Just Another Drunken Memorial Day

My Memorial Day weekend.
Deep breath. (Only continue reading if you’re ready for a novel)
Here I go…

I woke up Saturday morning to the gray overcast skies producing a gray drizzle that streaked across my windows. “Please, please, don’t be like this in eastern Washington” continuously ran through my head over and over again. Seriously, I don’t think there could be anything worse than being at the Gorge—already a filthy dust pit—with only a tent and a rain jacket to protect oneself from the wide-open skies. I bundled up in my jacket, which I was planning on only using till I arrived at the Gorge, and drove to Luke and Adam’s at 8 a.m. to pack up Jana’s car with my things. This proved to be a more difficult feat than I thought. It seems hard to pack a car with four people’s belongings when 60 percent of it is alcohol. Hmmm. Let’s see. If I’m bringing one bag of clothes, a sleeping bag, a cooler, a bottle of wine, a twelve pack of beer, a bottle of vodka and coke/tonic water as mixers…then that’s….yep, 57 percent of what I’m bringing is attributed to getting smashed. That’s some kind of ratio.

I decided to leave the vehicle packing to a real man—Luke—and walked up the 46 flights of stairs to the boys’ house to say hi to Adam, who apparently was still up at 8:30a.m. from the night before, blacked out and drinking Boone’s Farm on the couch. You know you’re blacked out when Boone’s Farm Strawberry Wine (juice with a kick) is your drink of choice. Unfortunately he forced me to imbibe with him, a prelude to what my weekend was going to be like, I’m sure.

The four of us, (Luke, Jana, Josh and myself), finally made it on the road around 9:15 after we stopped for gas and a quick breakfast at Noah’s Bagels (the better alternative to McDonald’s for a grab-n-go breakfast.) We didn’t even make it through the tunnel from Mercer to I-5 before traffic was stopped—a typical start to a trip when leaving from Seattle. We came across a jeep that had flipped in the tunnel and two accidents right before the short distance to the I-90 interchange. Typical for people in Seattle to not know how to drive in the rain and SO FREAKIN FRUSTRATING. As soon as we merged onto I-90, it was smooth sailing from there. Not a stopped car in sight…and no cops either.

I took a little catnap and woke up right before we turned into the entrance for the Gorge campsite to Luke asking, “Is that a pig?” Now, I know that we’re from the city, but most of us should know if an animal was a pig or not. I glanced at the animal that was lounging in the field next to the car…it was black and quite large, too large to be a pig. Definitely a cow…I think? We decided that it was a Manbear pig. “It has the droppings of a pig, but sort of like those of the Manbear. ... It is half Manbear, half pig.”

Nearly escaping the Manbear pig, we pulled into the Gorge campsite, only to be directed to the far-off cow pastures, past the main field that I’ve always camped in. I’ve never seen so many people at the Gorge in all the concerts I’ve attended. I’m sure it had something to do with the run-off from those staying just for Friday night’s concert, but it was insane. We finally pulled up to our campsite and set up our tents amongst the wafting cow manure. Ten minutes into the trip and the four of us had already scraped cow shit off our shoes three or four times. Welcome to the Gorge, folks. For only 40 bucks a night, you too can enjoy the luxury of living like nature’s most primitive and stupid animals.

Collectively we started tearing through our eclectic mixture of alcohol…I cracked a beer and poured Jana and I a vodka drink. The Gorge calls for nothing below the two-fisted standard, of course. The skies started to clear out and we slowly peeled our clothing off layer by layer until we were all in T-shirts and jeans. By the time we left for the concert around 3:00, we were sure the weather was going to hold out for us. (Never mind the miles of dark, ominous clouds and the sky streaked with rain in the distance.) We couldn’t have been more wrong.

Approximately an hour into the Iron & Wine show—the only band I ended up seeing on Saturday, how’s that for a foreshadow?—it started hailing. Yes ladies and gentlemen, HAILING. I couldn’t effing believe it. I didn’t want it to rain…ha!…I could have begged for the rain at that point. It was probably the worst hailstorm I’ve ever been in. We quickly ran for cover while being pelted by the little fuckers, which, by the way, feel like tons of tiny Beebe bullets on your skin. Fun times. The four of us huddled undercover for a bit before it let up enough for us to walk back to the campground. By this time, my clothing was soaked through to the skin, I was wasted, and all I wanted to do was cuddle in a warm sleeping bag. Damn! I didn’t even have a man to cuddle with yet…always my number one plan while at the Gorge. Well, desperate times call for desperate measures. Josh and I were so drunk that we actually discussed cuddling with each other…weird. That’s how cold and DONE we were.

The minute I got back to the campsite, I peeled off my wet clothes and threw them in a pile in the tent, crawled onto the air mattress Josh had blown up and passed out. I’m embarrassed to tell you what time it was—ok, 6 p.m. I passed out at the Gorge at 6 p.m. I officially think I’m getting old and am not the partier I once was. I slept through everything, waking up briefly to Josh’s drunken mumbling while he threw his arm around me, then once again to Genevieve rescuing me from cuddling with Josh—dragging him away into the night. At 10:30 Luke tried waking me up and by the time I finally dragged myself out of a drunken slumber, they were ready to go to bed, and Josh was gone. And yes, I missed Ben Harper. I’m quite pissed at this, so if you could all never talk to me about this again, that would be great. I was forced to wander the Gorge campsite alone—still a little wasted—in search of Comfort Station 20 where some friends of mine were supposed to be. I walked up and down the roads by myself two or three times, searching for Comfort Station 20, only to find it an hour later and realize that I’d then have to walk up and down the isles, shining my flashlight at group after group, looking for guys that I’d only partied with once or twice. This idea forced me to wander back to my tent, again, like a lost little puppy. No one to party with. No guy to kiss. No one to talk to. Boo hoo. I’m surprised I was able to pass-out again, but I was.

Fourteen hours of sleep later, I woke up at 7:30 in the morning (like one always does at the Gorge) to bright blue, sunny skies. Kick ass. This is why I left Seattle—for a little sunshine and relaxation. We all sat around the campsite, drinking, smoking and eating—Josh had steak, a hotdog, three beers and four cigarettes all before it was 9 a.m. Pretty impressive if you ask me. The weather was EXCELLENT. We were able to wear tank tops and flip-flops and revel in the fact that we weren’t in Seattle’s drizzle. After a few games of Yahtzee and yet another nap (I'm pretty sure I needed it), we headed to the concert to make up for the previous day's missed events. Sunday’s concert was awesome. We arrived during The Artic Monkey’s set, and sat on the hill in time to catch The Decemberists. If you haven’t checked them out, they’re good. Real good. Jana and I had snuck a water bottle into the concert, full of vodka, and Josh had three mini Rum bottles and a flask in his shorts. We were good to go this time, skipped drinking before the concert so we wouldn’t all ass-out this time, and opted for drinking during the concert. Obviously we're all college educated. Matisyahu was amazing. I was never a fan of him until I saw him live. The man has amazing stage presence, and I really dug his music. (Not to mention he’s pretty hot. Yeah, so he has a beard, but that played right into my weird current beard obsession, more on that later maybe). The best of all best though was Clap Your Hands Say Yeah—my new favorite band. They only have one cd, but man are they good. I danced my butt off to them and can’t seem to get their music out of my head. I definitely recommend downloading or buying their CD! The concert was finished off by an awesome laser show on the side of the bluffs before Beck’s show. Definitely a good addition to this year’s concert. However, we were all a little creeped out because they featured the Manbear pig in the laser show, and I swear the music was saying “Manbear pig” over and over. Hmmm.

I drank a little more wine when arriving back at the concert, passed out yet again, and woke the next morning feeling satisfied with my Sasquatch experience. Yeah I didn’t make-out with someone like I wanted to, yeah I didn’t get to see Ben Harper and passed-out early, but I did spend an awesome camping weekend away with some really good friends, had some great laughs and inside jokes, and saw some spectacular artists. Can’t complain too much about that.

Currently Anticipating: The art gallery opening at Evo on Friday. Tre-Baby will be there…
Currently Feeling: Crazy busy. I took a much-needed break from work to write this long novel of a blog.
Currently Listening To: Back and forth between 89.5 (now that I get it in my car again) and the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah CD.