165
by NerblyBear_Archive
A story comes to mind:
I have no idea why I did this, but, for some reason, when I was ten years old I put up a sign in my neighborhood mail-house (y'know, where all of the mailboxes are packed together in one little house) saying that Shaquille O'Neal was coming that weekend to sign autographs and meet 'n' great everyone. Y'see, at that time, Shaq was in his second year in the NBA, and the Orlando Magic had high hopes that his giant bulk and slamming skills would re-vitalize the city. Basically, everyone in Orlando idolized Shaq.
So, after putting up this sign, I promptly forgot about it during the rest of that week.
Saturday afternoon rolls along. Having just finished a game of Little League, I come home and shower up. Then I go in to say Hi to my mom. She says:
"Do you know anything about this whole Shaquille O'Neal brouhaha?"
Ashamed, and completely surprised that anything had come of it (you see, I had figured no one would really take it seriously), I answer that, Yes, I actually was behind the whole thing.
She starts cracking up and tells me that half the neighborhood ended up coming to the clubhouse and waiting there for a couple of hours, with balls they had purchased to get signed, and everything.
The entire rest of the summer, whenever I would hang out with anybody in the neighborhood, someone would always say, "I wonder who did that." I would start blushing and become quiet. Nobody ever found out. Nevertheless, I was truly embarrassed by the whole thing.