'Where's Larry?'

Summer of 2001, friends of mine were planning a week long boating trip to Lake Powell. Two ski boats, a motor home and a bunch of tents. I was not planning on going on this trip at all. Although I was invited, I figured I just had too much to take care of at home with the kids and all.

Thursday, the day before they were leaving, Gary came to me and said ‘If you change your mind, be at my house at 7am. All you need to bring is your swim suit.’ I said ‘thanks, but I really shouldn’t. I’ve got too much to take care of at home.’

I get home that night, and my wife is doing her normal thing (nothing) and the kids are doing their thing. I think about what the week would be like without me. I really had no appointments. No agenda. Nothing to do. The more I thought about it, the more I realized everything would be fine even if I wasn't there.

11pm that night, I tell my wife I am going to Lake Powell for a week long vacation with my friends. Alone. After an hour long discussion about it, (aka: fight) she realized she had no say in the decision.

7am, Friday morning, I pull up to Gary’s house with one small bag packed. This bag included: Swim trunks, shorts, shirt, underwear, hats and deodorant. Aside from my shorts and shirt I had on, that’s all I was bringing. No camera, no food, no sunscreen and no responsibility what so ever. The best trip I never really packed for.

The first couple of days were great. I slept in the boat under the stars with a life vest for a pillow and a towel as a blanket. It was great! The days were filled with water skiing, beer drinking and cliff jumping. Lots of sights were taken in too.

One particular day, we headed up to Hite marina to get some ice. There were probably 6 or 7 of us in the boat. After we parked the boat and headed to the shop, I got drawn in by some t-shirts. As I was browsing, others went and got the ice and hiked up the hill to the bathroom. After a couple of minutes, I decided I needed to head up to the bathroom as well. As I’m hiking up, others from my group are walking down. I said I’ll be right down. Just need to hit the head real quick. They said ‘OK – Hurry it up!’

After I walked out of the bathroom, I noticed they were all piling into the boat. So, as to not make them have to wait too long for me, I started jogging as best I could, down hill, with my flip-flops on. As I’m half way down, I notice they start to pull away! Assholes. Screwing with me like that. So, I keep the pace knowing the are just screwing with me. I make my way to the store and they are reaching the edge of the wake break. Easily 200+ yards away. I finally make it to the end of the dock as they kick up the speed and pull away.

‘HEY!’ I yell. And keep yelling. Nothing. I’m waving my arms and jumping up and down trying every thing I can to get there attention. Nothing. They forgot me. ME! How could they forget ME!? I’m the life of the party! Don’t these assholes do a head count before taking off? Bastards!

Suddenly, I see a couple of them jerk their heads around and look back. Yes! They remembered me! Finally! The boat slows down and turns around. Good. They are heading back for me.

Then, the boat turns back around AGAIN. They then start going in circles. JERKS! There fucking with me….here we come…no were not….here we come…no were not... Assholes.

As I stand there waiting for them to make up their minds, they go in 3 circles, then, speed off once again. HEY! I yell out like they can hear me. Gone. They left me at the marina. Bastards.

I would later find out that the reason for them doing that was because something flew out of the boat and they went back to get it.

I start to think about how I’m going to make it back to camp and what I’m going to do to these assholes that night while they are sleeping. I look around and there is a boat that had just pulled up. They are now the only boat there. Some guy and his son.

‘Excuse me.’ I say. ‘When you’re done here, could I bother you to take me back to my camp. My asshole friends I’m with thought it would be funny to leave me behind.’

‘How far is it?’

‘Just 2 canyons down. Can’t be more than 20 min. away.’

The guy ‘ho-hums’ a second about it and finally agrees. He finishes getting his ice and what not, then me and his kid load up in the boat and head me back to my camp.

As we pull up, I see a few of them looking at me and realizing it’s me. I hear cheers…’Hey – there he is!’ ‘Yeah! Larry made it back!’ ‘Hooray!’

‘Fuck you assholes!’ I yell as I’m getting out of the boat. I thank the guy and he and his kid boat off.

Apparently they sent a recon car to track me down because after they got back to camp, the people there had asked were I was. The dipshits in the boat thought I had stayed back at camp! They never even knew I was with them. They never thought about it when they left the marina. Bastards.

After that, EVERYONE was always keeping track of me.

That night, Maga had slept on the other seat that laid down in the same boat I was in. In the middle of the night, it started to rain. Maga was sound asleep. I got up and nudged her to wake her so she could get some cover. I climbed in the hull on one side, thinking Maga was coming in. Fell asleep real quick. Next thing I know, I hear my name being called. You know…really softly. Still asleep, so not really clear. Then, I hear people talking…It was morning.
’Have you seen Larry?’,
‘Nope. He was in the boat last night. He’s gone now.’ Maga says.
‘I heard a splash in the water…did he fall in and drown?’
‘Laaarrryyyyy….’

This is when I finally wake up enough to poke my head up threw the door of the hull.

‘I’m in here! Now shut the hell up!’

I lay back down and try to sleep, but all I here are people talking about how they have to keep track of me from now on so I don’t get lost. Thanks guys! Your real friends.

Only a couple more days of that crap, so wasn’t too bad. Just being there the whole week with little to no responsibility whatsoever was nice. Never again will I have a vacation like that one.

Oh – until my business trip to Japan…..

'It's not a party unless ....'

Parties are fun. Especially when the people you are with don't judge you or anyone else that is there. Just a bunch of cool friends hanging out, and having fun. No drama....sigh....good times...

Speaking of good times...Here's one:

Some friends of mine called a party to their house one winter day. It must have been new years or something. I Don't really remember.

I get there, and the party was already happinin. Shots were flying, beers were being downed, board games with alcohol were being played, music going...typical fun party. I had a few jello-shots to chase my beers down and a few shots of this, and a few of that. Then, the party moved downstairs and into the garage.

The house is a split-entry house, so you go down 4 or 5 steps, and your on a landing to the front door, then you go down 4 or 5 more stairs and you are on the bottom floor of the house. Straight across from the stairs is the bathroom. To the right is the TV room, and to the left is the door to the garage.

The garage has a typical 'male' setting. No car, dart board, work bench, yard tools hanging, you know, typical garage. Me, Dalton, (names have been changed to protect the guilty) his date Amber, Jason and his date Heidi are standing around in our own little conversation when Jason leaves to go to the bathroom. Heidi asks if any one needs another beer. 'I do!' I say as I start to down the last half of my someteenth beer. She grabs me a bottle and even twists the top off for me. 'Your awesome! Thanks!' I say. She smiles and says 'Your pretty alright your self...and your welcome!' and with that, I focus back on the conversation that was going on, when not 2 seconds later, the rest of my night began to come to an end...

As I stand there, holding my beer, I see Heidi, out of the corner of my eye, lift her beer as if she is going to drink it. Now, I don't know why, maybe the beer gods were watching, but I suddenly gripped my beer tighter, as if it was going to drop out of my hand, but I am now thankful I did! Next thing I knew, Heidi had 'tapped' my bottle and it started to foam over. (if your not familiar with 'tapping', this is when one idiot hits the top of a bottle with the bottom of their bottle. This causes the beer to foam up and shoot up and out of the bottle. It literally shoots up. 6-8 inches. So it can cause a mess if your not on top of it and start chugging it to prevent the mess it will make.)

My quick thinking saved the garage floor. I wrapped my lips around the top of my bottle and started chugging. Chugging foam that is. When you chug foam, it normally tends to fill every crevis in your stomach, throat, nose, ears, then your eyes and lastly, your mouth. This is exactly what happened. As it had gone through all the above, then into my mouth, I thought I had it all under control. I looked at my bottle and seen it was still foaming. I went to drink more of it, but as I tried to open my mouth, Daltons eyes were getting bigger and he started to move back away from me as he seen bubbles coming out of my nose. Heidi was crying she was laughing so hard, and the foam in my stomach wanted out. Bad. So, it started coming out. I knew there was no turning back. My cheeks instantly filled up and I covered my mouth to prevent anyone in the room from being decorated with what I was about to release. I ran into the house and busted open the bathroom door.

Now, remember a minute ago, before I got this new beer, Jason had left to go to the bathroom. Well, I remembered this as soon as I busted open the door and seen him standing there with his hand just zipping up his pants. All I remember of this is the size of his eyes as I busted in the room and him backing up against the wall like I was a freight train he was avoiding.

I didn't make it to the porcelain god in time for the first wave. In fact, when I flung the door open, it was pretty much on its way out then. It flew out of my mouth, past Jasons face, across the bathroom and on the back wall of the shower and into the tub. By that time, I had my body wrapped around the toilet hanging on like it was an old girlfriend I didn't want to let go. You know how the rest of that goes.

I don't recall much of the rest of that night. I do recall some kind of wrestling match out in the snow in the front yard, but everything else is pretty much gone. This was the first of what was to be several incidents at parties where my insides decided they wanted to join in on the fun too. Thus, the phrase 'It's not a party unless Larmas pukes!' was coined.

So - with that said, I would like to thank those that cleaned up after me when I obviously couldn't. And I apologize for all of that.

Party on!