Acid Washed...

My friend Frank grew up in Niagara Falls (the city, not the cataract), which strikes me as a little unfortunate. I mean, Niagara Falls is a great place to visit but I think that actually living there would have me over the falls in a barrel quicker than you can say "Thundering Waters." I understand why they have so many wedding chapels and casinos in their quest for "Honeymoon Capital of the World" but why all the haunted houses? I don’t get it.

Anyway, with its proximity to the US of A, and like all primarily suburban cities, Niagara Falls has a lot of drugs running through it. As a result, the first time Frank tried acid was way back in high school. He and a friend had rented a movie or two and were going to sit in for the night. They dropped the acid and were wondering why nothing was happening yet when unexpectedly, Frank’s friend’s parents came home. They were supposed to have been gone the whole weekend, but for some reason had returned early. But it wasn’t really a problem, since the acid apparently wasn’t working, and having no knowledge that it normally takes an hour to kick in, they sat down to visit with his parents. Like all good stories of this nature, Frank was chatting away with his friend’s Mom when he noticed that the walls were melting and starting to drip. This was relatively distressing for Frank. He quickly clammed up, and watched in panic as the mom’s mouth slowly formed the words, "Frank, are you ok?" Somehow, he managed to get across that he had a headache. The mom left the room and returned with some water and a Tylenol. Frank stared at the drug in his hand for almost five minutes while the drug in his mind registered one paranoid thought: Poison. Nothing could possibly be worse at that moment than swallowing that over the counter pain reliever. Slowly and deliberately, Frank took a sip of water, raised his hand to his mouth, and then casually tucked the Tylenol under the cushion of the sofa. The whole family was staring at Frank during this entire episode of completely obvious sleight of hand. His friend, who was still fine, suddenly realized what was wrong with Frank and attemted to rescue his tripped out friend.
"Come on Frank, let’s go to the store and get some snacks."
"Ok," said Frank and rose to go.
"Sit Down!" said his friend’s father. The gig was up. Frank sat. From out in the hall came his friend’s voice, "Frank let’s go." Frank was confused. He stood up again and headed for the door.
"I said, Sit Down!" said the Dad. Frank immediately sat. "Are you sure you’re ok Frank?" asked the Mom. "Come ON, Frank!" came the call from the hallway. Once again Frank stood up, dreading the father’s wrath.
"SIT!"
Frank sat.
His buddy finally came back into the room, grabbed Frank by the arm and dragged him out of there. "What the hell is wrong with you man! You’re acting like an idiot! Why didn’t you come out?"
"You’re Dad kept yelling at me man!"
"Frank, he was talking to the Dog!"