What do you get when you add copious amounts of alcohol, alumni professionals, hardcore undergrads, and cops that clearly couldn’t give a shit? You get Edinboro Homecoming, and no amount of words can convey the level of intoxicated shenanigans that occur– every freaking year. Sure, go ahead, compare it to a larger school’s homecoming, or one held in a large municipality. When it comes down to brass tacks, we see everyone, and it’s easy to hit all the bars multiple times– in addition to house parties, all while on foot. You can lose half of your running crew, find another, and then regroup by pure accident within a few hours if you’re a dedicated badass. Let’s see you do that at WVU or UCLA. That’s right, back off, you have to experience this to believe it.
Informational crapola aside, let’s see, where do I start? I know, to properly set the stage, maybe I should go into the fact that I was driving in a freaking rolling bar. I do not condone drinking and driving, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t park my car somewhere convenient– and serve drinks out of the trunk with complete impunity. Sometimes I want to have conversations that don’t involve shouting over music. Remember, this is Homecoming. Open container laws are a secondary offense only to be tagged on if you’re guilty of doing other extraordinarily dumb shit. So yeah, one small road trip to pick up my little sister (fraternity wise, not biological), her friend, and my girlfriend later– we ended up at the “country club” where all the oldhead alumni show up. This is a tradition of mine, for one, because catching up with the silver-haired sultans of smooth is always a damn good idea. Besides those guys being a great time, it’s also the hub where my running crew can meet up. It’s a logistical must, and a mixological imperative.
After rounding up the first half of the crew, and touching base with my favorite alums, it was time to get this party rolling in turbo. I parked behind my buddy’s apartment, in plain sight of the police station. This should tell you how few damns the 5-0 give about drinking as long as you’re not being a complete assjack. We had flasks and mixed bottles on us most of the time, and this year was unique. My undergrad brethren lack a house to party at. We could either speed-drink at my buddy’s place… or do work at the bar. This is a crucial point– seeing how there was no daytime (or post last call) base of operations. My trunk was the place to be, but more on that later.
My girlfriend rapidly came to the realization of why Homecoming is kind of like my un-birthday of choice. Due to many little factors, some beyond my control, rolling with me is not something done incognito. I couldn’t go five minutes (quite literally) without running into (and subsequently collecting) another drinking buddy from years past. It was hilarious, every single time I’d wander to a bar– or stumble out of a bar– I’d either get grabbed, or hear my name being called. I could describe the feeling, but it’d make me sound like an egomaniac akin to something you’d find on Capitol Hill. Now, we cue the shenanigans.
My running crew, comprised of friends I’m close to– all the way to friends I haven’t seen in over a decade, ended up at one of the undergrads’ apartment. He’s in possession of a classic beer pong table that was made about seven years ago. Of course, I had to play– I’ve had many years of memories on that table. After losing, thanks to Jill deciding to be a whiny bitch– I got a phone call from my little. She didn’t go into detail, but shit had apparently hit the fan to the point that she wouldn’t give me any further info besides that she was upset. Here, I’m at gross point tanked– so I do the only thing a good big does. I took care that my girlfriend was with people she knew, then made like Forrest Drunk and ran like all Hell.
Rule #14 of Homecoming, dumb shit always happens. In this case, it was me assuming the worst, running about six blocks while utterly obliterated, just to find out that they had been locked out of a party. I was none too pleased. After the run, the coughing, and the ongoing adrenaline surge, I pretty much arrived sober– and got a bit salty as a result. So there came the realization that without a standard base of ops (like in prior years), it was time for “bed.” This meant relocating the vehicle and converting the rolling bar into a rolling hotel room. Which culminated (the next morning) in two words: trunk sex. You can’t get on my level without some DIY kickassery, and a backache from sleeping in places that no mortal should.
And thus began Day 2, as God ordained, and hath been dutifully carried out for over a decade. Oh shit, I'm getting old.
Every year, we dredge our booze-soaked corpses from wherever we landed to go to Kegs ‘n’ Eggs. Milling about are silver-generation alumni, down to red-eyed undergrads, and everything in between. Like at Culbertson’s the night before, this serves as a hub to gather the troops. Unfortunately, all good plans go to shit, and only the hardcore of my bunch end up bumbling their way down to the “Breakfast of Champions.” Of course, when you’re asshole-to-elbow with a shit ton of people– waiting for food, beer, or Bloody Mary’s gets old. Cue the old war cry, “To the bars!!!”
While we were en route to the next destination, hangover still lingering like a grim reminder that I’m no longer in my early twenties, I got the news that my buddy’s boss was a clutch dude– and let him off from working the kitchen at The Empty Keg. It was better than a Christmas Miracle. With half of the running crew put back together, we imported the rest (albeit with plenty of logistical stupidity) and met up with the legends from the night before. At this point, there’s the parade– an altogether forgettable occasion that even the undergrads don’t give a flying damn about after they’ve finished putting together their floats. Shortly after remembering why I usually opt to party instead of attend the parade, my girlfriend and I slipped away from Edinboro to go shower (among other things).
We returned a little bit later, with the hangover dead and stashed in the trunk. The running riot began again, and apparently on day two– more alumni come out of the woodwork. It was a damn good thing that we were back on the booze bandwagon, because every few minutes– there was another familiar face. At this point, I started to wonder if this is what it feels like to be an icon, a legend, or a celebrity. I checked my ego with another healthy drought of my flask, and then she walked up.
Since my other letters are that of a Delta Zeta sweetheart, that’s a whole other sect of alumni that I actively seek out. My generation of DZ’s are the best of the best, and there was even a year that I opted to hang out with them as opposed to my own freaking brothers. An alumni sister, one of the generation that immediately preceded my own, strolled up to me in my TKE letters– and somehow knew my name, and that I was a little brother. No, there were no other alumni sisters in The Boro (that I saw, and believe you me, I saw everyone). She noticed my girlfriend, and without missing a beat– introduced herself, then inexplicably retreated. According to my better half, she was getting ready to make a pass at me until she noticed that I wasn’t single– and made a remarkably graceful exit. The mischievous looks I saw, every freaking time I saw her for the rest of the evening, corroborated this one. There were no death looks from my girlfriend, shit, I had to do some research post-haste to figure out who the Hell she is– and to this day, I really don’t know why she looked familiar, or how she knew me– but not my big sister. At this point, I wonder how I never realized I was this much of a brofessional when I was an undergrad.
Maybe awesome is like wine, and has to be properly aged to the right potency.
Distilled awesome results in this kind of happy. In other news, it took almost a full hour to figure out where and when this picture was taken.
For some reason, everyone I know was tossing their cookies at some point during the weekend. This included while we were relaxing at another Boro tradition– John’s. We’re sitting there, drunkenly minding our own business, and then three cops roll into the joint like stormtroopers. While we speculated from a booth that’s as old as I am, they led some belligerently wasted female example of middle-aged failed life from the place. The employees of this place are getting their asses handed to them on the busiest business day of their year– and she started giving the counter girl shit. I don’t blame her for calling the bacon, but what happened next utterly floored my ass.
The broad tossed her cookies outside the front door, right in front of the cops, right on top of where one of my buddies puked not five minutes before. Not only did the cops clean up the puke, they let her stumble off into the night like nothing even happened– no public intox, nothing. Considering how many friends of mine have had their lives anally fisted by these Keystone Cops, I was truly astounded. So here we are, full circle– even the cops don’t care unless you’re driving or fighting.
Homecoming. Get on our level, and try to keep up. Otherwise, you’re gonna get left in the dust.
Unplug.
Snark and Circumstance 