Every summer, one of my college buddies invites a bunch of guys from school down to his parents' summer house for a weekend of beer, boating, beaching, belching, etc. The usual plan is to stay up late the first night so we can catch up on old times, drinking a lot of cheap beer while we load up the grill with greasy meat products. The following morning, we wake at dawn and head out into the bay for some fishing. We never catch anything and everyone hates getting up so early, but for some reason we always do it.
Last year we grilled up a vast array of encased meats for dinner, spending most of the night snacking on the occasional hot dog, linguica, bratwurst or chorizo as we drank cans of Genesee Ice -- an incredibly cheap and potent beer from upstate New York. I'm usually a beer snob and prefer to drink better beer for a lot of reasons, but sometimes you need to relax your standards. Unfortunately, this was a poor time to do so.
Normally I shit first thing in the morning. Sometimes I can wait until after I brush my teeth, but usually I just go right away. The morning we were due to go fishing, I woke up first and went to take care of my AM duty; and everything seemed fine. The boat we were going on was all open, so there's no port-a-john or anything -- just the bay in which to do your business. I felt a little squeamish in the intestinal area as we headed down to the dock, but I just chalked it up to the early hour and the lack of sleep.
About an hour later, as we're drifting along not catching any fish, I felt the pangs of death grip my sphincter. I tried to hold it for a while, but sitting on the hard fiberglass deck of the boat and the rocking from the waves didn't help. Finally, after considering the options, I cleared the fishing lines from the back of the boat, lowered the water ski ladder and jumped in the water. As my shipmates looked down in wonder, I took off my bathing suit, held it in one hand while my gripping the ladder with the other (we were in the middle of a strong current; if I'd let go, I'd have to swim after the boat), and let all that cheap beer and encased meat come flowing out. It trailed after me for a while like a chum slick while my friends in the boat roared with laughter.
Getting back on board, I wrapped myself in a towel, dropped my line back in the water, and hoped at least for a change in fortune on the fishing front. Instead, I ended up going overboard three more times to finish the job. The third time, some corn kernels came out and we all had a good laugh at that one. At one point, a few snapshots were taken so the moment would be remembered forever.
Needless to say, we didn't catch any fish; and I had a terrible time of it until we returned to shore and I was able to get a nap. Until we did, I was cold, wet and miserable. I was unable even to make the minimal effort to pick up a fishing pole and drop a line.
At one point, my dear friend took pity on me as I sat there shivering from the damp cold and the tremors in my bowels. He said to me, "You want a banana? They're binding!"