The EpHELLady, One Bazillion Angels & Being a Crap Ton of Trouble

You know someone has been a traumatizing SOB when

you haven’t seen them in over 25 years and memories of their shenanigans are almost as disturbing as the shenanigans of your family of origin.

Indeed, Cadet Corporal Les Stover of the Junior ROTC was a classmate of mine in high school with whom I became familiar during the first week of my Freshman year when he was suddenly directly in my face and loudly stated,

My name is Cadet Corporal Leeeeeeeeeees Stover of the Missouri Junior ROTC and I am telling you I have an eye on you because you look like a crap ton of trouble.

And I thought,

Yeah?  Jeezuh!  What the hell was that?

Cadet Corporal Les Stover of the Missouri Junior ROTC was absolutely right that I was a crap ton of trouble and was also not lying when he said he had his eye on me because he regularly ended up directly in my face saying,

I’ve seen you smoking cigarettes on your way to school!

and

The school boy you are regularly seen with has a juvenile record!

and

You appear to be under the influence of illicit drugs!

In Mrs. Schmidt’s 4th period English class my friend Matt

(Matt:  The gay boy to whom I officially attached myself to as a proud ‘Fruit Fly’ or ‘Fag Hag’…whatever you want to call it)

and I were, as usual,

• drawing odd pictures of
• a woman with one leg shorter than the other whom we’d dubbed
• ‘Ilean’
• and laughing silently yet so hard that it’s a wonder one of us didn’t
• crap our own spleen and
• also regularly checking with one another to see if
• we’d peed our pants because
• we were, indeed,
• normally under the influence of illicit drugs since
• Mrs. Schmidt’s 4th period English class came just after
• lunch
• and it was always hard to tell if we were going to be able to
• control our bodily functions if we’d
• gotten some
• really good stuff which was always
• great
• because we were something like 14 and
• didn’t have much money and
• therefore
• smoked a lot of skunk weed

And one day in Mrs. Schmidt’s 4th period English class just after lunch Matt and I were in our usual illicit state of mind and drawing our usual pictures of ‘Ilean’ and I suddenly followed the urge to

• lob my chewing gum across the room at
• Cadet Corporal Les Stover of the
• Missouri Junior ROTC in hopes of
• it sticking to the side of his head but
• as if surrounded by the blessing of
• one bazillion angels
• my gum landed on the
• inside of his glasses
• directly in front of his eyeball and
• caused him to

rip his glasses from his own face, throw them violently on the floor, jump up from his seat, point at me across the room and say,

I know you did that!  I know you did that!  I know who you are and your name, rank and serial number and you are a crap ton of trouble and you did that!

I thought,

Holy shit!  I hope he doesn’t come over here!

But before he could do anything else he caught sight of Mrs. Schmidt talking on the intercom phone in our classroom and, before the Vice Principle could appear at our door, Cadet Corporal Les Stover quickly picked up his chewing gum infested glasses and books and stormed from the room.

And my friend Matt muttered,

Fuckin’ freak.

under his breath.

I said,

No shit,

under mine.

And I can’t remember one more encounter with Cadet Corporal Les Stover.

Though I do still think that piece of chewing gum landing on the inside of his glasses was the blessing of one bazillion angels and is one of the most amazing and funny things I’ve ever seen.

Last weekend Ben’s brother and his girlfriend Dolly stayed a night at our place and one evening we were suddenly discussing the attributes of that meniachial machine called

The Epilady.

Affectionately known by me as

The EpHELLady

The EpHELLady, described as follows in its sales pitch (with a ‘truth in advertising’ rewrite by Yours Truly in italics):

• Wide epilator head with 40 tweezer discs quietly and quickly removes hair by the root for up to 4-6 weeks
• Diamond-shaped head resembling a poisonous snake with something like 40 sets of venomous fangs that hiss and scream just prior to quickly ripping hair by the root…usually along with an appendage or two

and

• Dual-sided shaver with a single foil for a smooth and gentle shave
• Dual-sided tool of Satan with a single foil because having more than one would probably kill enough consumers that the manufacturer would end up having to deal with more wrongful death suits than it could handle

and

• Ergonomically designed with rubber grip-points for a secure hold
• Ergonomically designed with rubber grip-points for a secure hold because this bad mamajama is perfect as a self-protective weapon against intruders.  (You will also need something secure to grip when it rips hair from the roots along with an appendage or two)

and

• Kit includes deluxe travel pouch, power adapter and cleaning brush
• Kit includes deluxe travel pouch packing a few things for your trip to the ER, power adapter compatible with the ‘Scooter’ or ‘Hoveround’ personal transportation device you will need for 4-6 weeks after use, and a cleaning brush to take care of the fact that you crapped your pants when you were passed out after your first hair removal

And last weekend just after

• Ben’s brother described Dolly attempting to use her EpHELLady on one of his forearms and causing weeks of oozing and open sores and
• I described my first and only use of an EpHELLady back in the days of knowing Cadet Corporal Les Stover and having to peel myself off of the bathroom ceiling and thinking I was going to throw up or pass out due to pain and crying a little and throwing that thing violently into the trash can

everything became silent and we all looked at Dolly who was

• wearing a tank top and
• kicked back in a big recliner and
• had her arm over her head and
• was gently stroking her underarm and saying,

But it’s so smoooooooth.  I loooooove it.

And we all groaned and Ben’s brother said,

I can’t believe you.

She said,

But it’s so smooooooth.

And we all groaned again.

And now I’m sitting here thinking it would have been great fun to have fished that EpHELLady out of the trash can all those years ago so I could have

• charged it up with its handy dandy little power adaptor and
• put it into its handy dandy little deluxe travel pouch and
• taken it to Mrs. Schmidt’s 4th period English class and
• sat behind Cadet Corporal Les Stover of the
• Missouri Junior ROTC and
• suddenly yanked a few hairs out of the nape of his neck and
• then thrown the handy dandy little cleaning brush onto
• his body which would
• be splayed out beside his desk because
• he would have passed out due to pain

But I didn’t.  And some strange part of me is glad because I really love thinking back on that piece of chewing gum landing directly onto the inside of his glasses.

Plus I think the whole EpHELLady plan would have been so premeditated that the Vice Principle would have done a little bit of investigating and figured the whole thing out. 

And I really was a crap ton of trouble back then and didn’t need Mrs. Schmidt calling the Vice Principle about me when he already had a file folder full of little yellow ‘incident’ cards with my name on it in the left hand drawer of his desk anyway.