Learn them, know them, live them - these are the 10 commandments

***Editor's note: This is longer than Dirk Digler's winky***

Sometimes words slip by my internal censor before the delay switch is hit.

That's how it works in my head. The censor, my own MPAA, the MCC if you will (Melissa Communication Commission) often works double time when I'm mixed into a group, and overtime when hard alcohol is involved. And I'm sure the MCC went through its procedures and guidelines thoroughly Friday afternoon as my nervous as hell body sat in it's aisle seat on the way to Pittsburgh - I'm about as calm as an asshole at a proctologists convention when inside those flying metal tubes - for my first guys weekend since getting hitched to Wife's runaway trailer.

As an aside, Wife imparted upon me before I departed my airport chariot her 10 commandments for this trip:

• Thou shalt remember to be on your best behavior at all times. (FAILED, and you'll learn why in a bit)
• Thou shalt be polite and friendly. (PASSED)
• Thou shalt not drink to oblivion. (I didn't puke or proclaim my man love for Dodger catcher Russel Martin, so that's a PASSED)
• Thou shalt not participate in nor initiate any food or drinking challenges. (TOO VAGUE TO GRADE)
• Thou shalt not get arrested for public urination or intoxication. (PASSED - because I run faster than the fat pigs working the Downtown Pittsburgh beat. One piece of advice PPD officers, lay off the Primanti Bros. sandwiches)
• Thou shalt not remove the wedding ring for any reason. (PASSED - she'd put it through my nose if she heard it left my hand)
• Thou shalt remember that all behavior will be reported to me. (PASSED - until HeadShrinker's hubby reports to her)
• Thou shalt not cry nor throw a tantrum at the ballpark. (FAILED - the Yuengling beer guy didn't come by until I had just bought a Budweiser. You'd cry too if you were forced to drink that monkey piss.)
• Thou shalt not taunt others with Kirk Gibson's name. (FAILED big time - it was impossible commandment to begin with.)
• Thou shalt not dare nor respond to a dare to run naked on the field. (PASSED)

That's what I was facing before I set foot on the bird. The pressure weighed on my like it was a 20-pound dildo and I was afraid Wife would slap me with it if she heard I misbehaved.

As the teenage figure skater next to me continued to explain her religious views, I continued with the mantra I would follow on the trip, "Don't say anything stupid. Be a mature adult." (When one has to remind one's self to act one's age and not the like the adolescent he really is who still laughs at butt and poo jokes, being out in public on one's own may not be the best remedy.)

The mantra stayed with me on the connecting flight to Pittsburgh. I peppered the pro boxer next to me (7-1 with 5 KOs) with boxing questions, but that still didn't wipe away the pressure of uttering a phrase or two that would wedge my foot deep into my pie hole.

Once off the plane and in the party barge with the rest of the early arrivers, the mantra faded as we all talked baseball - Sandy Koufax overrated? My left nut, you butt munches. If I wasn't the new guy and following Wife's commandments, I would have given y'all a kick to the groin followed by two quick rights to the jaw. That's just how I roll when Mr. Koufax is brought up - and enjoyed Pennsylvania's green countryside. It's like driving through Ireland I suppose, just with steel and asbestos factories instead of shamrock farms.

I made it six hours with the Friday nighters without uttering something that would either a) offend; b) get my ass kicked three ways from Sunday; and c) show them my world really revolves around midget porn and poop jokes. Even with their threat that I would earn a nickname for saying or doing something dumb, I passed the first night's test like I just crammed for a History of the Toilet Brush exam.

With all the Friday nighters together Saturday morning, we hiked to the Andy Warhol Museum - the last place I'd think such a museum would reside for the pop artist, but I guess he grew up in the Steel City, and the only artsy fartsy thing the folks of Pittsburgh would get before the museum was built came in the form of someone singing the national anthem at the Steelers game.

Chances were good the MCC wouldn't be able to curb my tongue when I started spying paintings of faceless cartoon men having their wee-wees yanked off or laying wood to man's best friend. Hell, some images had the roles reserved. And yet, I was able to keep it together. Warhol's collection of wigs didn't even send me from the museum screaming bloody murder (wigs freak the holy living crap out of me).

I didn't make it through the morning completely stupid-free. As I started to click pictures of PNC Park, I realized the memory card in the camera wasn't holding the images. I checked the screen and found I didn't have a memory card. Then I remembered, it was sitting in transfer box (that's right, I use technical phrases, don't I?) at home.

A nap recharged my batteries and recharged the MCC. A couple of us found a bar for the Dodger game and beer, which was a test in itself as I was surrounded by four Giants fan. Talk about feeling like an alter boy in a room full of smiling Catholic priests, I minded my Ps and Qs as the Dodgers thumped on the Mets. The rest of the group wanted to scout out the Strip District which really wasn't as glamorous as it sounded. There weren't any strip clubs, and district made it sound like a condensed community of kitchy boutiques and bars. But I believe that was the reasoning to wander around in the district, to scout out the late-night, post-game Pittsburgh hot spots. And even though our little troop of Oaklanders and welcomed guests were eyed like we were burgers served on a golden plate to a pack of rabid Pittsburgh dogs, we trudged until the perfect night spot was found. I could have told you the name up until we walked in later that night, but after Drink Baseball, all bets were off on remembering the joint's name.

Commandment No. 2 was nearly broken after the third inning of the Pirates-Astros game when I noticed the Houston pitcher had retired the first nine hitters he faced in a row. I uttered, "He's pitching an intersting game," (that's code for he's throwing a no-hitter so far. Then again, a 3-inning no hitter means about as much as Luara Bush sending me an e-mail reminder for President Bush's birthday) and the lady in front of me threated to jam the rest of my Primanti Bros. sandwich up my nose and pull the hunk of capicola through my pecker. I took the hint and kept my french fry, cole slaw, fried egg, capicola sandwich-eating trap shut for the rest of the game.

As we trudged back to the bar - halfway there I wished I had my hiking boots and the Camelback (filled with my favorite libation, of course) from the hike - I felt proud of my censor for not cracking under Wife's pressure. Hell, I believe I even endured myself to the crew when, as they discussed their chances of winning a fight now that they went 10 deep I gave them a quick and dirty way of winning an altercation.

"Knee the chump in the nuts and as he doubles over come down with two quick overhand rights to the chops. Dude'll go down like a hunk of beef. "

"We have the wild card we've been missing all these years! We can win a fight now!" One shouted, others laughed, and I figured the MCC was out of danger now. I shut it off for the rest of the evening to give it a break. It earned one. Twenty-one and a half hours among these guys and the tongue had stayed in check.

But I basked in that glory too soon.

When I have a few pops in me, the MCC gets loose and I can go off like I'm in a South Park movie. And with 10 of us drinking like we were playing a baseball game - a new mixed drink each "inning" for a total of nine - the MCC must have left the building entirely and started partaking in the game as well. It didn't help that each drink contained more Vodka than a Russian president's liquor cabinet, either. Vodka, my mortal enemy, and the undoing of my perfect, verbal weekend.

At one point, unsure what we should drink for the sixth (maybe the seventh, who the hell knows at that point - it was all a blur after the Wild Turkey and Washington Apple shots) we sent one of our own over to a table of Pittsburghian ladies for drink guidance. He came back with Vanilla Stoli (Vodka) and Diet Coke. Not bad I thought, and it wasn't. But then the question popped up. Why Diet Coke? Then it became a question of our manhood. Can we drink Vanilla Stoli and Diet Coke - DIET COKE! - and still be considered verile, baseball-loving, All-American dudes?

The question passed around the group. Why Diet Coke? Finally, taking one for the team I figured, I had to pose the questions to the ladies.

And there, 23 1/2 hours among this group, I broke Commandment No. 1. Sometimes, I'm denser than a soggy phone book, so I didn't pick up why they would be drinking Diet Coke with their alcohol.

"Quiet, Melissa!" "Shut it!" "Kick him so he pipes down!"

Someone kicked me in the shin a half dozen times until my leg looked like a warped record. Another tried to quiet me down by shoving my drink in my face, which often works. It took me a second to understand what my question implied.

Then the Pittsburghians sent over their spokeswoman.

"We're trying to watch our girlish figures," she said. Then, she threatened to cut a map of the three Pittsburgh rivers into my ass, so I backpedaled faster than a 10-legged unicycler, explaining that my censor was shut off for the evening, and that I'm a moron for not reviewing the question before letting it out in the open. And while she accepted somewhere in the neighborhood of 21 apologies (21 because that was Roberto Clemente's number, and the only way to make nice with a Pittsburghian is to include Clemente's name in a conversation.) I still felt horrible because I think I ruined the two singles dude's chances of getting a piece of Pittsbrugh hootchie. I'm pretty sure I broke a few man laws there, and it's a wonder I wasn't arrested and forced to turn in my cock card.

The hangover the next day was punishment not for drinking too much, but for turning off the censor and letting my thoughts run wild like over-sugared 6-year-olds.

And while everyone said they'd invite me back for next year's tour, I could see in their eyes that they'd appoint someone as the official Melissa Duct Tape Monitor, in charge of taping my cake hole together in case verbal diarrhea began to leak past the censor.

Good luck whoever gets this assignment. Ask Wife (she's tried for seven years), you'll need it.