I will preface this story by stating that I don’t think it is my funniest story. However, every time it is told by one of my friends it is sure to elicit laughter from all who hear. I have a few theories on that but I will leave that to you to decide. This took place a few month ago during a trip to San Francisco, I hope it was as fun to live as it will be to read.
My longtime friend Lightweight was living in San Francisco and I had made plans to go up and visit him. I was flying up for a week and then I was flying up my sister and her boyfriend to stay with us for the weekend. My sister had just turned 22 and she had wanted to go wine tasting. Lightweights mom lived up by Napa so we made plans to go out there for a couple days over the weekend. Now Lightweight and I had been partying all week so when my sister showed up Friday night we were almost partied out, almost.
We took it pretty easy Friday night and got on the road to head to wine countr early on Saturday. Lightweight’s mom lived in a small city called Healdsburg and it was about an hour and a half drive from the city. The weather was beautiful and we couldn’t wait to start wine tasting. After a few stops we got to his mom’s house and she gave us the locals guide to the wineries. Lightweight had to go to a family dinner later that night so he volunteered to drive the car for us.
I will summarize the next 3-4 hours as they well let you know what kind of state we were in but don’t really add to the story. Drive…stop at winery…drink free wine list…drink a paid for wine list…maybe buy a bottle of wine…drive to next winery…continue. If you have never been to Healdsburg, or Napa for that matter, it is beautiful country. Lightweight had to be back for dinner at 5 so he dropped us off in downtown Healdsburg. At this point the three of us were all pretty hammered. My sister gets this glassed over look on her face when she was drunk and calls everyone “Honey Bunny” which is freakin hilarious in the moment. Not wanting to stop drinking we stop at a few more tasting rooms downtown then go to dinner where we polish off another two bottles.
By the time we finish dinner it was around 8 at night I had sobered up a bit and Lightweight was on his was to pick us up. I ran across the street to a bar to take a shot of Jaeger and have a beer to get my buzz back before he picked us up. Wanting to drink with us Lightweight thought we should drive back to his mom’s house and then walk back to the bars together. We jumped in and headed back to his mom’s place where we downed a few Ketel on the rocks. This would turn out to be one of the last moments I remembered.
The rest of the story is totally drawn from the three witnesses as I have no recollection of any of it. A few things come back when I tried to remember the next day but for the most part I was completely blacked out. None of this has been embellished.
We headed to the closest bar so that Lightweight could catch up on our drunken stupor. Here I continued to drink Ketel until I was eventually cut off by the bartender. Not understanding why I am being cut of, and the bartender not being able to understand me, we got into a heated exchange. Soon all of the cooks in the back were coming out to kick me out of the bar. I am still yelling when Lightweight tries to explain to the bartender that he can get me to leave. His mom being from the town he knows most of the locals and this worked to his advantage. The cooks back off and they finally convince me to leave.
At this point I am both belligerent and pissed. We begin walking to the next bar and I am shouting and trying to run back to the bar, evidently to tell off the bartender who thought it was a bad idea to serve my drunken ass. Lightweight keeps trying to hold on to me so that I wont run away but I continue to squirm and try to run away. Being drunk I can’t run straight and Lightweight soon catches up to me. The group soon decides they should just take me home and we change direction. Sensing what is going on I make a quick evasive move and start running down the street. Let me explain what I mean by running. The best way I have heard it described is if a retard placed Forest Gump during the scene where he runs out of his “special shoes.” My arms were flailing, legs swinging, totally out of control, until….Smack!
I have been told that I laid on the ground for a good 5 minutes without moving. When lightweight finally got me up all I could utter was a drunken, “my head hurts.” The side of my face was cut and scraped and I had a huge gash on my chin that was spouting out blood profusely. When my sister finally got there she started bawling seeing all of the blood. They hurriedly tried to get me back to the house. On the way back there was a restaurant we passed that was still open. I walked over to the window to check out the wound and proceeded to ask the patron if I was bleeding. Obviously grossed out they assured me that I was.
We finally got back to his mom’s place and we started to try to clean up the cut with the first aid kit. The consensus was that the cut was really deep and I needed stitches. Being a drunken idiot I didn’t want to go, even though I couldn’t even stop the bleeding. They came up with the great idea of convincing me that we were going to another bar as a way of getting me into the car. Pulling into the emergency room parking lot I opened the door and peered out. It took a few seconds but I soon realized where we were, “Ohhhh Noooo,” I exclaimed to the group and tried to get back into the car. The two guys grabbed my arms and started dragging me to the door. I played the dead weight card to protest such actions.
They finally got me to the nurse, who bless her soul put up with me through the rest of this. I had to sign a consent form in order to go in and get stitches and for some reason I was vehemently against doing so. After a prolonged argument with the nurse Lightweight tried to convince me of why I should sign.
M e: But dude I don’t want to be operated on.
Him: They wont operate on you, it’s only stitched.
Me: Read the form, they can operate on me.
Thinking that there was no way I read the form Lightweight reads through it. Sure enough it says that you give permission to operate if it is deemed necessary.
Him: Shit!
At this point the nurse was on her final straw. I just stood there singing the Modest Mouse song “The Good Times Are Killing Me” mixing in Peter Bourne and Jon’s “Amsterdam. Both great songs by the way. Every time I sang the modest mouse chorus, with my face dripping blood, Lightweight couldn’t help but laugh. At this point I guess I was bored so I decided to run into the hospital. I ended up in a medium sized conference room where I proceeded to sit down at the head of the table and proclaim:
“Hi my name is ( ), and I am an Alcoholic.”
I spent the next 15 minutes having an AA meeting with myself, all while the three others stood at the door busting up. Soon the nurse threatened to call the cops so Lightweight, giving up on the whole hospital thing, took us home. As we pulled up to his mom’s place I was convinced they were trying to trick me again so I wouldn’t leave the car. Being that they all were sick of me by this point they left me in the car to sleep. I woke up the next morning wondering, “What the fuck happened to my face?” …
