I woke straight up out of a coma and....

This is me trying to put the best scar forward.

If you read my December blog, you know what happened -- you know, the midget with the butter knife. I was drunk sitting in my favorite bar (The Hard Times and Misery Saloon), and the little guy pissed me off. He just stood there lookin at my shorts when I was talking to him.

I asked him, "why don't you look me in the eye?"

He said, "because I don't look up to scum like you, dickhead. Anyway, aren't I'a lookin you in the eye?"

Everybody laughed, and that's when I punched him on top the head -- the little fucker.

He pulled out his butter knife then -- and IT WAS ON.

You all don't really believe this, do you? I was just funnin ya. It was just a boring surgery, but be careful, cause I like to tell whoppers.

What really happened was emergency surgery for an exploded colon. (I had a cancer the size of a football. It was really gross. I was fecal vomiting -- that's when you throw up turds. But don't worry, it only happens when you have a football sized cancer keeping you from poopin). I was out, comatose for days. I was very, very sick, but I was too scared to die. I was so sick someone called for the priest. I hadn't seen a priest in years, but someone called one. It was only Gage and I in the room when the priest came in.

This is what Gage told me happened, "yeah, you woke straight up out of the coma. You had been out for days. Nobody thought you were going to make it. The doctors wouldn't look anyone in the eye when they talked-- and you know what that means. So we called the priest. He came with his oil and priest things. I don't know about Catholic stuff. Well, anyway he started putting oil on you and you began to moan. Then he mumbled some prayers. I don't know what he was saying. Gawd, Catholics are weird. Well, about that time he started to ask you in a loud voice, 'do you renounce Satan? Do you renounce Satan?' You woke straight up out of the coma and looked at him with his oil and priest stuff, and you said,'WAAT?' I damn near cracked up. He asked again--real serious, "do you renounce Satan?"

You looked at him for a while and asked, 'Father, am I going to die?'

He said, 'I don't want to worry you, but it doesn't look good.'

Then you said, 'Well, Father, if I'm going to die, I don't think it's a good idea for me to go around making me any new enemies."

Look, mom, a human Chia Pet.

I am William Sharum......(what a moment of self-awareness, to suddenly wake up in a modified body, a body sent through a demolition derby of whirling dervishes with sharp knives. They fixed it where I would die another day, and not on their stainless steel table or in their hospital.)

The last thing I remember was, "sign this paper or die."

The bag on my side covers my new poop chute. Friends and family were glad to hear I survived my rip-me-a-new-asshole surgery. My pipes have been moved around to where I no longer sit and shit. I figure over the past year it had saved me 20 minutes a day x 365... that's a savings of three days on the pot. WoW! Everybody should have this done; think of the time you'd save, and the money to be saved on wipe! Over a period of ten years you'll accumulate thirty days -- one month! Use it any way you want: go on vacation; sleep through July; drive to Alaska-- any way you want.

Little kids spot the bump under the shirt right away; immediately wanting to know "what's you packin?" They aren't afraid to ask. I love it when they do, particularly when their parents aren't around. I tell them I use to eat watermelon seeds, and one of them took root. It grew and grew and before I knew it, I had a giant watermelon in my gut. I then show them the scar. I tell them how the doctors took big knives and big forks and dug it out. I wince, whimper, and cry when I tell them. (sort of a re-enactment). They wince in sympathy. I tell them it hurt like hell, and I remind them not to eat watermelon. Then I laugh. They always cut a skeptical eye toward me then. Every once in a while, one of them will ask, "didn't they knock you out?"

I tell them I didn't have any money, and "that's what they do to broke people."

They know they are being bullshitted, but all the evidence of the real story is still there, at which point they'll ask to see it again. They never know what to think. The memory of me will stay for a while in their consideration of the strangeness of the wide world, and in their bad dreams. In a few years they'll figure it out and realize they'd been had by the fat man with the scar.

Someday, when I'm really feeling sorry for myself, I'll tell you all of what a groveling financial humiliation my life has become. Watch for: Hardscrabble Days.