There’s a program on my I-pod called Cool Facts. Some of the information is really cool, other bits of information were just a waist of time. How a slinky was invested, you can lead a cow upstairs but not down. That makes me wonder if a country kid snuck a cow into his two-story schoolhouse how do you get it out – or do you just plan a barbeque? I guess that doesn’t matter because a school now days have to be handicap accessible and not being able to walk downstairs is a handicap. So most likely they would have an elevator.
One fact I saw the other day was that in Japan they had a national contest involving who could fart the loudest and longest. Now this information is cool to a little boy and some immature adults. I know, your hoping I’m not writing a story about this! Sorry – so here we go. Now this would be important to me because this is one area I could have been a national champion. When I was a kid I didn’t know what it was called or why it happened, but I’m lactose intolerant. This is a fancy way of saying dairy products give me gas.
Now its just uncomfortable – well I’m sure it was back then too, but as a kid you hardly ever thought about holding it in. In the right situations it was even a desired ability to produce at a moments notice. At my age now you would say I’m a little more couth – or maybe I just can’t trust the results of such an event. In my case it’s not just dairy products that I have a problem with – I mean there are certain foods that everyone has problems with. One of these is sauerkraut. I love sauerkraut, and the best thing with a krautdog is a glass of milk. Mom made the best homemade sauerkraut I’ve ever had, then added with dairy – I guess my stomach would call it the perfect storm.
I mentioned at certain ages this ability is very desirable, one of these ages is twelve - especially as a boy scout sitting around a campfire. I’m sure most older people have seen the movie “Blazing Saddles” and their famous campfire scene. Now this may be how cowboys do it, but scouts take it to the next level. Having gas is a natural event and in a way could be considered natural gas. In our furnace natural gas gives off a pleasant light blue flame, well the same is true for the other kind of gas as well – thus blue darts got their name.
Now scoutmasters try to tell the scouts about the time a kid received internal burns – I don’t know if that ever happened but I speak from experience and as a witness that the other parts are true. If you sit just right and hold a lit match a short distance from the explosion the natural gas is indeed flammable and blue. Of course it’s something you only want to do at night – otherwise it would be like lighting fireworks in the daytime. As a scoutmaster I tried to stop the kids from participating, which was hard when the assistant scoutmaster grabbed the matches and joined in. The longer and more powerful the excretion - the larger and longer the flame. I’ll admit as a kid the first time I was a little scared and only participated after seeing the other boys do it. I’ve seem this phenomenon a few times as a kid and just about as many times as a scoutmaster. For some reason things like this seem to be passed down for generations.
This isn’t the only time being able to perform at will was a benefit. As teenagers hanging out with the guys it seems to be a opportunity to show you are still a little kid in a big body. One time we were driving around in my friends VW Bug and I got stuck in the back. I asked them to open the windows because it was a little stuffy. One of the guys didn’t want to because he was cold; well I knew how to solve that problem. Of course every time he tried to roll them back up the perfect storm from dinner came to the rescue.
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