stay in the shallow end

It’s amazing how chewable Bic Round Stic pens are. The pen shown here was brand new before my one hour class today.

Bic Round Stics were my weapon of choice in high school for non math related writing. They were cheap, which given my propensity for losing things, was the primary decision making factor. The chewability was just a bonus. I gnawed my way through many a pen, producing frankenpens far more grotesque than the one shown above. Usually I would gnaw the cap until there was nothing left but shredded plastic and then move on to the back of the pen. My insatiable urges for bic chewing led to two amusing incidents in high school.

The first was freshman year in World History. I had already worked my way through the cap and was chewing on the back of the pen. The pen tasted kind of funny, but I didn’t realize that the pen had exploded in my mouth for quite awhile. I gnawed, felt something on my lip, wiped it, and saw the ink on my hand. At that point, my mouth and teeth were black, I had smears on my lips and face, and the pen was dripping all over my desk. I had to interrupt the teacher’s lecture and explain why I had to go to the bathroom. On the plus side, I got to chew gum the rest of the day to help get rid of the ink.

I don’t remember when the second one happened, but it was the only time I’d thought that I had a serious pen chewing compulsion and that I should probably do something about it. If you look at the cap above, you’ll notice that the rim of the cap is tapered to an edge, a result of me grinding the end down between my teeth. Anyway, at end of one of my classes, I was packing up my stuff and putting my pen away by pushing it into the cap which I held between my front teeth. Well, I pushed too hard, it slipped between my teeth, and I ended up stabbing myself in the back of the throat with the aforementioned sharp edge of the pen cap. It was pretty painful, but I was far more concerned with the blood filling up my mouth and dripping down my throat. I was in the bathroom for a few minutes spitting the blood out and continued to do so throughout the day… not fun.

In hindsight, rather than purchasing pens to accommodate my bad habits, I should have purchased pens that would force me to adopt better habits. Perhaps I’ll do that now. I’ve always wanted a Fisher Space Pen.