Five years ago, I was a junior in college, and Mardi Gras happened to fall over Spring Break. So of course, we had to go. If you went to college and never took a spring break trip, well, why did you bother going to college? I weep for your soul.
Anyway, it started as a few of us intending to drive down to New Orleans. One of the guys had a friend who worked at the University of New Orleans, who was willing to allow us to crash in their student center at nights (really just a place to stash your stuff and grab a shower -- who needs sleep when there is partying to do?). As word spread, the group swelled to 15 and necessitated the renting of a giant conversion van -- that guy you see above -- to drive the 16-hours to the bayou. Luckily, this being Creighton, one of the guys' dad owned a rental car business and cut us a deal on the van.
Total cost for transportation and shelter: $80 per person. I am not shitting you.
Now of course, beer is not a cheap commodity at Mardi Gras. So we spent upwards of $500 a piece, or more, by the time you figured in beverage consumption.
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Mardi Gras in The Big Easy does weird things to a man. You wear girly plastic beads around your neck, that anywhere else in the world at any other time, you get your ass kicked for wearing. You drink more alcohol than you would think is possible. And you get so delusional you sell out your team and wear a LA Dodgers cap.
Even if a girl did give it to me, its unacceptable, and I apologize. Can you ever forgive me? I beg your mercy. Please.
That's a rogue group, there. Scooby notwithstanding.
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Ahhhhh! Now that's frightening. This guy, one of my college roommates and old friends, wow. We called him Big Daddy, and he did not drink. At all. But he was so wild and crazy, everywhere you went, people would implore us to "cut him off". And we would have to tell them that, sadly, this display was on pure air. Good times.
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What word am I looking for here? A little audience participation, please. The adjective escapes me.
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This is what happens in New Orleans. You wear beads. You give them away to hotties who then flash you, or do something better, just depends. In this case, she wasn't wearing a shirt to begin with, and I looked, so I felt obligated to give her some beads.
Yep. You bet. What do you expect me to say? Its fucking awesome.
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And so is this. The world's largest beer bong, or at least, the biggest one I've ever personally seen. Note I'm back to wearing my Twins cap at this point. Ladies be damned, I ain't wearing no Dodgers cap. Oh wait, I did. That girl was a bitch anyway.
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For five glorious days in the spring of 2000, we partied all night, slept all day, ate Burger King twice a day, paid to use bathrooms, and saw more naked people than you really ever ought to. Plus I got about as close to a topless Playmate as I ever will when one of them flashed me in exchange for a really cool lightup bead strand with a monk on a keg medallion. I loved that strand, but come on, it was a Playmate!
This was also the first time I had bad times at the hands of a glass (or six) of Hurricane. As my buddy Nate will attest from one night in Kearney, Hurricanes do not get along with my tummy. No sir. One night in New Orleans, I decided that, being in Louisiana, I ought to drink the native drink and not Bud Light, which I could enjoy anywhere.
Oh boy.
Memories of that night are fleeting, but I remember cops on horses, pissing in the street, and um, cops on horses. And not much else. Oh yeah, the guy behind me chucked a glass at Britney Spears when she rode by on a parade float. And hit her, causing a ruckus as the cops stormed over the barracades to take him down.
Now that, my friends, is good times.
Quite a Spring Break trip.
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