All around him, the crowd of a few hundred hushes. They form a dense semi-circled pocket. The man in question adjusts his stance, feels for wind and lines up his club. The only sound is a cracking beer can until he swings with the strength of a hammer meeting a...

I cut off mom's thumb.

Or so the story goes.

I was a toddler playing with scissors and she went to snatch them, but was caught in the line of fire.

According to family legend: the thumb was dangling by a tendon. Her appendage only works today thanks...

"What will people think?" Mom asked, many years ago, looking at my ankles with panic.

She denies it now, but I can't forget. I was speechless because it never occurred to me anyone was paying attention.

Turns out, people have a lot to say about a man's sock choice....

For less than one week, I was famous. Famous enough that the employees at my optometrist's recognized me. But not famous enough to get free glasses.

It was going to go over big. I knew it!

"Question," I said, reading from a notecard adorned with an Xed out Kenny Rogers. "One famous country singer sold his soul to the devil decades ago in exchange for fame and a marginal acting career. The trade off, aside...

Yahoo! News, one of the biggest media outlets on the planet, emailed me and asked for an interview. Hundreds of thousands of people would see this story. It was the kind of publicity break an independent press author like me dreams of.

"Absolutely!" I said. "But can it...