Effluvia

Win a date with Trey.

Extreme Bible! Surge!

Beth rides again.

My high school.

Bygone Days
Uncensored!

75 YEARS AGO
June 12, 1925

Yesterday's ball game results: Memphis 4, Mobile 4.

Who played in this game or, indeed, what sport was being played was not known at press time.

Boss Kenny

"Did I mention that I invented basketball?"

Two Years Ago
I buy a computer.

One day last week Dave and I are at this sub shop, getting some sandwiches for lunch. We gave our orders to the teenager behind the counter and then we were chatting.

"Are you two together?" the kid asks.

"Well, we are having sex," Dave immediately responds, "but our orders are totally separate."

Dave and I lost it, laughing like motherfuckers. The teenager looked sick and ran to the back room. I'm sure he stayed back there the whole time, pointing at us and whispering.

"They're fags, dude," he'd insist, "the big guy said they were having sex, and the other one is wearing a pink shirt and an earring!"

And then Friday James was out in my work-neighborhood, doing some work of his own, so we went to Krystal, which is located conveniently next to a car wash. We're trying to sell Sonya's car, so I dropped her Altima off while we had little square burgers.

[While I'm talking about it - would you like to buy an Altima? 1995, blue exterior/grey interior, 68000 miles, just had a major tune-up. AM/FM cassette, power windows/locks/mirrors, heat/AC, cruise - a great riding car. Seven-thousand bucks, firm. You interested?]

After lunch we got in the car to drive back. I'd chosen "Clean Car" air freshener, even though James lobbied for "Pina Colada."

"Whoof," I said, fanning the air, "it smells like fresh-baked ass in here."

"Pina Colada, man," James told me, "at least you know what coconuts smell like."

Then we were back in the parking lot at my work-place, admiring the car.

"Damn," I said, "they treated the fuck out of those wheels, didn't they?"

"I'm surprised they don't just spin around, they're so slick and shiny," James observed.

It's a good-lookin' car. You should buy it, Gentle Reader.

Friday night me and Donna and Ben ran the Gibson 5K. My time was a horrible, slow, shouldn't-even-bother kind of time, but that was okay, 'cause we hung out and drank lots of beer afterwards.

It's not like we had a choice, though. By the time Donna and I finished the run they were out of water and sports drinks, and though more were rumored they never showed up. The beer went on for quite a while, though, and it was wonderfully cold.

We were on the roof of the guitar factory, enjoying the breeze and sucking the beer down 'til it ran out. We were having a good time, drinking and talking, and I didn't realize until after I got home that I was drunk as hell. Donna reported a similar effect.

"We were all drinking together," she supposed, "and we had just run, so we just didn't realize..."

So I got home, drunk and stinking like a goat from running, and Sonya didn't kick me out. She's a good Wife. Her and James and Jen were watching Buffy videos. I walked the dog and took a shower and drank some water and eventually sobered up enough to go to bed.

So...Saturday, the Class Reunion. Very little has changed.

I took my boom box and the music I'd put together for the thing Saturday afternoon over to the school Saturday morning. Four girls - Janet, Angie, Lori and Kristy - were all already there, taking care of last-minute details. I visited for while, then went home to get ready.

Sonya and I got there around two, and there was much rejoicing. About half the class was there - which is impressive, until you remember only twenty-four people were in the class to begin with. There were some teachers and parents there, too, along with assorted spouses and offspring. I mingled about, talking music and jobs with Ron and Krista, life in Conway with Lana, old gossip with Angie...they also had a table full of pictures, where I admired the many flowing manes on hockey hair the boys had - me included. The girls couldn't say much, though, 'cause they had the huge cow-catcher poofs of hair hanging above their foreheads.

And some ingenious sould had set up a big screen on which was being projected various videos from our senior year - homecoming, graduation, class play, football games - while my mix tapes played in the background. I went heavier on the eighties music than on actual '89/'90 tunes, 'cause that was a pretty barren year, music-wise. Motley Crue's Dr. Feelgood and the Pixies Doolittle excepted, of course.

We took pictures and had door prizes. It was fun, pleasant and inoffensive.

I knew our true selves would be revealed that night.

While I'm pretty sure the vast majority of my high school classmates drank during high school (God knows I did) we never actually all drank together. There were a variety of reasons for this, I'm sure. So Saturday night's adventure at the Fox and Hound was a first-time thing.

The Fox and Hound, for those of you unfamiliar with beer joints in Cordova, is a strange combination of English pub and sports bar - lots of wood and brass, lots of TVs. It's a bit jarring if you've actually been to a pub (or a reasonable American facsimile thereof) and kind of hokey if you're used to sports bars, but there are a lot of TVs and they make a fine (and large) black and tan, so it was okay by me.

Things were quiet at first, and tentative, as we sat in groups of four or so and had a drink. We all had some food, though, and another few drinks, and then people started to get up and mingle. I went with Ron and a couple of husbands to play pool.

Ron was the golden boy/quarterback in high school, and we never really hung out that much. I didn't dislike him, and he didn't dislike me (that I know of), but we just did different things. Saturday night, though, we were old buddies, talking shit and cracking wise.

Farther into the (by then) drunken evening, Ron said, "you know, Harold, you were always a little different than everyone else in high school, and we never really hung out. And now I can't figure out why."

I blew it off, saying we were both busy with girls and out-of-school friends (which we were) and Ron was occupied playing every sport the school had. These are true things. But it's nice to know he's seen the error of his ways, nonetheless.

In his defense, though, Ron is a pretty nice guy - though he's quite the frat boyand something of a pig, like my good buddy Glen. It's a funny, entertaining piggishness. He kept trying to get Kristy to show us her new boobs (see below). He had no luck.

For the record, Krista and Janet, my two favorite people who I haven't kept in touch with, were both there. I was glad to hang out with them. And Christie - whom you read about often here - was there too, though she kept her drinking to a minimum since she was driving herself home.

"I'm glad I didn't show my ass," she told Sonya at lunch today.

Things degenerated pretty rapidly from there, once Kristy (the valedictorian, no less) bought several rounds of shots for the whole class and anyone else within range of the wait staff. Kristy got a boob job since graduation, too, and her lawyer husband left early to go to a bachelor party, so she cut right loose on her night out.

Everyone did, including people who probably don't get out too often. Angie, who is still the same pretty, happy girl she was in high school, got really drunk, started flirting with all the non-Class of 1990 guys who came in later in the evening, got weepy in a corner and then was violently ill for an extended period in the ladies room.

Everyone was smoking and drinking and hugging far too much, and at one point Dyanna (who looks just the same except for longer hair and now teaches English at our old high school) got up on one of the pool tables and made one of those lovely "fuck you" toasts. So Sonya and I left, going to Backstreet to meet Nicki and Shawn. We left directions and encouragement for any classmates who might want to join us.

We found them on the porch at Backstreet, chillin' with their homies. Nicki got her nipples pierced a few weeks ago, and we've chatted about it some, so I of course said "whoop 'em out, dude!" and she did and I was suitably impressed.

The next day, Sonya said, "Ron tried to see Kristy's boobs all night and couldn't. You ask Nicki to show you hers at the end of the night and she does."

Score: Harold 1, Ron 0.

Apparently some classmates did go to Backstreet, but we missed them. Sonya and I left after not too long, because she was tired and I was having a hard time standing.

It was a fine reunion, and my feelings are mixed in its wake. I'm glad the whole thing is over, for one, because I've been kind of dreading it. And I'm glad, 'cause it was fun and it was good to see people. And I'm a little sad, 'cause most of 'em are basically good people who I probably won't talk to for a few years at a time, if ever again, and once we used to be pretty close. But most of my feelings are positive.

Sunday was blessedly uneventful. After two nights of solid drinking I was weary and achy, so I napped on the couch for most of the day. Last night we went to Donna's for dinner (salmon, salad and squash) and then we sat, admiring the view and talking details of our upcoming trip to Washington to see the Cure.

Donna's workplace is moving into a new building.

"They're destroying the top six floors of the old building," she told us.

"Why?" Sonya asked.

"To make the building shorter," Donna replied sensibly.

Check out today's Photo Extra for pictures of me, Jen, Dawne and Sonya dressed like Kiss, scenes from my class reunion and a look at just how cute Roxy is.