September, 2002. I bought a boat. The day I brought it home for the first time, I parked it in the driveway so I could mow the grass. My wife came home and immediately a distressed look seized her face. "I don't want that in front of the house." My step daughter's friends joked that I must have spent upwards of $7 for it. Sure, its ugly, but who cares? Not me. I want nice teeth, not a nice boat. Besides - I don't want it in front of my house either. Think of what the neighbors would say behind my back: "I wonder when he's going to start hoarding tires?" The boat is going to live in the back yard.

If you've followed this page for any length of time, you'll know that everything has a name other than that which Webster's has assigned. What would I call the boat? I thought for days and nothing. No inspiration at all! But awesome my wife met me at the door one day when I came home from work. "I know what you should call the boat, " she said. "The POS." How perfect! I danced the most lame dance I ever danced! The boat finally had a name.

You can't just name a boat, though. There has to be a ceremony. A christening. Like those rich people who bust a $500 bottle of champagne on their yachts. I certainly didn't have $500 for a bottle of champagne. But I DID have 99 cents for a 40 of Olde English 800 - 8 Ball. 40 oz. of rancid malt liquor. A guaranteed buzz for less than you can scrape off the floor of your car or out of your couch cushions. Its not for the discerning palate, however. Its more for the broke palate. I'm long past that stage, but it seemed fitting to christen a boat called the POS with a 40.

So I bought a 40 and we took it with us diving. Twice I tried to break it on the bow, but the bottle wouldn't break. It left a few nice dents in the boat, though. Rather than risk destroying it with the extremely resilient 40, my brother said I should just pour it on the boat. Brilliant! The rest of the day, though, the boat smelled like a donkey urinated all over it. Ahhhhh... fond but clouded memories of high school and college rushed over me.

We took the digital camera to take a movie of the event. Its pretty cool to see, but I'm warning you - its over 700k. If you have a slow connection, it could take you a little while to download it.