I remember with great fondness the all-nighters I pulled with Paul, George and NeerajS in Davis library for some obscene chemistry exam. Part of the excitement was the prospect of actually learning something from Paul (I wasn't much of a classroom-attender, which caused problems with some professors, cause apparently the fact that I was paying them tuition wasn't enough ... no, they wanted me to attend classes The nerve!) while the other half was the excitement of what tangents we might discuss while "studying."

One night while we were studying, Paul mentioned that consuming wood alcohol would lead to blindness and maybe even death. Of course, being the smartass, George remarked, "Yeah, but I bet you'd get f'ed up real good before you went blind." That elicited a few laughs before silence fell over the table.

As I'm starting to skim over the same paragraph I've been reading for roughly 20 minutes, George remarks, "Goddamnit, Paul. My lab has a bunch of wood alcohol. Now everytime I work with it, I'm going to think about taking a little sip."

It's just like when the little voice in your head says something, and curiosity gets the best of you. The thought becomes louder and louder in your mind, and it consumes you. Of course, George was never actually dumb enough to try consuming wood alcohol, but I remember I got a few good chuckles in later labs whenever I had to do something with wood alcohol (much to my lab partner's bewilderment).

In any case, I was doing yardwork today when my dad remarked that the area under the hedges in our yard was a primo spot for poison ivy. Curious, I crouched down under our hedges, and sure enough ... there was TONS of poison ivy!

Now, I've never gotten poison ivy before in my life (I've also never broken a bone even with the nasty bike spills I took as a young'un), so I've always wondered whether I was "immune" to poison ivy. I would imagine all the time I spent traipsing around in the woods when I was younger would lead me to brush up against poison ivy or poison oak at least once... or was I just fortunate?

The little voice in my mind started saying, "Hey Roy ... take those gloves off, and rub the poison ivy on your arm! Then you'll really find out if you're immune to it or not!" At first, being a responsible adult (*cough cough cough*), I immediately discounted the thought. But the more I stood there and stared at the shiny poison ivy, the more the idea made sense. It was like the echo chamber...except every time the idea got louder and louder, and I started to trick myself into thinking it was a good idea.

Shouldn't we know these types of things? Shouldn't I know whether I'm allergic to bee stings (never been stung before) or poison ivy? It could be useful, some day! What if a situation arises where someone needs to run into an area infested with poison ivy to retrieve an errantly-thrown football? I could easily volunteer for the dangerous task, thus earning the respect of my compatriots.

Anyways, I must of been squatting there for only a moment or two before my mom came over and inquired what I was doing. I explained to her that I was thinking of taking a little bit of poison ivy and rubbing it on my arm to see if I was allergic to it, and she went ballistic.

Calm down, mom. I was only joking... or was I?

Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them