"Wet Dream", Way to Die #606, is the fourth death to be featured in "Hard Lives, Easy Deaths", which aired on May 21, 2008.
Plot
Dalph Smith was a German Librarian and he wanted to look at fish and swim with them. So Dalph took an old waterbed, cut it up, glued it with Latex, and made it into a suit he called the Merman. Meanwhile, Dalph put his suit on and headed down to the water. But it was slow going and started to overheat. When body temperature rises, sweat begins to form in these glands. As sweat evaporates, heat is dissipated. If the temperature outside was cool, that could've saved him. Unfortunately for Dalph, it was a scorching 97 Degrees. He began feeling the first symptoms of hyperthermia. To reach a point of heat stroke would normally take about 3 hours, but it was so hot and he exerted so much energy, that he got there in less than 15 minutes. His temperature red-lined at 108 degrees and he died of heatstroke just as he reached the water's edge.
Transcripts
Narrator: The man flapping his arms like a bird is Dalph Smith. A German Librarian with a serious fetish. For a fish.
Dalph: Der fisch. (The fish.)
(Dalph creates a wing of a fish)
Narrator: Dalph long to be as close to fish as possible. To swim like them.
(Dalph created the fish's head and trains to communicate with fishes)
Narrator: And to swim with them.
(Diagram of fishman that Dalph will create)
Narrator: To fulfill his dream, this amateur archaeologist went so far is to create his own fish suit. He took an old waterbed, cut it up and glued it into something he called... "The merman".
(Dalph finishes creating the fish head; later, he disguises his fish suit outside)
Narrator: Dalph couldn't wait to taking out its maiden voyage. An a nearby lake, he climb it to his fish suit...
(Dalph jump-climbs to the lake)
Narrator: ...and headed down to the water. But it was slow going and he quickly started to overheat.
Bob Girandola: We produce heat eternally. And we...
(Cells split)
Bob Girandola: ...dissipate that heat to the environment. All cells are metabolically active and as energy is produced, heat is dissipated.
(The human body CGI is shown)
Narrator: The human body possesses millions of sweat planes, located just beneath the skin.
(The hair's root gets thicker)
Narrator: When body temperature rises, sweat begins to forming his glands.
(The skin forms the glands)
Narrator: And it's acquired to the surface. As the sweat evaporates, heat is dissipated and cools off the body.
Bob Girandola: The example of that man who put that waterbed material on him, those water model cures could not penetrate, he put a microclimate next to his skin. He had a double whammy, he basically couldn't lose heat by sweating and he couldn't lose heat by radiation. So there's no way that he was gonna dissipating, if the temperature outside as cool, that could have saved him.
(Dalph still jump-climbs)
Narrator: Unfortunately for Dalph, it was a scorcher, 97 degrees. Not long after starting for the water, he began feeling the first symptom of hyperthermia.
Bob Girandola: Initially could be a heat cramps. When you gonna start see some pain. And then it goes to heat prostration,
(Dalph exhausts, kneels, falls to the back)
Bob Girandola: ...you're not gonna have a tension, you've gonna be a little bit delirious, loss of a balance and then it goes to heatstroke. If you getting to the heatstroke, that's a critical area because if you don't get cool down rapidly, you'll never survive.
(Dalph gets close to the lake by proning)
Narrator: To reach a point of heatstroke would normally take about 3 hours. It was so hot and Dalph exerted so much energy, he got there in less than 15 minutes. With a lake's edge tenterizingly close,
(Dalph decides to roll to the lake)
Narrator: Dalph's core temperature red-lined at a hundred and eight degrees. Right before he died, Dalph finally got his wish. He knew exactly what it felt like to be a fish... out of water.
(Dalph dies, near the lake; takes off his hat for his "departure")
Interviewees
- Bob Girandola - Associate Professor of Kinesiology, U.S.C
Trivia
- This segment has a repeated word about a water bed accident for a man who had previously crossdressed during a party the previous night. See "Way to Die #331".
- The mask used on the suit resembles the Gill-Man from The Creature From The Black Lagoon.
- This is the very first death to end with the only person in the story dying.
Foreign Names
- Wodna pułapka (Water Trap) - Polish voice-over
