textfiles/groups/CDC/cDc-0256.txt

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  ...presents...                  Fecal George
                                                         by David Humphrey

                      >>> a cDc publication.......1994 <<<
                        -cDc- CULT OF THE DEAD COW -cDc-
  ____       _     ____       _       ____       _     ____       _       ____
 |____digital_media____digital_culture____digital_media____digital_culture____|

PRELUDE
-------

     During my freshman year at Purdue, some idiot living on my floor of our
residence hall foolishly stated he would allow his head to be shaved for $100 -
right down to the scalp.  A few of the guys on the floor organized a collection
process and quickly raised the money.  The event became what we termed "a floor
function" and guests were invited to attend.  The whole thing took place one
evening around seven o'clock or so with about thirty guests there.  It was a
really popular floor function and no harm was done to anyone's image or pride.
But that's not the story.

     Here's the story:

THE SETUP
--- -----

     About a year later, I was a sophomore living on that same floor and we
starting talking about tasteless things we'd do if the money was right.  Some
guy mentioned that the previous year we had a great floor function wherein a
floor member shaved his head (allowed it to be shaved, actually) for $100.
Other guys said there's no way in hell they'd shave their head for a scant
$100; it would take hundreds or thousands of dollars for them to do it.  Then
some guy (me!) says, "What would it take for you to eat a spoonful of shit?"
Huge sums of money were now being discussed for this tasteless feat.  A million
dollars was a real common figure.

     So my friend, George, decides to open his big, stupid mouth (oops!
foreshadowing).  George says something along the lines of, "I'd never let
somebody shave my head but I'd probably eat a spoonful of shit for $50."

     "Really, George?  $50?  Are you serious?"

LOGISTICAL MATTERS
---------- -------

     Yep, George was serious.  And before George had a chance to change his
mind, the fund raising gears were set in motion.  Word went out that another
floor function was being planned for next week sometime.  A "lottery" or sorts
was held (The Feces Lottery was my idea.  We were faced with two problems: we
didn't have $50 for George and we didn't have any shit for him to eat.  I
solved both problems in one brilliant moment.).  For the low, low price of just
$1, you could buy one chance at winning the Feces Lottery (For $5, you got six
chances.).  After we had the $50, we placed the names of the contributors in a
trash can.  We drew out two names.  One of the "winners" declined his prize and
we drew another name.  We now had our two lottery winners and, you guessed it,
those two winners got to be the Feces Donors.

     George made us agree that the feces in question had to be of a somewhat
"normal" variety.  Nothing green and runny, no diarrhea, nothing with high
corn-content... standard requests for this sort of thing, I guess.  That's why
we had two lottery winners; we decided to give George his choice.  We told the
lottery winners they couldn't do things like eat a bunch of prunes, have Taco
Bell for five days straight, etc.  This was, after all, a floor function and we
would like to keep things friendly.

     The day before the floor function was to take place, the two lottery
winners were escorted from their rooms (one at a time) by part of the fund
raising committee.  Each was sent into a bathroom that had been certified
"feces free" with only a medium-sized cup (We had to be sure that no illegal
feces made it to the big event).  After each of the winners finished his
assigned task and departed the bathroom, the cup was sealed and placed into the
refrigerator of the most honest guy living on the floor for overnight
safe-keeping.

THE STAGE IS SET
--- ----- -- ---

     Although attendance was strictly by invitation only, we had a huge crowd -
well over 100.  George was escorted into the elevator lobby (where all our
floor functions took place) as if he was a king.  The crowd shouted and cheered
upon his entrance.  George was placed center stage complete with homemade bib
and a big glass of water.  He was sober, upon insistence of the fund raising
committee.  After giving George about five minutes to sweat in front of the
crowd, The Feces Fetcher made his way into the lobby - with one cup in each
hand held proudly over his head.  The crowd went wild.  The chants of "GEORGE!!
GEORGE!!  GEORGE!!  GEORGE!!" reached a deafening level.  The soup spoon was
brought forward by another member of the fund raising committee.  In accordance
with the rules, the two cups of feces were presented to George for his perusal
and, ultimately, his decision.  This is where I became somewhat concerned about
George - about his physical well being, not his mental well being.  Mentally, I
knew he was already scarred for life and nothing could change that now.  I
thought if he could live until morning we could get him home to his parents at
the end of the semester and they could deal with the long-term mental damage.

     After a hesitation of about ten seconds, George, pale-faced and covered
with sweat, picked the cup on his left.  The crowd roared again: "GEORGE!!
GEORGE!!  GEORGE!!  GEORGE!!"  Still following the rules, The Feces Fetcher
spooned up a good helping for George.  The spoon was then handed to George, who
was still wearing his bib and had a big glass of water in his other hand.  The
rules stated George had to do the following to get his $50 reward: insert spoon
w/ feces into mouth, remove spoon from mouth clean of feces, show the crowd the
clean spoon, swallow feces so as to remove it from mouth, and display empty
mouth to crowd by sticking out tongue and saying "awwww" like you do at the
doctor's office.  After that he could then eat or drink as he wished.  He also
had to keep it down for at least ten minutes - we figured after ten minutes if
he wanted to send it back through his mouth the other way, that was fine with
us, but he didn't get any extra money for it.

     George then raised the spoon w/ feces to eye level at arms length from
his body.  He made a couple of wide sweeping arcs in front of his body with
the spoon so that everyone in the crowd could get a good look at the winning
feces.  It was here that I could tell George *really* didn't want to go through
with this thing.  He was wondering about the consistency.  "Will it be like
pudding or more like... what?  Will I notice the smell?  How much of it will
get stuck between by teeth?  Will I have bad breath the rest of the night?  Am
I going to double over and throw up saliva-covered human feces in front of
these people who don't really even know me?  How did I get myself into this
mess?  Can I possibly get out of this?"

     Well, George took a long, hard look at the crowd and knew there was
simply no way to back down.  I almost felt sorry for the guy.  Just thinking
of what he was about to do made my stomach queasy and my knees a little bit
weak - and I used to deliver roadkill to my "friends" back when I was in high
school.

     After everyone had a good look at the feces-covered spoon, George held it
straight in front of his face, about a foot from the tip of his nose.  He
took a deep breath and brought the spoon to his opened mouth - and stopped.
The spoon went back to being a foot from the tip of his nose and his eyes sort
of rolled up to the top of his head.  I thought he was gone for sure.  He then
steadied himself, took another deep breath, forced the spoon into his mouth,
(flash! flash! flash! from all the cameras in the lobby) closed his mouth and
his eyes, and then withdrew a nice, clean soup spoon from his mouth.  We all
held our breath and just watched.  He inhaled more air through his nose and
swallowed hard.  Then in one instant, his eyes opened, his mouth opened, his
tongue stuck out of his mouth and he rolled his head back so we could see
inside his mouth.  It was empty.  George then took another deep breath and
gulped down the entire glass of water.  Two people in the crowd got sick and
had to go outside.  George made his way down to the bathroom where he had
toothbrush and toothpaste waiting.

THE EPILOGUE
--- --------

     My friends and I made our way back to our end of the floor.  We couldn't
really believe that he had done it - "and only for $50," we said.  "What an
idiot," we said.  We were then discussing whether he would get sick before
morning.  Or would he kill himself tonight while we slept?  Would he ever do
anything that stupid again?  Would he ever eat shit again for $50?  Certainly
not, we decided.  We could tell it had been a traumatic experience for him.
And we knew he'd never be the same.

     Then as four or five of us wee standing around talking outside our rooms,
George came out of the bathroom and started walking toward us (his room was
at the other end of the floor).  He came down and leaned up against the wall
next to us.  Everyone was speechless.  Silence.  Then I finally said, "George,
I can't believe...."

     But I was cutoff in mid-sentence as George belched.  "Oh, excuse me."
 _______  __________________________________________________________________
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  (' ')  |            Save yourself!  Go outside!  DO SOMETHING!            |
   (U)   |==================================================================|
  .ooM   |Copyright (c) 1994 cDc communications and David Humphrey.         |
\_______/|All Rights Reserved.                               05/01/1994-#256|