I was sitting on a ledge outside the house, on my porch, when my buddy from L.A. came out side.

We rapped a bit.

It was good to see him. Eric reminds me of R.P. McMurphy from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's nest. He seems to thrive on turmoil, and has a desire to either get laid or get into a fight on any particular night.

The previous night, we had went back to the bar to meet the manager and some out of town friends, as they were all in town for a wedding.

The bouncer gave some flim-flam reasons to kick Eric out. A bartender with an axe to grind took his opportunity, shouting and shoving Eric out of the bar.

So they have Eric on the street corner, and it looks as if fists will fly.

Then I intervene.

I shouted, "Hey!", in my deep, booming, authoritative register, and pushed them off of Eric. It was the tone I used to stop fights between inner city kids. The type of force in my voice is tough to describe, because it only comes out when I'm upset.

I rarely get upset, for good reason. The sheer loudness of my shout seems to stun people.

They wanted nothing to do with me, and left Eric alone.

So Eric and I stand on the porch talking about last night. And he's wrapping a rubberband around his hand to shoot at me. Our interpersonal exchanges border on the idiotic and brutish.

He shoots me with the rubberband...and hits me dead in the white of my eye.

A combination of two things occurs: that survival thing says to the brain, 'Fuck! I can't see!', and another part of me just gets mad, instantaneously. Very mad.

So, in less than a split second, my Doc Marten wearing foot, lashes out, and kicks Eric straight in the family jewels, dropping him like a bad habit.

I feel bad about it...sorta'. I had done nothing to deserve what had happened to me. But a kick to the nads is kinda' low.

Fuck it.

You pays your money, and you takes your chances.