why i read "moby dick"

Unlike many high school students, I was never required (nor encouraged, for that matter) to read Herman Melville's classic book Moby Dick. I decided to read it about three years ago, after noticing the following sign on the door of a bathroom stall in my building:

you can download these and other great reading materials from the allegheny county health department to decorate your own bathroom!

After reading this a number of times, I really wondered how much of it was actually in the book. I wondered so much that I went to the library and found the book. I didn't see much of the exact wording on the first page, but I realized...maybe it was tucked away somewhere in the rest of the book. So I read the whole thing.

If you've never read Moby Dick and would like to know the feeling you have once you've finished reading the epilogue, I would liken it to the feeling you're left with after watching the original Ocean's Eleven movie with the Sinatra-Martin-Davis Jr.-Lawford-Bishop Rat Pack. It's highly ironic and semi-unbelievable. I was not impressed. (It was funny with the movie, which I recommend - I laughed for ten minutes straight after the movie ended - but not with the extremely long book.)

And, to spare you the pain and suffering, I will let you know that approximately the only words that are really in Moby Dick out of all of them in that adapted passage are "Call me Ishmael."