Hilarity Ensues
Page 27
Orthopedist “You still have an ACL there, so worst case it’s a partial tear, but it’s tough to tell from this MRI if you tore it or just strained it. We’ll look at it again in a few months and see how it’s doing in terms of swelling and joint stability, but things are looking good now.”
Tucker “OK, cool.”
Ortho “But this is very important—do NOT do ANYTHING strenuous with your legs during that time. No running, no jumping, no kicking, no weight lifting, nothing at all like that. No even light jogging. Upper body stuff is fine, but if you do have a partial tear, you can make it much worse by putting any sort of strain in your knee. Once we know the nature of the injury, then we can structure a rehab protocol.”
I get an appointment with him a few days after I got back to LA, and my knee was massively swollen. The MRI showed a complete tear of the ACL, a partial MCL tear, and several microfractures. He was PISSED:
Ortho “Tucker, what did I tell you? So you just ignored me and went and worked out anyway?”
Tucker “No man, I wasn’t working out at all.”
Ortho “You don’t tear an ACL like this walking down the street, Tucker.”
Tucker “I know … I did it having sex.”
Ortho “What?”
Tucker “Look, I’m not excited about my ACL either, but the way I did it is actually kinda funny: I was fucking this lawyer on a conference table and I slipped on some sweat. My knee buckled and I fell off the table. That’s how it happened.”
You ever do something as a kid that was so outside the realm of normal that your parents just stared at you, completely lost as to how to even react? Well, he gave me that look. The nurse giggling was the only thing that pulled him back into reality:
Ortho “Well, I can’t treat you. You are a knee abuser. I am referring you to Dr. Marc Friedman, he is the best orthopedist in Southern California, maybe he can talk to you about what you … do.”
Are you kidding? I had a doctor fire me as a patient because of this incident? What am I supposed to do with that? I guess just add it to the resume:
Tucker Max, Knee Abuser.
SEXTING WITH TUCKER MAX: A/S/LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION
* * *
Some of the girls who sexted me were into pretending we were in weird, exotic locations, except they always left it to ME to pick the place. Like because I’d written a book about fucking lots of women, all of the sudden I was some kind of connoisseur of imaginary exhibitionism. I didn’t understand this at first—not only do you want to have fake sex, but you want to do it in a fake place NOT of your choosing??—and I eventually learned to stop trying. Fools act foolish; that’s what they do. You can’t actually try to understand them; you just have to go with it. So I did, and they turned out to be some of the funnier exchanges.
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION #1: PUSSY PUSSY
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION #2: PLAYOFF READY
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION #3: 8 MILE
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION #4: THE CLAMBURGLER
THE LAW SCHOOL WEDDINGS AND BACHELOR PARTIES
For years I’ve known that I’d eventually write a story that detailed all the ridiculous bachelor parties and weddings of my law school friends. I saved this story for as long as I could, because even though basically all my friends have been married or engaged for a while now, I wanted to end it with a bachelor party and wedding story of my own.
Yeah, right.
This is my third book and I’m still the only one of my law school friends without a wife. Everyone else even has kids (except Credit). It’s time to stop waiting for pigs to fly across the frozen tundra of hell and just drop the story.
EL BINGEROSO’S BACHELOR PARTY, PART 1 — CHARLOTTE, NC
Occurred, November 2000
The first bachelor party was for El Bingeroso, before we even graduated from law school. He was having an “official” bachelor party in Kansas City the following spring, but we didn’t really know any of the people who were going to organize that party, so we planned our own surprise bachelor party for just us law school friends. Mainly because we wanted to make sure it was awesome, but also when you’re 25, you take every excuse you can to throw a party.
We decided on an overnight trip to Charlotte. GoldenBoy set the whole thing up, rented a van, reserved the hotel rooms, set up the strip club, etc. He also had the brilliant idea that we should all wear the same outfit, like the goofy sluts do for lame bachelorette parties.
His choice of outfit: Light blue button down shirts and khaki pants.
I’m not kidding at all. I have no idea why he wanted to do this. I guess because he was engaged and wasn’t going to get laid anyway, he thought we all needed to spend the weekend inside of a Dockers commercial. Nine dudes, all dressed up like poor Catholics on Sunday, assemble at his place and get in the van.
GoldenBoy “OK, because I know things can get out of control with some of you, I spent the extra money for complete coverage.”
Tucker “You bought ‘walk away’ insurance? You’re sure?”
GoldenBoy “Oh yes. I went over this extensively with the agent. We’re covered for anything, even acts of God.”
You don’t have to tell me twice!
I stepped back, took an NFL kicker stance, then drove my foot into that van like I was Adam Vinateri. There was a deafening smash as the body panel crumpled into a HUGE dent. I don’t know if you’ve ever kicked the shit out of a van, but if not, I recommend it. Very fun.
Much to my surprise, GoldenBoy freaked out.
GoldenBoy “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?!?”
Tucker “What? You said you had walk away insurance, right?”
GoldenBoy couldn’t even respond. He just stood there stuttering, staring at me in enraged disbelief.
Tucker “This isn’t even an act of God. It’s covered.”
Hate “I told you not to tell Tucker about the insurance.”
Tucker “I don’t understand why you’re mad, GoldenBoy. Insurance means everything is free!”
There was one more element to this plan: we had to kidnap El Bingeroso. Let me explain:
El Bingeroso’s fiancée was very “strict” with him. The reason he’s usually the wildest of the group when he goes out is that she requires him to be so docile the other 99.9% of his life (I would never call her controlling or domineering. NEVER). There was no way in hell she was going to let him come with us if she knew we were planning a bachelor party out of town.
First off, he already had an “official” bachelor party planned for the spring (one where her father and uncle would be in attendance). Second, she did not get along at all with GoldenBoy (too long to explain why, but it boiled down to petty bullshit). And third, the only reason El Bingeroso got to go on the Austin Road Trip—which we’d just gotten back from a few weeks earlier—was that he pitched it as a “law school bachelor” party to her. He got arrested there, she freaked out, and there were no more weekend trips for El Bingeroso.
And it’s not like we could tell El Bingeroso ahead of time that we were going to Charlotte and trust him to make up a good excuse. He was afraid of the woman he was planning to spend the rest of his life with (I don’t blame him; despite my fearlessness with any sort of authority, I made it a point to never cross Kristy). The minute she began the fiancée forensics, he would fold and sing like a canary. GoldenBoy decided to wait until the day before to tell him anything, and even then all he said was that we were all going out that night, and to wear a light blue button down with khaki pants.
When we pulled up to his place, all he saw was nine identically-dressed dudes in a white cargo van. He was too confused to fight until we had already dragged him into the van and were driving away. It was like a flash-bang grenade of debauchery and bad decisions. Only then did we explain:
El Bingeroso “We’re spending the night in Charlotte? Are you kidding?”
Hate “Look around. We’re all dressed the same! Do you think this is a joke, asshole?”
GoldenBoy “We aren’t turning around.”
El Bingeroso “Fuuuuck … gimme a beer. I need to get real drunk before I tell her I won’t be home until tomorrow.”
GoldenBoy was in charge of making the Charlotte plans. You can tell he’s had a girlfriend for a LONG time, because his plan was to have us start at a bar, then go to a strip club, THEN to a night club. Who the fuck puts the strip club anywhere but the END OF THE NIGHT? How does that make any fucking sense?
We start at some random Irish bar. After pounding beers for the entire drive from Durham to Charlotte, plus a few shots in the bar, El Bingeroso finally has the courage to call Kristy. He is outside for at least ten minutes. He comes back in looking like he’d just put down the family dog. Personally.
GoldenBoy “Everything OK man?”
El Bingeroso “No.”
Hate “You still getting married?”
El Bingeroso “Probably.”
Tucker “I know the solution to this problem!”
El Bingeroso “Line’em up. I need something to drown her disappointment in me.”
We did so many Irish Car Bombs, the bartender ran my card, signed me out, and then made us start another tab with a different card. My bill was so high he was afraid the card would get declined and I’d leave without paying. Weird—I’d never met the guy, yet it’s like he’d known me my whole life.
It was only like 6pm, so it was still happy hour, and pretty much everyone else in this bar was dressed in business clothes having a post-work drink to relax. We were not. We were in attack mode, looking for targets. And unfortunately for them, a group of young fat secretaries came into the bar and made the calamitous mistake of choosing to stand near us. They chatted away, stuffing their faces with the free happy hour food, oblivious to the fact that the world as they knew it was about to crumble around their cankles, like so many crumbs from the free appetizers they were chowing on.
Hate is normally pretty tolerant of most people—well, he normally holds his anger about people inside himself—but when he gets drunk and ornery, if you prod him the right way, he’ll let it out:
Hate “Fat girls should not be friends with other fat girls because all they do is tell each other how cute they look in clothes that are clearly too small for them. This is just offensive to those of us who know what a gym is.”
SlingBlade “You have a unique and interesting perspective. I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.”
Tucker “Hate, you should go tell it to them. I bet they think short guys are lame.”
I was joking, but Hate was so drunk he took me seriously and immediately walked over and started talking to them. This was the first indication that he wasn’t just drunk, but FULLY in the tank. He NEVER approaches girls. The second indication came moments later when he stormed right into the middle of the group:
Hate “HEY LADIES! HOW ABOUT YOU JUST STOP EATING FOR A WHILE? HAVE YOU THOUGHT OF THAT?”
Even from a distance, I could tell that the fatties were confused by this short angry person yelling at them. You know how cows get all flustered when they’re getting herded by border collies? It was just like that. I quickly scurried over to get in on the fun.
Tucker “My friend is only trying to be helpful. He doesn’t like to see people wasting their gym memberships.”
Of course, this started a whole heated conversation filled with ridiculous fatty logic and the flimsiest of rationalizations. I can’t remember what they said; it was nothing spectacular. They weren’t even very good at lying to themselves about why they were fat. One thing I do remember was one of the girls trying to accuse Hate and I of drinking too much. The gall of her!
Fatty1 “You don’t think you drink too much?”
Tucker “What does that even mean, ‘too much’?”
Fatty1 “How many times have you woken up and had no idea how you got home?”
Tucker “That’s not drinking too much, that’s called your twenties!”
Fatty2 “I don’t like it when guys drink too much.”
Tucker “I find that when I drink I become incredibly charming. I do things like yell obscenities at random people, vomit everywhere and break things that don’t belong to me. When I get drunk outside, in addition to being abusive and destructive, my charm extends to urinating in inappropriate places, running around with my clothes off and passing out in public parks. That sounds like awesomeness to me.”
They weren’t convinced, so I thought I’d try to spice everything up by adding more alcohol:
Tucker “Hey bartender, we need shots! And bring extras for the these pregnant girls, they’re drinking for two!”
We were ejected from the bar, even though I was the one who got a drink thrown at me. How does that make sense? If I’d known a joke that tame was going to get us kicked out, I’d have just roundhouse kicked one of the girls in her donut hole instead to get my money’s worth. Hindsight is always 20/20.
Here we were, kicked out of a bar at 7:30pm on a Friday. GoldenBoy had rented one of those party buses for the night so we could all drink and not have to drive. Unfortunately, it wasn’t scheduled to pick us up until 8pm. You’d think this half hour would be a good opportunity to slow down, maybe drink some Gatorade, and pace ourselves.
Yeah, you’d think. We walked to a 7–11, bought a 30-pack, and drank it on the street like a fucking homeless baseball team. You know the night is off to a banging start when you are street-drinking before the sun even goes down.
Ten obnoxious guys, all dressed like Catholics on Sunday, can easily get shitfaced and descend on a strip club without creating too much of a stir … at 1am. We got there at 8:30pm. We sit down at our table, and some girls come over and start talking to us. The stripper talking to SlingBlade was kind of a bitch to him, and then got up and left.
Tucker “Dude, how did you not just rip into that stripper?”
He kinda swayed in his seat for a second.
SlingBlade “I’m so drunk, I couldn’t find the way to my ass with a flashlight and a map. I don’t feel good. In fact, I’ll be right back.”
Ten minutes later, PWJ comes back from the bathroom.
PWJ “I just walked in the bathroom and heard SlingBlade yelling ‘HUH, YEAH, you gotta want it!’ What the fuck is wrong with him?”
A few minutes later, SlingBlade comes out holding his abdomen.
SlingBlade “Dude, taking antibiotics and then drinking is a bad idea. I just let loose a symphony of bowel movements, each in different pitches and melodies. It was like a poop xylophone.”
The bachelor show for El Bingeroso was pretty conventional. They took him up onstage, poured alcohol down his throat, rubbed their tits in his face, tied him up, hit him with belts and just generally used him to vent their rage against men, before unceremoniously kicking him off the stage.
The other guys dispersed and were getting lap dances or whatever, and I was left to watch El Bingeroso. We were sitting on bar stools by one of the stages, and at this point he was so drunk he had basically reverted to a state of mild retardation. Whenever a stripper came near him, he would reach out to touch her, like a child fascinated by an aquarium of fish. The whole time he was swaying back and forth on his stool, trying to stay on but of course falling off, and then cheering every time I caught him.
El Bingeroso “Woooooooo—YAAAAY!!!!! Hahhahhahahhaha!”
Eventually the bouncer sees this dog and pony show, and tells me that my friend is too drunk and has to leave. Thinking quickly, I used a technique I’ve used many times to save my drunk friends from getting tossed out of bars:
Tucker “No man, he’s not drunk, he’s got M.S. You know—Multiple Sclerosis. Normally he’s OK, but after a few beers, he can’t really sit up well.”
Bouncer “Oh shit dude, I didn’t realize. Sorry about that. Just keep an eye on him okay? And no more grabbing dancers.”
Tucker “Yeah, no problem. I’ll do that.”
If you’ve never taken ephedrine, the best way I can explain it is this: Imagine what it’s like to drink a bunch of Red Bulls. Add a couple Adderall. Now strap your heart to a car battery and switch it on. That’s basically ephedrine (well, several ephedrine. I don’t think what we took was the “recommended dose”). Half an hour later, I was ready to run a marathon carrying El Bingeroso on my back like he was Yoda.
El Bingeroso wouldn’t take an ephedrine, but the alcohol was catching up to him and so he wanted to eat. This strip club had food, but they were telling me the fucking kitchen was closed.
Tucker “Hate, come over here, I need some help.”