He's the Honky Tonk Man, he's cool...he's cocky...he's bad.

And you know what else??? I MET HIM!!!!

So about two weeks ago I got an e-mail from my mom, saying that there were going to be wrestling matches in Shamrock on the Saturday of Thanksgiving break. How convenient...because I was going to be very near Shamrock on that very day! She was just joking when she told me. Little did she know that I would take it so seriously. So I packed my "Hot Rod" shirt, my Honky Tonk Man action figure, and headed home for the holiday.

Saturday Staci and I spent the whole day mentally preparing ourselves for the fights. I made a sign which said "Honky Tonk Man - 'The Greatest Intercontinental Champion of all time!'" (Not to be confused with the Rock's "I am the best damn Intercontinental Champion there ever was.") Staci criticized my sign, saying that including the quotation marks made me appear too intelligent. But I didn't want to white them out either, so I left them.

I grabbed my camera, wore my Rowdy Roddy Piper shirt, pocketed Lil' Honky, and we were on our way. Once we arrived, there were about 2 cars there. So we decided to wait to make our entrance. Once we did (we bought 2nd row ringside seats) Mike helped us pick out the best seats in the house. Mike wore the classic "Cactus Jack - Wanted" t-shirt, and Mike proved to be the man to know in Shamrock.

Right as we sat down....Wayne Ferris, aka THE Honky Tonk Man, set up his autograph table RIGHT NEXT TO ME!!!! I get so nervous around celebrities, and I held Lil' Honky a little too hard, but finally mustered up the guts to go talk to Mr. Tonk Man.

First, he eyed my shirt. "That's a collector's item, you know." I said, "I know, I've been a fan a long time. Thrasher almost beat me up for wearing this shirt." Then I handed him the little bitty guitar that goes with the action figure and asked, "Would you sign your guitar?" He was totally amazed to see that I had his doll. "That is a limited edition, you know. They only made 28,000 of these. If you had left in the box for me to sign, it would be worth $55." I said, "I'm sorry, but I wanted to play with it." He rolled his eyes, and looked longingly into the little dolls' eyes and signed "Hom-- To---- Ma--" across the chestal region. I wanted to take my picture with him so bad, but I could tell he wasn't into it.

His hair still looks great. He was wearing a windsuit with boat shoes. And his match was great. Kids kept giving him the DX crotch chop, and he took the time to tell each and every one that they had nothing to be pointing at. And when the people in the audience started chanting his name and cheering for him in general...he stopped the match and said "Quit cheering for me! I don't need your help!" It was so cool.

I'll just give you a run-down of the wrestlers' names: Honky (of course), Doink the Clown (Dink could not make it), Marc Youngblood, Chief Running Deer, Ricky Romero Jr., Rick the 3rd, Jericho Kid (a Y2J knock-off with the mulletyest mullet I have seen in quite some time), Ricky White, and the Angel of Death.

This is already so, so long, so I won't go into the details of all the matches. Only the very, very end of the main event...the 10-man Battle Royal in honor of Dirty Dick Murdoch. To be eliminated, you have to be thrown over the top rope. So it was down to two: Marc Youngblood and some other guy in a mask. Youngblood threw him into the ropes....and drop-kicked him. I believe what was supposed to happen was that he was supposed to drop-kick him over the top rope in a very fluid-type motion. However, he really drop-kicked the masked guy, who fell back into the ropes, came to a complete stop, put his hands on the top rope and hoisted himself over, trying to make it as if he had just been kicked over the ropes, ignoring the fact that the momentum was long gone. It was awesome.

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