Oh Say, Can I Remember?

Sitting outside of 550 Blues, talking to Dale Ray, some thickly built dude came up to me and asked, with a straight face, “You gonna hit a home run or you gonna strikeout?” Several thoughts shot through my whiskey-hampered brain. First: This guy thinks I’m hitting on Dale Ray. Second: Why does everyone think I’m gay? Third: Now I’m going to have to get in a fight with some guy I don’t even know. Finally: His face is familiar.

Ryan Thompson, a guy I’d played rec ball with back in the day – not as short, more facial hair, but definitely Ryan Thompson. It’d been like 15 years since we’d seen each other, and I haven’t talked to anyone from Shurlington in so long, I sometimes forget that part of me exists. Ryan told me what other guys were doing, how many kids they had, how fat they’d gotten. One guy we played ball with killed someone earlier this year. Then Danny Bass showed up. He used to jump on the chain link dugout, clinging like an outraged monkey, shaking the hell out of the fence during a rally. The first words out of my mouth to him were, “You were so little.” He popped up off the bench and stomped towards me muttering, “I ain’t little now!” But he is. He’s tiny.

August 30^th: Oh Say, Can I Remember… my birthday.

On the evening of, I was still delivering the paper. That was my fault. And then it started raining, I’d already missed Monty Python at the Capitol, and I started feeling like, “F—it.” (F as in forget.) I was driving to Ft. Myers Beach the next day, why do it hungover?

But I did go out. The night called. My friends called. They wanted to know where I was. I was putting on a Thai silk tropical shirt, a grass skirt and a werewolf mask. I walked down Cherry that way. At the Bird, someone gave me a big straw hat and I gave away my mask. I kept my foam shackles, and several drinks into the night – at a point when I found it acceptable to have a glass of blue stuff – I tried to make amends with Jared Wright, who I felt I’d slighted before.

This is what happens when I make amends, apparently. People take their clothes off and I see pictures of it, and then part of me thinks I should apologize again. But the other part of me thinks those pictures should be published. (Thanks, Doug!) Oh yeah and I went to the Red Eye, which I mostly remember doing. And then I went to 550 Blues, which I only remember because whiskey was consumed and then quickly expelled. And then I was back at the Bird… I think. I woke up drunk at 9am and drove to nine hours to the beach. It was fantastic.

September 8^th – Sabroovy’s Birthday

This could’ve gotten ugly: A 15-passenger van, about 15 passengers and a makeshift map of the back alley bars in town, the places we don’t normally go. Initially, the plan called for an almost military-like takeover, with troops deployed in all four corners of Macon at places like Polly’s, Henry’s, Billy’s and other bars named for people whose names end in y. Instead, the party started at Grant’s Lounge and wound its way to the Riverview Ballroom where folks had such a good time, it didn’t seem like we’d make much of a dent on any other place. Of course, we were just about the only folks in there and it was something of a playground because of that. Eventually, we were at AP’s Hidden Hideaway, which was something of a highlight for me.

2 Finger Jester. Pure adrenaline-laced, big-haired, mean-assed rock n’ roll – Black Sabbath, Ted Nugget, Poison, etc – bands whose names alone scared parents into burning piles of innocent cassette tapes. The band members themselves were a little statuesque – or maybe it just seemed that way by comparison – but the lead singer was living the glam rock dream. Picture tight denim and waist-length, crimped, dirty blonde hair. And dude was a dynamo up there on that little stage, working the crowd, letting them sing along to their favorites. Good stuff.

By the time we did the inevitable visit to the Bird, the van was hyped. We’d been singing and dancing, getting off our transport in spirited steps, like a jazz funeral marching to the door. It was ridiculous what happened when what Riddle was playing met that mood. Anyhow, at the end of the night, I remember these things: Big Pasty opening an energy drink tallboy; Riddle saying he’d been challenged by text message to show his ass; me thinking it was time to go home; Big Pasty scuffling past with two tuxedoed gents in varying states of headlocks (the return of the Tuxedoed Banditos?); and then my decision to have another beer. I don’t remember what happened after that but I went looking for the $50 bill that should’ve been in my wallet the next morning and it wasn’t there