JIHAD IN MY NECK

Rev. Ivan Stang

OUCH!!

DON'T GET OLD! That is my message to the youth of today.

I'm only 48 and I managed to fuck myself up pretty well, BY ACCIDENT, with ZERO preparation or planning, using NO extra tools or household objects, not even a hard floor or wall. In fact I was stark naked at the time. Yet I managed to injure my back, using NOTHING but my BACK ITSELF. PROOF that I am a SUBGENIUS. Or OLD.

This is the kind of thing that happens to old folks -- not to young spry handsome whippersnappers like me! All I was doing was shampooing my hair, in the shower. It's all thinned out so it's not even HEAVY hair any more. Had both my arms up, my hands rubbing the shampoo into my grotty scalp, not with any particular force. Somehow, my left arm, right arm, and BACKBONES, or perhaps the muscles attached between them all, stopped working in unison. One of the three pulled at odds to the other two. I don't even know which was the culprit. Something "spazzed out" back there. Like a cramp in the wrong dimension, a cramp that made no sense. It's not an oft-repeated motion or anything strenuous or unusual, like, say, trying to stand on my head. But whatever happened, the SECOND it happened, I KNEW I had FUCKED MYSELF. I could just tell that something important had slid out of place back there, something which had NEVER BEFORE in 48 years so much as BUDGED, and that it wasn't going to just simply slide back into its nice slot where it came from.

Don't you hate that, when some part of you goes missing or is suddenly BROKEN -- that sickening realization that this isn't going to just go away in a couple of hours, that, indeed, it's gonna be a PERMANENT CHANGE on some level?

Euuuugh.

This happened last Wednesday night. I took Ibuprophen and went to bed, but the next day my whole back and neck felt BAD WRONG. I tried working at my computer but my lower back felt like a half-broken-up fryer-chicken whose parts had not yet been separated with a knife, but whose bones had been cracked in preparation. And my neck, where it has to hold my huge, John-Merrick-like skull upright, felt like a little house made of dominoes that was being held up by one tiny chip of a corner of a bottom domino -- a cornerstone was out of kilter and on the very verge of letting the whole thing tumble. That's how my NECK felt.

That same afternoon I had to go to my latest dermatologist, so he could see how much the special new creams and ointments had helped the mystery spots on my lips. They had helped, but not enough. So he took a BIOPSY. He gave my lower lip a shot, which hurt like HELL, and then SNIPPED OFF a SAMPLE of a LIP-BUMP and cauterized the wound. I couldn't feel a thing.. THEN. But I could smell the smoke and see it curling up from the wound. And they way he had to TUG to get that little sample out... ((SHUDDER))...

On the way home, my lip started to hurt like the proverbial "sumbitch," and my back and neck had gotten acheyer and acheyer, and the Ibuprophen wasn't helping, so I bought some BEER! Compared to many SubGenii, I'm a real straight arrow, so purchasing beer is a sign of desperation on my part. Normally, purchasing beer is something I talk myself out of on a daily basis.

The beer WORKED until the evening. Then it gave me a TERRIBLE HEADACHE. And the next day I felt even worse, and tried to drink beer again, but when you're normally a teetotaller, the side effects from that stuff just aren't worth it. Perhaps LESS would have been better than MORE...?

I did manage to finish cutting and polishing the digi-remix of olde Media Barrage 11 -- since someone actually ordered one, that meant I had to finish it!! And I mailed out all the swag that had been ordered that week, and mailed out the show copies.

Then Princess Wei and I left for a weekend at Brushwood, that nice campground where we hold X-Day drills. A.C.E. was throwing a party for members out there inside their brand new "Pufferdome," ESO was playing, and there was a FEAST involving catered steak and crab legs. I figured this would be a good break for my broken back. Instead I got terrible stomach cramps from eating too much. (See "The Jihad in my Pants" by iDRMRSR for details on seizures caused by Northern Ohio dinners.)

A friend of mine was there who is a professional therapeutic masseuse, Rev. Anomie, and after poking around she decided I should go see a chiropractor, but the gentle kind, not the MEAN kind. But I will do ANYTHING to avoid spending a THIN THIN DIME if I can help it.

On the way back home on Sunday, Wei was driving the 3 hours, after having surrounded me with thick hot pads and pillows. I found that my back felt better if I pushed with my legs against the front of the car, so that my back was rammed HARD against the lumpy hot pad. After much experimentation, plus quite a bit of careful interior sensing and "relaxation visualization," New Age style, I felt like I had zeroed in on the actual injured spot -- it seemed like there was SOMETHING, something about the size and resilience of a flattened SUPER-BALL, poking out from between my bones towards the right side. It took about an hour to pinpoint this spot. (I am cognizant that I might well have been imagining all these specific details.) Once I "had" it, I then centered the sandbag-like hot pad directly under the bad spot, and then started PUSHING LIKE HELL again -- pushing my back with ALL MY LEGS' STRENGTH against that lump on the back seat.

After about an hour of concentrated pushing, I mean, HARD pushing, I let off, and the "bad spot" seemed to be BURNING like a little firey coal in my back. But it felt "good" in a weird way.

When we got home, we went straight to bed and watched THE ENGLISH PATIENT, during which my back didn't hurt, but my NECK was KILLING me no matter how I cushioned everything. Then Princess Wei inadvertently distracted me in a way which led to unexpected physical exertion, during which I felt NO PAIN and complete freedom of movement... like a MIRACLE. But then my neck hurt again afterwards. We crashed.

BUT THIS MORNING MY BACK IS OKAY!! There are places that feel BRUISED all up and down it, and my neck is still STIFF, but by Gobbs I don't feel like a broken toy. Either my concentrated self-massage in the car actually WORKED, or somehow I later RELAXED just enough for the bent disk or whatnot to slip back into its rightful place.

WHEW!! I *HATE* the idea of DOCTORS poking around in my BACK. I have already seen that lead to ungodly disasters in people I know.

Hmmm... just typing this for half an hour (I'm slow) has produced a burning sensation in my neck and back again so perhaps I shall go lay down and watch MEMENTO for the 18th time or something. I am really lucky there's no Slavedriver Mustache Man whipping at my back right now. I am pretty sure that if I baby this motherfucker, I won't have to have any EXPERTS looking at it and, uh, "CURING" it with narcotics and surgery.

The moral of the story is, DON'T GET OLD!

Although if you do, watching that movie THE ENGLISH PATIENT will make you feel LUCKY.

*****
That was Monday, now it's Tuesday. My neck was still bad and Wei was home sick so we again lounged about like invalids, watching SID & NANCY (dr: Rev. Alex Cox)** and the re-edited version of MEMENTO.

Yes, I did it. I rented MEMENTO and re-edited it into chronological order. For those unaware of this amazing movie, it's a crime story told backwards about a man with no short term memory. i HAD to unravel the puzzle, and I could do pause edits on my VCRs without straining my back, so that's what I did.

In "normal time," and with the black and white transitional mini-stories about "Sammy Jenkins" removed, it's a remarkably short, simple, and cruel tale. The simple noir story was rearranged in editing in a way that forces one to identify with the brain damaged protagonist -- elevating MEMENTO to major league mind fuck instead of just another weird ass modern crime movie.

The process of re-editing it was ITSELF a major league mind fuck, for me the editor, and, while this did NOTHING to advance the cause of J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, it got my attention off my stiff neck for a couple of hours.

Now I must get back to work. I will work on the old new SubG books and the new old SubG books.

Please inspect our Scatalog and see what you can buy from us to help the War Effort. There are several old new and new old CDs.

** SUBGENIUS TRIVIA -- direct references to the Church were filmed for SID & NANCY, but ended up on the cutting room floor. The scene IS, however, in the book of the script, along with frame grabs of the excised scene. Sid (Gary Oldman) is walking on the street with a friend, all depressed, and says something like, "Everything sucks... I'm gonna join the Church of the SubGenius."
"What's that."
"A cult in America where they worship this millionairre named "Bob" ..."
"Sid, you're fucked."....

... something like that. Director Alex Cox is a pal of St. Palmer Vreedeez, that's the connection.

--
4th Stangian Orthodox MegaFisTemple Lodge of the Wrath of Dobbs Yeti,
Resurrected
P.O. Box 181417, Cleveland, OH 44118 (fax 216-320-9528)
A subsidiary of:
The SubGenius Foundation, Inc. / P.O. Box 140306, Dallas, TX 75214
SubSITE: http://www.subgenius.com PRABOB
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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: "Evangela" <evangela2000@mediaone.net>
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Tue, Oct 2, 2001 5:22 PM
Message-ID: <9pdcm002bkf@enews3.newsguy.com>

"Two Beans" <twobeans@godhatesyou.com> wrote in message
news:hn5krto0huur6vnesduee746vsfosrb7mg@4ax.com...
> On Tue, 02 Oct 2001 12:20:18 -0400, "Rev. Ivan Stang"
> <stang@subgenius.com> wrote:
>
> *snippage of broke backbone rant*
>
> Stang, my nental ife musta got stuck in your peanut butter....cuz my
> back's been just as fucked for the past few days. Been taking
> ibuprofen 800 mg tablets like m&m's. Sunday I felt like I had an
> involuntary kidney removal, sans waking up in a bathtub of ice with
> staples in my back.
>
> Proof that you don't have to be old, just MORTAL. I'm only 23 and my
> own shell kicks my ass once in a while. I wish they'd come up for a
> cure for the human body.
>
Me too, 23 but I come from sickly, wimpy, never hafta join the service
genes. I get aches, pains and ouchies like I am 40 sometimes. Everytime it
rains I get old lingery broken bone reminder pains, and when I wake up EVERY
MORNING my feet hurt for an hour or so. My Papa looked like wimpy from
popeye cartoons, I BLAME HIM. i would heed stang's advice and avoid getting
old but I just can't wait til my face turns into a cartoon, dan pointed this
out as a positive side to getting old, all the lines get deeper and the skin
gets looser, cool, it's like a science experiment in my head. i think dan
has a point, old people just look more interesting.

feel better stang and 2beenz!

-evangela

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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: iDRMRSR <alex.i.thymia@depression.org>
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Tue, Oct 2, 2001 7:26 PM
Message-ID: <6B792F10BA251E41.4694D41D7B34A936.E7A8C6325F739E23@lp.airnews.net>

>>snip snip<<

Hey, Stang, I think I'm just a couple years older than you. Hmm, I've
been through this kind of thing especially as it relates to the NECK.
You've seen me, and I hardly have a NECK at all. But under similar
circumstances (I was asleep at the time) various important anatomic
parts of my cervical spine pyroflatulated upon themselves leaving me in
great pain upon simply arising out of bed. Yes, my neck fucked itself
up while I was sleeping. Imagine that.

If you have any numbness or loss of sensation/tingling in your fingers,
toes, limbs etc, OR when you cough and sneeze it feels like you're
riding Old Smokey (the Ohio Electric Chair) because you just jump
halfway cuz of electrical shock and halfway cuz of pain, GIT YERSELF to
a good MD pronto. If you shut your eyes and hold your arms out, and
then try to get your left index finger to touch your nose and then try
with your right index finger without looking, and you can't do both
sides, that's a problem, too. Them is bad signs! Make sure your Blue
Cross is all paid up, too. If you git it in time, they can fix it,
screw the expense.

Lookit me! I have about 40 grand worth of labor, dead man's bone and
titanium holding up my miserable skull, but I can still WALK and move my
LEFT ARM! Which are two things somebody else would be doing for me if I
didn't see the doc when I did. Once your disks slip, they just squish
down on them spaghetti strands of nerves until they turn into like
pah-tay (pate). Then you GOTTA get a surgeon to jack the vertebrae
apart and put in new shims to prevent further squishing.

Hopefully all you got is a damn strain of some sort but it's unusual for
a stiff neck to last more than a couple of days. If it's a strain and
you exercise or Yogasize, that could help, but if your spaghetti has
been mashed in there, the exercise could make it much worse. Could be
time to call in a perfeshunul!

Take care...

[*]
-----
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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: Kevan Smith <cuthulu@shreve.net>

On Tue, 2 Oct 2001 15:34:29 -0400, prostata@bronze.coil.com (The
Stinking Bishop Prostata Cantata MP) wrote:

> one word I never thought I would hear myself say: YOGA

Hey Boo Boo, how about we go get us a pic-a-nic basket? Keep an eye
out for the Ranger.

--
Kevan Smith (featuring Larry Fine)
I request a weekend in Havana with Phil Silvers!
2 October 2001
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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: Hulkturds@crappagammabrick.ouch (HellPope Huey)

In article <021020011220184504%stang@subgenius.com>, "Rev. Ivan Stang"
<stang@subgenius.com> wrote:

> Don't you hate that, when some part of you goes missing or is suddenly
> BROKEN -- that sickening realization that this isn't going to just go
> away in a couple of hours, that, indeed, it's gonna be a PERMANENT
> CHANGE on some level?

OH WELL MAYBE JUST A FUCKING LITTLE BIT WWHUUARRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH BUT I
AIN'T WHINING NO MORE 'CAUSE THE MENINBLACK SAID I'D HAVE TO RIDE THE
LIGHTNING IN A THING IF I DID AND I HATE WALKING THAT WAY UNTIL THE BURNS
CLOSE UP SO I AIN'T SLACK SLACK OK

HellPope Huey, hellpopehuey@subgenius.com
Trio of Ocularly-Deficient Rodents
Slashed by Psychotic Housefrau, Pg. 7

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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: Hulkturds@crappagammabrick.ouch (HellPope Huey)

BTW, I been a hobbling mess for a few years now, speaking from a
musculo-skeletal perspective in THIS ONE INSTANCE. Factor in knee tendons
bein' sewn back together and a recent whiplashing and, well, when I creak
outta bed every morning, it sounds like demon monkeys are going at my
joints with cricket bats. Lucky you, you got OVER yours. Nothing like a
buncha pulled cables to make you SMILE AND TAP-DANCE LIKE A MUFUH. And
then that damned commercial for CDs of Christian songs came on and I
pulled another'n. I'm glad you're healed you old fart and I'm another'un,
yizzir.

HellPope Huey, hellpopehuey@subgenius.com
Trio of Ocularly-Deficient Rodents
Slashed by Psychotic Housefrau, Pg. 7

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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: opalpeacok@aol.com.net (Salacia the Overseer)
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Wed, Oct 3, 2001 12:43 PM
Message-ID: <20011003124349.07138.00000393@mb-mq.aol.com>

My whammy is bigger than your whammy!
Take this!

The X-ist Saints command you, cunning mathemagicians and all of the human
agents of NHGHEE, to stop confusing yourself and to keep you from annoying
yetikind; to stop persecuting the Church of the SubGenius, to stop tormenting
"Bob"'s elect and sifting them as seeds from 'frop. This is the command made to
you by the Most High "Bob", with Whom in your haughty insolence you still
pretend to be equal; the "Bob" Who will have all yeti to be $aved, and to come
to the knowledge of the Rupture.

So there! *raspberries* beep, beep, neener~ neener~

(Thanks to John Starrett for his Excorcisms Suitable for Use by the Laity
link.)

Headmistress Salacia the Overseer
Branch Salacians
Director of Programming, Keeper of the Seven Squeals, keanuphobe
http://www.members.aol.com/opalpeacok/TheCompound.html
---------------------------------------------------------

Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: "Rev. Ivan Stang" <stang@subgenius.com>

HALLELUIAH!!! All of a sudden, not only did the last vestige of my neck
ache vanish, but my right hand grew a sixth finger, and I got THREE
power-boners, I mean, purple-veined diamond-cutters with YOUR NAME on
them, two of which STILL won't go away! And the fucking STOCK MARKET
started going back up again!

You can do THAT again, ANY time, honey! HOOO-hah! Andale arriba!
KREEGAH BUNDOLO!!

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Subject: Re: Jihad in my Neck
From: info <info@iprc.org>
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Reply-To: info@iprc.org
Date: Thu, Oct 4, 2001 3:04 AM
Message-ID: <3BBC0A19.A5B36890@iprc.org>

(*snip*)

One day a week I temp at a fancy Persian carpet store. My co-worker there
is a guy about my age (near 40) who has a lot more stress than I do, and
from time to time his back starts to bug him. Now, he's a shortish,
stocky, kinda heavyset Italian guy -- which I've got to tell you so you'll
get the full mental picture here -- and what he does is goes over to a
stack of carpets and starts judo flipping himself onto the rugs, just
slamming the living fuck out of his back. Every time he does this, he
gives out a grunt, or an "OH YEAH!!" This whole torrid scene looks like
one of Steve Martin's self-fights in "All of Me," except starring John
Belushi. Usually all I can see behind the counter where I sit is just his
feet flying up in the air like the finale of a 1930s comic strip where
Jiggs is shocked by something Maggie just said.

I do not recommend this unless you post pictures to alt.binaries.slack.

Yes, the aches of getting old suck. On the plus side, I seem to be going
deaf, and I am really, really happy about it. When people ask "what sense
would you be willing to give up..." I don't even let 'em finish before I
say "HEARING!" Hasten the day when I am at last stone cold DEEF, and no
longer have to listen to these gott-verdammt kids and their screwy
"music". One fine day, when some motherhubbard is really pissing me off, I
will just turn off my hearing aid and SMILE in pure bliss!

Ignatz Topolino

Ride Theorist
33rd Degree Rollercoastafarian, Sexton and Thereminister,
Second Metropolitan Church of the Art of Jesus Christ the Conductor
---

"Je suis Marxiste, tendance Groucho."

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Original file name: Jihad in my Necka - converted on Thursday, 20 December 2001, 03:30