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Posted on 12/25/2003 10:57:26 PM PST by RangerHobbit

I see that Swiss researchers from the University of Bern announced on Friday in the British journal "Nature," that a rare chemical bonding agent originally developed for use in pharmaceutical buffers was thought to be responsible for an unusual side effect on human metabolism. The discovery was made by scientists testing a new psychotropic drug called "Retalanaline," which contains the said chemical bonding agent. The drug is said to stimulate cerebral cortex synapses in both men and women in a manner similar to synthetic dopamine substances, but with an intensity and duration previously unknown to medical science. Friday's "Nature" essay is an elaboration of a paper originally published in April by Markus Vanweilt, a Ph.D. candidate in neurochemistry from the University of Bern, who along with other scientists was also a test subject for the new drug. Proving unremarkable for its intended purpose after three months, Retalanaline was about to be dropped from testing when Vanweilt and other scientists began to notice an incredible side effect: Orgasm lasted up to fourteen minutes.

Explains Vanweilt in "Nature": "Though the normal physical sensation of orgasm is limited to several seconds by blood surge in women and ejaculation in men, no such limitation exists for the human brain, and the human brain is, after all, where orgasm actually happens." Vanweilt went on to explain that medical science is not yet certain of the exact neuro-chemical triggers between human sexual organs and the cerebral cortex that trigger synapses during orgasm. What is obvious to researchers, however, is that once human orgasm has been triggered, the neuro-chemical properties of the new drug prevent the synapses from closing after several seconds as they normally would, locking them instead in their highly excited position for up to fourteen minutes - and that is even after normal ejaculation or female orgasm has subsided. Researchers who use the drug commented that there is actually no sensation of transition between the few seconds of orgasm involving sexual organs and the fourteen minutes of the brain orgasm. Vanweilt stated that once orgasm is triggered in the normal physical way, it feels exactly like a normal orgasm, but a very, very, long orgassm.

"As one might expect," said Vanweilt, "Retalanaline has proved overwhelmingly popular with researchers taking the drug, but this popularity has come at considerable social cost." Citing the case of Retalanaline test subjects Dr. Detmar Wolze and his wife Kathleen, Vanweilt said the couple were brought under investigation by Bern police because of Switzerland's tough anti-religious-cult policy, Switzerland being a country where cult movements like Scientology, the Moonies, and others are illegal. The problem began when neighbors of Dr. Wolze complained to police that the researcher and his wife were conducting religious cult ceremonies in their fashionable suburban bungalow. A two-month investigation ensued but was inconclusive until police secured permission from a Swiss magistrate to plant electronic listening devices surreptitiously within the Wolze residence. The couple were arrested soon thereafter and held in custody on charges of religious cultism until a very embarrassed University of Bern Chancellor came to their rescue, explaining to civic authorities the highly unusual reason a police recording of Dr. Wolze and his wife Kathleen had the couple screaming "Oh God!" and "Sweet Jesus!" more than a thousand times on a 14-minute loop of tape. Finally convinced that there was no actual religious invocation implied by the convulsive mantras, Bern police released the doctor and his wife without further incident.

The worst episode surrounding the drug, however, involved two traffic fatalities on a German autobahn last July when Retalanaline testers Dieter Krupshank and his girlfriend Molly Wentholtz died under mysterious circumstances. Police can only speculate on what happened, but they believe the couple were engaged in sexual activity and that Retalanaline played a part in the mishap. When the bodies were finally exhumed from the couple's demolished Mercedes Benz, Dieter Krupshank's pants were around his ankles and Molly's face still lay in his lap, her mouth still agape on his sexual anatomy. "The drug must have kicked in while they were fooling around," said Vanweilt. "It's the only way we can explain Dieter crossing the median in broad daylight and driving the wrong way on a one-way autobahn for 13 minutes, finally colliding head-on with a semi-truck from Dresden. It's really very tragic, because they almost made it, only one more minute to go and they would have been OK. At least we are left with the minor consolation that Dieter and Molly died a very happy young couple."

Now involved in that case is California personal injury attorney Bernie Shellac. Vacationing in southern Germany at the time, Shellac witnessed the collision from a Eurail train on which he was riding as a third class passenger. Shortly thereafter Shellac himself nearly became a fatality when exiting the moving train in an attempt to be the first lawyer on the accident scene. Clothes in tatters, bruised and bleeding, Shellac explained to German police that Americans don't call his kind of attorney "personal injury" just because they sue insurance companies on behalf of other people.

"These days, a trial lawyer has to break his own damn neck just to be first in line for a decent whiplash case," he lamented. The "Nature" article goes on to explain that the autobahn mishap was Shellac's stepping stone to the much larger legal rumble now unfolding in Bern. Vanweilt elaborated on the case when asked about the commercial prospects for Retalanaline. He explained that it will likely be some time before the drug sees mass distribution in the open market because when word leaked out about the pill's unusual side effect several months ago, the University of Bern found itself embroiled in a colossal intellectual property dispute with three parties, each of which claims to be the real inventor of the drug: the Roman Catholic Church, the Greater Bay Area Transvestite Marxist Organ Donors Thrift Shop, and a rock band from New Jersey. Shellac is representing the thrift shop interests on a contingency basis. The Catholic Church and rock band are said to have legal war chests in the millions. Due to his notoriety from the legal wrangling, Shellac recently signed a book deal with The Atlantic Press. He commented in an interview that writing a book is proving quite a challenge, but it's the fulfillment of a lifelong dream. The law school version of "How To Sue Your Way Across Europe On A Third Class Eurail Pass" will be in college bookstores by April, and the "For Idiots" consumer edition should hit Barnes & Noble by June.

Reminded by reporters that Court TV doesn't give him a snowball's chance in hell in the orgasm pill legal wrangle, Bernie "Big O" Shellac, as he's known to the media now, responded that his courtroom strategy was as basic as his writing style. He said he'd approach the jury as though penning a story for a web site.....say like www.freerepublic.com for instance. He'd dream up a fable so monumentally preposterous that after the first five words, people would sit up straight with their eyes wide open. Once their undivided attention was gained, he'd slip his hands in their pants and give them the psychic genital massage of a lifetime, promising undreamt of pleasures, and toss an argument in somewhere along the way naturally, well before removing his hands from their pants. "Of course you don't always win that way," said Shellac. "But at least you keep people smiling that way. Besides, how often do you think a guy who wears white shoes, polyester jackets, and orange ties gets to ask anyone within earshot, 'Was it good for you too, baby?' "

©Tom Sweetnam 2003

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