Here is the handsome buffalo that watches over everyone as they talk about puking their guts out at the Monty Bar.
Dear Everyone;
The talented genius Mike O’Connell asked me to tell a story of drunken excess at his wonderful show, Drunken Tales of Glory and Shame, at the Monty Bar, and I’ve already written it and everything, so here it is.
Mom, don’t read it!
Ladies and gentlemen, you are experts in this field, and I’m not gonna bore you with regular old drinking stories, like the time I woke up in a shed in Dallas, TX wearing striped tights and a strange man’s suit jacket, or the first time I puked, or the second time I puked, or the first time I puked in my 30’s and said to myself, hey self, this is not cute anymore –or the first time I cracked a fresh Zima in a friend’s kitchen at a house party and wondered where the fuck everyone was and realized that the sun was coming up and it was time to go home. I can tell you that as I get older, I can’t drink the way I used to, because now, I have to use my mouth.
Like most of you, I grew up Mormon in a family of Irish Catholic alcoholics and my grandfather died of alcohol-derived cirrhosis at 44 years old. My other grandpa died of a heart attack at the ripe old age of 52. And we all thought, That was a LIFE lived, man. When people my age are all broken up about their grandparents dying, I like to ask, your grandparents are in their eighties? What are they, pussies? So, until I was 21, I didn’t drink at all, but I did drugs, because nobody in my family had a drug problem. You can see the wisdom. Standing before you now, I am half made of acid. Probably the lower half.
So in this story, I was in my 20’s, and I had a first date with a really special guy, who was tall and could play guitar and looked like Douglas Coupland, an author who is no longer famous.
The night I fell in love with him was when a group of us went to New Orleans and got rip roaring drunk, and were slowly making our way back to the hotel. Our friend Steve was with us, and Steve both loves a drink and walks with a cane, due to Cerebral Palsy, and he found that he had had too many drinks to walk at all, so we decided that the only thing to do was to heave him onto my swain’s back and he would be piggybacked to our beds. The big man knelt down and Steve was trying to clamber on top, and he made such a grunting and a noise in the French Quarter that a resident yelled out a window, “I don’t care what you faggots do, but don’t do it in the street!” and that was it. I was in love.
I was nervous to go on a date with him on my own, so my best friend and I decided we would throw a party, and we decided to take GHB, because we heard it was rad. In the 90’s, people would take GHB and Rohypnol on purpose, just because they were bored, or a new episode of Friends wouldn’t be out for another week, or they couldn’t wait for a new Diet Coke flavor. They were both legal at the time- GHB was legal until 2000, when a 19 year old died of an overdose. Small doses of GHB is sometimes referred to as liquid ecstasy, due to its tendency to produce euphoria and sociability, Despite this nickname, GHB or Gammabutyrolactone,has separate chemicals than Ecstacy, or Methylenedioximethamphetamine, but can produce the same effect in SMALL amounts. Small ones.
The really great thing about GHB was that it inhibits metabolizing alcohol, so once you’re drunk, you stay drunk for a really long time and you don’t sober up, and we all know that that’s a great idea! We got enough for four doses, because four of us wanted to take it. However, when push came to shove, in a carpeted living room, my date and one of the other girls chickened out, and the one thing you should know about me is that I don’t like to waste, so my best friend and I split the dose.
I did not know then that even a slightly larger dose of GHB is used to treat insomnia and narcolepsy and is a potent depressant. Then, I laid down to rest awhile and passed out cold and covered in sweat on the floor for three hours and listened to the two remaining undrugged people awkwardly watch six episodes of South Park.
When I woke up, I realized I had to puke, so I very classily on my first date walked down the hallway, steadying myself on the wall with my shoulder, and knocked on the bathroom door only to realize my best friend was already puking in the bathroom. It’s that kind of connection and sympatico feeling that keeps our friendship strong. On Facebook. So, I cleverly went outside to puke over the side of the balcony onto a teal Dodge neon in the parking lot and I felt much better, and rested my hot forehead on the wooden plank of the balcony, and later found a large splinter in my forehead .
After that, I brushed my teeth and we went out to a gay bar in walking distance of the house and drank crappy bottled beer until closing time, and so then I was drunk until 2pm on Sunday, and having proved myself to be smart and have to have good planning skills, I dated the boy for a year and a half, before he married someone just like me but a little shorter and not as crazy, and they had beautiful twin girls and I moved to Los Angeles and stopped mixing my drugs and drinks, for the most part. The end!
Selfie as Edward Scissorhands at the Monty Bar
Names have been changed to protect the drunk. Objects may be closer than they appear.
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