Baytown, Texas. Land of pick-ups, gun racks, and open beverage containers. Just the mention of this bastion of country-fried conservativism usually is enough to cause a liberal urbanite such as myself to break into hives. Ahh, but sometimes the allure of a well phrased evite can change any opinion. This particular invitation promised to celebrate Michelle's birthday with a keg and something called "poison croquet". Although I didn't have a clue what that was, I knew it was something that I wanted to be a part of (and something that would likely make good column fodder). I instantly knew that Baytown and I were on an unavoidable collision course.
Alcohol, when mixed with Michelle's friends and family, makes for a memorable (if slightly foggy) event. Looking back on the day, it occurred to me how the party revolved around the different games that we played. To help those of you who weren't there understand what I am talking about, let me elaborate. In chronological order:
1) Attempting to embarrass Michelle and her family - A few days before the event, Michelle's parents felt the need to email all of us to inform us that they were aware that their daughter was "no angel. Please feel free to bring any manner of gift to make sure that our daughter's birthday a memorable one". I don't know about you, but to Jeff, Rob, Blake and I, this sounded like a challenge. Hoping to test the boundaries of her parents' open-mindedness, Jeff took advantage of
10-3-03 - A Night in D.C.
10-2-03 - Thoughts
10-1-03 - Some Movie Reviews
9-24-03 - Glenn's Thoughts
9-22-03 - Austin City Limits
9-17-03 - Jeremy's Guest Column
9-16-03 - Hicktoria, Part 2
Archives
1) "Don't Fear the Reaper" - Blue Oyster Cult
2) "Orange Sky" - Alexi Murdoch
3) "Reptilia"- The Strokes
4) "Don't Give Up On Me" - Solomon Burke
5) "Blue Christmas" - Bright Eyes
6) "Saint Simon- The Shins
7) "Molly's Chambers" - Kings of Leon
8) "I Luv U" - Dizzee Rascal
9) "God Loves Ugly " - Atmosphere
10) "Rock Hard Times"- The Eels
2) Poison Croquet - Poison croquet is a marathon game that tests one's hand-eye coordination, ruthlessness, and liver. Without going into too much detail, the game matches the patrician favorite, croquet, with the plebeian pastime, drinking until you forget your name. This game started out with a bang, but bogged down around the fifth hole, when everyone was too drunk to remember whose turn it was. My personal highlight of the game was convincing Michelle's father that he hadn't finished a hole (he was too drunk to remember that he had...twice) and eventually passing him and eliminating him from the game. For my talent and my stamina, I won the winner's prize of a stylish red crab hat. Rob, being the first to spill his drink (roughly 2 minutes in), was the proud recipient of a coconut bra. Fortunately for him, Jeff took a liking to it, and chose to wear it for much of the remainder of the night. Don't worry...we have pictures.
3) Messing with Rob - By virtue of living with Jeff and I, Rob has to put up with a lot of crap. Maybe it is because he is smarter than us and makes more money than we do, maybe it his ability to make every girl he meets swoon, maybe it is just that he doesn't usually fight back...whatever the reason, he often becomes the butt of our jokes and pranks. This day was no exception. Jeff recruits willing female accomplice to distract Rob, female accomomplice succeeds with aplomb, Jeff soaks Rob with hose. Rob and Jeff proceed to wrestle Greco-Roman style, much to the delight of the girls and gay guys everywhere. Later, things only got worse for Rob. Many Rob-spific Jenga pieces are made, most were changed before Anne came to town. We are not good friends.
4) Dirty Jenga - I haven't yet decided if this game shows our mature, liberal attitude toward sex, or if it just illustrates that we are similar in temperament to a group of shy, horny twelve year olds who can only initiate action if we are forced to. Whatever your take on the game is, there is no doubt that it has led us to many interesting situations. Just a few of the occurences: Mary-Margaret penetrated Jeff with a dildo (sort of), Hari spanked rob, Jeff, and I, some random girl flashed Rob, everyone licked his nipples, Lindsay did some very dirty, very un-Lindsaylike things, Susan made out with me with her legs wrapped around me...multiple times, Blake kissed people, and Jeff's anus...do whatever. So it has that going for it.
5) Post-Party Strip Club - The party was beginning to wind down to the point when no good could result from continued drinking. Being the group sole sober member, I carefully assessed the situation. None of my friends appeared to have an imminent hook-up that they would have been happy about in the morning, so I made the command decision that it was a good time to say our goodbyes. On the ride home, drunk Jeff saw through the beer filled haze and remembered seeing an all nude BYOB strip club on the way out to Baytown. Alcohol is the muse of many an inspired idea, so we went with it. After a brief stop at a gas station to load up on beer, Boone's, and champagne, we were on to the club. Once we arrived at Shangri-La, we encountered an unexpected problem...the dreaded $20 cover. With the skill and precision of a cluster of chickens just off of the chopping block, we settled into our roles....Jeff scouted out the quality of dancer, Rob used his Boras-like negotiating skills to try to get the cover reduced, and Blake and I stood in the corner by the door because the thought of boobies make us blush. Once we realized that Rob couldn't get the cover any lower than $15 and Jeff confirmed the talent was not of the $15 quality, we decided to go on home. In summary, the night of Michelle's birthday party was similar to most nights out with Michelle....there was a lot of initial excitement, but at the end of the night we were left alone ans sexually frustrated.