It was the summer before my second year at Michigan State. That summer I made the mistake of living back home in Mt. Pleasant instead of staying in East Lansing.

The whole summer I was busy working at Burger King making Whopper sandwiches for $4.25/hr. My dad thought it would help to teach me about the value of the dollar. Needless to say, he and I didn't get along at all that summer. When I did work, I went in there and worked hard. Even though my manager was critical of my double bacon cheeseburger he thought I made a tasty Whopper and was willing to put in the good word for me down at the E. Lansing Burger King.

My dad was proud of me.

Yet I made a definining decision: for once I wasn't going to listen to my dad. I was determined to either find a more humane job or willingly become unemployed. That week I checked through the papers and found a job posted for the Department of Public Safety(DPS) that required you to work parking for Michigan State football games.

The thing that sold me on the job was that it paid $5/hr and you could get into the football games for free!

I couldn't believe that I was going to be making .75 cents above minimum wage! Dollar signs went off in my eyes. I called up my friend Jason Stevens and told him about the job.

"You mean we get $5/hr and get into football games just for directing traffic at football games?"

"Yep." I cooly replied.

"Dude, our fucking troubles are over." he said.

The next day I drove down to East Lansing and we applied for the jobs. The guy at the DPS was impressed with the fact that we had both written down unlimited availability on our applications. It turned out that he was in a real pinch and needed workers bad so he hired us. After getting hired we were on top of the world. We were walking down Grand River feeling like a couple of major league studs. Little did we know that there was a major catch to this job that the hiring manager neglected to mention (and for a good reason).

For safety purposes, this job required it's employees to wear these bright orange vests that made us visible to every car and person within a mile radius.

For about half a season Jason and I were two of the unluckiest dudes on campus. We were subjected to all sorts of ridicule for wearing these vests. Before too long the money got old and we were fed up with the humilation and torment.

Not giving a shit anymore about our job, me and Jason both decided to make a statement at the next Michigan State/Wisconsin game. So there we were the Spartans were up 21-7 over the Badgers, and we agreed that next touchdown we would make our move.

It didn't take too long before a Spartan defensive back was able to grab a wobly little pass and take it into the inzone by the student section. The fans were going crazy and we both nodded at eachother knowing that this was it. Quickly we threw on our orange vests and had our stronger friends lift us up on top of the crowd. There we were in our orange vests crowd surfing around the student section of Spartan Stadium. Just about everyone in the section thought it was hilarious and kept passing us around. Slowly people were starting to watch the two fans in the orange vest get passed around as opposed to the football game.

For some reason I was getting nauseous getting passed around so I had some people set me down. My friend Jason however, was rather enjoying his fifteen minutes of fame. He enjoyed it so much that he got passed right into the arms of a waiting Police officer that didn't find our disrespect for the orange safety vest to be as funny as we did. Moments later two other officers came up and helped out in strong arming Jason out of the stadium.

Jason later told me that at the stadiums exit the officers boot missed his ass by only three inches! Better luck next time Officer Friendly!

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EDITORS NOTE:In what many have called a modern mystery of feline biology, Groucho "Miracle cat" Hershey has eluded explaination by growing back his testicles. Groucho's balls were excised from his groin several years ago but have inexplicably returned. "It's amazing," said JJ, Mark's old roommate who has since adopted the cat. "I really don't know how they grew back. All I know is one day Groucho was content to lay by the window and the next he was humping my leg."

Speculation has arisen that the procedure was performed incorrectly or there has been an increase in the amount of chemicals in the tap water. Veterinarians at the MSU Clinic deny liability in the matter leaving toxic pollutants as the only possible culprit.

Meanwhile, a small cult has formed around the cat proclaiming Groucho's new gonads as a "sign of the new millenium" and the "Second Coming of the Testicles of Christ". The End of Days Cat Cult instruct their followers to carry two marbles in each hand at all times, even when sleeping, and to pray when they pass JJ's house.

The cat, on the other hand, has refused comment.