Nasty John (Part 1)

The Beginning

“I would rather walk with a friend in the dark, than alone in the light.” – Helen Keller

Keep in mind as you read this, that this is just the warm up. The prelude. There’s just too much that happened to recant in one post. The following story is the tale of two unlikely friends and their adventures in collegiate terrorism. As always, I assure my readers that the facts contained in this blog are 100% true.

We met each other in high school. John was a quiet, introverted individual who had “trouble” written on his forehead. There was a certain mysterious darkness about him that intrigued me. Given that I was an extreme extrovert, I immediately engaged him and began the process of peeling back the layers of the onion to find out what this guy was all about. In my opinion, John was a troubled soul that needed saving, and I would be the savior. That never happened. He was just a regular dude with trust issues. Please note that I was not a rebellious person. Yes, I drank too much alcohol and got in a fight just about every weekend, but I never skipped school, never smoked pot, tried to be nice to people and valued my friendships dearly. John brought out the naughty side of me. Better yet, the “nasty” side of me. I started doing things and taking chances that I never would have taken. It was fun and exhilarating at the same time. Over time, a close friendship was born that would result in a chain reaction of stupidity and shenanigans that historians and scholars will deem as “ridiculously immature”. Thus begins the story of Nasty John.

McKneely Hall

“Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life son” – Dean Vernon Wormer

Following an absolutely average academic career at Slidell High School due to pure apathy and a desire to party, John and I both applied to Southeastern Louisiana University (SLU – a.k.a. Slow Learners University) and were accepted. Go Lions! As with most universities back then, first-year freshmen were required to live on campus. John and I submitted our housing request to room together. While most people will deem it the worst decision ever made by the SLU administration, others (John and I) would deem it the greatest thing ever to happen to that campus. Our application was accepted. We were going to be roommates! We were assigned to our dormitory, McKneely Hall. We called it “The Mac”. It was perfectly located directly in the center of campus, near the Student Union and was a perfect base of operation for the covert activities and night raids we would be conducting. It was shaped like a long rectangular, shotgun military barrack. It had a small lobby with a 40 year old sofa, several dated chairs and the door to the Resident Assistant’s dorm directly to the left. In its infinite wisdom, SLU assigned a 60 year old woman as the R.A. for an all-male dormitory. We called her our House “Mother”. She never knew what we were inferring. More to come about her later. There was only one entrance and one exit on the other end of the building. It was designed to monitor the comings and goings of all who lived there. It was a two-story, piece of crap, fire hazard that should have been condemned years ago but the State of Louisiana was too cheap to demolish it and build a new one. The walls of our room were painted cinder block, the wood doors had graffiti from previous detainees carved into the surfaces and they smelled like a combination of Lysol, jockstrap and cabbage. This was the dorm that based on your previous academic record, was reserved for “low percenters”. That meaning there was a low percentage chance that you would make it to your second semester. It didn’t matter…we were home.

The Lion’s Roar

“I wanted to get a job being creative, and I did.” – Lady Gaga

One thing my father taught me was responsibility. He taught us to that you should work hard and earn what you get. When I was in high school and was dressed and ready to leave on a Friday night, I would would ask him for some money to go out with my friends. He would say “Sure! Go rake the yard first!” Needless to say when he told me to get a job because “College isn’t a free ride!” I took his teachings seriously and applied for the easiest, most “cush” on-campus job. I applied with our school newspaper, The Lion’s Roar, and was hired to sell advertising in the paper and as an illustrator/cartoonist. John did the same and was hired as the head photographer. It was a match made in heaven. This was against school policy as you could not hold and be paid for two separate on-campus jobs, but yet I did given the campus administrators were inept. Selling advertising to local businesses got me connected to every bar in Hammond, LA. I rarely paid for drinks. Being the cartoonist gave me a communications platform to drive the university administration batshit. Fortunately, our department supervisor, Rick, was equally demented as John and I. He was our “mentor”. Many times I would walk into Rick’s office to see him looking out his window with a pair of binoculars. Unfortunately, he wasn’t bird watching. He was watching young female coeds walking to their classes. He had a prime window view that overlooked one of the main walkways on campus. He would say “Jerry! Come over here and check out the rack on the girl in the green shirt!” Given he was my boss, I felt uncomfortable telling him no. That and the fact that I was a man and a pig (not necessarily in that order). While a dirty old man with an appreciation for ogling young female students, Rick saved our asses on more than one occasion. He personally bailed John out of jail and saved me from repeated calls by the Dean to have me fired. But that’s another story. The Lion’s Roar became our personal playground. And we used it to our full advantage.

Nasty John

“The chief enemy of creativity is good sense.” – Pablo Picasso

I was a cartoonist with no cartoon! How would I earn a living working for the most prestigious and only campus newspaper in Hammond, LA? The answer was living in my dorm room with me. I would write satirical and true stories about the real-life, on-campus exploits of my roommate John. But no one wants to read a cartoon named “John”. It needed “flair” (Office Space reference). Have you ever heard any of the Nasty John jokes? If not, let me explain. It’s about a young elementary school student who the teacher will never call on because he’s unpredictable and always says something profane. Given the mixed audience who may be reading this (including my Mom), I will abstain from sharing an example of a Nasty John joke…but here’s one. John’s teacher asks the class to use the word “fascinate” in a sentence. No one raises their hand but Nasty John. Feeling there is no way John could turn this word into something dirty, the teacher reluctantly calls on John. He then stands up and tells the class “My sister’s sweater has 10 buttons but she can only “fasten eight” because her boobs are huge!” You get the picture. Anyway, that was the genesis for the creation of Nasty John. I created a cartoon strip which featured real-life characters like John, me, our friends Randy, Lance and others. It detailed shit we actually did on campus that no one could prove. It ran every week in the school newspaper. We would sit in the Student Union, see the papers get delivered, watch everyone rush to grab a copy and flip the pages until they found Nasty John. Students (and even some faculty) would laugh when they read it and we knew we were on to something. Then the question was, how would we put it to our selfish use? – See the “Chicks…Check ‘Em Out” Chapter of Nasty John (Part 2).

DISCLAIMER – Please note that I would never intentionally harm any animal. These cartoons were created to be shocking, inflammatory and drive certain individuals and staff crazy. The only animals I kill are spiders, cockroaches and mosquitoes and for that I do not apologize.

Daria

“I’m just an individual who doesn’t feel that I need to have somebody qualify my work in any particular way. I’m working for me.” – David Bowie

Have you ever had an arch-nemesis? Daria was ours. She was the she-witch editor for the paper and everything had to be approved by her. She also loathed the existence of both John and I. I’m not sure how to describe her other than a narcissistic, intellectual, sexually ambiguous, know-it-all cat lady who deemed herself superior to everyone around her. She didn’t like the businesses I sold advertising to, didn’t think my cartoons were funny or appropriate (they weren’t) and thought John’s photographs of cheerleaders and sorority girls were too suggestive (they were). What really drove her crazy is that each week I would draw two cartoons. One was morally acceptable and the one I would submit for the “editor’s” approval. The other was morally offensive and would be the one I actually sent to the printer for publication. Imagine Beavis & Butthead before MTV. Complete bait and switch. Every time the paper would be distributed across campus, she would be furious. So was our Dean. There were so many complaints from different campus organizations and the SPCA that I almost got fired several times. But I was resilient. I was bringing in so much advertising revenue that my sins were overlooked. Coincidentally, PETA was founded the same year I started college. Damn it feels good to be a gangsta! Compounding Daria’s utter disdain for us was John and I repeatedly asking her out on dates just to see the disgusted look on her face. We would also stuff socks down our jeans and then when she would tell us we were disgusting we would ask her “Why were you looking at my crotch?” Childish, but quite effective I must say.

The Point of No Return

Once John and I realized we were well established and respected figures in the arts, literary and cartoon establishment, we devised plans to use this new found campus pseudo-fame to our advantage. What would follow would be a multi-year series of stupid, immature and sometimes decadent adventures that left people asking “Why?” Grades would suffer, probation would be assigned and police would be involved. I will do my best to chronicle these events so they can be recorded in the historical archives of nowhere. There is one disclaimer though. After reading this you are probably wondering why an intelligent, beautiful woman like Celina would have ever dated me, much less marry me. The answer is that she knew nothing about this part of my life before dating me. I respectfully ask you grant her absolution.

Action Required

Please stay tuned for the next episode which I creatively named “Nasty John (Part 2).” It contains juicy stories regarding our sudden popularity with sororities, becoming on-campus celebrities/chick magnets, gambling, toga parties, marijuana, firearms, protests, explosives, virginity and pizza delivery. You think I’m shitting you, but I’m not. I would never shit my favorite turds.

By the way, I made it easy as crap to follow me. Go to the “Follow Me” page on my site (if you’re reading this, you’re already there) and do what it freaking tells you to do! Follow Me! It’s not rocket science. Don’t make me ask you again or I will Instagram/Facebook shame you. I need to get up to 50 followers to earn a free coffee mug from Google.