By: Luke Burns, McSweeney’s 

Q: Do I have to kill the snake? 
A: University guidelines state that you have to “defeat” the snake. There are many ways to accomplish this. Lots of students choose to wrestle the snake. Some construct decoys and elaborate traps to confuse and then ensnare the snake. One student brought a flute and played a song to lull the snake to sleep. Then he threw the snake out a window.

Q: Does everyone fight the same snake? 
A: No. You will fight one of the many snakes that are kept on campus by the facilities department.

Q: Are the snakes big? 
A: We have lots of different snakes. The quality of your work determines which snake you will fight. The better your thesis is, the smaller the snake will be.

Q: Does my thesis adviser pick the snake? 
A: No. Your adviser just tells the guy who picks the snakes how good your thesis was.

Q: What does it mean if I get a small snake that is also very strong? 
A: Snake-picking is not an exact science. The size of the snake is the main factor. The snake may be very strong, or it may be very weak. It may be of Asian, African, or South American origin. It may constrict its victims and then swallow them whole, or it may use venom to blind and/or paralyze its prey. You shouldn’t read too much into these other characteristics. Although if you get a poisonous snake, it often means that there was a problem with the formatting of your bibliography.

Q: When and where do I fight the snake? Does the school have some kind of pit or arena for snake fights?
A: You fight the snake in the room you have reserved for your defense. The fight generally starts after you have finished answering questions about your thesis. However, the snake will be lurking in the room the whole time and it can strike at any point. If the snake attacks prematurely it’s obviously better to defeat it and get back to the rest of your defense as quickly as possible.

Q: Would someone who wrote a bad thesis and defeated a large snake get the same grade as someone who wrote a good thesis and defeated a small snake? 
A: Yes.

Q: So then couldn’t you just fight a snake in lieu of actually writing a thesis? 
A: Technically, yes. But in that case the snake would be very big. Very big, indeed.

Q: Could the snake kill me? 
A: That almost never happens. But if you’re worried, just make sure that you write a good thesis.

Q: Why do I have to do this? 
A: Snake fighting is one of the great traditions of higher education. It may seem somewhat antiquated and silly, like the robes we wear at graduation, but fighting a snake is an important part of the history and culture of every reputable university. Almost everyone with an advanced degree has gone through this process. Notable figures such as John Foster Dulles, Philip Roth, and Doris Kearns Goodwin (to name but a few) have all had to defeat at least one snake in single combat.

Q: This whole snake thing is just a metaphor, right? 
A: I assure you, the snakes are very real.

This is really the only reason I go on WSHH anyway.

NIGGAS ASKED ME A COUPLE TIMES IF HITTING A BITCH WAS OK AND UNDER WHAT CIRCUMSTANCES ETC. SOME NIGGAS REALLY DIDN’T KNOW AND SOME NIGGAS WAS EXPECTING ME TO BE LIKE “NAH IT’S PERFECTLY NORMAL TO BREAK YA WIFE’S LEG IN HALF IF SHE STEPS IN FRONT OF THE TV PICKIN UP GARBAGE OFF THE FLOOR AND FUCKS UP YA KILLSTREAK” YOU SHOULDN’T JUST BEAT BITCHES UP FOR NO REASON B. THAT’S FOUL B, CUZ IMAGINE YOUR DAUGHTER GETTIN HER EYELASHES BEAT OFF BY SOME NIGGA CUZ SHE TALKED OVER AN ESPN HIGHLIGHT. YOU GOT A DVR NIGGA THAT WAS TOTALLY UNNECESSARY. SO YOU SHOULD NEVER HIT A FEMALE B.

UNLESS 

1) SHE PUNCHES YOU OD HARD IN THE FACE IN FRONT OF AN AUDIENCE: IF YOU ON THE 5 TRAIN AT 149TH PLAYIN PLANTS VS ZOMBIES IGNORING WHATEVER BULLSHIT SHORTY IS TALKIN ABOUT AND SHE GETS TIGHT TO A POINT WHERE SHE’S ACTIN RECKLESS AND YOU JUST BE LIKE “MA, SHUTUP.” THEN SHE PUNCHES YOU OD HARD IN YOUR FACIAL? YOU GOTTA DO SOMETHING, CUZ NIGGAS IS LAUGHIN AT YOU. SO YOU GOTTA OPEN HAND SMACK SHORTY IN HER FACE SO HARD THAT HER EYEBALLS TURN INTO JELLO SHOTS AND FALL OUT. DO NOT PUNCH HER CUZ SOME NIGGA IS GONNA TRY TO COME TO HER RESCUE AND THEN YOU GOTTA THROW HOMIE ON THE TRACKS LIKE MY NIGGA QTIP DID IN PRISON SONG. THEN SUBSEQUENTLY GO TO JAIL AND DO CRAZY JOINTS AND EAT ONION SOUPS ON SOME MAZEL TOV WACK SHIT. WHICH SUCKS CUZ THEN SHORTY GETS THE LAST LAUGH. SO JUST SMACK HER IN THE FACE OD HARD. 

2) SHE HITS YOUR MOTHER/SISTER: IF SHORTY VIOLATES LIKE THAT AND HITS YOUR MOMS OR YOUR SISTER THEN YOU GOTTA GO HAMMY DAVIS JR. ON THE BITCH B. YOU CAN’T LET THAT SLIDE AND EVEN IF YOUR SISTER GOT IT YOU GOTTA HIT SHORTY IN THE CHEST WITH THE VANDAMME KICK B FUCK ALL THAT GENTLEMAN SHIT. YOU GOT THE GREEN LIGHT TO PUNCH A BITCH IN THE FACE, BODYSLAM A BITCH ON A FIRE HYDRANT, ALL THAT. JUST DON’T KILL HER OBVIOUSLY. BUT NOW YOU GOTTA BE PREPARED TO FUCK HER BROTHER UP CUZ THAT NIGGA IS PROLLY GONNA TRY TO HOOK OFF. IF YOU LIVE IN THE HOOD THIS IS GONNA END UP WITH ONE OF YALL NIGGAS GETTIN SHOT TO PIECES AND NIGGAS WEARING LITTLE FLYER LOOKIN CARDS WITH “RIP MY NIGGA” ON THEM WITH YA PICTURE. IF YOU LIVE IN THE SUBURBS THIS IS GONNA GO ON FOR INFINITY ETERNITY AND YALL NIGGAS GON FIGHT EVERYTIME YOU SEE EACHOTHER AT CINNABON IN THE MALL.

3) SHE SUCKER PUNCHES YOU: UNLESS YOU WILD SOFT OR YOU DATING ONE OF THESE BITCHES EVEN IF SHORTY TROMBONES YA SHIT ON SOME UNEXPECTED YOU SHOULD STILL BE STANDING. IN WHICH CASE YOU TURN AND FLINCH AT SHORTY. IF SHE FLINCHES ON SOME SHOOK SHIT THEN YOU GRAB HER FACE AND SMUSH IT. DON’T MUSH THE BITCH SMUSH THE BITCH…YOU GOTTA PALM HER FACE LIKE A BASKETBALL AND BE LIKE “FUCK YOU DOIN BITCH? YOU CRAZY?” IF SHE DON’T FLINCH AND COCKS BACK FOR ANOTHER SWING THEN YOU GOTTA HIT SHORTY WITH THE DOWNWARD SMACK. YOU COME FROM UP HIGH AND SMACK DOWN LIKE YOU SLAMMIN DOMINOES ON THE TABLE. THAT SHIT IS WILD DISHEARTENING B. IT MAKES SHORTY REALIZE SHE CAN’T BANG WITH YOU CUZ YOU’LL ROCK HER SHIT. 

NO MATTER WHAT YOU GOTTA STAY CALM B. DON’T WILD OUT AND START SCREAMIN & SHIT B. YOU GOTTA WHIP SHORTY ASS AND BE ON SOME COOL IKE TURNER SHIT. THAT WAY SHE FEELS LIKE “YO THIS NIGGA IS CRAZY LEMME NOT TRAVEL DOWN THIS ROAD DOWN AGAIN CUZ I CAN’T SEE OUT MY RIGHT EYEBALL RIGHT NOW AND MY EARS IS RINGIN”… ALSO, THIS SHIT APPLIES TO REGULAR BITCHES. IF YOUR GIRL IS WILD FAT THEN YOU GOTTA BE CAREFUL CUZ FAT BITCHES DON’T GO DOWN EASY AND THEY GO INTO CRAZY RHINO MODE AND WILL FALL ON YOU TO IMMOBILIZE YOU AND PUNCH YOU IN YA NUTS AND ALL THAT…NAH I’M PLAYIN FAT BITCHES GO NO SELF ESTEEM THEY WON’T EVER GET OUTTA POCKET UNLESS YOU GET HIGH AND EAT ALL THE ENTENMANN’S.

(Editor’s note: I immediately thought of this. Also, never ever hit a woman.)

Derek Boogaard, the Boogeyman, who was found dead last Friday in his apartment in Minneapolis, was a forward for the New York Rangers, and the only player on the team who was the best in the world at his role. Boogaard was the team’s sergeant-at-arms, the player whose responsibility it is to protect his teammates from being abused, leaned-on, harmed, or forcefully negated by the other team’s fearsome players. Hockey is a game of unabashed intimidation, and it is easy to play a threatening style that makes less bruising players shy and therefore less effective. For years the Philadelphia Flyers were known for a menacing game that gave other teams pause. Players were sometimes known to feel indisposed on the day before they had to play the Flyers, and this was known as having a case of the Philadelphia flu.

The rules in hockey protect players only to a degree. Referees sometimes miss infractions, or one overlooks what another won’t, leaving the players uncertain about how far they can press matters. Hockey is also the only major sport in which players are armed with clubs, and the only one to unfold at such ferocious speed. Furthermore, there are no out of bounds for the players and long intervals of engagements between whistles, during which resentments smolder and sometimes ignite. Boogaard was the peacemaker charged with seeing that teams behaved politely when they visited Madison Square Garden, or acted thoughtfully as hosts. Earlier in the season, there was a dramatic moment when the Calgary Flames became enraged at one of their players having been rudely handled by a Ranger. For about forty-five seconds, they tried to run over every Ranger they could, and it looked as if someone might be hurt—hockey collisions being no joke. Finally, there was a whistle, and Boogaard came on the ice. While the Flames waited for the face-off, they directed a certain amount of lip at him, like birds in a tree chattering at a passing cat. A slight smile, nearly a smirk, crossed Boogaard’s face. He said merely, “I’m right here,” meaning for anyone who wanted to ask him to dance. The linesman dropped the puck, and the game became suddenly orderly and serious and civil.

How respected a fighter is in the N.H.L. is measured by how often he fights. The players who are less feared, or who are trying to establish themselves, fight more often. Boogaard fought infrequently. Since his death, other fighters have been interviewed and one of them described Boogaard as being “definitely at the top of the list of guys you really didn’t want to run into. If you had to, you had to. That’s our job. But he had the potential to hurt you”—hence the nickname.

Players able to frighten other players are as difficult to find as players who can score goals. Boogaard was six feet eight inches tall, and sometimes weighed as much as two hundred and eighty pounds. He didn’t move quickly, but players who didn’t get out of his way resolved to pay closer attention to Boogaard’s whereabouts. There are hockey players who provoke and antagonize and often carry things too far, but this was not Boogaard’s style. His presence was stately. He was more Gary Cooper than Charles Bronson. The Rangers best goal-scorer, a Slovak named Marián Gáborík, played with Boogaard for the Minnesota Wild, and was pleased when he came to the Rangers, because with Boogaard on his team he felt safer. Gáborík and Boogaard had the same agent who said over the weekend that when Boogaard became a free agent, there were as many teams interested in him as had been interested in Gáborík.

I admire hockey fighters, and I don’t care for it when people refer to them as goons. It is an uninformed point of view and disrespectful. Before Boogaard came to New York, he played five years in Minnesota. He was known for his remorseless effectiveness on the ice, but also for being deeply involved with the team’s charities. In New York he had a charity called the Boogaardians, which saw to it that military families had tickets to Rangers games at the Garden. He had not had a good first year in New York, and he had told friends that he was looking forward to the coming one. In January he had fought and got a concussion and had gone home for the rest of the season. For a while, to avoid headaches, he had to keep to dark rooms and wear sunglasses when he went out. He lived on West Fifty-seventh Street and spent a good part of the day walking around the city. He had the sort of bland looks of a construction worker, and probably didn’t stand out, even with his size. What killed him isn’t yet known, although over the weekend it was announced that his family had donated his brain to the Boston University School of Medicine, which studies brain trauma and is very interested in the effects on the brain of fighting in hockey. For out-and-out body-maiming violence, nothing approaches football, of course, or boxing, but hockey fights can be difficult to watch. I enjoy them (sometimes) when they are retributive, when a grievous infraction has been overlooked by the referees, and one bruiser confronts another. But I wouldn’t miss them if they were taken away from the sport. Nevertheless, I know I am not the only one who had been looking forward to the Rangers home opener, and hearing the announcer say, “Number Ninety-four, Derek Boooooooooooogaaaaard,” and watching him step onto the ice, a battleship among the swifter, more diminutive members of the fleet.