It’s not his real name, but for the purposes of this True Story™, we’ll call him C.J. I met him in college, and he was the craziest son of a bitch I’ve ever known.

He was a few years older than I, prematurely balding with a Southern accent that reminded me of the Carolinas more than his actual hometown, just an hour or so down I-55 from my own Chicagoland roots. His standard greeting was “Hey, fucker,” nomenclature he threw down readily, with a smile, and with no intention of malice or insult whatsoever. He loved to laugh and drink and sing at the top of his lungs, tone-deaf in that way that Baryshnikov can dance. He also liked to streak, despite the fact that his genital area resembled nothing so much as a mushroom propped up in the approximate center of a reddish-brown semi-spherical mound of thick steel wool.

Like I said: crazy.

In the early 1990’s, C.J. shared an apartment with my best friend, IMWAN’s own Jeramy Anderson, so I saw a lot of him. (Well, all of him, from time to time. See above.) Every Thursday afternoon, once classes were done, I would make my usual trek to Jeramy’s place over on White Street to launch the weekend with loud music, Sega Genesis, the free flow of liquor, bad movies, and well-into-late-night discussions on subjects ranging from quantum physics to the true nature of the universe to ethical behavior to FLASH GORDON to the existence (or not) of god, God, or gods…and then back around again. And C.J. was always there -- reliably drunk, occasionally nude. It became routine.

On one such Thursday, I was greeted by the sight of C.J. sitting in the windowsill of the third-story apartment, beer in hand, addressing the women on the sidewalk who walked by on their way to the bars. “Afternoon, ladies,” I heard him say from across the street. Two women, already a little sauced, wearing the requisite denim micro-mini-skirts and two-sizes-too-small t-shirts, waved and giggled in response. And then C.J. let fly with his big pick-up line:

“Hey, I’ll lick your pussy for an hour.” Smiling all the while. Raising his beer in a salute of sorts.

Predictably, the women took offense, scoffed, and hastened their pace. C.J. looked undeterred, and in fact quite comfortable in his perch. He shrugged and adjusted his position slightly, taking a pull on his beer. I crossed the street, walked into the apartment – the door was always wide open on Thursday afternoons -- and sat on the couch, looking at C.J., not quite knowing what to say.

“Hey, fucker,” he said, with a wink.

“Dude,” I said. “You can’t just say shit like that to women on the street. What are you, nuts?”

C.J. laughed a little. “Hey, man, that’s what women wanna hear. That’s how you get ‘em.”

“Oh, yeah?” I said, my eyebrows as high up as they would go. “How’s it working out so far?”

C.J. looked out the window and tapped the neck of his beer bottle twice with the gold ring on his middle finger. “Just a matter of time, fucker,” he said. “You just watch.”

And I did. I watched him use that line over and over again on unsuspecting women walking past the apartment building for weeks. For months. No takers, of course, but no one could convince C.J. to change his approach. Once the weather turned cold, though, he did make a minor adjustment to his technique.

C.J. and Jeramy, you see, both worked in the cafeteria that serviced the student dormitories. They wore a lot of white and did a lot of cooking and cleaning, as I recall. They also had access to those old LED “rolling” electronic signs. Remember those? Long black rectangles across which red lettering would scroll, telling you what today’s specials were? Or reminding you that the Fighting Illini were headed for the playoffs again?

To this day, I have no idea how C.J. managed to smuggle one of those rather large devices out of the cafeteria, or how he figured out how to program the damned thing. But sure enough, long about November, I approached the White Street apartment and looked up to see an LED sign sitting in C.J.’s usual spot in the windowsill. Rolling across it, on an endless loop, were the following words:

WE’LL LICK YOUR PUSSY FOR AN HOUR…KNOCK ON DOOR #10

I stood there and stared at it for a very long time.

As always, the enjoyable style of writing makes your experiences come alive for the reader.

Well...it's well-told. But C.J. doesn't sound like somebody I would have cared to meet. If he ever did succeed in attracting a woman, I feel sorry for her.

Heh - these stories are always cool

Frank...did he have a greater success rate when he used the sign?

Stranger things have happened.

wow.

Classic.

He did not.

A modern Don Juan. Thanks for the touching story, Frank.

Well, it wasn't a total tragedy. He is now a married father of two. I couldn't say for sure if he ever used that line on his wife.

I'd buy a book based on Frank's college days.

Strangely, so would I.

And I was there for a lot - if not most - of the happenings I'm sure he would include.

Wait, maybe a book about Frank's college days wouldn't be such a good idea. Good thing I have no intention of ever running for elected office.

I plan on writing a book just as soon as someone tells me what the hell I did during college.

Maybe I would buy John's too.

And I'd personalize it for you, Dave.

That's what I like to here.

Wait a sec... HOW would you personalize it?

I was thinking that I would write something nice on the first page, and then add my signature.

Why, what were you thinking?

bump, because I miss IMWAN's Own Jeramy Anderson.

He lives far away now.

"Hey, fucker!"

I somehow missed this story the first time around.

Any thoughts?

You had an interesting college experience.

That's putting it mildly.