the Table61 blog

“Let’s get this one; it has a giant cock on it.”

Jessie sighed; perhaps Mitch was the wrong person to let choose the wine for the evening. She didn’t have any better recommendations though, so she decided to pick it up. She added the bottle with a big rooster printed on the front to the basket, which already contained a bottle titled “Another !@#%  Merlot (In a Very Cool Bottle)”, a bottle of Little Penguin Chardonnay (because Mitch is a Linux fan), and a large bottle of Verdi, because Gabe had said it was the best.

Neither Jessie nor Mitch knew much about wines; they just decided that would be an appropriate drink for the wedding after party. Jessie was Mitch’s date to Marv’s sister’s wedding. Jessie was going hoping she would find some single guys, and Mitch was looking for single girls. However, when they were told that all of the bridesmaids and groomsmen were married, they took that as a bad sign; they were getting too old. There were informal plans to have a big after party when the reception had ended. Jessie and Mitch were bringing wine, Marv and Ashley (mostly Marv) were bringing Scotch and cigars, and Gabe and Jessica were bringing food and music. There were kegs of Bud Light ordered for the wedding, and the plan was to finish them, staying up as late as needed, get trashed, then they could sleep at the campground at the country club.

They arrived at the club about 3 hours early; they told everyone they had came to help with preparations, but in truth they were hoping to identify any other single attendees as early as possible. It turned out that there wasn’t much help needed, so Mitch pulled out his camera to start taking photos. He took a few obligatory shots of his date before moving on to find his friends. After a few candid shots, he got bored and, not wanting to waste his film, he decided to talk to his friends and sneak a few swallows of Marv’s scotch.

As the ceremony approached, Jessie and Mitch decided it was time to change into their dress clothes, which they hadn’t worn since they had expected to be helping setup the wedding. Mitch was excited that he had an excuse to wear his suit, while Jessie got nervous. Every time she put her good luck charm on, bad things seemed to happen. She went to the bridesmaid’s room and changed. She soon returned to sit with her date wearing her little black dress, size 2.

Soon after sitting down, Marv came over and asked Mitch if he could video tape the ceremony. They had a camera, but they were short on help. Mitch didn’t enjoy standing in front of a group of people trying to be inconspicuous, but decided he had to help out. He found the camera and headed to the front as he tried to learn how to use it. He managed to load the tape and get it recording just as the bride started walking down the aisle; lucky timing. Lacking time to setup a tripod, he then began the struggle to keep the camera steady while moving around to try to get good views. As the ceremony started, he was disappointed to find that the pastor was speaking very quiet; he was only 10 feet away and couldn’t hear him, so he knew the camera couldn’t.

Gabe had never been a fan of wedding ceremonies; he preferred drinking at the receptions, but Jessica had made him attend. He decided he would cause a little mischief. As the ceremony started, it became very quiet. No one in the audience could hear the pastor, but they all remained quiet in hopes that they would. Gabe realized that in this silence, he could really embarrass someone. He looked around and saw Mitch standing in front of everyone, distracted with the video camera; perfect. He decided he would be real evil, and time it during the vows. Soon, Gabe pulled out his phone and began to dial.

Mitch couldn’t make much out, but he could hear the pastor asking the bride “Do you…” so he knew the important moment was coming up. He began his dance around the photographer to get to a good angle. He was slowly walking sideways, steadying the camera with both hands, when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. He suddenly panicked; he knew it would vibrate two times before ringing, so he needed to act fast, but without disrupting the camera. The first vibration stopped as he slowly started moving his hand to his pocket. He was subconsciously keeping time and expected the start of the second vibration as his hand reached his pocket. That left him til the end of the vibration followed by a short pause to hit End on the phone. He managed to get the phone in his hand as the last vibration stopped. Mitch started to panic though as he couldn’t determine which way he was holding the phone or where the button was. His mind was visualizing the phone and he managed to find and cancel the ring just as his subconscious timer indicated he was out of time. Mitch breathed a sigh of relief as he turned his attention back to the camera; he thought he had managed to keep it steady too.

“Sometimes he is actually kind of smart,” Gabe thought to himself, assuming that Mitch had his phone on silent. He put his phone away and looked forward to the kiss, which meant he was about done with the formalities. Soon he could lose his jacket and loosen his tie.

As the wedding party cleared the aisle and the ushers started to dismiss people, Mitch hit the stop button on the camera, and dropped his hands to his side. He had spent far to long holding the camera steady in one position, and as he finally let his arms down they burned with fire. Someone came to ask for his help in moving something, but he quickly snapped “No!” before they could even finish their request. For the next ten minutes, he sat with his arms hanging straight down.

Jessie rejoined her date to discuss what they would do in the hour remaining before the reception started. They decided they would hang around with Marv while the formal pictures were taken. Soon, Marv was called into a family picture and he handed his camera to Jessie to take a picture of him with his parents and the bride. She was unsure how to use the camera; it was a big high-end professional looking thing, but she assumed she just had to hit the button. As they were posed, Jessie took a picture while standing next to the photographer. He noticed, and approached her. She suddenly got an uneasy feeling in her stomach; the look on his face combined with the fact that she was wearing her not-so-good-luck-dress made her nervous. He asked her not to take any of his posed pictures, to give him some ‘exclusivity’ since he was the one setting them up. She agreed not to take any more; not a problem since that was the only one she was taking. She felt rather embarrassed standing there in front of everyone, but sucked it up and tried to regain her composure.

They soon went to the reception, a minute’s walk across the country club, and started socializing. Somehow, their group of friends had gathered at a table separated from the rest of the reception. Jessie wasn’t sure if this was planned by their friends, who usually separated themselves, or was planned by the bride, who knew that they should be separated. They were all drinking before supper was served, and they soon gave up on going back to the bar for refills; most of them had their own personal bottle of wine in front of them. Some had a glass of beer as well. Marv had scotch too.

Everyone was having a good time until Jim came over to say hello to them. Everyone suddenly got silent; many of them knew this would be awkward, the rest just were confused as to why everyone else had gotten quiet. Jessie and Jim used to date until they had a bad breakup. For years neither one of them spoke and they avoided each other at any cost. This is the first time they had been around each other in years, and no one knew that they were both over the situation. When it was apparent that they were going to be civil around each other, the conversations resumed.

Mitch was talking to Amber, a girl that all of his friends knew, but somehow he had never met before. He kept flirting with her, even though she had a boyfriend at the other end of the table. She ran out of wine, and she asked him for a refill, for the fourth time. Mitch decided to play the part of an asshole, since girls seem to like that.

“Listen, I like you and all, but you’re too pretty for me.”

Amber had no idea what he meant by this, but patted him on the head and thanked him.

“No, what I mean is I have no chance of hooking up with you,” he explained, “so why should I run around being your little servant. No matter how nice I am, I’m still not going to be good looking enough for you.”

Amber was shocked. She didn’t know how to respond. It’s one of those comments where someone compliments you but makes you look bad at the same time. She was buzzed enough she could just shrug it off, and she turned around to find her boyfriend to make him get the refill. He promptly complied with her request.

A few more bottles of wine made their way to the trash cans, and they hadn’t even noticed the cake was cut until it was served to their table. Everyone had been concerned when Jim had approached while Jessie was around, but no one thought anything when Jen approached. Mitch had had a serious crush on Jen for many years, but everyone had assumed that he was over it. He thought he was too, for the most part. He had seen her as soon as he arrived and he had been discreetly paying attention to her. He tried to keep her off of his mind and pay attention to the other girls around him, who were much more inebriated. She had come to say goodbye to some of the members of the group, and he watched her walk away, wondering how many months or years it would be until he saw her again.

The music started, and most of the girls made their way to the dance floor. Marv found his cigars and scotch, and invited the guys to join him for the “man party”. He was disappointed at how many guys didn’t want any of the scotch, declaring they’d rather stick to their wine. He had never seen such a lack of masculinity. He managed to find a small group guys, most of whom he didn’t know, who joined him to enjoy the whisky. Most of them commented on the smoothness of the drink; apparently they were surprised to find he had filled his flask with Glenfiddich. What did they expect, Cutty Sark?

While Jessie was on the dance floor, the photographer approached her. She got nervous again as he apologized for his comments earlier. She forgave him, explaining that she understood his position and why he did it. He asked for a dance with her to apologize. She excitedly agreed; he was quite a bit older that her, but he was good looking. She learned his name was Doug, but was disappointed to find out that he had a girlfriend. She still had a good time; he was a good dancer.

As people began to leave, the music shifted from the traditional wedding soundtrack to hip-hop and rock. Jessie and Mitch danced together a short while, as dates are expected, before Mitch started dancing with Rachel, a girl he had just met and had introduced himself to with the warning “I bite”. As the reception came to an official close, he invited Rachel to stick around for the after party, but she had work in the morning. He mumbled a curse about responsible people.

The only distinction between the reception and the after party was the departure of the DJ. They had planned to bring a stereo for their own music, but they were content with no music as they tried to finish the rest of the beer in the kegs. Someone soon got the idea to do keg stands. Marv decided he liked the idea of seeing guys in suits doing keg stands, so encouraged it. Jessie decided to partake, and they soon learned it is hard to hold a girl’s dress up while holding her upside down. Jessie was glad she had decided to wear underwear. They also decided they wanted to play beer pong, but everyone was disappointed to find there were no pong balls. Luckily, at the same time, the bride’s father carried in a stack of graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallows. Apparently there had been a bonfire with S’mores; not a single person left at the after party had noticed, but at this point, they were happy to have a stack of chocolate to consume. Mitch got the great idea that the marshmallows would be a suitable replacement for pong balls. Thus Beer-Mallows was created.

While waiting for their turn to play a round of Beer-Mallows, Mitch and Jessie were talking alone in a corner. The more she drank, the less reserved she became. At some point, for some reason, she stuck her butt in his face, and Mitch had decided to bite her. This wasn’t out of character for Mitch; however, when he sank his teeth lightly into her dress, the drunken side of him decided to bite as hard as he could. Jessie was shocked, mostly at the fact that he hadn’t lied when she’d heard him introduce himself to Rachel, and hit him, mostly because of the pain he’d inflicted. He promptly apologized and wasn’t sure himself why he had done it, but just wrote it off as part of being drunk.

After the marshmallows were were too wet and slimy for continued play, the party, which was now only four people, moved to one of the campers. They took a few bottles of wine with them, and continued drinking until they were all empty. Mitch and Jessie were forced to sleep in the same bed, as Marv and Gabe refused to sleep with another guy in the tiny beds. Jessie warned Mitch that he’d better not bite again, but really she was happy that one of her ‘dates’ actually ended up with a little cuddle time.

The next morning, Mitch drove Jessie home and dropped her off before beginning his own four hour trip home. Jessie got in the shower, and, when she pulled the shower curtain back to get out, she found her sister anxiously awaiting her.

“You finally didn’t come home from a date. I didn’t know whether to celebrate or call the cops.”

“No, nothing happened.” Jessie explained as she dried herself off. “It was just a date to a wedding. We did cuddle together, but that was the extent of it.”

“If that’s the case, then why’s there a bite mark on your ass?” She showed a sly smile to Jessie before turning around and walking out of the bathroom. Jessie blushed in embarrassment.

On his way home, Mitch couldn’t stop thinking about Jen. He thought he was over her, at least to the point that when he did think about her, he could forget her in five minutes. When he finally arrived home, and she was still on his mind, he knew how his night was going to be spent. He went straight to the kitchen and grabbed his favorite rocks glass.

Late that night, an empty bottle of Johnie Walker Black Label on his counter, Mitch discovered that his printer was out of ink. He went online to compare prices at Best Buy, Staples, and online retailers. He found that Amazon had the best price and ordered a replacement cartridge. When he awoke in the morning and checked his email, he found the confirmation message for the ink cartridge along with confirmations for several other orders. He didn’t remember ordering anything else, and there were only a handful of times in his life he had drank enough to forget the events of the previous evening. The last thing he could remember was getting on Amazon to order the ink cartridge, but the emails were an indication that he had done much after that. He decided not to read the messages and allow himself to be surprised as the packages arrived over the next week. With over a dozen order confirmations in his inbox, he knew it would be entertaining.

— This post brought to you by Rex-Goliath “Giant 47 Pound Cock” Wine.

This story is based on actual events, though some of the names have been changed.

Lindsay, sorry about biting your ass.

And seriously, no hard feelings towards Doug.

So far I’ve received one “drunk gift” from myself. I have no idea how many more are on the way…

“You’re not wearing that are you?”

“It’s my good luck charm.” Well, it was supposed to be.

Stewart was referring to the little black dress, size 2.

Jessie had been good friends with Stewart in high school, but they had lost touch when she left for college. She had recognized him at the bookstore. He was carrying a hiking magazine.

“You like the outdoors?”

“Ya, I love hiking and rock climbing. In fact, if I was taking a girl on a date, that’s what I’d do with her. So much better than dinner and a movie.”

“That sounds like fun. You’re right, something different would be nice for a change.”

Stewart glanced down at the book Jessie was carrying; “Advanced Techniques of Kama Sutra.”

“Oh my god, no, this isn’t mine. It’s my sister’s. I’m holding it for her until she gets out of the restroom.” Jessie was blushing, scared he didn’t believe her. “I haven’t even had sex in like a year.” Jessie paused again, embarrassed at what she’d just said.

“So you’re single? How would you like to join me for a hike this weekend?” Jessie accepted, and her sister walked over to them, taking her book. She looked at Stewart, smiling.

“Who’s your friend?”

“My date for this weekend.”

“Damn. I hoped I’d get a chance to try this soon,” she said while thumbing through the book. While Jessie was embarrassed by her sister’s promiscuous behavior, at least Stewart should believe the book wasn’t hers.

On Saturday, Jessie had decided she wanted to drive, having had a few bad experiences recently.

“Well, I’d let you, but we need my truck to get to the hiking trail. I really think you should change out of your dress, or at least take a jacket.” Jessie refused. Stewart gave up; at least she had on suitable shoes.

Stewart picked an easy three mile trail. He had really wanted to do Trail 7, but that involved a bit of rock climbing, and he was sure Jessie wouldn’t want to do that in her dress. They set off, and Jessie seemed to easily keep up. About halfway through he stopped them near a small stream and took off his back pack.

“I should have clarified; I don’t think the whole dinner for a date thing is lame; just when its in a restaurant.” He pulled out a small picnic set and some food. Jessie was incredibly impressed. This was about the most romantic thing anyone had ever done for her. He had even brought a small bottle of wine. They sat on the ground and ate. Jessie was so glad her little black dress was starting to bring her luck, even though it was getting a little dirty.

“So it sounds like you haven’t had a boyfriend in a while. Bad luck with guys?”

“Ya, I seem to pick some real losers. I’ve gone on a few dates, but they’ve been disasters. I don’t even want to talk about it. How about you?”

“Well, a few weeks ago my girlfriend broke up with me. I should have seen it coming. She’s been with a lot of guys in the last year. I just thought I’d be different. She was with The Next Guy within two days.”

“Ouch, that sucks. Especially since you seem to be such a nice guy.”

Stewart smiled at her, and then laid back and stared at the sky.

“Uh oh… I forgot to check the weather for today. It looks like it may rain soon.”

Jessie offered to help, “Well, I can check it on my phone.”

“Not likely. You can’t get cell reception out here. Got to head about five miles back up the road. We’re pretty much completely alone. In fact, I’ve only seen one other person out here ever. We’d probably get moving so we don’t get stuck in this rain.”

They packed up and continued on their hike, talking the whole way. “I hope you liked the wine. I didn’t even think to ask whether you drank alcohol.”

“Ya, I’m a social drinker. I don’t really get drunk that often though.”

“Oh, that’s about every night for me. I pass out a lot, and wake up in bed with girls I don’t know. Luckily, Gabe taught me a great trick. I ask them what their middle name is, and then say ‘Well from now on I’m gonna call you that.’ It saves a lot of embarrassment.”

Jessie was a little shocked that he’d share this, but decided to play along. “Megan.”

“What?”

“Megan. That’s my middle name. Now you have no excuse to forget my name.”

“No, I guess I’ll have to be careful. But that’s my ex-girlfriends name, so at least I won’t get in trouble if I mistake you.”

“Well, then how about we just ban you from ever calling me by my middle name.”

“Sounds fair.” Damn. He realized that he should have just kept his mouth shut.

It started sprinkling when they were about fifty feet from the truck. “Wow, we got here just in….” He stopped talking, hands digging through his pocket. “Umm… I must have dropped my keys when I pulled my knife out to open the wine. I’ll run back there real fast. Well, maybe not real fast. Three miles should take me about twenty five minutes. Do you just want to wait here? I should be faster without you.”

“Alone in the woods? I think I’d rather do another three miles.”

Within minutes, it had started pouring. Jessie was immediately soaked and cold. Luckily Stewart was able to put her phone in his pack to keep it dry. It was pretty useless out here anyway.

They returned to the picnic spot without any further conversation. The first words out of Stewart’s mouth were “oh no.”

“What?”

“Do you remember where we sat.”

“Ya, right along the stream around….” She stopped, noticing the problem. The small stream was no longer small. The place they had been sitting was now covered in fast flowing water. The keys were gone.

They walked back to the truck. Stewart opened the door and started putting his pack inside.

“Wait a second, the doors were unlocked. Why didn’t you tell me that. I could have been here warm and dry. Instead, I have nipples about to poke holes in my dress.”

Stewart smiled, even though she was yelling. “Ya, I noticed. Sorry about that.” She got in the truck and dug through his pack to get her phone, but he was right, no bars. She screamed again. Stewart climbed in the truck and suggested that he could walk up the road until he got signal and call someone to pick them up. An hour later, he returned.

“Ok, we should have a ride soon. My buddy Mitch is going to come pick us up, and I’ll just have to find my spare key at home tonight.”

Mitch arrived soon, and Jessie was glad to climb into a warm truck, although now she had two guys staring at her frigid chest. She was debating whether she was going to give Stewart another chance.

Mitch started teasing. “Why is it that on your date I have to pick you up in my truck. Doesn’t seem very manly.”

“Oh, stop your bitching. I tell you what, I’ll be a gentleman and pay you back. We can have Jessie hook you up with her sister. She’s even hotter and seems pretty kinky.”

“Sounds good to me.” As Mitch laughed, Stewart realized what he’d just said. He looked at Jessie.

“Don’t get me wrong, your pretty too. I just happened to ask you out before I met your sister.”

“Dude, not smooth,” Mitch warned his buddy.

Jessie made up her decision. There wouldn’t be a second date.

Jessie walked into her house, alone. Her sister looked at her and could tell things had gone poorly. “Get stuck in the rain?”

Jessie felt like being a wise-ass. “Actually, no, we were inside for all of that storm. We got kind of intimate and he poured a bottle of champagne over me.”

Her sister’s eyes lit up. “Really? That’s like rap video stuff. That’s awesome. Good thing you wore that dress huh. I told you it was good luck.”

Jessie continued on the way to her room, muttering to herself, “No, good luck would have been if I had been the one in the restroom.”

“Wait, so are you going back out with him?”

“No, we just didn’t click.”

“Ok, good, because I found out that Craigslist has personals, and I thought about setting you up on a blind date. Actually, I thought we could double date.”

Jessie actually liked this idea. Maybe an extra couple would make things smoother… Or maybe it would be double disaster.

Before closing her door, Jessie heard her sister yell one last thing.

“By the way, you should really start wearing a bra with that dress.”

— This story, at least the first half, based on how I want to take a girl out. The second half is about how I figure it would actually turn out.

“Fact: Ferrets attack more people than grizzly bears.”

Any other day, Jessie would have found this interesting. In fact, two days ago when Greg had first told it to her she had found it interesting. Instead of the usual pickup lines guys tried, this was the first thing he had said to her when he walked up to her at Wal-Mart. Then, it made her think he was an interesting and intelligent guy. Now, after hearing about thirty random facts, she was bored.

Jessie didn’t respond after hearing this for the second time. A few minutes later, Greg’s phone had beeped and he started texting back. Jessie found her chance to strike back.

“Fact: Texting while driving increases your chances of crashing.” His look informed her he failed to see her irony. Neither of them expected the irony that followed.

After finishing his message and looking back at the road, he had just enough time to notice a billoard for a gentlemen’s club. He hadn’t even noticed the driver that had veered into his lane.

Luckily, the other car did notice and swerved just in time to miss Jessie and her date, though he ended up in a ditch. Greg stopped the car and noticed Jessie was sweating just as much as he was. Greg decided he should go check on the other driver. Jessie decided her new deodorant was as good as claimed.

The other driver was sweating too, but he was okay. Greg asked him what had happened, and the driver told him that he had been staring at a “Don’t Text and Drive” billboard wondering how many crashes are caused by people reading billboards.

The driver was able to get his car out of the ditch, and Greg safely got Jessie to Applebee’s. He had originally wanted to take her to O’Charleys, but she talked him out of that. The only thing that she would let be the same as her last date was the little black dress, size 2.

Greg wasn’t too nervous to talk to or look at Jessie. In fact, he talked too much, and he spent a lot of time looking at her, not always at her face. Greg was a very confident guy, probably because of his good looks. He wasn’t at all nervous to walk up to his ex-classmate and ask her out when he saw her in Wal-Mart. He was carrying some protein shake mix, and he wasn’t trying to hide it. Jessie was carrying some feminine hygiene products, and she was trying to hide that.

Jessie hadn’t spent much time with Greg in high school. In fact, she hadn’t even recognized him at first. But she figured that she’d give him a chance. He seemed different than other guys, and she thought that would be a good thing. Now though, she was sick of hearing about bees that pollinate apple trees, Greg’s theory about how the restaurant had been named. He assumed the original owner was chasing an apple thief through an orchard when he was stung by a bee. Now she was starting to question his sanity.

Jessie had ordered milk with her dinner, but as soon as the waiter sat it down, she had a horrible thought of the milk spilling on her dress and making her look like a cow. Greg noticed her frightfully looking at the milk, and asked her. She explained her fear.

“Actually,” he explained, “Holstein cows are white with black spots, so it would be inverted. Also, did you know that ‘cow’ actually refers to female cattle that have had a calf? Most people just refer to cattle as cows, though that’s technically incorrect. You would be a heifer since you haven’t had a calf.”

The conversation suddenly paused. Greg realized that he didn’t know whether or not Jessie had a kid and may have just put her on edge. He had put her on edge, but mainly because he had just compared her to a cow, or heifer, or whatever.

“So do you watch much TV?” Jessie was trying to change the conversation into something that wouldn’t involve cattle, ferrets, or any other random fact. It didn’t work.

“Not really. I try to stay active to stay in shape. Did you know that you actually burn more calories while sleeping than watching TV?” Jessie actually thought that appropriate, as he was putting her asleep.

She turned her attention to her food. She noticed a hair in her corn, but Greg identified it as a strand of silk from the ear of corn. “There’s actually one strand of silk for every kernel of corn. It’s kind of amazing they get most of them out when you think about it.”

Jessie was able to finish her meal without learning any other facts. They received the check and Greg pulled out his wallet. Jessie decided, since there was no way she’d go on a second date with him, that she should pay her part. As she pulled her wallet out of her purse, she noticed Greg put his wallet back in his pocket. Apparently she was supposed to pay for all of it.

She gave her debit card to the waiter and started placing some cash on the table for the tip. “How much do you think he deserves? Five dollars?”

“Well, he didn’t really go above and beyond, so maybe just two.”

“I’ll leave four.”

After she signed the receipt they stood to leave. Before Greg walked away from the table, she saw him out of the corner of her eye pocket two dollars from the tip pile.

Jessie kept her eyes on the road the entire way home. When they arrived at her house, Greg actually invited himself in.

“Well, I live with my sister, and the last time she woke up and saw a guy in our house she didn’t know, she hit him with a frying pan.” Greg actually didn’t mind this risk, finding it an acceptable gamble, but he took the hint.

“Well, we don’t want that to happen, so I’d best stay at home.” Jessie got out of the car and wished him goodnight.

Jessie opened the door, and her sister was rolling on the floor laughing. She had to ask what was going on.

“You just missed the funniest commercial ever. Did you know that ferrets attack more people than grizzly bears?”

Jessie walked to her room and responded without looking back.

“Ya, I’ve heard that before.”

— This story based on real and imaginary events; so I’d guess you can call them complex events. If you haven’t seen the Mountain Dew ferret commercial, you should get on Youtube right now.