Oh merciful Saint Peterbilt, just when I thought that this world couldn't get any more screwed up, I finally went online and entered a chat room.

I know that must seem weird; like I'm the last person on the planet to go ahead and take the plunge. In truth, it seems odd to me, in a way. After all, I have friends who have met their wives and husbands on the Internet. Actually, I know a LOT of wives who have found their husbands on the Internet…after twenty or so years of marriage!

Maybe that's what has kept me out of the mix for so long. I think that is was all of those strange tales of people staying up late at night, talking dirty to each other, getting into arguments over nothing, pretending to be people that they aren't and basically acting like idiots.
And then I realized, “Hey, that sounds just like the CB!”

In fact, a friend of mine who is really into this whole chat room thing explained it to me that way when I broached the idea of launching myself in cyberspace. He quickly sat me down in front of his laptop and plugged it in right there at the counter in the truckstop. How cool, huh? Yeah, well, cyberspace ain't all it's cracked up to be.

“First you have to pick a profile,” he says. “That's who you are.”

“Okay,” I shrugged. “I'm a trucker.”

“No, no, no,” he says. “You need something more than ‘I'm a trucker'. Anybody can be a trucker.”

“I beg to differ, sir,” I retorted, rather miffed at the very idea. “I will have you know that I went to school, still go through refresher courses, graduated from dispatch school without losing my soul or dignity, and I…”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he pleaded, shaking his hands in the air. “But you know what I mean. You can be anyone you want to be—it's cyberspace.”

“Okay,” I sighed. “So, after I create this fictitious person, then what do I do?”

“Then you come up with a nickname,” he tells me. “It's like a handle.”

“Oh, hey!” I say, excited now that I recognize something. “I can do that. Call me Highwayman.”

He paused over the keyboard.

“Everyone knows Highwayman, already,” he says. “Pick something different.”

I was flattered, but I doubted that everyone knows who Highwayman is, regardless of how cool I am. I explained this to my pal, but he insisted that I needed to change my handle anyway.

“Changing your handle is bad luck, man, everyone knows that.”

“Yeah, but this isn't your handle,” he assured me. “This is your nickname. It's totally different. Just play along, will yuh?”

“Fine, I'll play along,” I told him, and set to work on the keys. After some careful thought I came up with something that I thought would be appropriate and showed him the screen.

“You're a twenty-one year old adult film star?”

“Why not?” I chuckled. “You said I could be anyone that I…”

“And your nickname is…” he stared at the screen, blinked, and then swung the laptop back to me. “Try again, you pervert.”

So again I hammered away at the tiny keyboard, and now the fabrications were coming faster and better. I figured out as I did that since I basically fabricate everything else—my logbook, my mileage to the boss, this column—I may as well get creative.

“You're a twenty-eight year old multi-billionaire international man of mystery?”

“Named Julio,” I added. “But you can call me ‘1richstudman'.”

“Oh…kay….Well, let's find you a chat room. What do you want to look for?”

I scanned the types of rooms, and let me tell you, I was amazed at what I found. I think that you can find a room for just about any topic that you might ever want to discuss…or not.

“Is there really a lesbian-squirrel-enthusiast group?” I asked, bewildered as to whether or not this meant that the squirrel girls got into each other, or if this was just a bunch of burly women who liked to toss corn in the park. “And, why are all of these teen sites listed as ADULT? I have teens, and they don't need to be hanging around with adults. Whoa, wait a danged minute! I know what THAT word means!”

“Uh, let's find something a little easier for you the first time out,” my buddy said as he quickly flipped through the pages on the screen before me. “How about an online truck stop?”

“I've been to truckstops,” I said. “Put me back with the lesbians. I want to find out if they know as much about small engine repair as I think they do.”

“How about The Coffee Shop?”

“Are there lesbians?”

*Groan from friend*

“Okay, put me in the truckstop,” I sighed. “But I really think that you should expand your mind a little.”

So we went into the Truckstop chat room of his choosing, and let me tell you, it was a real eye opener. Within the first two minutes I was:

1. Propositioned by the owners of thirty porn sites, varying in degrees of depravity from good old fashioned red blooded American bored house wife stuff to people who wanted to do unspeakable things with unmentionable objects in unthinkable positions.

2. Hit on by at least ten women who wanted to meet a billionaire.

3. Propositioned by five guys who didn't understand that not only does ‘no' mean NO, ‘1richstudman' means that I am a man. I was a little disappointed that they had not taken the time to at least look at the profile that I had created.

4. Hit on by at least eight guys who wanted to meet a billionaire, and knew perfectly well that I was a guy.

5. Offered three hundred, fifty-six ways to invest my billions, only ninety-eight percent of which involved porn.

6. Offered the opportunity to invest in penguin importing.

7. Offered the opportunity to invest in a small, Start-up Company called “Enron2”.

8. Asked if I knew anything about illegal penguin importing, and if not, would I like too?

9. “Whispered” to about ninety times for things that I really don't want to discuss and still have a hard time understanding why anyone would want to do that to a nice, normal guy like me.

10. Asked if I was interested in starting an online adult bookstore.

Now, I had just about my fill of all of this porno stuff. I had no idea that people had spun out quite this badly and felt that they were free to just come right out and ask me for some of the things that I did. And, let's not forget, I had decided AGAINST using the profile in which I had proclaimed myself an adult film star.

And here I thought that I was being original, you know?

Last but not least, this all happened in a place that claimed to be a truckstop. Let me tell you something, I have been in some real dirt-holes in my day, but this place would make East St. Louis look like Sunnybrook Farm, and you guys know what I am talking about! God only knows what goes on in the REALLY nasty sites, you know? As far as I am concerned, my days in cyberspace are numbered. I think that I'll get my filth the old fashioned way.

I'll just listen to late night CB chatter.