One of the funniest stories I have EVER read

[CoolBreeze]

This guy has a great website. He's from Fayetteville WV but now lives in NC. He works as a occupational safety and health consultant by profession, and he owns and operates an independent consulting firm called T2C. He grew up in the community of Jodie WV on the Gauley River in Fayette County, WV – and attended Gauley Bridge High School and (briefly and unproductively) Marshall University.

This is one of the funniest damned stories I have EVER read. Enjoy!

Attack of the Sewer Beast

http://kenthomas.us/?p=452

[AmpedNow]

That was great.

[Dave Allen]

I think I actually went to Marshall with this guy.

[cgarison]

It could have been worse. The mop could have continued to work and the $hitstorm could have come out of the kitchen drain.



KYJ: Finding the darker side to a bleak situation since 1997.

[Hoosier Daddy]

That ... is awesome.

[CoolBreeze]

By the way, Ken worked in radio for a few years before he moved to NC. I havent found out where yet, but I'm guessing Oak Hill-Beckley. He makes this comment:

I enjoyed being a DJ, but once we moved I made a conscious decision not to stay in that line of work. Why not? Well, it doesn’t pay much for starters. Unless you’re a big player in a major market, or get on a syndicated show of some sort, radio doesn’t pay nearly as much as people think it does. Plus, this was the early 90’s and it was already clear that syndication and automation were going to be putting the vast majority of local on-air folks out of work.

Not to mention the fact that being a ‘radio personality’ is really hard on the ego. Seriously. Have you ever listened to someone on the radio for a long period of time, and when you saw a photo of them, or saw them on TV, or met them in person, you felt disappointed? Sure you have. Everybody has. Even if you don’t mean to, you subconsciously build a mental image of what a person looks like based on their voice and their personality. Real people never live up to that image.

So my radio persona at the time was ‘Captain Ken’ (yes, I know it’s lame – it was the early 90’s and it was one of those Wacky Morning Zoo radio shows on a rock station) and for three years of my life, virtually every person I met was profoundly disappointed when they met Captain Ken in person. It gets to you after awhile, trust me. Women used to win contests and things and when they came by the station to pick up their prize, they’d always want to meet Captain Ken. The receptionist would usher them into the studio, I’d introduce myself, and these women would take one look at me and say (I’m not kidding here) “Oh.” Then they’d leave. Quickly.

I am not an animal! I am a DJ!
I am not an animal! I am a DJ!

I felt terrible about it. I always found myself wanting to apologize for being ugly. I mean, it’s not like I’m a hideous boil-infested drooling hunchback or anything. Not most of the time, anyway. A realistic assessment would probably conclude I’m marginally below average in the looks department, but it was clear that whatever people were expecting, I fell far short of the mark. I honestly don’t mind being ugly, but I hated disappointing everyone.




AND FINALLY THIS EXCERPT: I think he has a real point here. Not one young person knows how to cuss anymore.....

......So a few beers would get drunk, and maybe a jar would get passed around, and the stories would get fired up, and the profanity would just be exquisite – especially when Uncle Joe got started. Don’t get me wrong, Joe used the same words as everybody else, but he had a way of drawing out the vowels and really nailing those final consonants that just gave them a little extra oooomph!, you know?

But of course, sequencing and variety has always been the key to good cursing, and Uncle Joe was a master of that as well. When he’d go on a tear, he had this kind of relentless verbal jackhammer thing going, with each term and phrase building on top of the last until finally he’d erected a towering edifice of profanity, right out there in the yard in front of God and everybody.
It was impressive as hell.

When Joe really got going, everybody who happened to be within the blast radius knew about it. Grown men would flinch, women would weep, dogs and cats would flee, birds would fall from the trees and lay stunned on the ground. There was a strong temptation to rend one’s garments and gnash one’s teeth. If there happened to be any wax in your ears, it would melt, run down the side of your head, and stain your shirt collar.

And of course, me and all my cousins would stand around, slack-jawed and awestruck, and dream of the day when we too might cuss like Uncle Joe.

I guess it comes from having been exposed to a genuine Master at such a young age, but I often find myself disappointed and frustrated with the current sad state of profanity. I’m not sure where it happened or why, but the bottom line is that as a culture and as a society, we’ve just lost the knack somehow. I work in the construction business, you know? I’m in a position to be familiar with the current state of the art, and we’re definitely not lacking in terms of quantity. There’s probably more profanity now than at any point in our history, but the quality of our profanity is just pathetic.

Of course, we’re dealing with a younger generation that was largely raised by their mothers, and that may have something to do with it. I’m not a sexist by any means, but let’s be honest, OK? Profanity is predominately a male art form, and is best passed from father to son during sessions of auto repair, while hunting and fishing, mounting stands on Christmas trees, and starting stubborn lawnmower engines. Without that connection, our young males ended up learning profanity from Quentin Tarantino movies, rap music, and The Sopranos. No variety, no ingenuity, no humor in it at all. Just endless F-bomb repetition, basically.

Kids, listen to me for a minute here, OK? F-this, F-that, F-the-other-thing, and just generally trying to cram as many F-words into the sentence as possible is not good swearing. Nobody is impressed with that. It’s F-ing tedious, is what it is. There’s a wide range of profane terms out there just waiting for you. Hell, look them up. Work them in there. Shake it up a little bit. Experiment with some different combinations. Try a little humor too. Impossible acts, improbable positions, unlikely animals, whatever. Trust me, absurdity works wonders when you’re letting it rip.

With a little creativity, a little grit, and a sense of humor, I’m sure we can address this national crisis together, and build a better nation because of it. Now let’s all get out there and turn some air blue, OK?

[CoolBreeze]

Just got this reply about his radio work: He worked in Summersville, then he says....

There was a company in Charleston that had 3 or 4 radio stations in one building. V100, some FM country deal... Kicks 96, maybe? Then WCHS (AM850) was in there as well. I worked on all three at one time or another, but I spent most of my time doing an evening shift on the FM country station. Ran the board on the AM side every once in awhile, that sort of thing. Did that for a little less than a year

[AmpedNow]

I couldn't agree more with his take on profanity.

Nothing's worse than hearing someone cuss who don't know how to do it right.

"Fuck" should only be used for emphasis. Otherwise, it gets pretty fucking old really fucking fast to fucking hear someone say "fuck" every other fucking word.