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Angle's Anatomy

"The Swerved"

by Stephen Rivera

Originally posted October 16, 2006.  For Stephen's latest blog entries, please visit The Swerved every Monday.

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If you've been living under a rock with low rent and free appliances, you must not know that Olympic Gold Medalist Kurt Angle is the newest member of the Total Non-stop Action roster. Sunday, October 22, 2006 marks the day when Angle will be at Bound for Glory... as the special guest enforcer in the NWA World Heavyweight Title match between This Olde Slapnuts Jeff Jarrett and The Man They Call Sting. Wrestling fans are quite curious about the direction of Kurt in TNA. Will he do what's never been done before and become Jarrett's lackey? Will he do something physically or verbally impressive that excites colour commentator Don West so much that his speech becomes strained and hoarse? Will he wrestle? These are all questions we want answers for, but I think we're getting ahead of ourselves here. Yes, the acquisition of Angle was an impressive move by TNA. You can't help but look forward to such match-ups as Angle versus Samoa Joe, Angle versus Sting, Angle versus AJ Styles, and Angle versus Norman Smiley, but is Angle even healthy enough to compete? TNA President Dixie Carter, who is unfortunately not from the television show Designing Women, assures us that Kurt Angle is good to go. Am I convinced? Absolutely not. In my humble opinion, just because Angle is in a new company does not mean his pain is suddenly gone. Hey, I ate a salad today, but I'm going to McDonald's tomorrow. Using Kurt Angle logic, I never ate a salad.

Why do I feel this way about Kurt Angle in TNA? Well, why do you have to ask so many questions? Anywho, my answer is below:

Reaction to Kurt Angle's X-Ray = Sideways Face Accentuated by the Letter O for A Mouth to Suggest A Surprised Expression A.K.A. <=^O

ANGLE'S ANATOMY

Pie Crust Skull Casing

Several years of stiff chair shots to the skull have forced Kurt's doctors to surgically implant a store-bought pie crust around the outer layer of his head in order to keep his face intact. The art of taking a chair shot is tricky because blocking a blow to the face with a hand or two is wise, but what's stopping you from back-handing yourself in the skull when the chair draws near? It'd be doubly ironic for someone whose hand was made out of steel. It's too late for Kurt, but he should've taken chair shots in the strongest part of his face -- his eye.

Regulation Sized Wiffle Ball

Severe hemorrhage to Angle's head has made it impossible for him to keep his vulnerable, tender brain fully functional. Doctors assured him if he decided to continue to wrestle, he may have to sacrifice his capacity for human thoughts and emotions. Kurt was puzzled and saddened, but also intrigued about this news. What did he do? He told a shady doctor from Mexico to house the remaining parts of his brain inside of a wiffle ball. The average person claimed he was absolutely crazy for doing so, but he said to himself, "How else am I going to be able to continue to wrestle? I have no other options. At least with a wiffle ball, I can give my brain some air."

Today, Kurt Angle believes 1 + 2 = fishsticks... and he's much better for it.

Dollhouse Picket Fences

Some fans think Kurt wears a mouthpiece to appear in the same vein as a real amateur wrestler (which he used to be). Others believe he wears it for protection after having corrective dental surgery in light of a mishap in the ring with WWE Champion John Cena. While these two explanations seem plausible, they are fraudulent. Angle uses dollhouse picket fences to resemble actual teeth because he used all of the teeth on his upper jaw to coax the Tooth Fairy into providing him muscle relaxants and human growth hormone. Although picket fences aren't practical for eating or drinking, they do somewhat resemble a human set of chompers. I don't expect Kurt to brush his teeth anymore, since all he has to do to keep his fences in pristine condition is slap on a coat of white paint once in a while. It's all good in the hood for him, but then again, Kurt Angle benefits at the expense of poor little Conchita out there, trying to play with a dollhouse without a barrier between her safe, suburban area of residence and the dangerous projects located across the street.

Lego Building Bricks

Angle's quick fix, anti-fusion neck surgery proved to be unsuccessful for many reasons. I think the biggest reason was the following -- he told the doctor to put pointy, plastic, interconnecting rectangles inside of him. Lego is a toy, not a replacement for an actual neck. Look, when I play with Legos, I construct buildings, stairs, or buildings with stairs. Nowhere in the instruction manual of childhood does it say Lego blocks can be a good substitute for certain sections of the human body. Kurt Angle is either the most desperate wrestler ever, or the worst Lego builder ever. It was as if he bought a Lego set from Toys 'R' Us intended for the elaborate construction of a castle, though instead of a castle, he built a neck.

Used Popsicle Sticks

Do you know how hard it is to find popsticke sticks without popsicles attached to them? In elementary school, I tried to construct a wrestling ring out of popsicle sticks when everybody else was building bridges. How many did I use? Five and a half billion, and I had to pretend to enjoy popsicle flavours I hated, like grape. Sure, people were impressed by my eventual creation, yet the first time I used the ring, my classmate shoved me face first into the apron. I did not comically bounce off and hold my head in agony; several popsicle sticks impaled my face instead. According to professional wrestling standards, it looked pretty realistic, but it felt as choreographed as wooden sticks in a dude's face can get.

Sadly, Kurt Angle employed the assistance of his young daughter Kurtxena to eat as many popsicles as she could just so Kurt could implant them at the back of his neck to support the building blocks. Sooner or later, his neck is going to topple like a Jenga tower. Ker-plunk, Mr. Angle. Ker-plunk. Yahtzee. Trivial Pursuit.

Chewed Gum

Are chewed pieces of Dubble Bubble efficient adhesives for the skeleton of a human body? According to Kurt Angle and his person, they absolutely are. Not only do they sufficiently attach Angle's head, neck, and shoulders together, the comics included with each piece of bubble gum provide seconds and seconds of entertainment. Let me present an example of this finite, but deep hilarity:

The Setting: A man is walking his dog along an empty street. A young boy runs into the man accidentally.

Man: Hey, you should watch where you're going, kid!

Young Boy: Why don't you, mister?!

The man points to his dog.

Man: Well, then he's out of a job!

The young boy realizes the man cannot see because he is blind. They both chuckle with lines around their heads to suggest visual representations of laughter we experience in our everyday lives.

FIN

See? So funny... I think I just peed a little. I assure you that Kurt Angle finds similar joy. How dare you try to rob him of happiness.

Bike Handlebars

Your Olympic Hero's sternum was unfortunately destroyed at Summerslam 2000. In a triple threat match for the WWF/WWE World Heavyweight Championship, Kurt Angle suffered a concussion after a botched announcer's table spot with Triple H. Angle took most of the bout to come to, forcing Hunter and The Rock to continue the match by themselves. Little do people know that the moment Angle hit the floor, his sternum shattered like a flourescent light tube hitting the back of some out-of-shape indy guy with a dirty, smelly shirt named Buckets McGuffin.

With the heart of the warrior, and the brains of The Warrior, Kurt Angle decided to go through the necessary procedures to restore his sternum to its original condition, albeit with the utilization of foreign materials. Such dense objects as concrete pipes and refridgerated Toblerone bars were discussed as possible replacements, but neither seemed to be an effective fit for Angle's body. Luckily, an anonymous donor lent his bike to the hospital, which enabled the surgeon to attain its handlebars for the procedure. There was a period of time in which it looked as though Angle's body had rejected the handlebars; his immune system did not know whether Kurt wanted to be a person, or a bicycle. Strangers would come up to Kurt and try to ride him around the neighbourhood; one child added rainbow tassels to Kurt's ears and a chiming bell to enhance his aesthetical and auditory appearance. In the end, Angle submitted both the strangers and the young girl in hard fought battles on free television. Today, he has a clean bill of health.

The Verdict: TNA's ring has six sides, but no shame.

This Week in Angle-y Questions of the Week:

Q: Did you know that Kurt Angle, a multiple-time world champion and future hall of famer, is so healthy that from now on, his movements will be manipulated by strings and wires attached to his limbs, kind of like a marionette?

A: Yeah, but when he spins around in his ring entrance, won't his strings get all tangled and what not? Won't that anger Geppetto? 

Stephen Rivera is the author of The Swerved, one of the most critically acclaimed blogs on the internet.  To read Stephen's brand new posts every week, please visit The Swerved every Monday.