Six Days of Absolute Heck

Happy Wednesday, friends. Today I'm sharing an intriguing little piece from former journalist, Michael Seese. Michael has written a collection of ghost stories, Haunting Valley, as well as two non-fiction books Scrappy Business Contingency Planning and Scrappy Information Security. He invites you to "laugh with him or at him" at his blog after you read the short piece he's sharing with us today, Six Days of Absolute Heck. Enjoy!

Six Days Of Absolute Heck

By Michael Seese

I was hung over. Hell, I might have still been drunk. That rum sure packed a punch. Or maybe it was the punch, packed with rum. Maybe that’s where the term “punch-drunk” comes from. Maybe I shouldn’t be so focused on etymology or what caused my current state, but rather the current state itself. What exactly was I doing wearing a nun’s habit and a gun belt, strapped to the hood of an Isuzu Trooper doing 100 miles per hour over the I-480 bridge?

Not again, I thought.

Actually, it wasn’t a thought. I said it out loud, though “out loud” is relative when strapped to the hood of an Isuzu Trooper doing...well, I already covered that.

I knew the “why” and I knew the “who.” What I wanted to know were the “what the f-” and the “where.” To the zoo? No, they already did that...was it Monday? This past week had been one long, trying, hazy blur.

Yes, Monday was the zoo. They gave me a friar’s cut and locked me inside of the primate house. Unfortunately, it wasn’t my head which got “the treatment.” It was...um...the other end. And it wasn’t a cut. It was a Brazilian wax. Ouch-ie! I am so not looking forward to that hair growing back in. The baboons didn’t find it funny in the least.

Tuesday was karaoke night at the Ugly Broad Saloon. I had to sing Britney Spears’s “...Baby One More Time.” Worse, I had to wear the outfit she wore in the video: the grey sweater-ette, the midriff-baring white oxford shirt, the plaid miniskirt, and the grey hose. Thank goodness I didn't have to do any corresponding costume changes; I had no idea where to find a pink jog bra. And as if all of that were not bad enough, I had to mimic her dance moves perfectly, or oops!…do it again. It took me three tries to get it right.

Wednesday, I had to sit in a confessional booth, and just moan. With a German accent. For five minutes. They timed me.

Thursday? Oh yeah, on Thursday I had to don full monk’s garb--but with pink pumps instead of sandals--and stand on Public Square wearing a sandwich board that read “Repent! The End Is Near!” on one side and “Kick Me!” on the other. Every 15 minutes I had to cast it aside, yell “flash mob!” and try to convince everyone around me to line-dance. And, boy, did that flannel robe really itch, especially in the certain area that was still recovering from Monday.

But I think Friday was the worst. I spent the night in a movie theater passing a collection plate back and forth across the aisles. Had it been the local Cineplex, it wouldn’t have been so bad. But it wasn’t. Naturally, it was a theater where they show blue movies. I don’t even want to think about what the hands that put the money into the plate had been touching before they went fishing for their change. I did manage to collect $4.52, plus 26 tokens which (I later learned) are for the private viewing booths. I sure hope I can use them at the batting cages or Chuck E. Cheese. I don’t want to have to come back here to spend them, since spending them is one of the requirements.

So what will my next “adventure” be? I have no idea. I can only pray that it won’t permanently scar me. Thank goodness this is the last day. I hate “Heck Week.” Let me tell you, the seniors in seminary school can be real assholes.