Is That A Banana In Your Pocket...

Or do you suffer from a priapism?

All those erectile dysfunction medication commercials warn that there are several side effects associated with taking their drug, such as blurred vision, headaches, indigestion, and painful erections that last four hours or more called priapsims.

Apparently, I may have had a priapism from age eleven to fourteen.

What else do we know about it though?

You may have heard the joke:

A man goes into a drugstore and up to a female pharmacist.
"Can I help you sir?" she says.
"Yes," answered the man. "What can you give me for a priapism?"
She responds "How about five hundred dollars in cash and part ownership of a drugstore?" (rimshot)

What you may not have heard is that the word priapism comes from the Greek god Priapus, known for his huge permanent erection.

In Greek mythology, Priapus is the protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia.

Evidently statues of Priapus were common in ancient Greece and Rome, standing in gardens or at doorways and crossroads.

They would be set as guardians and were often hung with little signs that threatened sexual violence towards transgressors of the boundaries that the statue protected.

It was a quite literally a “Trespassers Will Be Violently Raped” sign.

The statues were of a bearded male figure wearing a conical hat.
The top part of the figure could be removed to reveal a giant phallus underneath. It has also been suggested that the modern garden gnome popular today is a descendant of Priapus.

Yuck, I’ll never look at the Travelocity Gnome the same again.

Well, if you ever need a boner or some tomatoes, now you know who to pray to and knowing is half the battle! G.I. Joe!