Up Yours - a growing body of literature about things people "lose" in their lower alimentary canal (with a footnote on removing these objects)

By Mona Goldwater, Medical Science Editor

There are at least two books, "Up Yours," and "Stuck Up" and numerous websites and blogs about objects that people have "lost" in their rectums [1]. 

A forensic psychiatrist Marty Sindhian, another psychiatrist, Rich E. Dreben, and an E.R. doctor, Murdoc Knight wrote "Stuck Up."  Dr. Dreben said "Sometimes patients tell us that they were doing some type of household chore in the nude when they 'fell' or 'tripped' or 'jumped into bed' and 'landed on the object.'

X-Ray specs from "Stuck Up"

Yes, that's Barbie

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[1] Removal of 100-Watt Electric Bulb from Rectum

from Annals of Emergency Medicine
November 1982

To the Editor:

In all societies, individuals have introduced foreign bodies into the rectum, penis, and vagina, sometimes for sexual gratification and sometimes for unusual psychological reasons. The literature contains many reports of such instances, particularly with respect to foreign bodies in the rectum. Objects reported include stones, coke bottles, plastic vibrators, pencils, sticks, a baseball, knives, screwdrivers, the U-bend of a sink, a sponge rubber ball, glass tumblers, a pickle bottle, and a beer glass.

This case report adds to the list a 100-watt electric bulb, an object not previously reported, and describes the technique used for the successful removal of this fragile object.

A 54-year-old man presented with the complaint that two days earlier he had drunk whiskey and "did something" to his rectum. He was obviously embarrassed and reluctant to explain his problem. Rectal examination revealed a hard, smooth, globular mass. The results of the rest of the physical examination were within normal limits.

When asked specifically, the patient admitted that an electric bulb had been in his rectum for two days. He said he had gotten drunk, accepted a wager of $100 and, using shaving cream as a lubricant, had inserted a 100-watt electric bulb into his rectum. The next day, sober, he realized that he had done a "stupid" thing but believed that the bulb would come out unassisted. After two days he became aware of difficulty defecating, and when he began to experience difficulty urinating, he became frightened and sought medical help.

AP and lateral films of the pelvis verified the location of the electric bulb in the rectum, and the patient was taken to the operating room. He was placed in a face-down position with his hips elevated. The buttocks were separated and held apart by a circular metal ring. With the aid of malleable retractors in the rectum, the electric bulb was visualized, but it was not possible to get a gloved finger over the maximum diameter of the bulb.

Toy darts with suction cup ends were used to draw the electric bulb to the sphincter. After drying the glass surface of the bulb with ethyl ether swabs, we attempted to attach the suction cup end of the dart to the electric bulb with cyanoacrylate cement. Four attempts of this maneuver were unsuccessful: the cement would not stick.

The patient was then turned to the lithotomy position and another dart was successfully attached to the bulb without any glue, and the bulb was pulled to the sphincter.

Three #24 Foley catheters with 30-cc terminal balloons were lubricated with mineral oil and passed over the maximum diameter of the bulb. The catheters were placed at the six, ten and two o'clock positions. Throughout this procedure, a steady pull was maintained on the attached dart.

After it was verified by digital examination that the tips and balloons of the catheters were beyond the maximum diameter of the bulb, the balloons were inflated with 30 cc of water, and about 30 cc of mineral oil was injected into the rectum through a Foley catheter. A steady pull of about five pounds was applied to each catheter, and after about ten minutes the sphincter began to dilate and the bulb began to emerge.

The electric bulb finally came out through the external sphincter with no further complications. Sigmoidoscopic examination showed no bleeding or other injury to the rectal mucosa. After 24 hours of observation, the patient returned home.

The literature describes various methods that have been employed to retrieve foreign bodies from the rectum. Because this electric bulb was a large object (maximum diameter, 61 mm; length from metal end to top, 114 mm) made of fragile glass, special consideration had to be taken to avoid breakage that would have resulted in lacerations to the rectum and adjacent structures, with consequent complications.

Ideally, the bulb should be removed intact from the rectum through the anus. If this is not possible, the abdomen must be opened and the bulb gently squeezed through the rectum and the anus, with great care taken to avoid injuring the rectum. Should this method be unsuccessful, the sigmoid colon must be opened and the bulb removed through the abdominal incision; however, opening the sigmoid colon is a very lengthy procedure with severe morbidity and a prolonged recovery period,, and this maneuver should be reserved as an extraordinary measure.

Vaman S. Diwan, MD, MS
Huntington, West Virginia

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All This Is That Celebrates Its 7th Birthday today

By Jack Brummet, Pablo Fanque, and Mona Goldwater

It has been a wonderful seven years. We've published 4,940 posts since we started in 2004, and have published every single day for the last seven years, mostly from Seattle, but also from India, England, Turkey, Greece, Canada, Mexico, Korea, Idaho, Montana, New York City, Texas, Florida, Massachusetts, New Jersey, California, Oregon, Arizona, and Wyoming.

All This Is That is often syndicated and referenced by other blogs and websites, and our articles and art have been reprinted in books and magazines about The Web, alien lore, folk lore and folk ways, poetry, and politics.  We've even published a few recipes by Jack.

All This Is That began seven years ago with a poem by Jack Brummet posted the morning of November 16, 2004:

Poem: Driving Home To Seattle, We Watch Deer
Drink from the Skookumchuck River
by Jack Brummet

A rainbow loops over
the alder cathedral.
Dark clouds are sinking.

The Lamplighter
loans them a patch of land
and a heartbeat.
---o0o---

Our favorite All This Is That moment occurred the day that Jack FM radio put Jack on their list of Most Famous Jacks (which--we assume--happened because he was linked to so many articles on ATIT).  His second favorite moment was when All This Is That became the number one Google, Yahoo, and Bing search--besting the Beach Boys song from which we nicked the title of the blog.  

		A list of famous Jacks! A Jackass Andrew Jackson Captain Jack Sparrow Cracker Jacks Jack (the Movie) Jack (the Song) Jack and the Beanstalk Jack (and Jill) Jack Albertson Jack Astors Jack Bauer Jack Benny Jack Black Jack Brummet Jack Connector Jack Daniels Jack Dawson Jack Dempsey Jack Frost Jack Haley Jack Hammer Jack Johnson Jack Jones Jack Kennedy Jack Kerouac Jack Kevorkian (a/k/a Dr. Death) Jack Klugman Jack Knife Jack LaLane Jack Lemmon Jack London Jack Lord Jack McFarland Jack Nicholson Jack Nicklaus Jack of Clubs Jack-O-Latern Jack Osborne Jack Paar Jack Palance Jack Plane Jackrabbit Jack Ruby Dr. Jack Sheppard Jack Skellington Jack Sparrow Jack Straw Jack The Ripper Jack Tree Jack Warner Jack Webb Jack White Jackalope Jacks (the classic game) Jack in the Box Jack's Manequin Jacqueline Kennedy Kangeroo Jack Little Jack Horner Samurai Jack SpringHeeled Jack Tekken's Jack The Union Jack You Don't Know Jack (the Game) ---o0o---

ATIT Re-heated: Varnishing coffins and 86'ing the rubes - interview with a Manhattan bartender

By Jack Brummet, NYC Metro Editor

[We originally published this interview in February, 2006.  Around that time, I found a book I wrote in 1981 (The Spirit Below), in which this interview appears.  This is not an interview with a glitzy "Cocktail" style bartender. It focuses on the darker side of being the person on the other side of the bar...not that the bartender is necessarily dark, but the nature of the job brings you into contact with some unsavory folks and situations.]

JACK: You should try to answer these questions as a bartender, not as a drinker. Or at least, as a drinker second.

SCOOTER: Okay.

JACK: Do people come to your bar for a specific reason? Is it loneliness, habit, to forget, celebrate, looking for “love,” or do they just want a drink or two, maybe even because they are happy?

SCOOTER: A lot of people. . .this bar I work at is different. . .there’s a nice Italian man, inherited his father’s milk company. Some days he comes in to forget a problem. Obviously. Other days he comes in because he’s in a good mood. But I have heard stories. At work he’s a sonofabitch. But at the bar he is very friendly or at least polite. Sometimes he’s a little funny too. But this guy who works with him says he is always an s.o.b. Only in social situations is he a nice man. Never at work.

JACK: Only at the bar? He becomes human then?

SCOOTER: Yes. Another man comes in. . .the guy’s always upbeat. Says the world has been great to him. But. . .last night he came in, started telling a lot of jokes and was very funny when he got there. And he started drinking. He was drinking V.O. straight up, with a shot of Gran Marnier floated on top.

JACK: A stiff drink, in short.

SCOOTER: It sure was. Well, he has three in about twenty minutes. There are two women in the bar. He became very rude and started in with “I’ve got nine pounds between my legs…” You know. “Do you want to f***?”

Yeah, he was not rude. He was sick. He said it over and over again, like a very desperate man.

JACK: The real self emerged.

SCOOTER: Yeah.

JACK: Can you tell is a drinker will be like that when they walk in? Even before they hoist the first glass? Before they talk. . .

SCOOTER: I can’t. Other bartenders say they can. I guess I haven’t been at it long enough.

JACK: Another question—how much do you let people get away with before you 86 them?

SCOOTER: I’d have to say I’m pretty lenient.

Sidebar: The term "86" comes, quite possibly, from Chumley's bar and restaurant at 86 Bedford Street in the West Village in NYC. We used to go to this bar because it was one of Dylan Thomas's old haunts, like The White Horse.

JACK: Extremely?

SCOOTER: Yeah. But I’ve never really had a situation like that in New York.

JACK: But I’ve seen you, years ago, drop four glasses in a row and come back for another.

SCOOTER: I know. . .

JACK: . . .drop four because you forgot you were holding them and you were staring off into space. Would you let someone do that four times?

SCOOTER: No. But. . .well. . .a tavern is much different. This place [Dorian’s Red Hand. . .an establishment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, at about 80th Street I think. Jb] is a restaurant with a bar. People drink martinis, cognac and wine, not beer.

So. . .a Scottish guy came in here. I wasn’t working at the time. He was crazy. Bull goose loonie. The first time he came in he was a f***ing maniac. He was staggering around the place, leaning into the bar, stepping up into stools and swaying back and forth. Not really out of drunkenness but from that sort of drunken bravado, of feeling like a powerful human being when you are really just drunk. Those drunken sorts of motions, hyperbolic and exaggerated motions of the drunk. Did I just say hyperbolic AND exaggerated?

JACK: Well [laughs] I can’t remember. Let’s run back the tape. [Plays back tape] Yes. You did.

SCOOTER: Uh. . .I saw him get really crazy. Sort of like when we used to drink with Bob Huff [a professor of ours, a gifted poet, and a professional drunk]. He had that sort of approach: ‘I’m man’s man. . .we understand each other. . .I’m a Scotsman, and you’re an Irishman. And I love the Irish. . .even though. . .You’re a good man. . .descended from Kings. . .” and all that stuff.

Well, he came in once when I was working and he was really gassed. And he ordered drink after drink after drink. I kept pouring them, beer after beer. He was s***-faced when he walked in the place and he must have had eight beers in half an hour. He just poured them down his throat.

There was a funny thing about the guy, ‘though. He would only drink them down so far and leave the last bit in the glass. I tell you they weren’t getting warm. He would order another as soon as the glass reached some mysterious level. And finally he got rude and the manager came over and asked if I kept serving him and I said “Yes, I did.”

JACK: Isn’t it like technically illegal to do that?

SCOOTER: Yeah. But I think it’s more to protect the bar you would kick someone out for being drunk.

JACK: Save the mirrors and such.

SCOOTER: Yeah.

JACK: And no one ever really seems to get kicked out for being a happy drunk!

SCOOTER: True.

JACK: How about a trick you told me about once? Pouring vodka in a guy’s beer to speed the process, so to speak, and get him out the door?

SCOOTER: The guy’s crazy. Fifty-five, sixty. Tells me the same story time after time. And yeah, the vodka works. It gets them out of there. He has a couple of beers and he’s so crazy he can’t even taste the vodka. Another bartender here—Sean—said he would fill his glass nearly halfway up with vodka. Even if he were not drunk, a couple of those would send him down the road. One usually.

JACK: Do you ever feel like you are helping people varnish their coffins?

SCOOTER: No.

JACK: A guy comes in with D.T.s, or terminal alcohol bloat. Does it bother you to pour them drinks? A corpse on the other side of the bar. . .

SCOOTER: No.

JACK: You don’t care? If you see a guy almost literally dying?

SCOOTER: It’s his job to stay alive. Mine is to sell drinks. For instance, this one guy quit drinking because he had liver trouble, or epilepsy or something. A while ago, he started coming in and drinking light beer. The first couple of weeks he was drinking coffee or club soda. And then he quit drinking a few and would have twelve, fifteen beers. Sean said he drank 24 one time. Sean cracked a case as it happens on his first beer. And he emptied the case in an afternoon, five or six hours.

So the guy says to me once “Kevin, this beer is just not settling right. Give me a grapefruit and vodka.”

Now, he’s sliding fast. He’ll be back to Scotch soon. He acts like vodka, beer, anything but Scotch is all right. He came in here today and looked like hell. He’d been drinking two, two and a half days. I kept pouring them. And yesterday, he was in here on day two maybe and had twelve drinks in three hours.

So I saw what was happening and started pouring them with just a floater of vodka on top after his first two. Just a little vodka he could smell and taste at first. After that first blast, when you are that twisted, you forget about worrying whether or not you have sufficient alcohol in your drink.

He wanted to be somewhere. And I wasn’t really cheating the guy. He was lonely and a compulsive drinker. He’s almost dead.

JACK: So, in some sense, you’re actually extending his stay on the planet.

SCOOTER: Although he apparently doesn’t actually want to stay here. . .

[A long digression in the interview occurs here, where we discuss the relative merits of various potables, and go into cash register theft in bars, all of which is deleted because of possibly incriminating statements made about other individuals in the business, notably our friend The Dogfish. As it turns out, this interview will only first be published here, twenty-five years later, long after the statute of limitations has expired. However, All This Is That will be delving into this area in the near future.]

JACK: What is the best philosophy for a bartender to have?

SCOOTER: Pour.

JACK: Poor? Pour?.

SCOOTER: Yeah. That’s what Sean told me on Saint Patrick’s Day. ‘Yeah, keep pouring them and when they get drunk, rob them. Anything on the counter is yours Kevin. That’s business.’

JACK: Do you think the atmosphere of a bar is conducive to business? Does a bar provide the right setting for clear thinking? Because business guys we all know at least have to think clearly enough to fleece their marks. . .to separate the rubes from their money? I mean what is it about bars? The martial regularity? The neat order of the glasses and the bottles?

SCOOTER: No. It’s not the order or anything. It’s the liquor itself. There is a certain. . .as you know. . .lucidity that can be achieved drinking [1]. It’s great stuff. I’m not saying there isn’t a fragile point. There is a point where you have another and it’s gone.

Sidebar: Cf. Horace’s epistles I, v, 19: Brimming bowls—whom
have they not made eloquent?

JACK: One more question. Would you resort to violence to quell a brouhaha or disturbance? A guy comes in, say, extremely high, and gets wild. . .

SCOOTER: Even if he didn’t get wild, I’d kick his ass.

JACK: Right. Anyone who came off loco? What if he was a big, scary, dumb looking guy?

SCOOTER: If he was really drunk? If he was a big guy? I’d say leave! And if he didn’t. . .I’d whap him. Big or small. I’d grab a club and whip his ass.

JACK: But you can’t whip everyone. Do you guys keep heat behind the bar?

SCOOTER: No heat. But there is a baseball bat.

JACK: Wow. What about the bouncer? He almost didn’t let me in here today, you know, the clothes, the hair. He was a big sumbitch!

SCOOTER: Only today. . .on Saint Paddy’s Day is there a bouncer here.

Once in a bar in Washington [state]. I had to sort of kick this guy’s ass. You were already in New York by then.

A weirdo comes in. He was real nice, quiet, normal. But somewhere in there, he turns crazy. Jerry Melin was there when it happened. I was a crappy bartender. Always will be. Even back then . I didn’t like it.

JACK: You seem like a good one, just too reticent.

SCOOTER: So this guy comes in and wants to arm-wrestle me! There were two girls there. Now I can’t arm-wrestle. Any pain and I quit.

JACK: That’s funny because I’ve seen you in several retarded fights. . .get pummeled, and come back for more. . .

SCOOTER: Well, I suck at arm wrestling. This guy says ‘Let’s do it to see who’s stronger.’ I said ‘F*** that. Bet twenty bucks.’ He said ‘Let’s do it to see who the man is.” I came back and said I wasn’t going to do it for free. He said ‘You’re chicken,” and threw something at me. A drink. . .I don’t know. I got mad and walked around the bar and grabbed him by the seat of the pants. . .in front of the girls he—and I suppose I—were trying to impress. I walked him toward the front door, cussing him out, and punctuating each phrase with a knee in his ass. I threw him against a wall outside and tossed him his wallet, which had fallen out. He tried to come back in and get his umbrella and I said ‘You sonofabitch, get out! Get the umbrella tomorrow.’

JACK: What does that story mean? Would you fight for your job, to defend the honor of your bar’s sacred turf?

SCOOTER: No! Only an insult to me. F*** the bar.

May, 1981, New York City.

---o0o---

Tomorrow and the Occupy Uprising

It will be fascinating to see what happens tomorrow with the Occupy Uprising, following a week of police actions and broken up encampments in Oakland, Portland, and NYC, along with many other cities.

From the Occupywallst.org web site:

Posted 18 hours ago on Nov. 15, 2011, 8:40 p.m. EST by OccupyWallSt

Occupy Wall Street and the 99% Movement Persevere

The feeling here at Liberty Square tonight is the feeling of a movement that is rising, building, and making headway.

Following the 1am eviction of Liberty Square early this morning and a long day of legal wrangling, the park was reoccupied late this afternoon. This evening, just after 7pm, the first General Assembly at the reoccupied park began. Using our 'people's mic', we declared together:

"They showed us their power. And we're showing them ours."

We are here because we believe a better world is possible. We are willing to endure mistreatment, if by doing so we can help re-enfranchise the 99% and reclaim our democracy from the stranglehold of Wall Street and the top one percent.

We will push back against billionaire Michael Bloomberg and any politician who wantonly tramples on proud American freedoms: freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and the freedom of Americans to peaceably assemble and petition for change.

We will overcome the obstacles placed before us. We will not be deterred. We will persevere. Our message is resonating across America, and our cause is shared by millions around the world. We are the 99%, and we want to live in a world that is for all of us — not just for those who have amassed great wealth and power.

You cannot evict an idea whose time has come.

---o0o---

BHO may skip traditional ads and just "run clips of the Republican debates"

President Obama recently told Univision News that his re-election campaign won't require any attack ads or mud-slinging.

“We may just run clips of the Republican debates verbatim,” he told the Spanish TV network. “We won’t even comment on them, we’ll just run those in a loop.”

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A debris field the size of California from the Japan 'quake is heading toward Washington State (and may already be here)

By Jack Brummet, West Coast Editor

A debris field "the size of California" is headed for West Coast--specifically, Washington, Canada, and Alaska.  The debris was swept out to sea after the massive earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan in March. 

A Seattle oceanographer and author, Curt Ebbesmeyer, says that while the bulk of the debris will take several years to arrive, items that float could hit the Washington shore any day now.  Check out Ebbesmeyer's website, Beachcombers Alert for more information.  He also runs the Flotsametrics website, where he is collecting data on the debris field as it nears Washington State. 

"My message is the debris--big objects--could be here now," said the oceanographic detective. "Aircraft wings, boats, big buoys -- big objects that catch the wind that can be here now."

Ebbesmeyer agrees with the government figures that around 100,000 tons of debris, most of it moving underwater, will hit the U.S. coast in 2013.  He believes, however, that the floating debris (as opposed to the debris being carried underwater by the current) is moving three times faster.

The oceanographer is asking the public to report any found debris on his website, flotsmetrics.com.

More than 200,000 buildings were washed out by the waves that followed the 9.0 quake. There are reports of cars, tractor-trailers, capsized ships and even whole houses bobbing around in the open water. There will also be human feet, still in their shoes, washing up.  Feet tend to be the part of humans that survive the seas because they come off bodies at the joints, and are encased in shoes that keep them floating on the surface.  Several thousand bodies were washed out to sea following and while most of the limbs will come apart and break down in the water, feet encased in shoes will float, Mr. Ebbesmeyer said.

---o0o---

"Richard Gere is a decent actor" - the oddest photo we've seen today

click to enlarge

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Finger of the day, No. 22

by Mona Goldwater, Nonverbal Communications Editor

As often happens, we cannot find the sources for these images that appear on either dozens of websites, blogs, and posts, or none at all. . .at least according to TinEye.com (who are a great source for "sourcing" images).

This seems to be Sharon Osbourne and friends?

A bad Santa

Bank of America guards

The Geico Cavemen

the late metallurgist Dimebag Darrell Pantera

X-ray

former Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar

Our cousin gives the finger

The Police

Homeless man gives a double finger

"Hot for words'" Marlina Orlova

Keith Richards

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is saluted by a protestor

You have to hand it to this youth, who enhanced the

family portrait, which the family missed and sent out with

the annual Christmas Card

Stan Lee of Spiderman fame salutes reporters

---o0o---

the dilbert transformations

By Jack Brummet, Managing Editor

When we were just starting KnowWonder/Amaze Entertainment, the first game we published was "Young Dilbert," an "edu-game" that taught kids computer fundamentals.  One of our marketing pieces was a "make your own Dilbert" flyer.  I created these in 1997 from those templates.  The artistic challenge I set was to make these transformations using only office supplies we had in our copy-room.  I think I did about 100 of these.  Cleaning out my office, I recently found about 20 of those Dilberts.  Here are some selections.  [Mixed media:  commercially printed templates, with White-Out, Sharpies, Yellow, pink blue, and green highlighters, and Dogbert stickers].

click images to enlarge

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Faces No. 254 - Jitters Coffee Shop

drawing by jack brummet

click to enlarge

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The West Wall

By Jack Brummet
This is the west wall in my office, or, roughly, 136 square feet of faces (the north and south walls have roughly the same; the east wall is all windows).

click to enlarge

---o0o---

Poem: Contemplation

By Jack Brummet



The wind scours the desolate earth
Flaying turf and churning surf
The literal and figurative ablution

Is made
But not yet the offering
Or the prayer

Because the way is unclear
You look for an omen
Like the old kings

And contemplate
Advance and retreat
Fight or flight

Waiting for The Lamplighter
In his own sweet time
To show you the sign.
---o0o---