Column:

Only bad can come from a jerkin' journal

By Dan Friesen

Published Sept. 19, 2006

Remember what it was like in junior high and the beginning of high school? The pervasive social awkwardness, the regimented schedule, the sparse electives menu, people teasing you about anything that seemed abnormal, all of which caused a persistent feeling that somehow you weren't normal?

Those were bad days, days in which young boys and girls felt hell-bent to deny that they masturbated. Some of the ladies had the truth on their side. The boys, however, did not. Bad days.

Thankfully, those days are long gone. So far gone, in fact, that now I get paid to discuss my masturbatory habits with the campus. It's not like I am an expert on anything. Well, to be fair, though I have not studied the subject, if beating-off were a flight simulator, I would have logged enough hours to be a world-renowned pilot/astronaut at this point. I suppose that does give me a semblance of authority on the subject.

I cannot lie to you, children; I still find myself in another stage of denial. Yes, you heard me right. I have a certain amount of denial in me. I am comfortable with the public knowing that I masturbate and that I love porn about as much as I love air, yet I am uncomfortable with people knowing exactly what I am beating off to.

Now, I know this will instantly bring to mind suspicions of me being into some seriously weird stuff, and in response to that I ask: Since when is interracial, underage goat porn weird?

Guys, you know what it's like. You sit down to take care of your business. You go to your favorite "jump-off" site, the site where your journey usually starts. You start to click on links that strike your fancy. Usually, all goes well.

But sometimes you hit a rogue link that sends you to a site you didn't expect to end up at. Sometimes you end up at a gay porn site, and closing the window is the work of an instant for you. Other times, you end up on a site with a picture of a cute girl standing next to a horse, and your curiosity gets the best of you. You never find anything, but according to the history, you are a bestial pervert. That's no good.

I have my computer set so every time I close my Explorer window, the history erases. I just don't want to answer any specific questions. I think about it like this: The history is a lot like a journal of what I have been looking at.

I never kept a journal when I was younger, but I understand that a lot of you ladies did. Now, it is common knowledge that young gals are emotional and complex creatures, and a lot of them were up to no good at an earlier age than their parents would have liked. What do these young gals do? Write down in a little diary exactly what they are up to, who they have a crush on and a bunch of dirt on their friends.

Don't they realize that their mother will undoubtedly find this book and bust them? Admittedly, a lot of my knowledge of young girl behavior comes from watching bad teen movies, but I think the analogy still works.

Although I don't have a parental authority figure to worry about, I do have another concern. My roommate, Nick, would just love to find some sort of deviant deviation in my masturbatory travels to latch onto and mock mercilessly. It seems some junior high habits never change.