Obscenely Stupid Hypothetical

I was in the car with Mike (brother, roommate, fellow procrastinator) this week, and the conversation turns, as it so often doesn't, to eggs. In our defense, we were coming straight from the grocery, and the eggs were in the backseat, sliding, bouncing, frolicking--doing all sorts of things eggs shouldn't be encouraged to do. Mike railed, as he does whenever the subject is broached, against the merits of eggs on the whole, and in doing so, he tossed out this (very true) fact that I had entirely forgotten about: in the town that Mike and I grew up in (Wauconda, Illinois), it is illegal to have eggs inside the car with you. I have no idea if this sounds far-fetched to you, but it would to me. I will try to explain why, which will require a bit of background.

Eggs were not always the reprehensible and dangerous products they are now considered in the 60084; like you, the people of Wauconda frequently enjoyed the taste of egg salad, for instance, or of a plate of huevos rancheros. Pickled, deviled, or simply boiled hard, the egg was revered and beloved, as it is all over this land. Like the Force of Star Wars lore before it, though, it soon became obvious that the egg could just as readily be turned; turned for the purpose of evil.

The tradition of Homecoming (if this is an unfamiliar term to you, I suggest you study up here) runs rampant in the fall months of the the northwest suburbs, and Wauconda is no exception. Aside from the games, parades, and dances, ol' W'onda, like many other small towns, injects its own local traditions. One of particular importance (for our purposes is) known, by its participants, as Junior/Senior Wars. During school hours, the local high school encouraged good-natured competitiveness, where a particular school day might have a specific theme, like dressing up like idiots day, or pie-eating contest day. These school-sponsored events were generally engaged in with the same spirit in which they were proposed, and simple (if stupid) fun was had by most. At night, however, things begin to take a devious turn: Juniors and Seniors wage war between them, near-literal war, and the primary weapon, when I was of this age, was the humble egg.

Just in case you've never been hit with a thrown egg, I will describe it to you: it sucks. You probably could have guessed at that, so I'll describe it further: an egg is like a golf ball that is filled with snot, and being hit with this object is terrible. While I was a Junior, and, predictably, a senior, I was hit with maybe a dozen eggs, personally, although my car was hit by easily three times that number. Why, you ask, would people have thrown eggs at me, the author of this blog, and all-around good chap? The answer is this: I was probably holding an egg, and trying to hit them; maybe from the bed of a moving pick-up truck, or perhaps while chasing or being chased across a baseball field behind Pizza Sam's. These were ridiculous times, and I don't recommend them to the faint-hearted, or people that hate snot and snot-like substances.

"Egad," you are thinking, probably. "Why would you tell us this stupid story, which also makes you look like a complete jackass?" If you are thinking this, then the hypothetical exercise I am about to propose will probably not make you feel better. So, back to the top: Mike and I are riding in the car, and talking about how it eventually became illegal to have egg cartons in the car with you in Wauconda (they needed to be stashed away in the trunk), and one of us proposed this scenario: what if you could reduce the rate of homicide in Chicago to zero incidences, in exchange for an increased rate of public eggings? We both agreed that no person with a heart could refuse this swap. But how high a rate of public eggings would you accept in exchange? How about 25 times as often as the old homicide rate? 100 times? Let's put it in simpler terms: On a 10 minute walk to, say, the el, how many times would you allow yourself (and everyone else, of course) to be egged, on average? Even once? How about five times? Mike and I agreed on this: most people, we thought, nearly everyone, would still make this trade, and it would just be common practice to wear a raincoat everywhere, even in the summer, or else people would just get used to the sudden stinging pain and wetness of being egged regularly. People are generally good, we thought,and very adaptable. Mike and I agreed that we would both still do it, no matter the cost (if you define cost as a quantity of blows to the body with eggs), but that we may have lost more than a few people on the idea by now, people who are both very honest and have excellent imaginations. And then, finally, Mike proposed this: would I still do it, still make the trade, if they could get me...in the house? While I was sleeping? I think this is where I broke, but what about you? Don't worry, I'll try to make a poll.

For those of you who found this offensively stupid, just hang tight, because we'll do something better later in the week, and I hope you'll still be reading.