Prison Science

Step aside, Bill Nye the Science Guy, for a new installment of Cutting Edge Prison Science.  What you are about to read is agreed upon FACTUAL information as approved by unit consensus:

FACT ONE:  The reason diabetes is so prevalent among African American men is their high rate of unprotected sex.  (How does this matter, you might ask?  And um, what?)  The prison scientist explains that diabetes is actually a sexually transmitted disease initially planted in black women by the Government to weaken their men.

DISCLAIMER:  Please remember, I do not, in fact could not, make this stuff up and I am in no way endorsing these important scientific discoveries.  That said:

FACT TWO:  Sweat is the body’s way of getting rid of disease.  That’s why you should always workout in multiple layers of clothing, no matter how hot it is, so you can “trap” all illness away from your body.

FACT THREE (as shared by two keen prison scientists):

Genius 1:  I hear the flu is going around.

Genius 2:  Yeah, that sh*t is bad, it gets everywhere.

Genius 1:  Yo, you know how that joint got its name?

Genius 2:  No, how?

Genius 1:  ‘Cause them germs can fly, they from birds, so they like flew (flu) from one fool to another!

Genius 2:  Wait, I thought flu and flew spelled different?

Genius 1:  Come on fool (laughing).  You know back in them prehistoric days MFers couldn’t spell!

Genius 2:  (Nods head.)  You right.

FACT FOUR:  Trump’s border wall will definitely work, because everyone knows that “Mexicans hate to climb!”  (I don’t even know where to go with that one; that statement is crazy in so many ways.)

And my favorite Scientific Prison Fact, are you ready?

FACT FIVE:  Asians are good at math because they are so little!  (Not a person in this conversation skipped a beat at this obvious truth, despite all being basketball fiends who no doubt have heard of 7’6” Yao Ming formerly of the Houston Rockets.  No, this is an iron-clad fact not to be disputed, period.)

You know, this would make a good tv show.  Fake News is popular now, what about a show on Fake Science?  We could start by debunking the Global Warming Hoax (clearly a government plot to take away our cars), move on to the President’s discovery that we are all born with a finite amount of energy that is dispersed by too much exercise, and move right into my collection of prison science factoids.  Anyone interested?  We could get rich!

Crazy, Crazier, Craziest

I’m on a mission to come up with the ultimate life in prison slogan, the one true phrase, a clear concise statement that will summarize the essential situation, the massive totality of the experience.  This may be impossible, but I pursue it with the tenacity of Sisyphus, the old Greek king of myth condemned to push a rock up a mountain only to see it roll back down again.

I have tried out “In Prison What’s Up is Down and What’s Down is Up” (as compared to the outside world).  Evidence for this Opposite World claim includes the many terms in use to characterize incidents that do not make any sense.  Like the Inuit’s having so many words for snow, in here that sort of creativity is reserved for variations on “crazy.”  For instance:

C-r-a-a-a-a-a-z-y!

That’s sh*t’s ridiculous!

That sh*t don’t make no sense!

Dat N___er’s Craaazy! (Used only by black guys)

That man is burnt (for the behavior of someone who has been in prison so long (18, 19, 20 years) that they make no sense at all).

That sh*t is twisted!

That’s some bullsh*t.

Basically you can start with “That’s some….” Or “That sh*t’s….” and finish the sentence with almost anything.  I’m trying to popularize a few of my own, such as:

That’s some gobbledygook!

That’s some poppycock!

That sh*t’s incomprehensible!

That sh*t’s apocryphal!

And my favorite, based on the unwritten prison rule that curse words must be included in any exclamation, thus improving the import of the message:

That sh*t’s some sh*tty sh*t!

To my great disappointment, so far my additions to the crazy lexicon do not seem to have caught on.  But each day seems to offer new opportunities to try them out.  For instance, the administration has just announced that we will no longer be allowed to have Sharpie pens.  Why?  Were people graffiti-scrawling the walls?  Nope.  Were they being used for some other illicit purpose?  Possibly, I guess, but wrong again.  We were told that some people had begun labeling their possessions with their real names and that sort of behavior must be discouraged.  What behavior, exactly?  Acting to protect your belongings?   Please choose any of the above listed phrases re this new rule (as we have).

Trick is not to give it too much thought, or you’ll go crazy too, and then they’ll have to come up with a phrase to describe you!  Instead, I’ll keep looking for that perfect one sentence prison description.  After all, the rock won’t push itself, and the mountain just keeps getting steeper!