Tuesday, August 21, 2007

The Bachelor party that wasn't (Weekend wrap-up)

After my cash at the IHOS 'gimp' tourney on Friday, I shared a cab home with Karol. She is having an insanely good summer. The beach, new clients, clubs, music. She's got it all, no question. But I had a comeuppance, didn't I? I was getting up in a few hours to catch a train out to the Hamptons for my friend Gary's bachelor party. Oh yeah, top that!

A bit of background first. One of my friends is dating someone new. They're *very* cute together and I'm very happy for him. He was going to take her out for a date in the city on Saturday which involved them being able to shower up afterwards (I think they might have gone sailing). Since I'm so close to the Marina, he asked if he could use my place to wash up. Oh, and could I make myself scarce too? Always being one to help out my fellow man, I had arranged for my cleaning woman to come and get the place tidy so they wouldn't be in a pit of squalor. Wouldn't you know it though? My cleaning woman called me Friday afternoon to tell me that she had gotten a food allergy of some sort and wouldn't be able to come until Monday. So instead of getting up at noon and casually getting ready to go out to the Hamptons by about 7PM or so, I woke up earlier to clean up as much of the apartment as I could before my friend showed up at about 1:30.

So here I am, in a frenzy of activity when 1:30 comes and my friend calls me up to say that he is going to the street fair on Water Street with his girlfriend. Do I want to join him? I looked around at the apartment and it looked fairly neat. Not perfect yet, as there was still some dusting to do, but not too bad. The last thing I needed to do was change the sheets on the bed (Hey, I ain't no fool) and I could join them for one of my biggest temptations. Roasted street fair summer corn! Mmmmm.... My taste buds were tingling with delight. I figured I would change the sheets, throw together an overnight bag, meet my friend for some corn and then make my way directly to Penn Station. Oh, I'd better hop online to check the train schedules though. I needed to go out to Mastic-Shirley, which is about an 1hr 45min train ride. I figured that I could take a train around 4:30 or so and get there on time with no issues. Oh lord was I wrong. When I got onto the LIRR web site, I discovered that there was only ONE afternoon train out east!!! The next train wasn't until 7:30 and the next train was in...wait for it...30 minutes! OH CRAP!!!! There was no time to do everything I wanted to do, so I packed the overnight bag (quickly) and hurried out the door, intending to phone my friend on the way with an explanation (and directions to where to find his clean sheets). As I opened the door to leave, I nearly crashed in Alex, the maintenance guy who had come to fix my bedroom air conditioner unit. I pointed to the bedroom, told him to let himself out when he was done and flew downstairs to the train. On the way, I called my friend and offered my hurried apologies. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit... Only 26 minutes until the train left Penn Station.

Of course, I missed the uptown 2 train by about three steps, but there was one right behind it. The MTA runs the red line locally on weekends and I sweated the whole trip but somehow made it to Penn with about 3 minutes to spare. Just enough time for me to run to the platform, get my ticket and get on board just as the doors were closing. Whew! The trip was uneventful, I even napped a bit while also getting some reading done (Harry Potter, thank you very much). I met Gary's cousin Aletia at the train station and she drove me to her home. Since the train got in much earlier than anyone had anticipated, there was nothing we could do but wait until 7PM, when everyone was supposed to get together. I figured we would hang in her place and watch TV or something. I was even holding out hope of being able to do some more napping, but Aletia had other plans. She wanted to make a peach cobbler for dinner and could I peel and slice the peaches? I sprang into action, handling the paring knife with even more expertise than I had expected given that I haven't done anything remotely resembling cooking in nearly two years. With the peaches expertly peeled and chopped, the cobbler went into the oven and we took a trip to the supermarket for some more 'party' stuff. Beer, cheese, crackers, etc.... Good times. :-) By the time we got back, the cobbler was done and it was time to go. We packed up the goods and made our way on the road for the 25 minute drive out to East Quogue where Aletia's brother lives. Her brother, Tony, lives in a beautiful house with a beautiful plot of land and beautiful children and a beautiful wife and beautiful pets in a beautiful part of town. I was almost sick with envy. My measly 700 Sqft apt., as cool as it is, is only cool in comparison to others 500 sqft. apts. And that kind of Schadenfraude, I can do without.

Tony and his wife were completely gracious to us and we hung out and waited for Gary and his fiancé Karen to show up. Actually, I was looking around at the place and expecting more people to be there. "When is everyone coming?," I asked. "Uh, it's just the 6 of us.," was the reply. Really 6 people for a bachelor party and the fiancé is here too!!! To be fair, Gary and Karen live in Boston so if he's going to make the trip, they might as well visit family while they're at it. Ok, so it's a nontraditional bachelor party (no boobies I expected), I can still enjoy myself. When Gary and Karen showed up, we made our way onto the deck and had an incredible meal. Aletia's tortellini salad was not to be believed. We chatted amiably and I even threw out some good jokes. Thanks Dawn for the 'black' joke. It went over huge.

Oh, for those of you who don't know the 'black' joke, here it is in all it's glory:

Question: "What do you call a black guy who drives a plane?"

{Stunned silence from the audience who are now giving you looks that would make a Nazi feel politically incorrect)

Answer: "The pilot, you racist"

{Howls of laughter when the audience realizes their own prejudices have been turned on them}

So after some good natured stories and jokes, we made our way on the road for some Hampton-style partying. Bar after bar we went to, doing shots, drinking longnecks and generally having a good time. I don't remember too much other than that I should really think about making the trip out there more often. The women in the Hamptons are HOT! Yes, they're trashy hot, but every bar we went to was populated with at least a dozen head turners. Great great eye candy. Gary was on his best behavior, of course....

When the night was over, in the wee hours, we went back to Tony and Laura's to crash. The kids were away and I was given the choice of sleeping in the son's room or the daughter's room. Hmmm...I'll go with the son's room. I was led to a bedroom near the kitchen and I flipped on the light. Shock hit me in the face. Tony's son sleeps on a race car bed. With Spiderman sheets. I imagined myself sleeping peacefully and Gary sneaking in in the middle of the night and snapping a picture. Said picture would find it's way on the internet and my dreams of becoming President of the United States would vanish in a flash.

Uh, I guess that means I'm sleeping in the girls room. While she did have a normal bed, it probably isn't any less embarrassing being surrounded by posters of various Disney Princesses with everything tinged with glitter. Luckily, Gary was too tired to take any incriminating photographs....

The morning was a hurried affair, with everyone up way too early for Sunday. Breakfast was done in exactly the wonderful country manner you'd expect from a woman who dreams of retiring one day to run a B&B. Perfectly made scrambled eggs with fresh bacon and English muffins along with coffee and OJ. Too bad we had only 20 minutes to wolf it all down before Tony had to go to work, Gary had to get his ferry back to Boston and I had to be at the LIRR. But everyone made it on time. When I got back home, I flopped on my couch and promptly set about wasting the rest of the day napping and chilling out. It had been a frenetic few days and I needed to detox. Until next week that is...

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