Ah, sweet childhood memories...

What are your favorite memories of you parents drunken binges?

Mine would have to be one time in about 1966. My soon-to-be step-father and I were coming back from Parker Lake in the Huachuca's in Southern Arizona.

We were heading back home to the Papago Indian reservation in his 1963 Chevy truck (which I would kill or seriously maim for today).

It was about 12:00 a.m. and I, as a small boy, was fast asleep on the bench seat. As was the custom on the reservation and the time in general, my future step-father had been drinking continuously since we left the lake.

All of a sudden, I jerked up in complete fear as the passenger side window completely shattered and rained down on my sorry little ass.

My step-father slammed another empty Coors bottle out a window he assumed was open in the 100 degree heat. It wasn't (I rolled it up to keep the monsters out; guess I forgot about one...).

Historical note - back in those days, Coors beer, for better or worse, wasn't available in California or many states other than Colorado and a few surrounding states.

My parents actually used to have Coors smuggled into California, as if it were premium blend or something. My parents loved to drive to Vegas to see Sinatra back in the day, they always came back with souveniers for the kids, usually swizzle sticks and cocktail picks from the Sands or whatever hotel. Too bad I didn't have the sense to keep them but then what 6 year old would? But one 4th of July, after a few dozen Coors, my father got tired of constantly lighting sparklers for the kids. Just as one kid ran off with a lit sparkler, another kid's burnt out. He got the bright idea to take three boxes of sparklers in one hand and placed it into the BBQ. Needless to say it lit up like a torch and he ended up in the ER with 3rd degree burns. He told me last year that when he went in that day it was his 4th visit in 6 months, so they literally printed him up a credit card type of information card so they could just stamp his chart instead of having to always fill out info. Now he is 28 years sober and for him I say that it's a good thing.

When I was about 6 or 7 years old we lived in a neighborhood pretty close to the Long Beach airport. My dad and our neighbor (who just happened to drive a beer truck) would usually start out on the weekend mowing their lawns and drinking beer, then start watchin' the ballgame and drinking more beer. This would inevitably lead to a BBQ and more beer followed by both of them retiring to the living room to watch (and sing along to) a show called "Sing Along With Mitch" eventually passing out on the floor. When I was eight we moved to Buena Park and lived behind the Lincoln Drive-In where my dad and his new drinkin' buddy would get drunk, hop the back fence and turn up all the speakers so we could sit out in the back yard and watch the movies.

1976, my Mom, a 10 year old Me, a hermit crab, Vodka, Tequila, a heart attack, 1 Radio Shack Junior Chemistry Set, the Bay City Rollers, a whole lotta vomit, a white 280ZX with no passenger side window, rainbow toe socks, a whole lotta vomit, a 2 hour drive on the 10 freeway at 2 in the morning, OH! and a whole lotta vomit. Fun, Fun times!

[ Edited by: DawnTiki on 2005-02-28 01:13 ]

We were on holidays and we won a trivia competition - and the prize was a bottle of champagne. Anyways, we consumed that and went for a drive to the top of a mountain, where my mum proceeded to yodel...

And some German tourists called my brother a 'dunkoff' for wearing shorts in the freezing cold.

There used to be this kids show. I don't remember it's name, but the host was named Bob McAllistair, and he sang a song about an Aardvark. (Does anybody here have an Aardvark it was called)

Some episode of this show featured a kid in a booth where dollar bills were flying all around him. He won some contest and got 30 sec spree grabbing at the fluttering bills.

The image of that was in my tiny mind when my friends Mom took a bunch of us to an Angels/Tigers game. My friends Mom was vocal about how no child should ever be spanked (she was also I later a "swinger")

Sometime during the game this woman went to the "Clubhouse" for a quite some time, but left her purse

My friend Bill and I had been peering over the wall behind the last row which looked down onto crowds of people...and started dropping money. First quarters, which people scurried after. But paper money caused people to get violent. Soon we had my pal's Mom's purse and we were dropping 5's and 10s People were starting to riot, actually throwing drinks and punches...

When She came back, I think she was pretty drunk, and she started yelling at the Stadium Police (who thought we had stolen the purse...from a stranger) and it suddenly became kind of a scene.

When I got dropped off, she spilled the beans to my dad (who knew she was a swinger, and wanted part of the action) and he pretended to be furious.

Later, I heard him bragging about it to his office partners.

Later I heard he also slept with her.

Why should I tell the whole world why part of me is f***## up? I already told them way too much.

It's all vague and badly lit, but allthe parents' drunken parties were held at my uncle's Hollywood hills home, in his home tiki bar that was the entire lowest floor of one of those homes up on stilts perched precariously on the hill. The party I recall the most was in full gear, and all the adults had reached that relaxed stage where kids could do no wrong. Someone thought that they saw a large monkey outside, scampering in the deep foliage, and soon everyone was hysterically looking for it. (This was the late 60's - early 70's, and exotic pets were rather common, especially in Hollywood hills.) Within an hour or so, the gossip about the monkey changed to the monkey being the size of a large dog (so we thought it was a chimpanzee) to it being a prowler, so the police were called. Some people were more upset by the police being summoned, and a few women were terrified that a 'wild animal' was on the loose. About 30 paranoid, screaming, and drunk people were what the police found. They searched in my uncle's car in the carport, where they found one of the guys passed out in the backseat wearing a caftan and a life-size papier-mache 3-D horse head mask ... he was brought inside to recover on the couch. Late in the night there were people locked in the three bathrooms retching loudly, and people breaking things in the kitchen, and probably more retching there. To this day, I dislike chimpanzees, those little party crashers. The extreme tiki ambiance of the basement floor tiki bar made up for all the adults behaving worse than any of the kids ever dared. Summary: tiki bar, chimpanzee, man in a caftan, papier mache horsehead, police, vomiting adults, typical childhood.

Jungle Trader wrote:

Why should I tell the whole world why part of me is f***## up?

I think watching shows like "Wonderama" did more damage to my psyche than the night my mom left her 80 mile long vomit trail on the 10.

I don't think I would have made it through childhood if it wasn't for stuff like Mad Magazine, Rocky & Bullwinkle, A Hard Day's Night, Ed Roth, Jeepers Creepers, ZAP comix, Car Craft magazine, summer days at Huntington & Seal Beach, KNAC and Disneyland.

Wonderama....yikes, there it is.

On 2005-03-02 07:06, Gigantalope wrote:
Wonderama....yikes, there it is.

http://www.tvparty.com/lostwonder.html

"finkelheimer, finkelheimer, finkel-finkel-heimer-heimer..."

my dad's office mate in d.c. was friends with bob mcallister. they were both originally magicians i think.

On 2005-03-02 07:06, Gigantalope wrote:
Wonderama....yikes, there it is.

ex-er-cise...ex-er-cise...c'mon everybody do your ex-er-cise!

Every song from that show haunts me to this day. I have vague memories of being in the audience for that show, but maybe I'm just wishing it. I was DEFINITELY in the audience of the Banana Splits, and some animal show hosted by Betty White. What was that called?

On 2005-03-02 11:05, Tiki-bot wrote:

I was DEFINITELY in the audience of the Banana Splits, and some animal show hosted by Betty White. What was that called?

I think it was called The Pet Set

When that TV ad for the double bladed razor came out, showing how the first blade pulls back the hair, & the 2nd blade cuts it short before it has time to pop back into place...Dad figured it would work the same way mowing the lawn.

So he acquired a 2nd mower & had my brother follow no more than two paces behind him as they mowed in unison. A neighbor commented how remarkable it was that he could push that big heavy duty mower in a straight line with one hand while holding a highball in the other.

He had Mom buy him a robe to drink in after work. He specificly asked for a silky navy blue robe with white polka-dots. He decided he didn't like the way the sash felt tied around his waist, so he sewed it straight up the middle and wore it unbelted...outside, when he was barbequeing on the patio.

I asked Mom if that embarrassed her and she people driving by probably thought it was a big ugly fat woman wearing a muu-muu.

The old man hit the booze hard and slept in the buff, one night he heard a noise out at the garage, picked up his 38, stepped out on the back porch and unleashed a drunken verbal assult on the who-go-there, The neighbors called the police who found my Dad, naked on the back porch with a 38 and the door locked behind him. You would have thought he would either stop drinking or get some PJ's but...

There is no way stories about my parents escapades could ever top my own. For example, the night a vietnam vet who was walking across america to call attention to the plight of POWs came to my birthday party at my house in Alexandria, Va with a girl friend of mine and was accused of stealing $100 out of someone's wallet, and was then chased by car to the Viet Nam Veterans Memorial in DC, where he was threatened with death if he didn't turn over the money. Afterwards we went back to my place where people were variously throwing up, abusing their girl friend, loudly copulating in our bathroom or screaming to the neighborhood they needed to buy some cocaine, now! It was at that point, I decided I needed a different circle of friends.

On 2005-03-02 18:29, kctiki wrote:
When that TV ad for the double bladed razor came out, showing how the first blade pulls back the hair, & the 2nd blade cuts it short before it has time to pop back into place...Dad figured it would work the same way mowing the lawn.

A couple days ago I saw a preview for the evening "news" that said something like, "Lawnmower manufacturer takes a tip from double-edge razor technology" and they showed the mower, but I couldn't see the second blade.

Oh Bong! There are just too many memories for this little site. One does stand out (though it's not one of my parents-I'm not sure I can post any of those memories. I must consult the family): Late 1960's, Memorial Day or Fourth of July party. Our whole block participated in gigantic backyard bar-b-q. It was night and us kids were in "Helen Wheels" (the local Holy-Roller) back yard watching the hijinks. Music was blaring and folks were-a-drinking (and had been all day). My friend Malcolm's mom was completely boozed up and causing a ruckus at on of the picnic tables. Not getting enough attention she climbed on the table and started dancing artistically. She moved back and forth along the table with her invisible partner,

Well, at one point she went too close to the edge, tipping the table and shooting herself across the yard (I SWEAR!) nearly 15 feet!

The entire crowd let out a burst of laughter. Ol' Audrey, got up, brushed herself off, lit another cig and hit the bar to refill her now empty cup.

For some odd reason no one ever spoke of that event after that.

When I was two years old, I woke up up about 5:00 AM and escaped the bondage of my crib. My parents had had a bender the night before and party carnage was everywhere. I drank all the half empty beers, hopefully avoiding the ones with cigarettes. After I was good and plastered I ate a box of garlic croutons. My folks said I was totally wasted and smelled like foster Brookes.
Mahalo,
Al

On 2005-03-09 21:35, Alnshely wrote:
When I was two years old, I woke up up about 5:00 AM and escaped the bondage of my crib. My parents had had a bender the night before and party carnage was everywhere. I drank all the half empty beers, hopefully avoiding the ones with cigarettes. After I was good and plastered I ate a box of garlic croutons. My folks said I was totally wasted and smelled like foster Brookes.
Mahalo,
Al

AAUUWWEE, you were only a baby. I WOULD DIE if I saw a baby in that condition.

Alright.
During a few parties my dad would get out the 16mm movie cam. He would always zoom in on the tail end of various dancing ladies. When we played the film for the entire family my mother would scream out his first and last name. This caused incredible grief and suffering thruout my childhood and to this day I fear I will forever be haunted by those images.

edited to embellish the fear part

[ Edited by: Jungle Trader on 2005-03-10 16:38 ]

On 2005-03-08 13:34, Tiki-bot wrote:

A couple days ago I saw a preview for the evening "news" that said something like, "Lawnmower manufacturer takes a tip from double-edge razor technology" and they showed the mower, but I couldn't see the second blade.

Well there you go, drunk or sober, Pops was a genius ahead of his time.

He only enjoyed one year of retirement before he keeled over on his treadmill. He spent much of that year using a miniature sewing machine to sew rip-stop nylon patches into the crotch of all his pants. Undoubtedly that will be the wave of the future.