The Ballad of Samad Hoshweebeeweebeeweebeeweebee...

A couple of weeks ago, I celebrated the first 100 followers to this blog with a rather long, drawn-out, and frankly sycophantic post wherein I thanked everyone and let them know that I either was a regular reader, remembered their pithy comments, or just generally gave them a thumbs up. I started the train with Gwen, who was my first blog follower.

Speaking off...is anyone else's blog following add-on malfunctioning, or is it just mine?

Anyway, I differentiate between Gwen being my first blog follower and, well, followers in general because, long before I started puking words onto a screen in some semblance of cohesion and story, I had a follower. Well...follower seems kind of a light term to apply to the chap. Imagine, if you would, that the foot fungus you picked up on the floor of your gym was a follower, and that might quantify the meaning a bit better for you.

As a senior in college, I had it all: easy class schedule, ability to drink, living next door to Big Willy Style, single room, hot on-again-off-again girlfriend with loose morals and big tits. Apparently, this hedonistic lifestyle was enough to attract the attention of this freshman named Samad Hoshweebeeweebeeweebeeweebee...

Samad's last name is kind of messed up because his dad was Iranian and his mom was German (or something else Teutonic), and the pronunciation was kind of confusing. I'm pretty sure there's a K in there somewhere. Anyway, saying it is kind of like when I'm drunk and trying to spell "banana", I don't remember where the "weebee"s are supposed to end.

Anyway, Sam (as he liked to be called) was a solid 350 pounds on a 5'5" frame and his features were strikingly like a blond Rupert Grint. Everywhere that Sam went, he wore a cream-colored sweater that might have--at one point--been white, but prolongued exposure to dorm life and Sam quickly turned it ecru and worse. And, when I say "everywhere", I mean everywhere. Given Sam's bulkiness, this meant that he sweat profusely everywhere he went. Sunny day in spring? Sam's sweating. Sitting in the cafeteria, wasting the evening? Sam's sweating. Walking to the pisser? Sam's sweating.

Not only did Sam wear the sweater everywhere and sweat everywhere, he followed me everywhere. It was like I had summoned some sweaty, foul-smelling, portly familar from the very bowels of Hell to constantly be at my side and a step behind. Creepy, yes, but also flattering in a megalomaniacal sort of way.

And he would appear at some rather inopportune times. Once, I went down to the toilets to toss a whiz. I left my door open a crack. I came back to find Sam sitting on my couch, unannounced (though the yellowish tinge to the air should have clued me in that he was in the building). One time, I was having a rather naughty conversation with the aforementioned on-again-off-again hot girlfriend and we were galloping toward the phone sex route. My door was closed, but not locked. Just as I unzipped, there was a bang at the door, like someone had kicked it as they were shuffling toward it. A fraction of a second later, the door swung in and there was Sam, hulking in the doorway. I frantically pulled a jacket over my lap and told the Ex- I had to go and hung up the phone as Sam came in and sat on my couch. He just wanted to chat. About nothing.

Sam was good at putting the cockblock on me.

There was even a night when Sam caused me to break up with another girlfriend, whom I've dubbed Carrie Nation. You'll learn more about her tomorrow. Carrie Nation worked at Wal-Mart across the street and lived in the dorm next to mine. She loved football. On Monday nights, after I get done helping Dr. Awesome teach the freshman general chemistry lab, I would come home, unwind, and Carrie Nation would come over after work and we'd watch football together. What a fucking sexy couple we made.

Anyway, Sam came busting into my room about ten minutes before Carrie Nation arrived, plunked himself down in my chair, and proceeded to sweat copious amounts of funky Sam sweat everywhere. The mephitic cloud pulsed around him, getting slightly larger with each dollop of sweat that ran down his temples. So, I'm chatting Sam up, and it puts me in a weird mood. Maybe it was the lack of oxygen in the room, maybe I just woke up on the goofy side of the bed that day, or maybe I just remembered to take my meds that day, but I was in rare form when Carrie Nation showed up. I was, like, extra flirty. I was grabby. I was all sorts of weird.

This, coupled with the fact that I was flipping over to a NASCAR race on ESPN2, really pissed Carrie Nation off. Two days later, we were through. I blamed Sam, because he stayed with us until halftime of the game. Then he and part of his funk left; the rest of the funk stayed behind, lingering in the air like the greasy residue clinging to the grill in a short-order kitchen.

Retrospectively, I should have thanked Sam for rescuing me from the evil clutches of Carrie Nation.

This was not the only night that Sam put the cockblock on me. No, there was also Halloween of the same year, when I filled up on rum and went ashore a-lookin' fer some booty...and not the kind you find in a chest. Well, maybe ON a chest, IN a bra. You get the idea. There was this girl, Ann-Marie Vidal, whom I had a touch of a crush on. It was one of those kinds of crushes where, if we were better friends, maybe I would have followed up on, but it was borne mostly of youthful lusting. Which, for college, was good.

Anyway, as I was staggering about the darkened campus, I came upon Ann-Marie and a couple of other people. I started talking to her, noticing that she wore a tiny Christmas tree upon her head. Halloween does provide for some easy conversation starters. Things progressed nicely with Ann-Marie, and suddenly, I'm thinking, "Holy shit, this might actually come to fruition!" Yes, I am strangely verbose when I'm drunk and having conversations in my mind.

Suddenly, as if he rose up from the ground, Sam hove into view.

And Ann-Marie recoiled in horror. It's one thing to suddenly have a very large, very sweaty, very stinky person appear out of nowhere; it's apparently quite another thing to have a very large, very sweaty, very stinky person appear out of nowhere and do nothing but stare at your tits. As quickly as she could, Ann-Marie sped away. I tried to follow, asking her if I could escort her home. Sam was nipping at my heels like an eager puppy. I don't know if he had designs on my sloppy seconds or what, but he was not to be dissuaded.

Finally, I did the chivalrous thing: I let Ann-Marie escape. As I stood there, watching my lustful desires bounce away into the night, I wanted to gut Sam. But, I was too nice. I started toward my dorm, but Sam was to follow. Finally, at the last second, I diverted my course and turned toward the on-campus bar, where--being only 18--Sam could not go. I eluded him and spent the remainder of the night drowning my sorrows with my friends Susan and Julia and some dude wearing a Yoda mask.

You would think that my story would end here...but, alas, it doesn't. Every spring, my school hosts a go-kart race for students. Alumni tend to gather because it's a weak excuse to drink heavily. My wife and I had been dating for about a month and a half when the race rolled around in 2000, and I made plans to take her there and show her off to my friends. Along with us came my grad school buddy, Dr. Assy. It wasn't difficult to get him to come; I said, "There'll be a beer and brat tent." He perked right up and came along for the ride.

In the 23 months since I had gotten my sheepskin and joined the ranks of alumni, I had forgotten about Sam. Apparently, for the 23 months I was not there, Sam had been doing the 350-pound upright walking version of a puppy pining for its master. I arrived, girlfriend in tow, and within five minutes, there was Sam. Still wearing the white sweater (which was now a sort of dingy gray), still sweating, still looking to clean up my sloppy seconds. Holy fuck.

I tried every diversion in the book I could think of. Nothing worked to try and escape his predatious clinging and licentious staring at my girlfriend's chest and ass. I knew I should have gutted him long ago.

Suddenly, it dawned on me: Sam is young. He graduated from high school young. Sam can't go in the beer and brat tent.

I immediately bee-line for the beer and brat tent, my girlfriend in tow, Dr. Assy not far behind. Sam is halted at the door by the cop watching the tent and making sure the underaged crowd doesn't sneak in. My girlfriend gets in because she's with me and she's not drinking. We leave Sam to rot.

Finally, served our lukewarm beer and tepid brats, we sit down for lunch. Sam has abandoned all hope and has shuffled off somewhere else. We dine in a relative stench-free environment.

"Who was that?" the Comely and Buxom and As-Yet-Unwed Bouddica asked me, an involuntary shiver tingling her spine as she spoke.

"Jesus Christ," I said, after sitting down and smearing ketchup on my brat, "that fucker was like that when I was in undergrad, too. Guy followed me everywhere."

"Yeah," Dr. Assy added, "I can see that guy being like a disease."

No truer assessment of an individual's personality and demeanor has ever been uttered in the annals of human history, because Dr. Assy got it right in his very first shot. To avoid further conflict, we spent the rest of the day in beer and brat tent, only coming out to go to dinner with a bunch of my friends and then returning to campus to drink in the bar and enjoy a gloriously Sam-free environment.