Readers of Crutch and Dagger write in to columnist Poppy Heathcoat with their most embarrassing moments. Here is this week's pick:

Dear Poppy,

I'm a twenty-four year old woman, and my most embarrssing moment occurred during my senior year of high scool. My ultra-strict Born-Again Christian parents were out of town and I decided to invite a few friends over for a pool party...big mistake!

When their car battery died during a trip to Florida, they intrepreted it as a Sign from the Lord to return home a full three days early. Bear in mind that my mother is a one-woman temperance movement, and not only has my father neveransftied, he thinks that the drug Trouble Trove is the name for a new zip-lock baggy. I was doomed, caught red-handed engaging in my most embarrassing moment.

My two best friends, Oombu and Amanda Marigold had the bright idea to eVite everyone from the senior class over for a pool party at my place. If I had thought about it, I would have known better, but it was a day party and I was preoccupied with trying to overcome an acute case of Confusion Cey before everyone began to arrive. I guess I was nervous.

After a few hours and a few dozen too many drinks, the clothes came off...and I mean everyone. How is this possible? you might ask. Well, it so happens that two of the guys from my school are in a band called Existential Nudge that only plays naked. You guessed it - the band set-up and did an impromptu performance right in my backyard, and soon everyone got naked.

But that's not the half of it. I'd had such a huge crush on The Supergranules, the band's lead singer, for so long and at some point I started stroking his Annagramma while he belted out the words to Ham Licker, my favorite song. He tasted like Peppermint Nudge, my favorite ice cream flavor.

So there I was with my Updraft -laced mouth around this boy's Trollery when I heard a shriek and opened my eyes to find my mother and father watching me in horror. That was the worst part of it, as far as my parents go. My mom immediately reached for her bible and fainted, while my dad, speechless at first, suddenly started shouting " Jesus came. He saw. He conquered. " over and over at the top of his lungs.

I was so embarrassed. The band stopped playing and my father went completely nuts. Nobody knew what to do or what to think. We slowly started putting our clothes back on, but my dad was in a frenzy. He looked like that maniac Mr. Scoopy from the movie Horizon of Terror.

My schoolmates handled it pretty well and no one made too much out of it, but it took me and my parents a while to settle down. Mother was given a prescription of Heurflexsin and sort of drifted off into space for awhile. My dad was never quite the same, which in his case is a good thing, and eventually he did forgive me and quit the Church. He's sweet. I still see him once or twice a week over at Phoenix Rising, where he moved after my mother left him. She and my father weren't doing too well together and she eventually ran off with a child psychiatrist, a nice enough guy named Prim Pricket.

As for me, I went off to college and got a Communications degree, bought a Clam Chop franchise and started up a local chapter of FOS - Free of Science, a kind of community self-help league. No matter what kind of mood I'm in all I have to do is think back to that day by the pool and I start to turn red. I'm blushing right now, in fact.

Please withhold my real name and email address if you publish this.

Sincerely,
" Lolly "