One random Winter day during my 14th year of existence, I woke up on a dock in Cave Run Kentucky with very little memory of how exactly I got there. What I do remember is that it was freezing cold, my head hurt, and it seemed to be early in the AM hours of the fog-laden lake. After taking a moment to analyze my lot in life, I tried to raise up and rub my weery head, but I could not... my arm was stuck. I rolled over and looked down as to see what had taken hold of my stuck arm. It was when I viewed the devastation to my arm that I began to question
exactly how I had gotten myself into this situation.... and slowly, partial-memories flooded back into my consciousness.
My first thought was the last thing I could fully recollect which was riding in the back of my fathers Ford Expedition, sat directly behind my then step-sister and her boyfriend, and sitting next to his brother Mike, while my father was driving the beast with an attached cigar boat trailing wildly behind. We were on our way to his house boat. Dearest Dad was weaving maniacally between trucks while doing 85 as we all sat in the back passing back and forth a bottle of Apple Pucker and chasing it down with a case of nut brown ale that we had just bought for the trip.
By the time we had completed the 4.5 hour trip, we were all loaded, save for Father who was only half in the bag due to his being "responsible" and drinking only during the final hour-long leg of the journey. When we finally got to the house boat, we quickly unloaded and shortly thereafter began an impromptu game of "Up and Down the River". Now, I'm sure this game has rules in some book, and I'm sure someone cares about them... however we did not, we played the Jack Roush way. This consisted of passing out five cards per person involved, then turning the remaining cards up one at a time, and anyone that had a pairing card had to take a shot of Pucker. Generally most people would get 3/4 through the game before relieving the high-fructose inebriate from their churning stomach. Good times.
However, we were old hat's at the game, and managed to put two games of it under our belt.... and then came the whiskey... Jim Beam precisely. After about 4-5 shots, my father who had been at work all day went back into his private bedroom and crashed. That's when the fun began, Mike and I heard some faint yelling across the lake, the more we listened, the more it began to sound like females... so naturally we went to inquire as to what they were doing.
When we finally found the sources of the squeels down a random dock, we were disapointed to see that there were only two females and they both were taken, however the other 3 guys with them seemed to be drunk frat boys and down to drink with Mike and I... which my being 14 probably doesn't say much as to the caliber of human beings they were. We were drunk and I was once again drinking people nearly twice my age under the table... a talent that has lasted my entire life. It was around this time that I noticed a few of them were on another "plain" so to speak, I asked the guy to my left what was up with them and he informed me that they were tripping on ecstacy... it was around this time that I really began to lose my grip on reality, but I was later informed that I didn't in fact take anything that night besides smoking a little grass... but I honestly cannot tell you what happened in the next 4 hours. To hear the tale though, it involved me pissing off of what I thought was their boat onto the dock, when in actuality, it was the other way around and I got kicked off for my pissing on their boat.
So there I found myself the next morning, still-drunk, frozen to the dock... in what was apparently my own vomit. My arm literally a vomit-sickle containing a gross combination of last night's steak and my own bile. I tried to pick up my arm, but it was met with strong resistance. It was obviously early AM, and though my father didn't mind my drinking, I knew that I had to get to bed before he got up, for if he found me in this state in front of his neighboring house-boaters... he would be none too pleased to say the least. I briefly considered throwing water to melt the vomit-sickle encapsulating my arm, but I had no way to get it. I even considered pissing on my own arm to melt it, but I didn't feel like dealing with the explanation that may come along with being caught in such an act. So I held my breath, looked away, and ripped my flesh off of the dock.
Not as much of my skin was removed as I had feared while enduring the pain, matter of fact only a small patch was noticeably seeping with blood, most of it just looked as if I had a massive rash. It was the huge rush of endorphins that accompanied the pain combined with the fact that I was still drunk from the night before made me fall back to the ground as soon as I stood up. It was due to this momentary lapse of consciousness that caused me to not realize that my Dad was standing there on the bow of the boat. "Hey boy, what'd you get sick or somin?" I looked down, the vomit was beginning to glisten and thaw in the morning rays of sunshine, enough to where I felt safe in acting as I had just spewed it up. I stood up, hid my arm behind my body, mumbled "Yes sir, it was a rough one", immediately took a shower, drank a beer, and started attempting to imbibe enough whiskey to force the pain away.
My first thought was the last thing I could fully recollect which was riding in the back of my fathers Ford Expedition, sat directly behind my then step-sister and her boyfriend, and sitting next to his brother Mike, while my father was driving the beast with an attached cigar boat trailing wildly behind. We were on our way to his house boat. Dearest Dad was weaving maniacally between trucks while doing 85 as we all sat in the back passing back and forth a bottle of Apple Pucker and chasing it down with a case of nut brown ale that we had just bought for the trip.
By the time we had completed the 4.5 hour trip, we were all loaded, save for Father who was only half in the bag due to his being "responsible" and drinking only during the final hour-long leg of the journey. When we finally got to the house boat, we quickly unloaded and shortly thereafter began an impromptu game of "Up and Down the River". Now, I'm sure this game has rules in some book, and I'm sure someone cares about them... however we did not, we played the Jack Roush way. This consisted of passing out five cards per person involved, then turning the remaining cards up one at a time, and anyone that had a pairing card had to take a shot of Pucker. Generally most people would get 3/4 through the game before relieving the high-fructose inebriate from their churning stomach. Good times.
However, we were old hat's at the game, and managed to put two games of it under our belt.... and then came the whiskey... Jim Beam precisely. After about 4-5 shots, my father who had been at work all day went back into his private bedroom and crashed. That's when the fun began, Mike and I heard some faint yelling across the lake, the more we listened, the more it began to sound like females... so naturally we went to inquire as to what they were doing.
When we finally found the sources of the squeels down a random dock, we were disapointed to see that there were only two females and they both were taken, however the other 3 guys with them seemed to be drunk frat boys and down to drink with Mike and I... which my being 14 probably doesn't say much as to the caliber of human beings they were. We were drunk and I was once again drinking people nearly twice my age under the table... a talent that has lasted my entire life. It was around this time that I noticed a few of them were on another "plain" so to speak, I asked the guy to my left what was up with them and he informed me that they were tripping on ecstacy... it was around this time that I really began to lose my grip on reality, but I was later informed that I didn't in fact take anything that night besides smoking a little grass... but I honestly cannot tell you what happened in the next 4 hours. To hear the tale though, it involved me pissing off of what I thought was their boat onto the dock, when in actuality, it was the other way around and I got kicked off for my pissing on their boat.
So there I found myself the next morning, still-drunk, frozen to the dock... in what was apparently my own vomit. My arm literally a vomit-sickle containing a gross combination of last night's steak and my own bile. I tried to pick up my arm, but it was met with strong resistance. It was obviously early AM, and though my father didn't mind my drinking, I knew that I had to get to bed before he got up, for if he found me in this state in front of his neighboring house-boaters... he would be none too pleased to say the least. I briefly considered throwing water to melt the vomit-sickle encapsulating my arm, but I had no way to get it. I even considered pissing on my own arm to melt it, but I didn't feel like dealing with the explanation that may come along with being caught in such an act. So I held my breath, looked away, and ripped my flesh off of the dock.
Not as much of my skin was removed as I had feared while enduring the pain, matter of fact only a small patch was noticeably seeping with blood, most of it just looked as if I had a massive rash. It was the huge rush of endorphins that accompanied the pain combined with the fact that I was still drunk from the night before made me fall back to the ground as soon as I stood up. It was due to this momentary lapse of consciousness that caused me to not realize that my Dad was standing there on the bow of the boat. "Hey boy, what'd you get sick or somin?" I looked down, the vomit was beginning to glisten and thaw in the morning rays of sunshine, enough to where I felt safe in acting as I had just spewed it up. I stood up, hid my arm behind my body, mumbled "Yes sir, it was a rough one", immediately took a shower, drank a beer, and started attempting to imbibe enough whiskey to force the pain away.
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