The Life and Times of an Idiot

HOW ON EARTH have I missed this thread for over 2 and a half years???? This is an awesome thread.

There's some stuff I need to remember, some stuff I don't need to remember and some stuff I will never remember. I will see what I can come up with out of that (what I haven't already posted in the sea stories thread) and try to get this thing going again because I haven't laughed so hard in a while.
 
MarineUKFan said:
HOW ON EARTH have I missed this thread for over 2 and a half years???? This is an awesome thread.

There's some stuff I need to remember, some stuff I don't need to remember and some stuff I will never remember. I will see what I can come up with out of that (what I haven't already posted in the sea stories thread) and try to get this thing going again because I haven't laughed so hard in a while.
Click to expand...
I promised Dad I would go crappie fishing in south Alabama on 02Jan93. As it turns out, my oldest brother Travis was having a Sugar Bowl party on the 1st (Alabama/Miami). My brother Curly and cousin Mike came by my trailer about 7:30 that morning and asked me if I was going ... and promised to get me back home to go fishing the next morning. We all knew he was lying but frankly I appreciated it.

We smoked a joint or two and emptied the cooler waiting on the beer stores to open when I asked them what I needed to take. The answer was standard: whatever you need to get you through the party. So I get ready, we load up in Curly's truck, go to the bank and I grab about $400, head to the beer store, stop by my hookup and get another ounce of hydro grown, and around 10:30 pull into Hell's Trailer Park ... yes, that was the actual name of it ... go as far as we can and end up at Travis'.

When we walked in, there were two topless gals slow dancing on his coffee table. There is a difference between high quality gals and quality high gals ... these were neither, so they fit in with our family. I'm just saying that if they weren't ashamed of the people there then neither were we. I actually think we were all kind of proud, bless our hearts.

Travis called me to the back room and asked what I brought. I told him I packed heavy, just in case: six cases of beer, ounce of good smoke, 15 Clonazepams and a couple dozen Lortab 5s. Guys, I never mixed pills and alcohol ... I brought them to, well let's just say barter with the female company in case they are suffering. I like to think of myself as a healer in that way.

I will finish it later ...
 
batchaps4me said:
I promised Dad I would go crappie fishing in south Alabama on 02Jan93. As it turns out, my oldest brother Travis was having a Sugar Bowl party on the 1st (Alabama/Miami). My brother Curly and cousin Mike came by my trailer about 7:30 that morning and asked me if I was going ... and promised to get me back home to go fishing the next morning. We all knew he was lying but frankly I appreciated it.

We smoked a joint or two and emptied the cooler waiting on the beer stores to open when I asked them what I needed to take. The answer was standard: whatever you need to get you through the party. So I get ready, we load up in Curly's truck, go to the bank and I grab about $400, head to the beer store, stop by my hookup and get another ounce of hydro grown, and around 10:30 pull into Hell's Trailer Park ... yes, that was the actual name of it ... go as far as we can and end up at Travis'.

When we walked in, there were two topless gals slow dancing on his coffee table. There is a difference between high quality gals and quality high gals ... these were neither, so they fit in with our family. I'm just saying that if they weren't ashamed of the people there then neither were we. I actually think we were all kind of proud, bless our hearts.

Travis called me to the back room and asked what I brought. I told him I packed heavy, just in case: six cases of beer, ounce of good smoke, 15 Clonazepams and a couple dozen Lortab 5s. Guys, I never mixed pills and alcohol ... I brought them to, well let's just say barter with the female company in case they are suffering. I like to think of myself as a healer in that way.

I will finish it later ...
Click to expand...
It turns out that this day wasn't nearly as sordid as you would think. In fact, it was relatively uneventful especially considering the circumstances. It was just a good time had by all. I went into some of the details just to set the scene for the need of my escape. It was one of my redneck Kobayashi Maru decisions. I could leave that night or in two weeks ... one or the other.

As the 4th quarter ended, Curly said "We need to go". I hit the joint one last time and handed it off as I started to stand, and it happened ... I coughed. It was a deep cough and I knew what was coming. I was struggling to get out of my chair and knew I was going to puke. At this point in time I had two goals, keep it off of me and miss the TV that we pulled to the middle of the living room. I achieved both goals by puking on the wood stove that was keeping us warm on that frosty night. Southern hospitality being what it is, Travis said he would clean it up so I left him Half my pot in appreciation.

As it turned out, I was the first one to be able to stand up ... so under the redneck constitution, family traditions and all of the laws of nature ... that made me the designated driver. I got this, hell it's only a 15 mile drive. I tucked my almost half ounce into my boot and grabbed a twelve pack for the road. I want y'all to understand the genius of my planning. When dealing with my friends and family, you take enough beer, pot, and pills that when you are ready to leave, you can leave enough behind that nobody feels like they need to follow the party back to your place. It is a basic survival technique that cannot be overstated.

I need to tell you about Curly's truck. It was a 1972 C10 and to be kind let's say Bondo colored with green accents. There was no hinge on the driver's side door, so it had been spot welded shut. Everything worked on it except the speedometer, gas gauge, heater, radio, and brake lights. At this time in Alabama, tags went with the vehicle on sale so we have no idea who the truck is registered to. It originally had the shifter on the column but when the tranny went out my brother found one and put the shifter on the floor. Shifter may be a strong term but it was a handful of welding rods twisted together inside a piece of pipe. It was connected to the tranny backwards, so park was at the bottom, low at the top. It would not automatically shift from low, so you had to start off in low and bump it to 2nd, then drive. If I don't miss my guess, you probably now understand why we were proud to have those two gals show up for the party, but I digress. There is nothing safer against theft than a redneck Lojack system.

So I slide into the driver's side and have Curly in the middle to run the shifter. We get on the road and the paranoia sets in. I don't know why we were paranoid, between the three of us we almost had a driver's license ... mine was suspended, theirs were revoked ... and both of them had active warrants for criminal littering and contempt of court. Now that I think about it, that truck also had a Group W bench seat.

I am holding the lane quite well but am worried about my speed. I ask Curly and Mike if I am driving too fast in that 35MPH zone. My brother says, "no and I doubt the cars behind you think so either". I look in the mirror and there has to be two dozen sets of headlights behind us. I do all I can, pulled over, let them go and fell in line behind them. At least now I have something to judge my speed with.

As it always happens, the big question everyone has is do we have enough beer to make it home. We are down to six unopened cans and will pass the last beer store with about seven miles left. Guys, this is not a simple question. It is advanced calculus and statistics. Theoretically we have enough but all things considered, we can still be three or four days from home. I said I will buy a case but I'm not going in the store. Curly said he would go in so we stopped at the last beer store in town.

More later.
 
So I pull into the beer store parking lot, hand Curly a $20 and he climbs over Mike to get out of the truck. There are many a folk in the store celebrating the Bama win. While we are waiting, the city police pull in the car wash across the street and parked looking straight at us. Sure enough, Curly comes out of the store with a case of Natty Light on his shoulder and walks across the parking lot and hands the beer to Mike. Dammitt, Curly, the cops are right there, put the beer in the back of the truck!!! So he takes the beer back, holds it up so the police can see it and puts it in the truck bed. The LEO turns on his headlights and gently revs his engine. Mike refuses to get out of the truck and slides to the middle.

Curly tries to convince me that I can operate the shifter and puts me on the spot. Now I have two options, main road or back roads. The main road means we are out of the LEO's jurisdiction in about two miles but I have to drive right in front of him. If I go the back roads, it is obvious that I am avoiding him and have about four miles before we get out of his jurisdiction. Damn. I decide back roads but change my mind at the last second ...

I wind out the engine in low gear and expertly shift. Right straight into reverse. I kind of need sound effects for this part but as you can imagine the rear end hopping in the air and it kills the engine. Curly yells, "It will crank in gear!" so I hit the ignition. It starts but we are still in reverse. Hop, hop, hop, engine shuts off again. Curly dives for the shifter and gets it back in low. We haven't even made it 100 feet nor passed the police yet. And we have a stop sign to navigate in 100 yards.

Of course the LEO pulls out behind us. We are all trying to finish our open beers because there is no sense in adding open containers to the list of charges that we are guilty of. It's not like it will have any effect on a sobriety test. When I stop at the sign, turn and start again, I do the same damned thing, low to reverse. Hop, hop, hop, dead engine. Curly dives in and gets it back to low, and we successfully keep it running. The LEO followed us out of his jurisdiction and never hit the lights. My best guess was that he knew there was going to be a whole lot of paperwork if he did and let's face it I held the lane until it was someone else's problem.

I turned onto a back road, got around a curve so that nobody could see our brake light and stopped. We got our beer out of the back and had to take a moment. We were shaking from fear so badly that we almost set the truck on fire trying to light a cigarette. We tried to let one of us hold the cigarette and another run the lighter but that made things worse. We got out of the truck and sat on the tailgate for a couple of beers trying to calm down. We couldn't roll a joint so we poked a few holes in a beer can and smoked a bud like it was crack. When we could light a cigarette, we got back in the truck and headed home.

About a mile and half from home, Curly and Mike had to piss. In fairness to them, we didn't know how long it would take so I stopped at the bottom of a hill. As they were getting out, I told them that if I saw headlights, taillights, flashlights or even lightning bug lights, I was going on with or without them. Nothing eventful happens and we were able to roll a joint for the home stretch. I even manage to shift from low to drive without killing the truck.

We get to the top of the hill where that road dead ends into the road I live on. I have walked that road a thousand times and driven it more times than that. For some reason on this night I locked down the brakes and was totally lost. I had no clue where we were. Granted these were my stomping grounds but hell, we were already two and a half hours into a 30 minute, 17 mile trip. The struggle was real. We made it home safely and stayed in the truck until daybreak drinking and smoking.

Just after daybreak, Dad and his friend Pops pulls in to pick me up for fishing. I rode to south Alabama in the back of his truck with the understanding that I will clean the vomit out of the bed upon arrival to the bait store. Every time that day that it appeared I might survive, Dad would stick a freshly opened can of sardines under my nose asking if I wanted some. For some reason they loved seeing me dry heave.
 
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