“I wanted so badly to mock this book. But you know what’s crazy, a sure sign of how stupid I am? Can I ask in the form of a question?
Why, on the eve of my 30th birthday, did I think the Amazon river was in Africa? How am I that dumb?
I mean, sure, in the book I’m a doctor who specializes in leprosy and has spent many a day in weird canoes going up and down horrifying rivers in order to cure diseases, but if I don’t know which CONTINENT I’m on, what are the odds that I’m going to get out of this alive?
If I don’t even have that one piece of information in my brain, what are the odds that I’m going to finish any of these without being devoured by piranhas Jesus Christ.
Oh shit, can you imagine how embarrassing that would have been if I’d tried hitting on an Amazonian woman? Bad enough that they pretty much ousted men from their society and cut off a breast and almost always seem to be carrying weapons, but then I have to go in and say, “So, Amazonian, huh? I’ve been to Africa once. It was kind of cool. Can I buy you another one of those…what appears to be beer tinged red with the blood of a vanquished foe?”
This volume does get an extra star due to the fact that I died by piranha. Not that I’m excited about that, but it was a way in which, as a youth, I thought I may very likely pass. There were a few things on the list, and piranhas was one of them, possibly in third place after airline disaster and, at the top, Bermuda Triangle. Seriously. I read every book my school library had related to the Bermuda Triangle. We flew from Colorado to Chicago a few times when I was a kid, and I always asked my mom if the flight plan was going to pass through the Bermuda Triangle. Then I would ask ARE YOU SURE? This is probably an early sign and a piece of information that, if you’d already had it ,would have made my Amazonian experience less shocking.
I have to stop typing because I’m afraid my degrees (MULTIPLE! WHAT THE FUCK!?) are going to be revoked if anyone finds out about this.”