My Time in the Slammer

As I often like to do from time to time, the other night I was sitting and reflecting on some of my many accomplishments in life. You're probably thinking something along the lines of, "Mikey, surely you need more than a single night in which to think on a topic like that."

Yes, it is true that there are vast amounts of success stories locked away in my accomplishment chest, but frankly, I don't like to let many people in on those. I don't need to tell people about these things because that's not who I am. I'm not all flash and jazz. Sure, I may be a minor internet celebrity at this point. Sure, I have my own web column which has garnered reader responses from around the country. Sure, I'm the author of an internationally viewed weblog that was listed as the second hottest WordPress blog for about a week like a month ago. But I've got to tell you, I simply haven't let these magnanimous successes go to my head.

I always swore to myself that once fame laid it's tanned golden-brown hand on my shoulder, ready to lead me into the abyss of scandal, money, drugs, sex, and William Shatner, I would stand up proud and say, "Damnit, you will not suck the life from me, Hollywood, for I am too strong to succumb to your demon temptations and botox injected dreams. I will not be tempted by your · holy shit, is that the Olsen Twins? Hey ladies, ever read my blog?"

In short, I can't help but believe that my acceptance of my own celebrity and my ability to ingest the attention that is thrust in my direction are two tremendous explanations for the question that most fans seem to ask me, "Mikey, we see your star shining so brightly, so hot, so handsomely, and of course, funnier than all the other stars in the sky, so how is it that you're able to remain so down to earth while at the same time remaining so gosh darned charming?" Because, my dear fans, were I in denial of who am and what I mean to so many other people, surely my public would have disregarded me by now, leaving me to turn up on some VH1 special five years from now.

What has happened to Tom Green, anyway?

But the fact remains that I handle my situation in life with grace, class, dignity, and just a touch of lechery. But it wasn't always like this. There was a time in life that I was a "bad boy." Please, don't embarrass me by pretending like you can't believe this could ever be true. It's hard enough for me to admit as it is.

I can tell that you're not going to let me off the hook and that you require proof. Perhaps a witty anecdote describing how I may have put myself in a difficult situation, how I dealt with that situation, and how that situation has made me a better person today.

Fine. I don't like to have to open up old wounds like this, but what you are about to read is a true story. As a disclaimer, I'd like to say that I won't be held responsible for any broken perceptions you may have had about me prior to reading this. Understand that despite the larger than life persona that I may have garnered through my minor internet celebrity status, I am just a man like you. Well, better than you and probably funnier and more handsome, but take solace in the fact that even if you don't have a job, or any money at all, you're still probably richer than I am. And I was lying about the handsome part, too. Chances are you're better looking than me. But I'm taller than a lot of you!

I'll begin the story by telling you that I had been drinking one night with some friends. Not that every good story doesn't begin this way, but bear with me. The late hour had come and passed and it was probably approaching three in the morning. We'd been playing drinking games and I was certainly past the legally intoxicated blood-alcohol level of 0.08 that the state of Iowa deems as the maximum one can be at and still be legally allowed to operate a motorized vehicle.

I put little thought into that fact as I sped down the entrance ramp to interstate 380. Of course, I looked into my rearview mirror to see the beautiful blue and white flashing that was an Iowa state patrol car's cherries flipping around like the shimmering of the aurora borealis. "That's pretty," I thought.

Upon realizing that the pretty lights were actually a signal for me to pull over, I became decidedly less impressed with the light show. In fact, I was pissed. But luckily, I was drunk enough to realize that this was funny. So instead I sort of started laughing. The alternative was to cry.

I pulled over, waiting for the police officer to approach my car. I should point out that by "my car" I actually mean my girlfriend's car. See, this happened to be fall break when we got a long weekend off from school. She went home with some friends and I stayed in Cedar Rapids (mostly because I wasn't even actually in school at the time) and used her car. So as the officer approached the car, I rolled down the window.

He asked the usual questions, "Do you know why I pulled you over?" "May I see your license and proof of insurance?" "Why aren't you wearing pants?" "Do you want to do this the easy way, or the fun way?" "Have you been drinking tonight?"

The funny thing is that I'd often considered how I'd respond to that last question. I've always played it in my head much better than I actually played it now.

"I have prolly have had no more than maybe one or a couple or three beers or so," I said. "But no, I haven't been [cue finger quotation gesture here] "drinking" drinking, but I have been drinking. So have I had drinks that would be too much to drink? Maybe. But really, no. I haven't."

Actually, what I really said was, "yeah, a couple." But I sort of said it with a smirk. At this point I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I was going to get arrested. I mean I knew my state and though I'm one of those so-called "aware drunks," I knew I shouldn't have been behind the wheel. I wasn't going to try to get out of something I was guilty of.

The officer asked me to step out of the car. He escorted me to the back of the car where he put me through the field sobriety test. I had to walk the line, follow his pen with my eyes without moving my head, say the alphabet, stand on one leg, open a jar of pickles, demonstrate the effects of global warming on the migration habits of the white-tailed lumberjack, put my finger on my nose, count backwards from twenty, and suck his partner's penis. To be perfectly honest, I thought I did a great job on the tests. Unfortunately, they don't give you your test results, so I'll never know how I did. Although if not ending up on an episode of COPS is considered a passing grade, than I passed.

After the field tests, they gave me the breathilizer test. I'm really not sure what the point of the field tests are if they're just gonna give you a breathilizer anyway. If I had passed the first set of tests would I not have had to take the breathilzer? So I blow in the breathilizer thinking back to all the tricks I'd ever heard might work to beat this test. They didn't work.

I blew a .178.

That's pretty high.

I was told that I was being placed under arrest for operating a motorized vehicle while intoxicated. I was handcuffed and placed in the back of the patrol car. And they weren't the kind of handcuffs with the pink fuzzy stuff around them either, they were real, standard issue police handcuffs. They placed me in the squad car and headed to the station.

Once we arrived and they realized that I wasn't a threat, they took off the handcuffs. I lunged for one officer's gun but tripped over my chair and had to settle for using a pencil I found on the floor as my weapon. They shot me once in the leg to neutralize the threat and began to read me my Miranda Rights.

Alright, so I made up the part about the shooting and all. But this was where they read me my Rights. Up until that moment, I sort of thought that this was just a joke; that these guys would let me go. They were actually pretty nice. They recognized that I was polite through the whole process and I actually think they didn't want to have to take me in. But I was legally over the limit - way over the limit - so they had no choice. But when they started with the reading of my Rights I realized I was in trouble.

From there I had to get fingerprinted and my mug shot taken; but not before I got the opportunity to submit to the strip search. I understand that they want to make sure that I'm not smuggling any sort of contraband into my jail cell, but was it really necessary for the guard to ask me if I liked Charlton Heston movies? Seems like an odd time to ask a question like that.

Once the guard was sufficiently satisfied that I wasn't hiding any sort of weapon, smuggling any drugs, or under the care of a medical suppository, I was told to get dressed.

It's a pretty humbling feeling to have to stand naked and pull apart your ass cheeks while a man with a gun watches you. Of course, he found it funny when I did my best Ace Ventura impression and made my butt crack say, "Let me ass you a question·."

There was nothing stuffed up my ass, so I got dressed. My mug shot was taken without incident. (I'm confident I looked better than Nick Nolte.) All that was left was to be fingerprinted. The thing is, now I can't commit any major crimes without buying a pair of rubber gloves. Ask me if I own rubber gloves.

"Mikey, do you own rubber gloves?"

I rent 'em. I have a lease, with an option to buy.

As it turned out, the guy fingerprinting me is a guy I went to school with. He was a graduate of Coe College and one of Cedar Rapids' finest. His name was Yon Abel and though we sort of knew who each other during school, and had mutual friends, we never really spoke to each other. So this immediately became one of those awkward I-know-you-but-not-really-so-I'm-not-really-sure-what-to-say-to-you moments. I was still drunk enough to not have much problem talking to anyone, but this awkward fingerprinting moment also happened moments after the awkward rectal check, so as you can imagine, my mind wasn't entirely focused on exchanging pleasantries at this point. Plus, I doubt he really could have gotten me out of the whole situation at that point, so I just kept my silence and let the man do his job.

I was to be kept in a holding cell overnight. They don't give you any sort of jumpsuit or anything for this. They basically just take your shoes and other belongings. I was able to keep my glasses. Little did they know that I'd devised 47 ways to kill a man with them. Suckers.

The cell they put me in had a pay phone and two bunk beds. First thing I did was call my roommate.

ME: "Hey Mike." (My roommate was named Mike too, and, as I've pointed out in the past, one of three Mikes I've lived with over the years.)
HIM: "Hi Mike."
ME: "So, uh, I'm like, in jail."
HIM: "That sucks."
ME: "Yeah."
HIM: "Sorry dude."
ME: "It's cool man, one day I'll be a columnist for a webzine and I'll look back on this in like eight years and write about it with a touch of humor."
HIM: "That's cool."
ME: "So wanna pick me up tomorrow morning?"
HIM: "Sure. What time?"
ME: "I dunno? What time does jail end?"
HIM: "I'll make some calls."
ME: "Fantastic."
HIM: "Don't bend over for the soap."
ME: "Fuck you."

I hung up the phone and turned around to check out the accommodations. Three of the four beds were occupied by sleeping bodies, so I hopped up on what remained: the top bunk of the bed closest to the cell door. The cell door, by the way, closes with the same sort of loud, echoing clank that you hear in every jail movie you ever see. I mean when they close that thing you really know it.

I fell on top of the bed and passed out almost immediately. When I woke up in the morning, I found it hilarious to discover that four more people had been allowed in the cell as I slept. They gave them these little mats to spread out on the floor to sleep on. What was brilliant was that I slept right through four opening and closings of that cell door. That's like sleeping through a sonic boom.

But we were woken up at about eight in the morning and everyone was ushered into a holding cell. There were about 30 to 40 guys in the holding cell. Most of them were sleepy and groggy eyed, but a few were still tweaking on crystal meth buzzes and were bouncing around all over the place and talking a mile a minute. I realized quickly that these are the guys that all inmates hate. So thankfully, I wasn't high on crank.

The time finally came for me to be arraigned. We were taken from the holding cell in some unknown system of grouping. One by one, we were each called to meet with a judge via a closed circuit TV. It was pretty weird and I'd thought about telling the judge that I'd been wrongly imprisoned. I had planned to explain to the judge that I hadn't been drinking last night at all and I can't imagine how such a huge misunderstanding could have taken place. I was all set to unveil this web of lies until I realized that I was still drunk and giggling at the sight of the webcams and such.

Plus, I kept calling the judge "sir."

I can't be totally certain, but I'm pretty sure that she didn't like that.

So I was set with a court date and given a court appointed attorney and blah, blah, blah. I was given back my shoes and belongings and set out into the daylight. I can't remember how I'd set it up with my roommate, but all I know is that I walked outside knowing that he'd be there at a certain time. I stood outside the courthouse waiting for him when one of the guys I'd been in the holding cell with came out. He was waiting too and offered me a cigarette. I accepted.

We smoked and talked pleasantly for awhile. Then I heard the familiar noise of my roommate's motorcycle. I hadn't even considered that he'd pick me up on his bike. He owned a pick-up truck as well. He pulled around squealing to a stop right in front of me.

"That's my ride," I said to the dude that gave me the smoke.

My roommate stepped off his bike and unfastened the bungee cords that had been holding something down on the back of his bike. With a quick flip he shoved a leather coat at me. It was the leather motorcycle jacket I got from the pawn shop I worked at. It was hand painted with various markings and symbols which probably had meanings of which I was not aware. On the back was painted a giant dragon or something. I had it as a joke. But I slipped it on while the cigarette dangled from my lips. Then Mike threw the spare helmet at me as well. I took the cigarette from my mouth, pulled the helmet over my head, straddled the back of the bike, took a drag on the cigarette through the helmet, flipped the cigarette away, dropped the visor on the helmet, tapped Mike on the shoulder to indicate I was ready to ride, and tossed a half salute to the dude that gave me the cigarette as we peeled away from the courthouse. Now that's a jailhouse exit.

Sometime later, I met with my lawyer for like a minute, he told me what was up, and said he'd see me again in court. My day for court came, I showed up, I got charged and convicted and was told I'd have to serve 48 hours in jail and participate in a 48 hour alcohol awareness program. Luckily, my jail time was reduced to 41 hours for time served. (I'd spent seven hours locked up the night I was arrested.)

Here's the best part: I got to pick when I wanted to go to jail. This was great! I mean I certainly wasn't going to give up one of my weekends to spend in jail. That'd be stupid. So I decided that I'd go in on a Monday evening at 6:00 pm. Than would get out on a Wednesday morning, around 11:00. I think it was right around Valentine's day, if I'm not mistaken, right around the time that Harry Carey died. Funny how we remember these things.

So the day comes for me to go to jail. You'd think they'd do something cool like send a car to pick me up or something. No, I had to get a ride to jail.

I walked in and waited in line in front of the bullet-proof glass window where a woman was dropping off some papers for her husband or something. Two people fell into line behind me. This was going to be awkward.

Not sure how to handle the situation, I walked to the window and in a pretty loud voice I announced, "I'm here to go to jail."

The woman, who was blonde and cute, by the way, sort of laughed at me and buzzed me through a big metal door. Then the process of checking into jail began. I was asked for my personal belongings which were all filed and placed in a manila envelope like I'd seen in The Blues Brothers. It was at this moment that I wished I'd really brought in some cool stuff so that when they'd give it back to me later I'd sound all badass.

OFFICER RETURNING PERSONAL BELONGINGS: "One black comb- greasy. One pack of Lucky Strikes - unfiltered. One box of condoms - empty. One little black book - also empty. Three pieces of Pez - lemon. Two Star Wars action figures - Boba Fett and Lando. One gold watch - plastic. One tin roof - rusted."

Once they get your stuff, they take your clothes - and yes, you have to spread your cheeks again. You're told beforehand that you can bring solid white undershirt, underwear, and socks. Nothing with patterns, colors, or designs. So that meant that the novelty prison boxers I bought for the occasion weren't going to fly.

I climb into my orange jumpsuit and get ready for the next 41 hours.

I was walked to my cellblock. Actually, I'm kind of surprised to realize that I can't remember what my cellblock number was. I wanna say it was cell block 6a or something like that. I dunno. But nothing can prepare you for that moment you walk into jail and meet your cellmates.

Realize that I was just a 23 year old kid at this point. Of course, in 41 hours, I'd walk out of jail a 23-year old man. Jail does things to a person. Turns 'em into something evil. Something different. At least, that's what the old guy at the bar used to tell me.

The guard walked me to a giant metal door. Through a window I could see that the other side of the door was the cellblock. It was about the size of a standard gymnasium and had two floors of cells, all of which overlooked the common area. In the middle of the room were three metal picnic tables. These tables were full of guys in orange jumpsuits playing cards. I can see the TV is on.

Then a loud buzzer sounds and the sound of the metal door unlocking cracks my eardrums. The door slides open and the guard, who's carrying a shotgun, walks me in and stands attentively at the door, looking at the guys in the room.

When this metal door was opened, I discovered that the TVs automatically turned off. They wanted as little noise as possible when moving a prisoner in and out of the block. The effect this has is terrifying because suddenly, the eyes of every convicted felon in that giant room are on you. Directly on you. And they hold for a good long time.

Finally one of the inmates yelled out, "What's your cell number?"

Had I heard this question today, I would have responded with some joke about not giving my phone number out to guys in jail, but as it was, I didn't. In fact, the acoustics in the place were so hard to get used to that I actually couldn't understand what he said. I sort of smiled like I would if a teacher had just asked me to answer a question about a book I hadn't read.

We finally got to the bottom of what he was asking me, and I answered. I was relieved as attention was turned from me as everyone began to give shit to the guy who's cell I was moving into.

The first thing I noticed once I had sort of calmed down, was that jail smelled like a horrible combination of bad gas and body odor. It's a smell that still haunts me to this day.

Nothing of consequence really happened in the following 41 hours. I sat in a corner and read some old western novel and tried to fall asleep. You're forced to hang out in the common area all day, and it's horribly uncomfortable as there are only the metal picnic tables.

My cellmate was a nice enough guy. We didn't talk much. He knew I was only there for a couple days and it was clear he didn't want to waste too much time getting acquainted. I did ask him what his situation was though and he explained that he was in for his fourth drunk driving charge. If I remember correctly, he had already been in there for 34 days and had 61 to go. Whatever the exact numbers were, it was an incomprehensible amount of time for a guy who had only been there for six hours and was already going out of his mind.

There's a toilet in each cell and one or two more in the common area. There's also a shower in the common area.

I didn't shower.

I didn't take a crap.

Hell. I barely even pissed while I was there.

The most amusing part of spending time in the Cedar Rapids lockup is that most of the guys in jail love watching COPS. This in itself isn't necessarily amusing. The amusing part was the fact that every time a guy on the show would get caught after running from the police, every guy in that common area would begin to explain why they wouldn't have gotten caught. I didn't bother to point out that they obviously had been caught, deciding, rather, to keep my opinion to myself as I wondered what the consequences might be for suggesting that we watch Seinfeld instead.

The time for my release finally began to approach, and as I watched the grate covered clock tick away, I could barely stand it. I wanted to get out of there so bad.

At no time did I ever feel threatened, or in any way physically uncomfortable at all. But I was bored beyond explanation. I mean it's not the fear of being locked away with criminals that deters me from becoming one myself. Especially not these criminals. Most of them were in for a drunk driving charge of some sort, be it their first, second, third, or tenth. Everyone else was in for either some sort of drug possession, stealing, or stuff like that. I certainly was never worried about being manhandled anywhere. In fact, I was probably one of the more threatening guys in there. Most of them were too drugged out to know where they even were.

No, it's the prospect of the maddening banality of a life in jail that keeps me on the up and up in life. When there's nothing to help pass the time other than to breathe in the odor of chili-farts and under arm funk, you tend to want to find other ways to fill your day.

(For the record, I'm claiming the rights on Chili Farts and the Under Arm Funk. It's going to be the name of one of my bands some day, so it's off limits I'm afraid. I call it.)

Finally, it was time for me to be released. The buzz sounded, the TV flickered off, the clank of the cell door unlocking moved me almost to tears. I stood up so fast that I think I startled the guard with the shotgun cause he aimed that .12 gauge right at me before he came back to earth. I got back my clothes, I got back my personal belongings from the manila envelope, and I got back my freedom.

My ride home was outside waiting and I was whisked away from there feeling like it was the greatest day ever. I got home and cranked "All Along the Watch Tower" by Jimi Hendrix, and took a 45-minute shower. I had been jail, and I had lived to tell about it.

Sometimes, when I close my eyes at night, I can still smell that smell. But I'm usually able to trap it under the covers.