Garage Door Opener Triggers Priapic Response

Status: Old joke
The Register has posted a transcript of a BBC radio call-in show during which a man phoned up claiming to have a highly unusual medical problem. Following an operation in Turkey to treat his impotence, the man now finds that every time his neighbor opens the garage door, he gets an uncontrollable erection:
CALLER: But what is happening now is every time my neighbour comes back in their 4 x 4, I get an erection.
HOST: Good Lord.
CALLER: This is embarrassing. It's a big problem.
HOST: Have you been to see your doctor about it?
CALLER: The problem is I had this done in Turkey, using equipment that is not known in this country. I don't like it because every time his car pulls in I can't leave the house.
HOST: (Laughing) I'm afraid that it sounds funny as well. I know it's not funny for you.
CALLER: It's not funny for me, Roger, when I can't leave the house because I'm walking around with a big erection.
I'm sure I'm giving this more thought than it deserves, because there's no way it's not a joke. I'm not aware of any bionic penile implants that could be activated by the radio frequency that a garage-door opener uses. (And I actually did some research into strange penis implants in the course of writing chapter two in Hippo Eats Dwarf... the one about fake body parts... but I never came across anything like that.)

Update: David Emery immediately identified this as an old joke whose history has already been traced in FoafTale News. Apparently Bob Hope used a similar joke in his routine, saying that his neighbor got a new pacemaker, but now every time he made love his garage door opened. As the joke circulated through popular culture, the pacemaker turned into a penile implant that was activated whenever the garage door opened. This version has been seen in the Weekly World News (August 5, 1997, p. 58) and Fortean Times (68:13).

Body Manipulation Sex/Romance

Posted on Wed Jul 19, 2006



Comments

He might not be joking, it might be some kind of paranoid psychosomatic response. In which case, sucks for him.
Posted by Citizen Premier  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  12:50 AM
"Can't leave the house?" Yeah, right. I'm sure every man hides in shame each time he's in public and has a randy thought.
Posted by cvirtue  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  03:47 AM
"Can't leave the house?" Yeah, right. I'm sure every man hides in shame each time he's in public and has a randy thought.


I agree. This kind of happens, and we men have learned to live with it. Or at least I have.

And hey, as long as you're in the house, there *is* an easy way to get rid of that erection 😉 I've learned to live with that as well.
Posted by robert.wood  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  04:20 AM
Mot sure that solution works with priapsis...
Posted by outeast  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  06:15 AM
Aaargh! Robert.Wood, what hast thou done?</blockquote>

That should help... Or will it...?
Posted by outeast  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  06:17 AM
This is a Larry the Cable Guy routine. "I got my vasectomy done at Sears, and now, every time my neighbor uses his garage door opener, I get a boner."
Posted by btsculptor  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  06:45 AM
yeah, it's on Larry the cable guy's series "Git-R-Done"
Posted by Blood For Nothing  on  Thu Jul 20, 2006  at  08:22 AM
Kind of reminds me of the guy who had an MRI scan of his pelvis and afterward every time he got an erection it always pointed north.
Posted by Blondin  on  Wed Jul 26, 2006  at  08:34 PM
Actually, it may be true.
Russian phyysicians and a bunch of researcher from the University of California have invented independently (and it ha a US patent, too...) a wireless implantable stimulation device which is used to excite the nerves which lead to an erection. See http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4585005.html

Since the frequency used in remote controls for opening automatic garage doors use a similar frequency, it might be possible.

Dr. Renato Sabbatini
Professor, Medical School
State University of Campinas
Posted by Renato M.E. Sabbatini, PhD  on  Sat Mar 31, 2007  at  03:47 PM
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