WORKSHOP #3 -"How To Have Badass Scars Like Me (or) A Tale From the High Seas"

by: Greasy Pirate

A note from the editor: The account you are about to read is true; a work of non-fiction. Please let it be known that Vice Division Capitano Greasy Pirate is a true badass of the highest caliber. With that, I give you his workshop.

1. Be poor by sitting on your ass playing video games, becoming seriously involved in a relationship with someone, going to college, or simply trying to drive a car at these gas prices (that will certainly bring about quick poverty).

2. Look for a job that interrupts your summer break from college, and possibly pays an insane amount of money for a short period of time. (Note most of these jobs involve dangerous work, but hey, quick money makes for bad long term vision).

3. Sign on as a deckhand on a Cargo Ship.

4. Sail several trips and allow an illusion of safety to overtake your thoughts.

5. Arrive at an Iron Ore loading dock and begin another routine of shifting the ship (working on the dock moving the cables that tie the ship to the dock so the ship so can be moved to line the hatches with the loading rigs).

6. Work long enough that the watch changes and the haggard, grumpy, and careless 2nd mate comes on duty. Concentrate on his grumpy and haggard qualities allowing the careless element to slip your mind while he makes a stupid move and snaps a braided steel cable that ties the 640' long ship to the dock.

7. Get stuck having to work with the mates less-than-safe solution for the broken cable.

8. Watch as the ship drifts away from the dock (all 35,000 tons of it); only immediately afterwards realize that you still have a cable in your hands.

9. Try to get the cable out of your hands before you are pulled into the drink only to have the cable snag on you, stretching your arm to the point that your clavicle is broken and your entire arm is almost ripped off. Subsequently, follow your nearly unattached arm into the water.

10. Climb a 40' vertical ladder one armed to get back on the ship, and then fill out an accident report with nothing more than ice to dull the pain.

11. Get the First Mate on the ship to give you a cab's number to call to go to the hospital where you'll need to be rushed to so you aren't left by your ship (they won't wait for you unless you hand out pay checks or cook).

12. Now manage to make it to the hospital and back (one armed) before your ship leaves and strands you hundreds of miles from home with no resources.

13. Finally keep from passing out while you spend 2 days without narcotics trying to get back home.

-Greasy Pirate, Vice Division Capitano