[flash]
...one
...two
...three
[BOOM]
Three seconds.
It's not raining. This isn't rain. It's walls of solid water, falling from the sky. It's outdoor swimming with little pockets of air floating around. I don't think there's a part of me that isn't wet. Hmm- my crotch is the only part of me protected by two layers, maybe that's still dry. I roll my hips. Nope, that's wet, too. Lightning forks its way across the sky.
Two seconds.
Thunder resonates across the park. Someone is tearing open the gunmetal grey coulds with giant machines, making a tearing, wrenching noise as they rupture their watery contents all over us. It's close. It could come raining down on us at any moment, electrical fire arcing across the park. Death by kerauno. I start looking round for metal objects to avoid. Pete's wearing glasses- best stay away from him. Jayne's got an umbrella- I'll avoid her. Do I have anything metal on me? I check my pockets for change. Nope, I'm good.
"Shouldn't we get out of the lightning?"
"Don't worry about it! You've more chance of winning the lottery than being hit by lightning."
"Surely those statistics take into account the fact that most people generally get out of situations in which they might be struck by lightning?!"
One second.
Oh, no. Of course I've got metal on me. I've got a great big hunk of silver right through my nipple. Right over my heart. I'm ground zero for lightning strikes. A mental image flashes through my mind: I'm lying on the ground. My hair has been vaporized. My shoes have been ruptured by the strength of the blast, my blackened feet protruding from hunks of torn fabric. For some reason I imagine that my teeth have all come pinging out of their sockets. That probably wouldn't happen. I have this thing about teeth. People are gathering round me in the aftermath of the blast, "Are you okay?"; "Don't touch him, he may still be electrified!". I'm paralyzed. I want to speak but I can't. I want to get up but I can't. I want to say: "The lightning has super-heated my nipple ring to 200 degrees (celsius!) and it's burning into the second most sensitive part of my body from the inside! Get it out!" But I'm trapped inside my own head. Just me and the pain. Shocked through the heart, and I'm to blame.
Zero seconds.
It's right on top of us. I'm getting out of here. I start running for the nearest line of tree cover. Hang on, lightning loves trees. Does this help me at all?
"Oi! Get back on the field! They'll take possession!"
Ah well, I think as I jog back to the goal- I did say I would make the most of the summer.
This is a 
LOVE THIS POST! It reminds me of swimming in our pool back home in SA while the rain poured down and the thunder crashed overhead. Is it just me or was the water always warmer then?
a ... nipple ring?
You know it's not metal per say that attracts lightning? It's tall structures. Specifically tall pointy structures. Metal just makes it easier to conduct that lightning to the ground and will be more attractive to lightning than say something less conductive, because as the negatively charged lightning approaches the ground it pushes all the negative electrons in the ground or tall pointy structure away leaving the tall pointy structure positively charged and hence more attractive to the lightning.
A nipple ring wont make any difference. A tree is dangerous. So are goal posts. The safest thing is to make you self as small and low to the ground as possible, but by covering the smallest footprint on the ground possible. The best thing is to keep your feet on ground as close together as you can and c,url the rest of yourself up into a ball. And as far away from anything that may be likely to be struck by lightning, as the charge will travel through the ground and can still zap you.
Safest place to be is probably in car or in a building that has well designed lightning protection. This would be better to say being on a gold course holding a pointy object in the air like say ... a 7 iron.
Sorry Joe, did I not tell you? I'm gay now.
You don't think that's a little bit offensive?
To gay people or pierced people?
To gay people.
Are you saying I'm so ugly that the gay community would find it offensive to have me as one of them? Because I'll have you know my buns are highly appreciated by the gay community, as has been mentioned to me on several occasions.
How I read it as
Dan> Got my nippled pierced.
Joe> You did what? Are you nuts?
Dan> Actually I'm gay now.
What's being gay got to do with a pierced nipple? I think it's offensive because their is a subtext that it's a bad thing or that only gay people do it or what not. I just don't see the link between the two, and hence get the feeling that you are saying something is gay, is bad, which its not.
I'm afraid that subtext (that being gay is 'bad') is entirely your own. You should look into why you believe that. I certainly wasn't trying to imply that you, as a person of pierced nipple, were gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
I don't believe that. But it's used so commonly in our everyday language as such "oh that's so gay" that when someone makes a statement about being gay that has no actual relation to being gay, it seems implicit.
Well, as you know I'm an enlightened 21st century guy who doesn't casually throw `round offensive terms.
Now quit being such a bitch-ass nigga you big girly saffa.
So explain to me the link between being gay and the nipple ring then?
You're the guy with the crazy nipple-ring = gay theory- I was just updating Joe about my new sexual orientation, and you start making up crazy conspiracies connecting it to all and sundry. You'll start saying rollerbladers look gay next.
Jesus!
Will you guys give the pedantic contradictions a rest?!
Yes, I think Dan was connecting having a nipple ring and being gay, but no, there was nothing (in the slightest) to suggest that that was a bad thing.
There. Now shake hands and make up.