pestering from the RA's.

Oh, did I say "miss?" Weird...cuz I meant I am sincerely elated that I never have to live in the communal toilet known as North Hall ever again.

But, in the event that I have to...I will PRETEND to like it for the first 2 months, until I successfully brain-wash myself to actually liking it, and then when I need a ride home, I WILL NOT call the funeral home service, because I will live on campus. Which is convenient, and assures NO confrontation with the Grim Reaper.

Because that guy is a money-hungry, blood-thirsty asshole.

"Loveland's Funeral Service do you plan to die today? How may I help you?"

Every year, the porn industry makes more than the NFL, NBA and MLB combined.

The two words you would least like to hear repeated from your roommate before getting ready for bed:

"Red Bull, Red Bull, Red Bull," except he was doing it in the accent from the commercials, but it is impossible to communicate that via text, so bare with me and stop demanding so much.

The last thing you want to do during a thunderstorm:

A feminism/gender-roles/sexism protest.

The thing that I hate:

A feminism/gender-roles/sexism protest sponsored by Red Bull.

Well, today there was a protest being held in the campus courtyard, and I am still not certain as to what exactly they were protesting, and I'm pretty sure the protestors had no idea what they were protesting either.

I looked down at the sidewalk, and written in chalk was a stunning statement.

"The pornography industry makes more money on a yearly basis than the MLB, NBA and NFL combined."

So, I stopped staring at the girls butt in front of me, and decided to let this annoying fat woman holding index cards and a Kazoo talk to me about some pointless protest she has.

Without asking to be spoken to, this lady walks up to me, very intrusively, and says "Did you know that sexual harassment didn't even have a definition until the mid-80's?"

After I picked my jaw up off the concrete, I was able to relay to this woman how genuinely disinterested I was by saying, "Nope. Weird."

Apparently to her that meant, "NO WAY!!!?? Please, do go on!"

She rambled off several other sentences involving the words "gender," "sex," and "apple," and after I was done pretending to listen, I asked her if the statement written in sidewalk chalk was true.

"Yes it is true! The porn industry is a huge money-maker! It's disgusting, really."

I concurred with her statement, and I was genuinely puzzled, thinking either America really likes watching people have sex, or commissioner Goodell and Stern have some serious work to do. I think it is probably a combination of both.

After the lady thanked me for my time, I continued to walk back to the dorm's, but I couldn't help but notice the random Kazoo's being played by the protestors. Some were talking to students, some were writing on the sidewalk, some were just standing there, blowing their Kazoo's.

Over, and over, and over, and in-between Kazoo blows, they would spout random words like "Pornography!" (Kazoo) "Women's rights!" (Kazoo) "Sexism!" (Kazoo).

This was my first protest on a college campus that I had involuntarily been a part of, and I have to say I am sincerely hoping it is the last.

To put the cherry on top of this wonderful protest, I walked into the Snack Bar, when two young children strolled in, holding a series of balloon art, unmistakably resembling a penis. The innocent children were thrilled to have found such a multi-colored, fun toy, but it was unmistakably...a penis.

Many people in the snack bar seemed stunned that this young boy was proudly carrying such a phallic toy, but in my head, I just thought it was hilarious.

Obviously, a protestor must have walked up to the child and said, "Hey little boy, do you want some balloons?"

Then the little boy said, "Sure."

Then the protestor said, "Okay, but first you have to promise me you will never view pornography, or ever use the word bitch, and you must accept Hilary Clinton as the second coming of christ."

This kid was obviously wise beyond his years, as he replied, "It's funny you say that, because I have a poster of Oprah Winfrey hanging in my room right now. Now give me the fucking balloons."

As I was observing this child's innocence being ripped from his grasp with every bounce of the balloons against his un-knowing palms, I realized it was pouring rain outside.

The sidewalk chalk slowly dripped away, the Kazoo's were drowned out, the protestors fled for shelter and everyone went back to not caring about gender-roles.

Suddenly, everything was right in the world.

In Honor of the NBA finals tipping off tomorrow, I would like to post this video again, and remind you that the Lakers will win in 6 games.

Enjoy.