Control yourself. Take only what you need.

Tapped, the documentary by directors Stephanie Soechtig and Jason Lindsey, shows that conservatives do not have the market covered when it comes to fear-mongering.

The co-directors’ film examines the growing anti-water bottle movement through a variety of aspects and arguments. Slickly produced and with a ton of fascinating information, Tapped had the potential to be the next Food, Inc. if only it didn’t rely so much on gotcha journalism tactics.

From the health effects to the environmental concerns to the economic inconsistencies, Tapped does a wonderful job covering all the bases when it comes to exploring why bottle water may not be as good of a thing as most consumers would like to believe. When it comes to shattering the sense of complacency most Americans choose to hide behind as they pay $3 for a bottle of water they could have just as easily gotten from a nearby faucet, the film clearly and concisely outlines a list of problems the length of the Nile. While not all of the arguments are given equal merit or consideration, they are all given the same level of pure, concentrated direness that a good muckraking documentary requires.

Unfortunately, just like most muckraking tends to lead to yellow journalism, Tapped falls prey to an emphasis on catching in lies the few corporate spokespeople who were foolish enough to agree to an interview.

Instead, Tapped would have been better off presenting a case for how Americans can change just as much as why they should. Sure its’ one thing to talk about all the potentially harmful products there are in an average bottle of water (no matter how small of a dose those chemicals may exist in), it’s another thing to actually find the minds in America who have thought up an alternative to plastic water bottles. These are the people I want to hear from — not the environmental lobbyists who are just as self-serving as the corporations they crusade against.

Likewise, instead of harping on the fact that Americans buy too much bottled water, why not present some feasible suggestions for ways Americans can maintain proper hydration while not tossing a water bottle in the trash every hour. Fashion-savvy canteens maybe?

Tapped presents a manifesto of sorts for ways the world can change the current water bottle situation — unfortunately, running this manifesto during the credits in a sidebar proves to be too little too late.

What Tapped does well, though, is in presenting some eye-opening questions to a world largely ignorant about the problems that have arisen from the increased use of disposable water containers — and doing so in a slick, professional way.

The film makes use of some truly stunning cinematography, a great soundtrack and some spiffy editing to make the documentary slightly more mainstream than your average environmental warning film.

Stephanie Soechtig’s frequent appearances in the film gave me the idea that she may have once considered being a more active face of the film — a Michael Moore or Morgan Spurlock if you will. Thankfully, though, her ego does not eclipse the film such as the aforementioned duo’s oftentimes has.

Tapped is an entertaining enough film that manages to chisel a crack into a subject that has yet to make a big impact on day-to-day conversation. While its tactics are less than desirable, it is worth a watch to those interested in the subject. To the casual viewer, though, the film’s sometime asshole methods may end up unfairly tainting your view on a complex subject that is deserving of some serious consideration.

Robert Saucedo could really go for a bottle of water after writing this review. Follow Robert on Twitter @robsaucedo2500.

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God bless the friends I met working at The Battalion.

The paper had changed and I was not sure I liked what it had become. More so, I no longer felt at home in the newsroom.

I was getting in more and more arguments with the EIC and other top editors — even breaking my cell phone in half out of anger during one such confrontation.

My friends were either leaving the paper or being fired and I came seriously close to quitting myself. I had typed up my letter of resignation and was prepared to bring it with me to work on Sunday when I decided to go home for the weekend and clear my head.

As I sat at the kitchen table and talked with my parents about the conflicts at the paper and the crisis of conscience I was wrestling with, I began to see a realization forming.

If I were to quit the paper now, I would be taking the easy way out. I would be giving up — admitting I was wrong. When I returned to work that Sunday, instead of a letter of resignation I submitted an application for managing editor.

Although there was a lot of support for me in the office, it was clear that it would be an uphill battle for me to become managing editor — a battle I did not make easier.

I made a lot of rash mistakes — said foolish things in emotional moments and perhaps drew a line in the sand that only further created a wedge between people. I made it clear that I was not going to be a “yes man” and I did not sugarcoat that fact.

I will not lie. In the end, when the EIC chose somebody else for the position, I was upset. With time and perspective, though, I realized they made the only choice they could.

I don’t believe it was a show of favoritism — friends picking friends. No, in the end, the EIC chose the person they could trust to watch their back. I wasn’t going to be the safety net of positive feelings the EIC was looking for, but I would have always watched the paper’s back.

The first few months after leaving The Battalion were hard. A magazine internship I had been promised fell through. Life in a real newsroom proved to be a different experience then I was used to. I realized that so much of what had made me good at my job were the people I worked with at The Batt.

I was part of a team and without the rest of the team to back me up; the job was harder and less interesting.

It was difficult to continue to read The Batt on a daily basis. The paper continued to make choices that seemed wrong. It became a good-looking paper — full of fancy graphics and flashy layout (a legacy I can’t help but feel partly responsible for), but it was loosing its substance. It seemed like a ghost of it’s former self — or maybe I was the ghost, looking in on the living and, unable to take part in the creation, left feeling cold and alienated.

The Batt, though, is in a constant state of transition. People come and go. Things get better and then they get worse again. That’s just the way a college paper operates. The Battalion will always have its guardians — people at the paper who will look out for it and nurture growth.

Working at The Batt was an honor and a privilege. I worked with some very talented people. I made some very good friends. Today is dedicated to all of you.

Thanks for everything.

The people who worked at The Battalion were more then co-workers, they were friends. I always respected them as friends — even through our arguments at work.

A student newspaper, by its nature, is in a constant sate of transition. Students do not make a career out of working for The Battalion. They come and then they go — leaving because they graduate, get a better job somewhere else or simply become bored. New students then come in to replace them.

In my time at the paper, I had the opportunity to be part of three very distinct staff “eras.” During my first year at the paper, I was the new guy — looking up in awe at the editors who ran the paper. I reached my peak during my sophomore year and the first half of my junior year — joining the ranks of those editors who I had admired. I became noticed for my skills, was recognized for my achievements and made serious changes at the paper.

More importantly, I was a part of something bigger — a group of likeminded individuals all working towards a common goal. On a daily basis we produced a great paper — and we had fun doing it. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of staying past my welcome — trying to force myself into the next “era” of Battalion staff when I should have moved on.

Looking back, I should have quit when the rest of my peers left. As friends such as Nikki, Aaron, Andrew, Nishi and Sonia moved on to different things, I stayed behind and tried to maintain that same fun atmosphere. It’s a very real possibility that I overstayed my welcome.

While there were always editorial decisions I disagreed with, during my last semester at The Batt these differences in opinion began to grow in their frequency and intensity. It was obvious that I saw a different purpose for the paper than the EIC did. The real kicker, the decision that continues to bother me to this day, was the paper’s editorial stance on a group of stupid kids who made a stupid mistake.

Three students, two of which had coincidently worked as Aggielife writers during my time as editor, made a video of themselves in blackface acting out a slavery scene steeped in ill-advised racial stereotypes. From talking to the students in question, it became obvious that the purpose of their video was to lampoon the perceived second-class status of minorities at Texas A&M. This message, unfortunately, was not obvious in the video and the student’s actions were not easy to defend.

Upon hearing about the video and the fact that at least one of the actors was a former Battalion employee, the EIC made the decision that the paper would come out strongly against the video and the students responsible. I did not have any real problem with this stance — it seemed like a perfectly reasonable one at the time.

Unfortunately, as the paper continued to harp on the subject with every day’s issue — inciting the school with inflammatory rhetoric that essentially amounted to a print lynching, I began to have serious issues with the paper’s choices. I felt that a bigger deal was being made of the issue then needed to be — possibly in the interest of 15 minutes of fame the EIC was receiving due to the incident.

Everybody at The Batt knew of the national spotlight that had been shined on previous Batt EICs during the bonfire collapse and the Uncartoonist scandal, maybe the EIC wanted a taste of that fame. Why else would they continue to force the paper to cover the story of three kids who essentially made a “Chappelle’s Show” skit?

I lost faith in the paper the day I found out the students were forced to withdraw from A&M — an act I strongly believe the paper was directly responsible for.

To be continued…

The Battalion basement office was, without a doubt, my home during my time at Texas A&M.

An emotional man to be sure, the paper’s advisor loved his job and it showed through every aspect of life in the Battcave. From the meticulous job he did every day with his Batt-rant e-mails (and later Batt-rant blog) to his style of coaching through trial and error, Mr. George nurtured one of the most creative environments I have ever had the joy to be a part of.

Even with his long history as a journalist up his sleeve, Mr. George knew that the best way to teach student journalism was to let us fail on our own. He gave us the opportunities to make our own choices, suffer our own mistakes — and, of course, he was there in the end to show us exactly where we could improve.

Instead of rolling up his sleeves and doing our jobs for us, Mr. George gave us the tools and resources to maximize our potential and make real change with the paper. I know for a fact that under most any other advisor, I would not have been given the chances to experiment and the opportunities to succeed that I had.

Beyond his role as a newspaper advisor, he was also there for us as a friend. I imagine every Batt employee who spent any real time in the Battcave has a story or two to tell about how Mr. George lent some advise, bailed us out of trouble or just shot the shit with us.

After my sophomore year, Mr. George and I began to talk with some seriousness about my future at the paper. It had become obvious by then that my stint as an editor was not just a resume-building fling. My work meant something to me and he was beginning to take notice. We started to discuss the possibility of me applying for editor-in-chief.

The thought of being EIC had always made me nervous. I knew my limitations. Technical editing was never my strong suit and I had trouble saying no to controversy. He saw the potential for me to rise above these weaknesses though and become a great editor. Through his pep talks, I began to see those possibilities too. I also began to see the assets I could bring to the paper. I wanted to do it.

And so, after my third semester as Aggielife editor, I turned in my application to be EIC. Mr. George worked with me to prepare for the interview, hone my technical skills and scale back my impulse to court trouble. In the end, though, I let him down.

As I started off this series writing, The Battalion was my life during college. The paper came before everything else — including grades. By spending so much of my time in the Battcave, I had forsaken my actual classes and my grades showed this to be true. I did not have the GPA required to become editor-in-chief.

I felt as small and worthless as a mound of bat(t) droppings when I asked Mr. George to remove my application from consideration. What hurt me more then anything else, though, was the fact that he seemed genuinely sorry that he might have had a role in my low grades. He was afraid that the paper, and by proxy he, had been the sole cause for my low GPA. More then I regret not having the chance to be EIC, I regret making Mr. George feel that kind of shame.

As all good things must pass, Mr. George left Texas A&M my senior year — the year things at The Batt began to go sour.

To be continued…

Mr. George transformed from one of the scariest men I'd ever met to a real inspiration in my life during the four years I knew him.

I had been told to go to the Batt offices to get trained on a Saturday morning but I did not know which classroom to go to or what time training would begin. When I finally found the right the classroom, I was nearly an hour late. Peering into the room through a window on the door, I tried to decide whether I should actually go inside for training or just walk back to my dorm room.

Mr. George did not give me a choice.

Spotting me through the widow, he stormed over to the door and yanked it open. Looking me up and down, he asked if I was there for the training.

I nodded; petrified of this imposing figure whose face was marked with a scowl.

Well, you’re too late, he said and slammed the door in my face.

I walked back to my dorm room in a daze unsure of what had just happened. In high school, I had heard about college professors being a bit unforgiving but this was insane. Who was that horrible, horrible man I had just encountered?

A few days later, I was finally given a name to put with the face of the man who had almost scared me away from the paper forever. The day after my first article was published, I received an e-mail from my editor. The subject line simply read “Batt Rant.”

For those who worked at The Battalion during Mr. George’s tenure as newspaper advisor, the words “Batt Rant” elicited a wide assortment of mixed feelings. There was the fear and apprehension that crawled down your spine just before opening the e-mail. There was the anger when you finally read the comments Mr. George made about your latest work and wanted to know just where he got off saying what he said. Then, of course, there was the striving that set in — the drive to create something that would warrant a compliment from this Anti-Giving Tree of a man.

In my first semester at The Battalion, I avoided Mr. George. Still afraid of his gruff nature, his masterful usage of sarcasm and the fact that he had spent the better part of the fall ripping my articles to shreds in his Batt Rant e-mails, I felt that the less time I spent around the man the more I would enjoy my time at the paper.
Then it happened.

Something I wrote elicited a kind word from Mr. George. He approved.

Like a little Dutch boy pulling his finger out of a hole in a dam, the article paved the way for me to build up the courage it would take to approach Mr. George.

And so, for the second time in my first year at Texas A&M, I found myself peering in on the paper’s advisor through a door window.

This time, instead of teaching a class I was late for, he was enjoying his dinner in his office. After hearing my diminutive knock on his door, he yelled for me to enter. I cautiously opened the door and peered into his darkened office.

I just wanted to introduce myself, I said.

I know who you are, he responded. Good work on the review. Keep it up.

That night I walked back to my dorm room rejuvenated. A week before I had considered quitting — almost scared away from the paper by the Batt Rant Boogie Man. Now that I had gotten good ink in a Batt Rant, though, the only thing I wanted was more.

To be continued…

The people I worked with at The Battalion, such as Andrew and Adan, were more then just co-workers, they were friends.

There’s the trip to San Antonio to compete with the rest of the paper at TIPA. While the actual competition was a great experience (I won first place for a television commercial I storyboarded), the real fun was had “off-duty” — from drinking too much on the Riverwalk and spending the rest of the night insisting on doing a terrible Christopher Walken impression to checking out San Antonio’s famous haunted railroad tracks and, disappointed with the alleged phantasms, covering Aaron with baby powder so he could jump out of the bushes and scare people with his stark whiteness.

I even had my own unexplained mystery when, after doing a traditional Mexican Grito on the Riverwalk, a stranger on a passing tour boat called me out by name to compliment my yell. How he knew my name, I will never know.

There was the time my friend Jay tazored me to research a column and then there was the time the Tazor corporation sent me an e-mail informing me that the word “tazor” should never be used as a verb. Well, they can go and tazor themselves.

There were the celebrity interviews I got to do — ranging from me from calling the director of “Nacho Libre” a racist because he hired Jack Black to play a Mexican character to me driving to Houston for the morning so that I could hang out with the stars of “Clerks,” a film I had grown up idolizing.

Other heroes of mine I had a chance to talk to because of my job include Bruce Campbell, Neil Gaiman, Brian K. Vaughan, Richard Cheese, Doug TenNappel and Kinky Friedman.

Other great memories include the Batt parties such as the Crystal Pepsi Taste Party in which I gathered a group of friends together to each drink a shot glass full of a 16-year-old soda I had bought off the Internet, the Risk Party in which two of my closest friends almost got into a fist fight over the rules of one of the most confusing board games ever devised, and the countless karaoke parties in which I discovered that some of my male co-workers can sing Britney Spears songs really, really well.

There was a reason I spent so much time in the newsroom — the people I worked with. I guarantee I would not have stayed at the paper as long as I did if it wasn’t for the friends I made in the Battcave. These are the memories of college that I will always cherish.

From the Chik-Fil-A bitch-fest dinners with Stacy and Adan to the wonderful lifelong friendship I cultivated with Andrew (a guy I started off unable to stand) to the summer Nishi taught me that a vegetarian dinner could actually be delicious to Allison helping me find the keys to my car so I could drive home when I was obviously falling-down drunk (I didn’t die and it gave me a great story to tell) to Evan and Wade taking pictures of me in various forms of pain to Aaron and Whitney and I spending New Year’s Eve watching Saddam Hussein execution footage on YouTube.

For those I didn’t mention, rest assured I did not forget you — I merely ran out of room.

Some of my greatest memories, though, involve a man who would, over the course of four years, be transformed from somebody I was genuinely afraid of to one of the top five people in this world I admire: Mr. Ronald E. George.

To be continued…

I fell in love with San Francisco during my brief visit there and would love for another excuse to go back.

On the first night in the city, the other Batt editors and I decided explore the city. None of us having ever been in San Francisco before, we decided to pick a general direction and just start walking. This idea started off fine — we passed some neat-looking buildings and weird upside-down trees that appeared to have designed by Dr. Seuss.

Eventually, though, we wondered away from the touristy side of town that we had started in and wound up walking through the city’s sex district. Now, I should probably mention that I was the only guy in the group.

As we started passing adult theaters, street dealers and other assorted debauchery, my spider-sense started to tingle so much I felt like a cell phone on vibrate. It wasn’t until I started to spot people seemingly following us, though, that I entered full freak out mode.

The girls I was with didn’t seem to have any problem with the danger that surrounded us at every turn. Maybe they hadn’t seen enough “Law and Order” episodes. As I tried to push them to walk faster instead of them pointing out prostitutes, in my head I was deciding which of my friends would be the best decoy to throw to the hungry wolves. If I let them take the weakest of my fellow Battsters, maybe the rest of us could escape. I’m proud to say that we were able to safely get back to the hotel that night without having to pull out my rape whistle.

I learned a lot of things during that trip. I learned that if you wake up early enough on a weekday in San Francisco, you could spot a man doing yoga in the middle of traffic. I learned that pictures of seals taken at night develop into pictures of black panthers fighting in a tar pit. I learned that Chinatown not only has a lesser-known rival district named Japantown, but its shops have an obsession with giant wooden penises. On a related note, I learned that if you take a picture of a giant wooden penis, you will get yelled at in Chinese by an angry shopkeeper.

My favorite memory from the trip, though, involves a chance encounter.

During one of the nights we were exploring the city, my friends and I came across an art gallery. The gallery was dedicated to Margret Keane, an artist known for her paintings of children with oversized eyes. After taking a look around at the paintings, I wound up talking to the gallery manager.

Among the many things we talked about, we discussed what I wanted to do with my life. I told him about my dreams of going to film school and becoming a hotshot director. He then proceeded to tell me that just that day he had talked to a dozen other aspiring filmmakers. The world is full of people who think they have what it takes to be the next Steven Spielberg, he said. What did I have that separated me from the rest?

I thought about his question and came to the conclusion that I didn’t have anything. Nothing I had shot was exceptionally good. My videos up until that point were funny because of their limitations — not their content. I was not going to find my fame behind the camera. He then asked what was it that I am good at. I answered that I was a fairly decent writer. Pursue that, he said. There’s not enough room in film school for everybody — there’s always space in this world for a good story. I walked out of that art gallery rejuvenated; I left San Francisco with a purpose.

To be continued…

A page I designed for the Aggielife section of "The Battalion" during my time as an editor.

Courting Controversy

If there was one thing I enjoyed about being an editor, it was the ability to cause a stir.

Upon taking the job as the features editor, I read the last three years’ archives of Aggielife stories. Scanning the articles, I noticed the same stale topics were being covered semester after semester. Even I was guilty of resorting to a few tired chestnuts during my time.

I never shied away from controversy, though. During my time at the paper, I developed an unofficial weekly segment I called “Deviant of the Week.” Every week I would try to spotlight a new alternative lifestyle I felt would make students uncomfortable. I realize that my motives may not have been soaked in journalistic integrity — but boy was it fun.

My first fur-ay into this experiment was a story I assigned about furries, those wacky kids with a fetish for anthropomorphic animals. I did not have the time (nor inclination) to write the actual story myself so I entrusted it in the care of one of the paper’s best and brightest writers. Upon publication, we received hate letters from both the students disgusted with the story’s glorification of man-animal on man-animal sex and the furries disgusted with the story’s gross inaccuracies about their sub-culture.

Yiff, indeed.

Undeterred by the article’s response, I went on to publish additional stories about wiccans, atheists and other assorted wacky student groups.

My favorite response I received came from a student angered by the paper’s decision to publish an article on preteen cross dressers.

“I’ll never read The Batt again,” the reader wrote in an e-mail. “From now on, I’m only subscribing to the Houston Chronicle.”

I sure hope the reader enjoyed the Chronicle’s features section that day — which published the same AP story about transgendered youth I did.

Press-kit Piñatas

Working on the paper’s entertainment section, I received daily shipments of film press kits. Occasionally, these kits would come in cool decorative packages such as a kit for “Monster House” shaped like a haunted house, a kit for “Sponge Bob Square Pants” that contained Twinkies, or a kit for “Strangers with Candy: The Movie” that contained a box set of the TV show. Most of the time, though, the kits came in DVD cases and contained nothing but CD-ROMS full of photos of whatever movie the studio wanted us to pimp that week. Not one to throw stuff away, I saved the press kits in a desk drawer. Eventually, though, I saved so many kits that I ran out of room.

My solution? I bought a piñata and stuffed it with the press kits. I then invited my writers to come in for a meeting and, afterwards, have a swing at the piñata.

Upon busting a hole in the piñata and seeing what appeared to be DVDs of the latest films fall out, the writers exploded into a tangled mess of grabbing arms and kicking feet. They fell over themselves trying to grab as many of the “DVDs” as they could, unable to believe their luck. Once the commotion settled down and my writers realized that they weren’t holding free copies of their favorite movies but had fought over glorified photo CDs, they walked away grumbling. I thought it was good fun but my writers weren’t laughing with me. Maybe that’s why I had such a hard time afterwards convincing them to meet their deadlines.

To be continued…

A features page I designed during my time at "The Battalion."

I worked on a daily newspaper for the better part of five years — first at Texas A&M’s student newspaper, The Battalion, and then later for The Bryan/College Station Eagle.

Part of my reluctance to reminisce about my brief stint as a journalist has to do with the fact that, despite currently having a job that I love, a part of me still misses the smell of a newsroom. Recent economic developments in the world of newspapers and my continued concern for the jobs of my friends who still work in journalism has lately left me thinking about my years pushing copy.

During college, my life almost exclusively revolved around the school paper.

Except for a few short-lived extracurricular trysts, I did not participate in any other club or organization during my time at school. I lived at the paper.

I would skip entire semesters’ worth of classes, going in only for tests and spending the rest of my time in the newsroom. My friends, for the most part, consisted mainly of people I worked with.

And for a while, life was good.

I had it in my mind pretty early into my college career that I wanted to work for the paper. Submitting an application in my first week at school, I was soon hired to write film reviews and features for the Aggielife section. I later learned, though, that my career at The Battalion almost ended before it began.

When turning in my application, I submitted a few stories I had written in high school. One of the stories, a mock editorial written by high school janitor who moonlit as an obsessive stalker, turned out to be a bit too creepy for the assistant editor sorting through the applications.

Thankfully, the section editor read it and saw something salvageable in the admittedly very creepy essay. I was offered a job.

For my first year, I kept my distance from the paper — only occasionally going into the office. In lieu of wearing my partici-pants in the newsroom, I submitted an alarmingly large amount of stories from my dorm room.

I probably wrote at least fifty reviews that first year, often times seeing an article of mine published in the paper every day for an entire week. While I didn’t know many people at the paper and didn’t exceptionally feel like a big part of the staff, I loved the thrill of seeing my work published.

I wrote everything that first year. I reviewed movies, music, books and comics. I even won second place in a statewide competition for a review I had written for the “Cold Mountain” soundtrack.

My career as a features writer had a little rockier of a take-off. The first few stories I submitted were sent back several times for revisions. I had not gotten hired in time to go through training and had to learn how to write a newspaper story through trial and error — with an emphasis on the error.

The more stories I wrote, though, the more curious I became about what happened to them after I pressed the “send” button on my e-mail.
And so, at the end of my freshman year when I was approached about applying to become an editor, I quickly became interested.

At this point in my life, I was still set on attending film school after graduation. I had no real interest in becoming a journalist, but I figured that a semester working as an assistant editor for the school paper would look great on my resume.

I was about to jump into the deep end of student journalism.

To be continued…

It takes a true friend to attack somebody with a stun gun.

Luckily, I have such a friend.

One afternoon while sitting in the Texas A&M student newspaper office. I happened to mention a list of things I would like to do before I die. Somewhere between being a guest host of Saturday Night Live and wrestling with a grizzly bear, I mentioned the fact that some sick and twisted part of me actually wanted to know what it felt like to be Tased.

To be Tased seemed like some new and interesting life experience that would define the rest of my life. At the very least, I could perhaps discover I had some heretofore-unknown immunity to surges of electricity and I would be free to embark on a life of crime.

As the weeks passed, word got around the newsroom that I was curious about being Tased. People would stop and ask me if I was serious. Had I had my psychological check-up lately?

During an opinion desk meeting, the editor brought my name up when one of his writers proposed a column about Tasers. As luck would have it, Jay, one of the opinion writers, happened to have a stun gun sitting in his car. To this day, I’m not sure why Jay owned a stun gun, but it did not matter. In no time, events had been set in motion that would finally make my wish come true.

It wasn’t until I was standing outside, looking at the stun gun, that I began to rethink my idea of excitement. Maybe swimming with dolphins would be more my speed. Sure I had never experienced being shocked by a stun gun, but I had also never free-fallen from a skyscraper. Maybe these were good things.

I had taken my shoes off (for some reason I’m still not sure of), removed any items of metal from my pocket (I wasn’t going to take any chances with electricity) and was beginning to brace myself for what I imagined would be a near-death experience.

I tend to have a very vivid imagination.

People tried to talk me out of it. I tried to talk myself out of it. I jumped around like a spaz trying to psyche myself up. For a while it seemed like I was going to chicken out and, in the process, disappoint the large crowd that had gathered around Jay and myself. Fortunately, Jay was a true friend and went through with it, whether I wanted him to or not.

After 10 minutes of nervously leaping from foot to foot, he simply reached out and glanced my side with the stun gun, shocking me for just a fraction of a second.

I don’t remember too much about the actual pain, albeit that it felt similar to a bee’s sting — if the bee had a semi-automatic stinger. As soon as the stun gun hit my leg, I fell away from it, falling toward the ground.

I bounced up soon afterward in no immediate pain.

A few hours later, though, my nervous system was telling a different story. With my leg sore and my head throbbing, I decided that a life of crime isn’t for me as long as stun guns and Tasers are hiding in the purses of women (and cars of men) nationwide.

Read more tales of my college life