Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Prodigal Son


I'm starting this at 11:15 AM PDT on Tuesday, September 1st. It has been roughly 55 hours since I finished my weekend by smoking a blunt in Smallwood at 5 Sunday morning.

I'm still not ok. Far from it in fact.

And to be honest, I don't even know where to begin. This will probably be my most read post of all time and I fear I will fold under the pressure. So what do I do? Do I water this down knowing adults will be reading it after the husband of the groom directed everyone at the wedding to this website for a recap? Do I service my long time fans with a brutally unflinching account of exactly what happened?

It's a tough call. Relationships could end over what I'm about to write. Jobs could be lost.

I suppose I'll do my best to honestly recap the weekend; the good, the bad and the bloody.

That said, let's establish a few ground rules before moving forward...

If you have a significant other that went to the wedding without you...I strongly recommend you bail now. I'm not going to name names, but it's probably best you just go the rest of your life thinking we all drank and had a good time. I'm serious. This will not go well for you.

Adults (40+) without a sense of humor...pull the rip cord. Please. If you don't think that casual drug use and wanton alcohol abuse are acceptable on special occasions, this is not for you. You are not safe here. Please seek shelter here. 

If you have that weird empathy disorder I read about on NPR, this post will likely give you PTSD. This link will take you to some cute kittens.

Ok, last chance to exit through the gift shop. The word 'f*ck' will be present throughout. My grammar is suspect at best. This post will make Sunday night's VMAs look like this.

Whatever man, you've been warned.

Holy fuck. What a weekend.

November 11th last year the official 'Save the Date' email went out. What immediately followed was an epic group frat text that went something like this...

-Did you guys get the email?

-DUDE, BLOOMINGTON WEDDING?

-We're going back to college!!!

-This is going to be insanity.

-We are all so fucked...

For anyone that doesn't know my association to the bride and groom. Jake and I were the same year in the fraternity. We lived together Senior year, we moved to Chicago together and moved into a three story party palace together...

And when I say together, I mean...like together, in the same room. For two years in Chicago Jake and I more or less lived in a master bedroom in bunk beds. Once Holly and Jake started dating seriously, she essentially lived with us too. Quarters were cramped, sometimes we would fight, but we were 22 with a three story brownstone on one of the most expensive streets in Chicago. We had a pool table, a steam room, a sauna and most importantly a deaf neighbor.

Also along for the ride were Hunter and 9 other roommates that cycled through the 3rd bedroom.

It can be tough to start a career when your roommates routinely stay up until 5 o'clock in the morning on a Wednesday.

I was the first to leave Chicago after I was fired from my job for writing this blog. After I took the severance they gave me and burned through it in a matter of three months, I packed my bags and moved to LA.

I continued to come back and hang with my fraternity brothers in Chicago, kick it on the couch at our old place, but one day HSBC ate a fat dick and let everyone know they would be transferred out of America.

First Hunter, then Jake The Burling house that had been used as party central for three years was no more. The entire time we had lived there, we never locked the door. On any given night anywhere between 3 and 8 people would be sleeping on a combination of couches, air mattresses and floors. Paul preferred our walk-in closet. 1618 Burling was the heart and soul of our crew in Chicago. We were idiots, we would throw couches off the 2nd floor balcony. We would sleep in our front lawn if we locked ourselves out (that door is supposed to be unlocked dammit!) We would set fire to old Christmas trees. We would call in sick on Thursdays and go back to the same bar from the night before.

Morons...all of us. But we were morons together.

When that house fell out of the crew people started to grow up a bit. Jake got a place in Gold Coast with Holly. Hunter moved to London, a bunch of people moved to 1 or 2 bedroom apartments in Wicker Park. Hell, some people even bought places. Our early 20's were over. It was one of the sad inevitabilities of growing up. Don't be sad because it's over, be happy because it happened.

So when that email came out in November, I lost my fucking mind. We were all going to be back together for the first time in probably 4 years.

Would it be different, had everyone changed? Or do those relationships you make in your formative years last a lifetime...

THURSDAY
Thursday morning I picked up our buddy Ben at the Indy airport.

"Paul isn't going to make it, delayed in Philly."

Learning point: Take the red-eye the night before, you can work a full day and not worry about missing out.

We drove down to Bloomington and immediately noticed the face lift the city has received in our absence. Where small mom and pop stores once thrived are now mid rise hotels with the names Hyatt, Marriott, Hilton. We drove a quick lap of the campus, yelled at some chicks, heckled the ATOs, it was good to be back.
Our Senior House, Shingles. I got arrested there once.
Immediately upon arriving at the Hyatt Place a cheerful student sends us to the fifth floor. It's 11am and a full pregame is underway. I see a guy carrying a case of champagne and a 1000 Watt amp down the hall, I follow him to a room full of guys rolling joints while facing Fireball shots.

Happy Bachelor Party!

25 of us board a bus heading to boats. About half of the RSVP'd people had to drop out last minute because, well we're all frat guys and that makes us flakey as fuck.

I helped take inventory of the booze, 15 cases of beer, 10 handles, one case of champagne, 30 joints, a dozen cigars, a carton of cigs (probably why I still have no voice) an unknown amount of blow and one Turkey sandwich.

"It's not enough, we need to stop!" Proclaimed the best man.

Thank God, I thought to myself. If we're out there 4 hours, we're going to need at least 10 Turkey sandwiches, maybe some Pringles?

"I'm getting out at Kroger to get 5 more cases and 5 more handles."

For those of you keeping score at home our new total was .8 cases of beer per person, .6 handles per person, 1.2 joints per person and .04 Turkey Sandwiches per person.

If you aren't good at fractions, that is roughly 20 beers,  21 shots, 1 joint and 0 to eat per person.

Ya, nothing had changed.

We board the boats and do what 25 dudes and no chicks do on boars. There was heavy drinking, there was smoking, there were back flips and there was a lot of pissing off the top deck.

No one drowned.

No one got a BUI.

What is that off in the distance? Oh, the bachelorette party. They have a boat too? Great.

We then did what 25 dudes and 25 chicks do on boats. Tied up...poorly. Lots of high risk tosses of glass handles, some drinking games, some cigars, and people trying to surf down the water slide.

Don't do that. That has to be responsible for at least half of my unknown bruises.

No one drowned.

No one got a BUI.

But as you could imagine there was lots of chanting, LOTS of drinking and not much eating. But that's ok. We have dinner after boats, that should sop up some of the booze floating around in there.

On the bus I blacked out, I came to with a start at a strangely familiar place, but not the Farm. Holy fuck had I blacked out all of dinner?


"Where are we?"

-Oh! You're awake?

"Ya...um, when is dinner. How did I get here."

-We carried you in the front, they didn't want to let you in, but then they saw who you were and we told them it was a bachelor party and we threw you into a booth for a while. Dinner is cancelled.

"Huh?"

-Ya, we took the dinner money and bought these 5 bottles. This is Kilroy's, new back patio...here, take a shot.

I guess there will be no eating today.

Apparently, all of the people that had missed boats had made an executive decision to get bottles at Kilroy's the resulting aftermath...



and then before Sports, things like this.



and things like "Hey Moeller, I just bought 20 shots for $60...they're basically giving it away, here take 4."

I woke up on the floor.

0 Casualties
0 Bridesmaids
0 Undergrads

Thursday was a bro night, but it wouldn't stay that way for long.

FRIDAY

*Knock Knock Knock* OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR

Oh God, it's the police, we must have killed someone last night.

I begrudgingly stand up, open the door to our hotel room. A whiskey bottle is shoved in my face.

I guess it's not the police. It's Jake.

"Kyle passed out in an alley behind Sports. He lost his phone. Does that count as a casualty?"

Well he made it to Sports, and he didn't go to jail...I'll give him a half point.

"We found Al sleeping on the floor of Jimmy John's, half of a Turkey Tom in his mouth. We carried him home. What about that?"

He didn't get arrested?

"No," Jake's phone buzzes. "Kyle, it's your girlfriend, she just ran find my iphone. Apparently it's still in the alley."

Zero casualties, but that sounds like two close calls.

"Ok Moeller wake up Paul and Knox, come to the lobby in 10 we're going to Crazy Horse."

I close the door. I hope there is a back exit for me to sneak out. I'm going golfing.

***

After shooting about a 60 on 9 holes and smashing a Datwich, I make it back to the hotel. There is a note for me on the bed.

"Stop being a pussy and take these. Come to Crazy Horse."

There is a red pill and a blue pill. In the Matrix, Neo had to chose, but I wasn't in the choosing mood so I took both. I would later find out it was an Adderall and a Xanax. You know what happens in weather when you combine a warm front and a cold front? Ya taking an upper and a downer is essentially the same. I walked across the street to find the entire wedding party waiting for busses to the rehearsal dinner. I think I took 12 tequila shots in 30 minutes. This was going to be a good night.

We board busses to Oliver Winery around 4pm. The wedding has rented out the entire winery. Inside are tasting flights, outside wine by the glass.

We arrived at around 4:30, by 4:45 an usher had already been sent home. By 6, most of the wedding party had been cut off. By 7 there were questionable activities taking place in the bathroom.

During the welcoming toast, the groom's father greeted the wedding party and the out of town guests (which was everyone) and invited everyone to read this blog.

He would later parade me around the dinner as if I were some sort of celebrity. Really I'm just an unemployed writer in LA with a blog that averages maybe 700 hits a post. He even tried to pimp me off to a distant cousin. Maybe I just imagined it but I could have sworn he winked at me and mouthed 'don't worry, she's legal.'

I guess now would be a good time to give a breakdown of the wedding party and my initial thoughts on them...

You have the Phi Psis, large portions of pledge classes from graduating classes '08, '09 and '10. We all lived in Chicago at some point and I described most of what we're about in the intro.

Then there were the Michigan dudes. I didn't know much about them going in, but I figured they couldn't be as out of their minds as us. I was wrong. These guys are fucking legends. I would find out later that one of them fell off a table at Thursday night...on his face. He put two teeth through his fucking lip and still managed to allegedly take home a bridesmaid.

On the female side we had a mash up of DZs from Indiana and friends from Southern Indiana. Conventional wisdom would say that most of these girls were much more reserved and wholesome than their savage counterparts. This was not necessarily true, but more on that later.

Oh and this entire wedding was like 80% kids. If you are planning on getting married any time soon, leave the neighbors at home. Bob from work can sit this one out. I think one of the reasons this wedding was so dope is because like everyone I know was there. I don't know Bob from work. Sorry Bob.

One last thing, the rehearsal dinner was fucking gorgeous. Do a Bloomington wedding, do the dinner at Oliver, your friends will be talking about it for the rest of their lives.

I don't remember much after the dinner, we went to Sports. We walked to the front of the line and just said "We're in the wedding" and were able to cut a 45 minute line. If you're ever worried about getting into a place, just wear a suit and drop that line, it worked for us all weekend.

The big takeaway from Friday night is the table next to us was occupied by Mark fucking Cuban. I really called my shot last week. If you see him at the bar moving forward, I'll go ahead and let you know...no pictures in the bar, you'll have to step outside.
Best man Kevin and Cuban at Bloomington airport.

My last memory from Friday is Paul convincing me to do a stuntman...don't worry, that's salt.



But allegedly after this incident the entire wedding party bought cases of champagne and had a squirt gun fight. Miraculously none of us were kicked out for this. Someone even gave me a champagne shower with Fireball, I surprisingly didn't go blind but my hair was so sticky in the morning you could crack it in half.

I didn't even make it back to the right room Friday night, but I do know that we deemed ourselves too drunk to walk one city block, hence an email from Uber the next day telling us about our 45 second ride.

Casualties: 0
Bridesmaids: ?
Undergrads: 0

SATURDAY

I woke up on the floor again, I was in my LA roommate's room. I realize in a panic that I have 45 minutes to be in my wedding suit for pictures. I'm not wearing a shirt.

Fuck it.

I sprint back to the Hyatt from the Springhill suites in nothing but a pair of Grey pants. I had lost my shoes (at Sports) but thankfully not been given drugs by some Jewish kids at Smallwood afterward. So I get back to the Hyatt, there is another not for me.

"Stop being a pussy. Take these. Come to Crazy Horse." There are 2 red pills and two blue pills. Neo only had to take one red or one blue in The Matrix but I was on the 3rd day of an epic bender and hadn't lost a phone or wallet yet.

I take all 4 and walk across the street to Crazy Horse. I get funny looks from everyone in the lobby along the way. Something happened here last night, something I don't know about.

I get to the bar and find out we'll be drinking Moscow Mule's today. Don't spill on your suit.

The inside of the bar looked like a middle school dance. All of the guys on one side, girls on the other, no mingling.

Rumors swirled.

"I hear we're getting kicked out of the hotel."

"Holly's brother puked on someone's face."

"The best man doesn't have a suit."

"The Acacia kid was wandering through the hall naked blasting a speaker and knocking on random doors asking for cocaine."

"One of the bridesmaids was seen walk-of-shaming from the Courtyard."

"Winks took 300 milligrams of Vivance yesterday, he hasn't been seen since."

Hospitals were called, jails were called. Both gave similar answers.

"We've received several calls asking if we have anyone from the wedding, we don't."

The bride walks into the bar all smiles, things can't be that bad if she is still smiling.

"Get on the bus, it's time for pictures."

We roll over to the sample gates where a professional photographer has us do all the classic poses. The girls all look gorgeous. The guys are all sweating profusely, 48 hours of sin seeping out of their pores. And then it happened, the stern talking to we'd been dreading all morning.

"Guys, there were some complaints last night. Three people vomited, a couple was found having sex at the indoor pool, there is blood all over the elevator and someone broke into the hotel bar last night and stole 4 bottles of gin."

How can they prove it was us? Asks the best man, who did lose his suit.

"We are literally the only people staying there. Well us and Mark Cuban. Get your shit together guys. Remember it isn't about you,"

After those sage words of wisdom we decide that it would be best to go to Kilroy's for a shot before getting back on the bus. Clearly we took the words to heart.


Once on the bus, one of the Detroit guys dishes everyone a bottle of champagne, mind you we still have 2 hours until the wedding. I would later find out one of the bottles was spiked with Xanax, one was spiked with molly. I don't know who drank what but there was at least one person rolling through the entire ceremony.

The wedding venue was a farm on the outskirts on Bloomington, there was a 2 hour cocktail hour for the wedding party BEFORE the wedding. Looking back this may have been a mistake. I stole a golf cart and took it for a joy ride before the vows had even taken place.

One of the usher's had a nervous breakdown while waiting for the ceremony to begin, the entire male side of the wedding was approaching sloppy status. I'd like to give a big shout out to our bridesmaids for holding us together, if not for their strength someone certainly would have face planted on their walk down the aisle.

The ceremony itself was beautiful and extraordinary. Holly looked incredible in her dress and Jake managed to not fuck anything up. Half of the bridal party was in tears, let's attribute that to the power of love and not more nefarious factors.


Immediately after the ceremony, one of Holly's brothers somehow sliced his hand in half and had to be taken to the emergency room. After that, someone gave us a shit ton of sparklers and allowed us to pick the new couple up in chairs. This seems dangerous, especially since I personally ate shit between 5 and 6 times on that dance floor. Hey, dress shoes can be slippery.

We did a dinner, both bride and groom's father gave splendid speeches. Kevin and Vogel crushed it as well, things seemed to be calming down. This was a wedding after all, not a contest to see who could commit the most debauchery.

A band kept the party rockin' for a few hours after dinner. We danced, we laughed, I think I had a permanent smile glued to my face. Busses arrived to take us back to campus, what a weekend.

But wait...there's more. The busses actually took us back to Sports, where Jake's sister and her boyfriend (Holla at Moose and Bear) did a two hour DJ set. I had been pretty confident up to this point in the evening that I had a chick coming home with me, but then M&B played "Where are U now" and I had to climb a table to dance on it.

Of course I slipped and fell off said table because there is only so much abuse the human body can take. I cracked my head open a little bit but instead of sending me home, Jake's cousin handed me a bottle of Grey Goose and told me to take a sip for the pain.

God I love these guys.

At 6am, I got back to my room. One casualty. Still an unknown amount of Bridesmaids and students bedded. Maybe we were just too fucked up for hook ups this weekend, not that there's anything wrong with that.

SUNDAY

Well somehow even though I made it back to my room without blacking out I wake up on the Goddam floor again. Our room smells like a decomposing AIDS body, but I have more to worry about. The crushing anxiety of Sunday is hitting me like a MAC truck, all I want to do is crawl into a hole and die.

I survey the damage of the room: used condoms, empty beer cans, a sign that was stolen off of the wall at Sports. When the fuck did this happen? It looks like a grenade landed in here.

Somehow I am suckered into going to Crazy Horse one more time. This time I am assured it will be for food only. I begrudgingly accept.

Of course 3 bottles of wine are ordered, I have to fucking drive today, but whatever.

"Holly, Jake, thanks so much for having us...it was the greatest weekend of my life."

Everyone around the table nods in agreement, I chime in.

"Ya, you know I wasn't quite sure how it was going to go. It seems like it was more of a bro weekend with not that many scandalous hook-ups."

"Lol are you serious Moeller? I think everyone except for you in the wedding party got laid last night. And you probably would have if you wouldn't have been the drunkest one there."

"Oh shit is anyone mad?"

As it turns out almost every male and female got it in on Saturday night. Some were scandalous, some weren't, but I think we'll leave the details of that in Bloomington. Although I will tip my cap to the Michigan guys, I didn't know you had it in you.

On my way out of Bloomington, I make the guys stop at Buffalouie's with me. I'm taking them back to my house in Geist so I don't have to go through this dark day alone. I come crashing down to Earth on the drive home. Depression sets in, I don't want to go back to the real world. I don't have a flight back to LA. My account appears to be negative and I'll be leaving a lion's share of the people from the weekend behind.

"When is the next one guys?"

I don't know, but we'll do it again soon, right?

Probably not. This weekend will never be recreated. Jake and Holly caught us all at the perfect time in our lives to come back for an all out bender. They had the perfect cross section of friends and open minded parents that allowed this weekend to be the greatest weekend of my life.

I'm sure I will see most of these people again, well some of them again. I would like to see them all, but that's not how life works. Even if there were to be another Bloomington wedding, circumstances change. Some one will have a kid. Some one will fall out of touch and not be invited, someone could die. It's sad, but that's life. This just happened to be a seminal moment in my life, in the bride and grooms lives that can never be repeated. It's just a memory that will live fondly in my mind for the rest of my life.

Don't be sad that it's over, be happy that it happened. That's supposed to be something you tell someone after a tough break up, or a major life crisis, but for me it will be the people I had the pleasure of spending this weekend with. You will always occupy a major place in my heart.

I have lived in LA now for 4+ years. I have new friends out here, I have moved on to a certain extent, but truth be told it will never be the same as it was with us. You are the people I spent the craziest and fondest years of my life with. I appreciate and love the shit out of each and every one of you.

We've been through some shit, and we all came out mostly OK on the other side.

Best of luck to everyone, I hope we don't spend another 4 years without kicking it, but if we do, know that I'll be thinking about you from time to time. Thanks to the Seidmans and the Begles for throwing the best party of all time. And to Jake and Holly, it goes without saying, but you two are the fucking best.

Final statistics:
No one died.
A bunch of people had sex.
Everyone had fun.

It's now 2:30PM PDT on Tuesday, September 1st. It's been roughly 58 hours since I ended my weekend and I've got some shit to deal with, but I think I'll be all right.

Ed. Note: If you would like to see pictures of the stunning bride and passable groom at the ceremony please check out Jake or Holly's facebook. The pictures of the ceremony are dope.

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