Shame

*The feats of stupidity detailed below were undertaken by college-educated miscreants so well-versed in the annals of vapid debauchery that it is possible to refer to them "experts".  Do not try any of this at home.  Do not try any of this anywhere, actually.  

I disappoint myself all the time; the sources of which are too varied to detail here.  I suppose they're sprinkled throughout much of my writing.  Friday night was a night not unlike many others before it.  My compatriots and I were coming off a long work week and into a long weekend.  We needed to blow off some serious steam.  Each of our respective significant others, for various reasons, were absent, a fact that never used to pose a problem.  Actually, the problem perhaps used to be the fact that we carried on in their presence exactly like we did in their absence.  These days, however, the presence of estrogen in our "party" is often the difference between dignity and depravity.   

The evening began harmlessly enough.  I walked to an upscale bar on the other side of town with a friend of mine -we'll call him Rich- to meet up with a mutual friend of ours -whom we'll refer to as Jack- and a friend of his whom we'd never previously met.   Our new acquaintance indicated we would be joined additionally by one of his friends from college.  This was fine with us at the time, as we were soon to be joined by three more guys from school.   I mean, we marveled at the lengths to which this guy went in order to convey to us how attractive, and subsequently promiscuous, his friend was, but ultimately thought nothing of it.   More the merrier.  

Well, you'd have been hard-pressed to find a bigger deusche in the greater Boston area.  Unable to metabolize two attractive women apparently not falling all over themselves vying for his attention, he rejoined Rich and I at the bar, rolling his eyes and mouthing, "L-Z-O."  We looked at each other, not sure if L-Z-O was something out of the metrosexual handbook he'd obviously read repeatedly, or if it was something we should know.  We both turned back to him, sporting faces that said, "Wha?"  "Lesbians" he whispered.  Needless to say, it was for the best when, an hour or so later, they went their own way and we went ours.  If I'm not recounting this inane part of the evening clearly enough, they likely moved on to a bar filled with as many hot slizzies as humanly possible.  We went to a dive bar to make asses out of ourselves.

A couple drinks and a change of venue later would find Jack and I mock-fighting each other like adolescents at a sleepover.  On this night, however, the bouncers were eager to keep patrons on a short leash.  After only one warning I was manhandled and dragged out of the bar.  Exile.  I can remember standing there, beyond the back door, wondering how long it'd been since I was last thrown out of a bar.  Shivering as I completed the thought, I walked back into the bar to get my coat.  The bouncers recognized me immediately and directed me back out the door, despite my gentle insistence, "Just let me get my f*ck*ng coat you bald piece of shit!"  By the time my friends arrived outside with my coat, they had to rush to get between me and the herd of angry bouncers who were quickly losing all patience with my antics.     

After getting over the initial shock at having been thrown out of my favorite bar, and my one true love, a hankering for more gin came over me.  I simultaneously realized there were more fish in the sea.  Didn't take long to mourn that breakup.  As we walked up the street to another watering hole, Jack lost himself for a moment.  What sort of charade was going on in his head is anyone's guess.  Paying no particular attention to him until the last possible moment, aptly characterized by an exalted anticipation, he stumbled and face planted into a steaming hot pile of garbage.  Doubled over in hysterics, we each fumbled for our ID's as Jack dusted himself off.  

"No chance.  Turn around guys.  Not here," the two bouncers urged without even cracking a smile.  

The only bar we could get into was an Irish pub that was completely empty.  Between my repeated inquiries directed at the English bar-tender as to where he was from in Ireland, and Jack's collapsing and making snow angels on the pub floor, we somehow managed to wear our welcome even as bar staff were faced with the possibility of a completely empty bar and zero tips.  Zero tips, apparently lesser of two evils on this night.  

Back at my buddy's place for some night cappers, Jack found it prudent to repeatedly pull his dick out of his pants.  "Put your dick away, dude!" warnings were ignored.  Eventually, my buddy Timmy had had enough, so he poured a beer on it.   The snake shrank back into it's wet cage.  Soon after, Jack crossed that very real line of drunkenness, and could no longer stand up or talk.  

Being the good friends that we are, we delivered him unto his bed and his loving girlfriend, who had stayed home that night with a cold.  As we dropped him into bed she demanded, "Oh no!  What happened?!  What'd you guys do to him?"  What sort of response she was given, is really anyone's guess.  We'd likely have to ask her in order to know for sure.  For good measure, though, after she had taken his pants off and he hovered his head over the garbage can strategically placed next to his bed, we ripped his boxers off, took a bow, and left the apartment, destruction in our wake.  

Aside from walking home in the middle of the night without a jacket, and the next day a severely hungover and depressing jaunt to the dog track, I'd been under the mistaken impression that this was the extent of our collective exploits until yesterday.  I can't say I was proud, but I did take a certain solace in the fact that I crawled into my bed under my own power.  Then I received the following email:

I am writing to inform you all that Jack may not have been the biggest slob of the bunch on Friday night.  I received a call this morning from the property manager (really nice lady).  I figured she was calling because we have a clogged drain and a broken dishwasher....  But the call was not actually about either of those things.  She asks me.."Did you have people over late on Friday night?"  My reply: "Uuuhh yes."  She continues, "Someone who left your apartment ripped all of the flowers out of the arrangement in the lobby and threw them in the street outside." My initial reaction: Deny, deny, deny.  But before I utter a word, she reminds me we that we all walked in together and that there are cameras.  So I ask her to describe the

culprit. She says there were two guys, one a blonde that had nothing to do with the situation. The flower destroyer was wearing a dark colored hooded sweatshirt and had dark hair.  I replied that yes I did know him.  

If it had perhaps been someone else, I could find some humor in this story.  The fact of the matter is, however, that it wasn't someone else.  Needless to say, Moose is never leaving me to fend for myself again.  And who could blame her?