my dad, ever the entrepreneur, had a brilliant idea:

if i want to be a famous writer, all i have to do is go to iran, get caught doing something illegal or legal but frowned upon, go to jail (think of all of the money i could save on rent and food!), get put on trial, somehow make it out of there, come back to the states, sell my story to the highest bidding publisher, go on oprah, meet barack obama and be awarded a purple heart (or whatever medal they give brave, yet stupid civilians) and watch my amazon.com rank rise.  

duh.

why didn't i think of that?