You Know Johnny Bones?

My good friend Ed went away for school. He went to Chicago, and he doesn't come back much, because of the distance. Now, he will tell you personally that he has trouble with small things, like directions or how many days there are in February. He's talented in other areas. But last year he came back to Fayetteville and he didn't know where he lived.

This was the second time it had happened. The first time, he parents moved from his childhood home to a condo. I had to drive him there. Last year, they actually switched cities - and he didn't know it. Now, he spends a few days in Fayetteville, sleeping at my house, and a few days at home, because it's a forty five minute drive between where he lives now and where he sometimes thinks he lives.

Last week, though, I had to call Ed and tell him to go back home, if he could find it. We had run out of beds at our house. The Cave, as I've previously stated, can sleep five comfortably, seven reasonably, and eleven illegally. Last week we slept eleven.

And it wasn't just having that number of guys in one room. It was the occupants. Two of them, to be exact. Julius and Christof. Exchange students from Germany.

Now, let me be clear - I've forgiven the Germans for what they did in World War I. If not for that, we wouldn't have created the League of Nations, and then where would we be? The country would be in an economic crisis, and Woodrow Wilson would be dead. So, frohe ostern, Germans. NBD.

But with the arrival of Julius and Christof, Germans have sunk to a level not seen since they were last referred to as Prussians. Take their entrance, for example. While their connection George, who looked, no lie, just like a recently electrocuted Robert Pattinson, gave us their names, Julius picked up three pool balls and began juggling. He lost his grip, and one of the balls hit our sliding glass door at maybe waist height. Everyone became quiet, waiting for the glass to break, but Julius picked up the ball and said, "One more time."

He couldn't juggle at all! He was terrible!

Julius cursed like a sailor, but he loved Rock Band. He loved it so much no one wanted to play with him. We left him in the cave, playing the drums by himself with a screwdriver and a pair of scissors (I hid the drumsticks and told him we lost them). He played Expert.

Christof was a little easier to stomach. He told me a lot about their boarding school, Christchurch School, in Virginia. They love Call of Duty there. Everyone plays it. One student, Johnny Bones, has a flatscreen tucked under his bed. He pulls it out after curfew; if folds out, along with the sound and gaming systems. I told Christof that Johnny Bones sounds like the twenty year old who gets held back four times and tells all the freshman about the secret passageways to Christchurch's sister school. Christof's eyes widened and he said, "You know Johnny Bones?"

I went to bed before the Germans. So did, I think, everyone else. When I got up the next morning, there were twelve empty grape soda cans on the pool table. My brother said it was all the Germans. He thinks they slept outside.