A friend of mine sent me this email and I have to admit, I laughed until I cried.  I thought it was the funniest thing I have ever read but the funniest part is it’s supposed to be a true story.  I don’t know if it is or not but I hope you enjoy it even half as much as I did. This is supposedly true and written by a guy who purchased his lovely wife a pocket Taser for their anniversary and submitted this:

Last weekend I saw something at Larry’s Pistol & Pawn Shop that sparked my interest. The occasion was our 15th anniversary and I was looking for a little something extra for my wife Julie. What I came across was a 100,000-volt, pocket/purse-sized taser. The effects of the taser were supposed to be short lived, with no long-term adverse affect on your assailant, allowing her adequate time to retreat to safety….?? WAY TOO COOL! Long story short, I bought the device and brought it home.

I loaded two AAA batteries in the darn thing and pushed the button. Nothing! I was disappointed. I learned, however, that if I pushed the button AND pressed it against a metal surface at the same time; I’d get the blue arc of electricity darting back and forth between the prongs. AWESOME!!! Unfortunately, I have yet to explain to Julie what that burn spot is on the face of her microwave.

Okay, so I was home alone with this new toy, thinking to myself that it couldn’t be all that bad with only two triple-A batteries, right? There I sat in my recliner, my cat Gracie looking on intently (trusting little soul) while I was reading the directions and thinking that I really needed to try this thing out on a flesh & blood moving target. I must admit I thought about zapping Gracie (for a fraction of a second) and thought better of it. She is such a sweet cat. But, if I was going to give this thing to my wife to protect herself against a mugger, I did want some assurance that it would work as advertised. Am I wrong?

So, there I sat in a pair of shorts and a tank top with my reading glasses perched delicately on the bridge of my nose, directions in one hand, and taser in another. The directions said that a one-second burst would shock and disorient your assailant; a two-second burst was supposed to cause muscle spasms and a major loss of bodily control; a three-second burst would purportedly make your assailant flop on the ground like a fish out of water. Any burst longer than three seconds would be wasting the batteries. All the while I’m looking at this little device measuring about 5′ long, less than 3/4 inch in circumference; pretty cute really and (loaded with two itsy, bitsy triple-A batteries) thinking to myself, ‘no possible way!’

What happened next is almost beyond description, but I’ll do my best…? I’m sitting there alone, Gracie looking on with her head cocked to one side as to say, ‘ don’t do it dip$hit,’ reasoning that a one second burst from such a tiny little ole thing couldn’t hurt all that bad. I decided to give myself a one second burst just for heck of it. I touched the prongs to my naked thigh, pushed the button, and . . .

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD . . . WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION . . . WHAT THE HELL!!!

I’m pretty sure Jessie Ventura ran in through the side door, picked me up in the recliner, then body slammed us both on the carpet, over and over and over again. I vaguely recall waking up on my side in the fetal position, with tears in my eyes, body soaking wet, both nipples on fire, testicles nowhere to be found, with my left arm tucked under my body in the oddest position, and tingling in my legs?  The cat was making meowing sounds I had never heard before, clinging to a picture frame hanging above the fireplace, obviously in an attempt to avoid getting slammed by my body flopping all over the living room.

Note: If you ever feel compelled to ‘mug’ yourself with a taser, one note of caution: there is no such thing as a one second burst when you zap yourself! You will not let go of that thing until it is dislodged from your hand by a violent thrashing about on the floor. A three second burst would be considered conservative?

A minute or so later (I can’t be sure, as time was a relative thing at that point), I collected my wits (what little I had left), sat up and surveyed the landscape. My bent reading glasses were on the mantel of the fireplace. The recliner was upside down and about 8 feet or so from where it originally was. My triceps, right thigh and both nipples were still twitching. My face felt like it had been shot up with Novocain, and my bottom lip weighed 88 lbs. I had no control over the drooling. Apparently I $hit myself, but was too numb to know for sure and my sense of smell was gone.; I saw a faint smoke cloud above my head which I believe came from my hair. I’m still looking for my nut$ and I’m offering a significant reward for their safe return!!

P. S. My wife loved the gift, and now regularly threatens me with it!

Well the truck is gone now.  Today is the day that it had to be paid for or they keep it.  I don’t have $1300 to pay for getting his truck out.  Besides, it’s a 1991 and probably not worth that much to begin with.  He’s just going to have to figure out a way to get a job so he can earn the money to get another vehicle on his own.  The amazing thing is he’s not mad.  He’s beginning to realize that he is the one at fault here and no one else.  He did wrong and now it has cost him his truck.

Dear God I hope he finally realizes that he can’t walk in the middle of the street and be doing right.  Sure sometimes he’s on the right side of the street but then he manages to get back in the middle of the road again and before you know it, he’s on the wrong side of the street again if only for a moment or two.  Life doesn’t work that way and he’s got to learn everything the hard way unfortunately.

I am not going to get the truck out of the tow yard.  If my son loses it, then he loses it.  He did this to himself and he has to realize that at some point in time, you are responsible for your own life.  I have helped him too much in the past I’m afraid and now he expects that every time he gets in a jam, Good Ol’ Dad will come to the rescue.  Well I can’t do that anymore.  I have to let him fall flat on his face and hope and pray he is man enough to learn to stand back up on his own.

My wife wants me to get it out but I can’t.  I understand her point of view which is “If he doesn’t have a car, then how can he get a job and get back and forth to work?”  I had a cousin that walked 15 miles one way to work everyday and supported his wife and two children only to have to walk back home 15 miles in the evening.  If he could do it, surely my son can too.  He has to want to, that’s all it is to it and he’s not going to want to as long as we keep giving and giving.  If we don’t quit giving, he’ll break us and never think a thing of it.

I keep telling myself I’m helping my son.  I’m doing what I have to in order to help him get his life back on the road it needs to be on.  But when is helping not really helping?  What am I really helping him to do?  Am I helping him to get it together or am I helping him to keep running from what truly needs to be fixed?  By that I mean he has a lot to face and fix still.  Am I helping him to get to the road that helps him face and fix the mess he has created all on his own or am I helping him to run from it all and not really face it?  I wish I had the answer.  I wish someone had the answer but when they do, I don’t really want to hear it.

I have been told that I am only enabling him and not helping him.  That’s a hard pill for a parent to swallow, enabling instead helping.  I have prayed and prayed and still I can’t find the answer or don’t really want to hear the answer I get I’m afraid.  I don’t know which it is.  This is my firstborn son.  My blood, my child in my eyes even though in all reality, he’s a grown man that has to learn to live his own life and be responsible for his own choices.  What gets me is this was the most independent child we had.  I think his first words were ‘I do it’.  And do it he has, his way always.  That can be good but in his case, it’s hasn’t always been.

Still I have this darn decision to make about the truck.  Part of me wishes that someone else would make it for me and then I could say to my son that I had no choice but that’s the cowards way out.  Women think they are the only ones that suffer for their children but they’re wrong.  Father suffer and worry too, we just don’t allow it to show like women do.  There’s a part of me that wishes I could show it too but I’m a man and that’s not the way a man does things.