I'm Pretty Sure We Partied, I Really Don't Remember

Last weekend was the bachelor party for my friend, K. It was, all things considered, a great success for a four-day event that took place nearly a year before his wedding will occur. Here's a brief recap:

THURSDAY
K and a handful of guys fly in from various places around the country. Winning Run and I host a cookout at our place for the guys, some old 4-H counselor friends, and a few of K's med-school classmates still here in Atlanta. We fired up the grill to cook some brats and burgers, cracked open some cold beverages, and caught up with one another. At one point in the evening, there were as many kids under age 7 as there were adults. As the party wound down, we cleaned up and headed inside to watch USC being dismantled by the Beavers. Bedtime: 3:30 a.m.

FRIDAY
The majority of the 20 guys arrived later in the afternoon. A few of us grabbed lunch together. Prior to returning home to take a much needed nap, I dropped K and company off at the Emory campus so they could meet up with K's brother and play flag football against some law students. A few hours later, I was roused from my nap by a phone call telling me that K was in the E.R. with a dislocated shoulder from the two-hand touch football game. He'd be late for dinner and would be hopped up on morphine until around midnight. Those of us who weren't football casualties met for an amazing dinner at Rathbun's in Innman Park; K joined us a little later. After dinner, we headed to Virginia Highlands for a drink or two in one of our old watering holes. It was purely nostalgia and lasted about twenty minutes; we're far too old to be in a ridiculously crowded, noisy bar. So, we decided to sneak away for a quiet glass of wine to discuss our book club selection, "The Choice" by Nicolas Sparks, author of "The Notebook." After that, we headed over to Wired and Fired to paint some pottery. We ended the evening with an impromptu chess tournament prior to heading out to breakfast at the Metro Cafe downtown.

As a social experiment, I took all the Strawberry Jam from our table after paying our tab and tried to give random strangers a packet of free jam. In the elevator up to the hotel room, I tried to offer Suge Knight's twin the opportunity to buy a packet of jam for a dollar. When he declined, I upped the offer to two packets of jam. Then, three packets of jam. Finally, five packets of jam. Luckily, Suge thought this was funny but still declined an incredible offer. My experiment results show that people are generally wary of anyone offering them jam in the wee hours of the morning.

Bedtime: 5:30a.m.

SATURDAY
I chartered a bus to pick everyone up at the hotel and drive us to UGA for a day of tailgating at Crazy Greg's famous annual tailgate. We caught up with a bunch of our old camp counselor buddies and introduced the bachelor party to the unique rituals of SEC football. There were a few early casualties (as the following photos attest) and some that bit it hard on the bus ride back to Atlanta. In all, it was a great day with a few guys playing cornhole (a.k.a. beanbag toss) with some strangers and dominating them after the strangers wanted to play for $20 per point. One member of the party went AWOL at game time and wasn't found until moments before the bus was pulling out; turns out he went somewhere and took a nap for several hours.

Oh, we went to the game. K got everyone tickets...in the Alabama section. (Boo!) In retrospect, we could've picked a better game to see as UGA was destroyed during the first half. Again, boo. Nothing like sitting among a bunch of annoying fans. We grew so tired of having to explain how to count higher than "10." What we wouldn't have given for a simple arithmetic textbook!

The following photos are from the game.

Bedtime: 3:30 a.m.

SUNDAY
Although I wasn't really hungover on Sunday morning, the cumulative effects of having drinks and staying up really late for three straight night left me feeling run-down and ill. In fact, I'm still feeling like I'm on the cusp of coming down with a flu or something a few days later. Trust me, I was one of the lucky ones who felt great on Sunday. Others didn't fare so lucky. For example, if you took a nap at the tailgate and had random shit stacked on you without your knowledge, chances are that you'd feel pretty rotten the next day.

Looking forward to living clean and going to sleep early for the next year.