That being the case, I figure I might as well give everyone a recap of my adventures. So for all of you who want to know what happened to all those piercings, I give you week 12:

I'll just start at the most obvious place, week one: the tongue.

The tongue was what got me started with this column, and I don't think I could have ever guessed it could have gotten this far out of hand.

There's a big stretch between the tongue and the penis . . . well, maybe not.

This is one of the piercings that has stood the test of time, however, through sickness and in health, in good times and in bad, for richer or for poorer -- O.K., for poorer.

I was originally pierced with a 14-gauge barbell, but have since moved up two sizes to a 10-gauge. I'm happy with that at the moment, and I don't see myself going any higher.

The following week, I went with the eyebrow. But unfortunately the eyebrow couldn't stand the test of time. It reached its untimely death a few weeks ago, after the Vanilla Ice concert.

Out on the street, talking to some fans, I proceeded to clean the crust that accumulates on my piercing. As I did, the top ball on the barbell fell and rolled off into the darkness, never to be seen again. Luckily, the barbell stayed there for some time. I just had to readjust it now and then.

And there it stayed for almost two weeks, until one day it fell out when I was in the shower. I tried and tried to put it back in, but it just wasn't working, so I gave up on it. I still haven't decided if I'll get it pierced again.

If you're a faithful reader who has stuck with me on this journey, you know what happened to week three's piercing. For those of you who don't, let's just say it didn't even make it through a week.

Week three's piercing was the labret, the area between your bottom lip and chin. A few days after getting the piercing, I received a call from my folks, saying they were going to be gracing me with a surprise visit.

Great, right? It's always good to see the parents -- especially when you're low on cash.

Wrong! Not when you're piercing yourself every week for the good of mankind, and Mom and Dad don't know.

So, to save them, and me, a trip to the hospital, I took the labret piercing out. Unfortunately, it closed up in the span of four hours. Although a lot of you have said I should get it redone, I haven't yet and don't know if I will.

In week four I had my first ear piercing with the tragus. As you can probably guess, this is also a casualty.

Although I cleaned the tragus regularly, it swelled up after a few weeks. If it was just the swelling, that would have been fine, but since I often sleep on my side it woke me up several times a night. Eventually, I became fed up with the piercing and wanted it out, fast.

Late one night I decided it was coming out. I tried and tried to get the hoop out, but the bead that connected the hoop wouldn't budge. Finally I got a pair of wire cutters and asked my roommate to cut the hoop off, but he wasn't going to get involved.

As they say, "If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself." And I did. I cut the hoop off and went to bed feeling much better.

For week five, I finally pierced something besides my face: the nipple. This was, and still is to this day, the most painful piercing I've gotten. Sure, the needle was painful, but the sensitivity of my nipple made even the slightest breeze agony.

After a few days the pain was gone and I could tug on the hoop as much as I wanted. Like the tongue, the nipple is still pierced. The only thing I regret is not getting the other one done. The pain was so bad, I should have gotten it all over with at once.

Five weeks of having my body parts on the front page of the Arts section began to get me some attention. And so for week six I wrote about my celebrity status, however inconsequential it is.

Although it started as nothing more than being recognized at parties and on the street, my fame has grown beyond the confines of State College -- as has my ego.

A reporter from The Chronicle of Higher Education wrote about me in a article about body piercing, and now a reporter from The Philadelphia Inquirer wants to waste paper by profiling me.

They even sent a photographer to take a "wacky" picture of me sticking my tongue out. Of course they couldn't show all the piercings. After all, the Inquirer is a family publication.

This may seem like a great gig, but if you become the next "piercing guy," don't let this minor celebrity status go to your head. Just because some girl recognizes you as the piercing guy doesn't mean she wants to go home with you -- well, not until week 11 at least.

After spring break I returned refreshed and ready for another week of piercing: the nostril.

When I first got my nostril pierced, I hated it. In fact, I told most people I was going to take it out very soon after I got it.

Well, I still have it. For some reason it's grown on me, and while I don't think I'll still have it when I'm 40, I'll keep it for the moment.

For week eight, I veered off of my body-piercing track and went for another type of adornment, the Mehndi.

Mehndi is a temporary tattoo, which usually lasts about four weeks. Although it can be put almost anywhere on the body, I chose my palm. It got some very interesting reactions from people, the most common being, "Is that real?"

What's the answer to that? Yes, it's real; it's Mehndi. No, it's not "real," because you think it's a tattoo. Now, after about a month, there are no signs I ever had a Mehndi tattoo on my palm.

Again I went back to my bread and butter for week nine and got my navel pierced. Although this isn't a piercing I would have gotten normally, I was trying to let everyone know what a navel piercing was like. However, some people didn't understand that.

I received plenty of e-mails from people who made fun of me for getting a piercing normally associated with women. My friends weren't that receptive either, and the fact that my picture looked like an anus didn't help much. Luckily, I wouldn't have to listen to this torment for long.

The Saturday after I was pierced, my friends and I decided to play some basketball. After about an hour of running, jumping and getting bumped around, my friend turned to me and said in a smug voice, "So James, how's your bellybutton?" As I lifted my shirt to show him, he responded, "Oh, you took it out?"

But I hadn't. In the action of the game, the piercing must have fallen out. After some searching I found the barbell, but I wasn't about to put the dirty piece of metal back in my body. So the navel became casualty number four.

Two weeks ago I decided to travel back to the ear and get a more unusual type of piercing: the orbit.

An orbit is any piercing in which one piece of jewelry goes through the body more than once. It doesn't necessarily have to go in the ear, but the ear is a popular place for it.

Like a few of the others, this piercing is still with me. Give it time, though. I'm sure it'll fall out or swell up or something, which would be too bad because I actually I do like this piercing. In a time when so many people have their ear cartilage pierced, this is something different.

Which brings us to last week. By now I think you know what I had pierced. And by the response I've gotten, it seems the penis was the piercing you were waiting for. The piercing is still there, and I haven't had any problems with it -- besides having to drop my pants.

If you decide to get this piercing, you'll realize that many people see "penis" as a dirty word.

"So, you got your, ummm . . . you know . . . pierced?"

You also see how uncomfortable guys are talking to other guys about penises.

"Like, I'm not gay or anything, but where exactly is it?" (Some guy actually said this to me.)

Or you might just find that whipping your penis out at a party is perfectly acceptable -- but only if there's a rod through your rod.

But perhaps I gave you the penis too soon. I've got one week left in the semester, and I don't know what to do. Maybe I'll just make someone else get something pierced.