Road Trip to Carolina
So my boss has been talking this up for the past two weeks. Road trip to NC, boating
with bikinis, and bloating with beer.
So first you must understand that People have a tenditcy to drink and drive in the east...
As we finish work at 10pm, 3 or us: Dexter (28 year old boss) Jude (Dex's roomate) and I load
up for the 6hr drive. Not being the owner I assume Im in the back. NOT SO FAST.
"FNG, dude... fucking new guy. You're here to drive."
"Ohhh?" (Six hours???) I offer a comprimise, we will allow chance to decide. Taking a chapter
out of "Stand By Me" I pull out three quarters.
"odd man out." I say
tails, tails, heads... and with that Dexter finds himslef behind the wheel.
Now you must understand that because people drink on the road, talking on the cell phone
seems rather tame. But Dex is a professional... he is still not done with work and has to make
a call to Mark in Portalnd. Merging with traffic, I see dex has cell phone on shoulder, papers
in one hand (did I mention he had to read?), and Corrona in the other. I squeeze my lime and
think "when in Rome..."
A few cars speed by, "wine guzzling chariot drivers ..."
My heart beats a little slower when Dex refuses a second round. Apparently the open container
laws arent quite as strict here... Jude and I continue...
4:20am. Sleep.
The next day we spend time boating and what do you know... drinking beer!
I realize I have no sunscreen, I get handed a half-inch cylinder with some white substance
inside.
"Did you just give me a glue stick," I ask.
Apparently it is some serious nutrogena stuff. It was only ment for small surfaces... a nose for instance.
After 2 min of application I have covered my nose, my forehead, and the top of either shoulder.
That is when I gave up.
Thinking back someone did tell me to watch out for the sun... If I had a dermatologist he
would be very disapointed with me.
That night we went to watch a semipro soccer game. Dex's friend Chris is also the GM of the
Hammerheads and promise us VIP status.
Continuing with the theme of the road trip we decide that it would be a shame if we allowed a
hard earned afternoon buzz wear off before we go out that night.
We would need something more refreshing than they were serving at the consessions stand.
Finally something I had experience with. Neither of my colleges thought I would make it inside
with a 5th of burbon, but my keen sense told me that the 14 year old girl taking tickets would
not question a man such as myslef.
After a half hour spent at the VIP tent gorging on everything fried under the sun (minus my
back) we adjourned with 7ups to the VIP bleachers (which are just like the non VIP bleachers
only that they are in the middle)
At this point I would like to thank Sprint for sponsoring the Hammerheads, and providing
descrete squeeze bottles, which when full of Jim Bean look remarkably similar to ice tea.
The game was great. (uhh we won)
Towards the end Eric, the owner of the boat we were out in earlier, (we had not yet met him)
joined us for a round.
He mentioned touring downtown in the flashy electric blue mustang convertable parked just
behind the bleachers.
Now I must mention, that at no point were any of us appearing drunk. given the thrust of this
email I could see how you might think that we were not in complete controll of our own persons.
Therefore I must remind you that we were drinking to sustain a mild buzz. As veterans of the
day long inhebreation olympics we knew to savor the evening.
As it came time to leave my associates went to releave themselves in the portable toilets beind
the bleachers where I had turned a 5th of burbon into a social ice tea (water into wine... not
quite, but I'm on my way).
while stopping to top my drink off I noticed a pair of campus police 100 yards away, leaning up
against a white convertable.
"oooooohhhhh" I said, as I tried casualy walk away.
Dex and I were waiting for Eric by his convertable discussing the virtues of manual shifting
for sporty cars when Jude noticed two onimous looking security types approacing.
With nija like stealth I discard the contents of my beverage. I turn to notice the remainder
of the "ice tea" laying descretly on the back of the mustang.
"Good evening. How are you all doing tonight?"
"... Fine, sir... and you?
"We got a complint that 4 guys were drinking during the game and were planning on driving this
veichle downtown so as to drink more."
"really," I say.
"Soccer Mom has foiled me yet again. That Bitch!" I think.
"May I see some ID, please?"
He looks at mine for a moment sees a fresh faced 17 year old with hair and a smirk that
screams, "I have a wise mouth and know how to use it!"
He looks at me. I smile. The other officer opens the squeeze bottle and make the approprite
face to let us know that he has smelled alcohol before.
"Did you realize that drinking on the campus is an arrestable offence?"
-now this sounds bad but is actually a good sign. He wants to let us know that he has the
ability to make our weekend misearble. Campus police take a lot of flak and regularly need to
remind students to respect his authority.
"No sir, we most certinly did not." --What a grevious error we made, however can we repay
sociey?
"Which one of you is planning on driving this car?"
"Uhhh... our friend."
"Oh? Where is your friend now?
"He had some migling to do."
"Not polite of him to keep you waiting this long."
"With all do respect sir, given the situation, I'm not sure he will come back."
"Who is the owner of this car?"
"It's our friend's, sir."
"And what is your friend's name."
"... uhh" (seconds go by)
"...Eric."
the police wait a few seconds. Now to me what we just said sounded made up. I can only
imagine what the fuzz thought.
into his shoulder mounted CB, "Run Noth Carolina plate, 258KSR."
-- You should know that my best party trick is to speak into my shoulder and sound like I'm on a CB, so
you know what kind of pressure I am under to keep my mouth shut.
The dispatch squacks back to the popo... turns out none of us have a record in NC.
They never bother to card Eric, and as we wait for someone to drive us home the officers can
help but ask what 2 residents from VA and one from Oregon are doing at a Carolina semipro soccer game?
"Drinking, sir," I think.
Dexter gives him the speel about intelligencepress.com and within 30 sec the police is asking
questions about the market. Apparently our friend is an amatur trader.
He askes questions, Dexter makes up convincing sounding answers.
"There is a natural sineregy between a gas provider and a power producer so look for Enron to
merge soon." sounds good to me.
"You know our option was to catch you driving and hand out a DUII. But you see like your just
having a good time."
I say, "I appreciate when an officer can use their own judgement in a situation..." I go off
for a min on the need for policej to be able to use their own descresion. He seemed to like
that
"I agree." He hands back my ID with a sort grin. He looks one last time at my licence then my
face and ponders what 6 years can do to a guy.
"Dont worry," I say pointing to my half inch image, "that guy in there is just a punk." I
thought that was really funny but no one laughed.
"I think you shouldn't come back to the next game."
"What!!! HOW DARE YOU TRY AND KEEP ME FROM MY BELOVED HAMMERHEADS!" we all thought.
"ok" we said sheepishly.
In the end we Eric convinces one of the cheerleaders (one of the good looking cheerleaders) to
drive us home. Because of my impressive girth (some might say "fat ass" or in some circles
"pooper") I sat up front.
"It's automatic right?" she askes.
The cops follow; I take it all in for a moment and tell her how it has been a life long dream
of mine to have a hammerhead cheerleader drive me away from campus security in a mustang
convertable.
ok its late now... maybe you will get the rest tomorrow.