Detectives Stabler and Benson walked
into the cold morgue, glad they were
still wearing their trench coats from the
morning’s crime scene. The Medical Examiner pulled back the sheet covering
the victim’s body. The little boy’s cheerful red santa hat wasn’t the only red thing
in the room; his shredded entrails filled
the examiner’s table. He had been eating
peas, their green hue quite appropriate
for a December 24th rape and strangulation, thought Benson as she bent down
to examine the yellow fibers running
through what were once tiny ears.

“Wait till you see this,” remarked the
examiner, before turning off the lights
unexpectedly. She flipped a switch next to
the table and a string of beautiful Christmas lights running along the boy’s
body lit up. They reminded detective
Stabler of the Christmas lights that
used to adorn his childhood home,
except those weren’t covered in blood
and weren’t arranged to spell out the
words “SATAN LIVES HERE” across a
young boy’s chest.

The medical examiner turned the
lights back on, but it would never be light
again inside detective Stabler’s soul. Not
with the things he’d seen. Not with the
things he’d done. He took a bite out of his
gingerbread man.

Detective Munch stared into the little
girl’s eyes. He knew what he was going to
have to ask, but he couldn’t bring himself
to say the words. Detectives Stabler and
Benson were the lucky ones, he thought,
at least their victim was dead. Finally he
continued.

“Okay, sweetheart. Tell me exactly
where he held the mistletoe.”

The little girl pointed to a spot on her
Santa’s Little Helper Ken doll. She wasn’t
pointing to the doll’s mouth.

Munch slunk back in his chair. He tried
to offer her a candy cane from his desk,
but he knew nothing would ever taste
sweet for this little girl again. Nothing
ever could.

Captain Cragen smiled as his detectives gathered around the plump Christmas ham he’d prepared. He could barely
hide his anticipation; tomorrow morning
they’d all gather around the tree and open
the presents he’d carefully picked out for
them. For Olivia, a beautiful porcelain
doll to keep on her desk, to remember
the innocence and beauty of youth. For
Elliot, a little red fire truck to give to his
son. And for Munch, a CD of all his favorite music. It would be a special Christmas
for everyone. Except for the South Village
Rapist who was stabbed to death by a
cellmate prior to sentencing.

1. Go to your professors’ office hours, no matter how early they are. The interaction between student and old horny intellectual is a tradition dating back to Plato and Socrates. You won’t learn a damn thing, but smart people need dumb people to talk down to. Going to office hours isn’t about an exchange of ideas, but about letting your professor masturbate directly into your brain, and this one time, shoes. Really, this is the entire point of college.

2. Therefore, the most important thing you can do at Cal is simply not fall asleep. Ever. My friend took a nap once and he got hit by a bus. Not while he was asleep, but still.

3. You must not rely too heavily on caffeine however, as you will become dependent. A caffeine addiction is one of the hardest addictions to break. A friend of mine recently quit caffeine and he shit blood for eight days. Contrast this example with myself, who several weeks into last semester quit caffeine and suffered no ill-effects. Why did I succeed where he failed?

Unlike me, he forgot rule #1 about quitting an addictive drug: always replace it with an even more addictive drug. For instance, I’ve replaced caffeine with meth. And then I replaced meth with cocaine. Well that last statement isn’t entirely true; replace the word “replace” with the words “started mixing cocaine into the meth,” then remove the rest of the sentence alltogether. Shit do I love cocaine.

4. This is 2005! You and me, man, we’re white. We can’t compete with today’s modern super-minorities. Your Asians. Your Indians. Your really determined Latinos who’ve ingested Asian blood for power. We need something to even the playing field. And that something is heroin. Oh, and also the meth and cocaine from earlier.

5. Here’s the trick: You won’t get addicted to anything if you keep switching drugs every time you get too close to an addiction. Feel like having some caffeine? Have some meth. Feel like having meth? Have some cocaine. Feel like having some heroin? Okay, cool, you and me should talk. There’s a bathroom in Wheeler with a false wall. Leave the money there and then I’ll tell you which toilet the heroin is hidden in.

I AM an expert excuse maker. I can squirm out of things better than the seed of a seventeen year old with a bright future and a punctured condom. Here are some tricks of the trade.

Avoid Cliches

Your excuses must be consistently fresh and
inventive. The excuses we hear every day like
“my car wouldn’t start,” “the alarm didn’t go
off,” or “she was dead when I got here,” are too
predictable. I recommend spicing up an old
favorite with a zesty new detail, e.g.: “My convertible wouldn’t start.” “The alarm didn’t go on.” “She was raped when I got here.” Etc.

Be Aware of Modern Cliches

Some excuses have only become unusable
within the last year or so. Keep abreast of the
times. If you’re really stuck, try combining an
old cliche with a new cliche. For example:
Old Cliche: My dog ate my homework.
New Cliche: My printer ate my homework.
Believable Excuse: My dog ate my printer. He
died of toner poisoning.

Notes

Notes are small scraps of paper onto which
the handwriting and signature of someone
with a post-graduate degree has been forged.
Notes are useful for excuses that come up at
the last minute. Slept through your job interview? Dr. Kline says you’re a narcoleptic! Is it too nice a day for discussion section?
Your psychologist says chalk reminds you of
grandma’s beatings! Being mugged at gunpoint? Not after Stephen J. Goldbloom Esq.
declares it a hate crime, you big queen! Got too high to play softball?
No. No you didn’t. You are never too high for
softball.

Contingency Plans

Invariably, one of your excuses will fail.
Don’t get discouraged! Just keep trying new
excuses until you find one that works, as in
the following example from my own personal
experience:

Policeman: Do you have any idea how fast
you were going?
Me: Man, my wife’s having a baby!
Policeman: License and registration.
Me: Man, your wife’s having a baby!
Policeman: I’m not going to ask you again.
Me: I’ll make you my man-wife, baby.
Policeman: Step out of the car, sir.
Me: She was raped when I got here.

Explaining Yourself

Double invariably, at some point all of your
contingency plans will fail and you will have
to either smooth things over or switch to a
section with a GSI who doesn’t know that
your mother has died before every major test
since the third grade.

It’s situations like these that separate your
amateur excuse makers from your white
house press secretaries.

First load up eBay on your computer. Then
search for “Ninja Smoke Bombs.” Don’t order
from TexasN1nja2; his high feedback rating
belies the low quality of his smoke bombs
and his use of media mail.

Now let’s try that last situation again:

Policeman: Step out of the car, sir.
Me: She was raped when I got here.
Policeman: What’s that in your hand?
Me: [Throws smokebomb and peels out.]
Policeman: [coughing] Fuck, that’s just what
Ari Fleischer did.