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Daily Story—Category: Story From My Past

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Sundays in Des Moines, Iowa, 1976-77

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I always tell people I didn’t go to college, but in actuality I did. I attended Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa for one year in 1976. My older Brother Jim was a junior there, the year that I was a freshman. That’s the main reason I went there, because he was there. I lived in the dorms, but he had a ground floor, ratty, one-bedroom apartment and I hung out there all the time. Sometimes I slept on the couch at night if I was too fucked up to go home. Which was many a night.

I only spent one year there because I flunked out. I was a fine arts major (this is back when I used to draw) and my first semester was spotty, but the second semester was a true exercise in slackerdom, before the word “slacker” was even used. I flunked every single class I had enrolled in. It’s not that I’m stupid, I just stopped going to classes and was basically high and drunk for an entire semester. I did this on purpose, I knew I could probably never have a time like this again in my life and I decided to pursue several months of just fucking around and having pure fun in my life. This was a great year of my life. That summer after my parents saw my 0.0 grade average (do you know how proud I was when a few years later Animal House came out and Bluto Blutarsky’s grade average was 0.0?) it was decided that maybe I was more suited for a life of toiling in shitty jobs. I moved out on my own and got a job delivering furniture. The first of many dead end gigs. I ended up in the printing trade, where I now work nights and I’ve never had a job I like or look forward going to. Not having a college degree has cost me some writing jobs, but you know what? It was worth it for those nine months of wild, unabashed, motherfucking fun. How many of you have had nine months of pure, unadulterated fun? Well, I did, I ran wild and never looked back. When you’re young you can do this and I’m glad I did.

The most fun day of the week back then was always Sunday. I loved Sundays in Des Moines, Iowa in 1976-77.

In those days Des Moines, Iowa was “dry” on Sundays and you couldn’t buy booze. This was always troublesome for Jim and I. At the start of the school year we would just buy extra booze for Sunday’s drinkathon. But sadly, as our booze supply would run low on Saturday night, or when we went back to his apartment after a party, we would greedily consume Sunday’s supply (we were doing a lot of speed those days and we would drink, drink, drink!) and my oh my, how dry we would be on Sunday. It was gruesome. We’d smoke pot and maybe do some pills, but it just wasn’t as much fun without booze. Soon we figured a remedy to this nerve-rattling problem.

About three weeks into the school year we figured out the solution to our Sunday booze situation We’d have a party. And steal our own booze, that is, booze that the guests would bring to the shindig (I love the word “shindig” by the way.) We went around on a Saturday afternoon and invited everyone that we knew or even half knew and invited them to a party at Jim’s apartment. And we told everyone not to show up empty-handed, since we were throwing the shindig (there’s that word again!), the least they could do is bring some booze. And if they had drugs? All the better, we never said no in those days.

Around seven that night people started showing up and soon it was a full scale party, with Jim’s stereo blaring rock ‘n’ roll, kids drinking and getting high and just general college type merriment and going nuts. About a half an hour into the party, Jim and I would go to work. Basically all kids drank those days was beer and cheap wine. So the refrigerator would be full of both. What we would do is take two to three beers out like we were taking them to someone and then stash them all over his apartment. Even though the apartment would be filled with people, we became quite adept at stashing booze right in front of people. There were four cupboards on the wall in the kitchen and we would open them, take out a glass and toss a beer in at the same time and then pour the remaining can of beer in the glass. The bedroom was usually empty so that was a primo place to stash beers and bottles of wine. The way we worked the wine would be to take a bottle out of the refrigerator, walk around filling up our party guests glasses like the good little host’s we were and then when the bottle was half empty or less, we’d stash it in the bedroom or bathroom. You couldn’t pull the cupboard trick with a big bottle. Well, I guess we could’ve tried, but a good booze-stasher knows not to push his luck or to be too showy or extravagant in your work. We were professionals and we played by the rules. We had a party at his place almost every Saturday and pulled the stashing trick week after week to tremendous results.

When the booze would run out, we’d pass the hat, get a new supply and stash, stash, stash the night away. The party was usually over around two or three in the morning and then we’d pass out (for some reason, since the booze was hidden, we weren’t tempted to drink it, I guess cause it would be warm and too much of a chore when you’re sozzled out of your ever-loving gourd to start looking for the stash) and wake up in the morning to quite a mess. We’d go to a local Convenient store and get something to drink and maybe something to eat and then go back to Jim’s apartment and sit around, have our drinks and food and listen to records or watch TV. Then we’d start bagging up all the empty cans and bottles, empty the ash trays and throw them into the dumpster in the back. Then the fun would begin.

We’d get so fucked up at the party, that we’d forget where we stashed all the booze on Sunday, so we’d start opening up cupboards, looking under Jim’s bed, inside the laundry hamper in the bathroom, under the couch, on the window sill behind the curtain and on and on. It was like an alcoholic version of an Easter egg hunt. We would put the beers and the half-empty bottles of wine on his rickety kitchen table and usually the hunt would yield between fifteen to twenty beers and three or four half empty bottles of wine. Sundays may have been dry in Des Moines, Iowa, but deep in the heart of Wombacherville it would soon be happy hour. All fucking night! Huzzah!

After we had found all the stashed booze, we’d put it in the fridge and then we’d go fuck around all day and let it refrigerate. My brother had a beater of a car, so we’d drive to record stores, book stores, maybe to the mall, to the park and sometimes we’d just motor around town and fuck with people we thought looked like uptight assholes. One thing we would do sometimes is go to the Convenient store and get a big fountain Coke with ice and then drive around looking for a guy on a bike. He would have to look like some sort of jocko, sporty type asshole, if he looked like a nice guy, just enjoying a leisurely ride, we’d leave him alone. Women were definitely off limits. But if he fit the “asshole” criteria, Jim would slow down and we’d pull over as close to Sporto as he could. I’d lean out the passenger window and scream out something like, “Hey dickhead!” He’d turn and I’d throw the entire Coke in his face. Jim would then floor it and we’d be howling with laughter as the jocko guy would be screaming at us. Fun, fun, fun!

Usually around five we’d go back to Jim’s apartment and get high and drink a few beers. Our version of a two-man happy hour. Then it would be time to pick up dinner. And I mean “pick up.” We’d go to a grocery store and one of us would steal a can of Manwich and the other would steal a package of ground beef and then we’d buy the cheapest pack of hamburger buns possible. Then we’d go back to Jim’s apartment and continue drinking while making our Manwich feast. One thing to note here is that in the winter, it was easy to steal this shit, because you had a big winter coat on and you could fit the item you were stealing in your coat pocket. But in the beginning of the year and at the end when it was warm and you would look a little conspicuous wearing a winter coat in to the store it was tough. We had to “jock” the items. In other words stick them down our pants. We’d wear oversize shirts, untucked and baggy pants and we’d stuff the item down our pants, buy the buns and take the stolen goods out of our pants as soon as we got into the car. That’s why we took turns on what we’d steal, putting ground beef in your pants is a weird feeling and neither of us liked it. But without beef, Manwich is pretty much like putting hot ketchup on hamburger buns. But with the browned, ground beef mixed in...well, we all know this, but I’ll repeat it anyway: A sandwich is a sandwich, but a Manwich is a motherfucking meal, motherfucker! Especially when you’re high as a kite and half drunk, which is what we would be as we would put a few open buns on a plate and ladle the magic mixture on and dig in and pig out.

Then we’d eat the meal while watching the Sonny and Cher comedy hour. We’d usually wolf the food down fast and then continue drinking and smoking pot. And then after Sonny and Cher, we’d watch Kojak, starring Telly Savalas. By now we’d be pretty well blasted and Kojak always cracked us the fuck up. If you’re not familiar with the show, Telly Savalas played Kojak, a tough talking, New York detective. Two of his trademarks were that he sucked on Tootsie Roll pops and he called everyone “baby.” And he smoked pencil thin cigars. For some reason, we thought this show was hilarious. We’d count the number of times he said “baby,” and we would laugh and laugh and laugh. It was always a goddamned blast.

Fun comes in all shapes and sizes and I hope everyone who reads this blog has some fun stashed up their sleeves. Have fun while you can my friends, life is short and so is Gary Coleman.

Fab Tops

As I said earlier, my friend (and publisher of my 99 Beers book), Joe Freedman has created a new toy that is really cool. They’re high quality spinners or tops called Fab Tops and each one has a unique color and design scheme that changes before your eyes when you spin them. One of them even appears to shoot sparks out! You have to see them to believe it. It reminds me of taking acid, but with these there’s no danger of brain damage! Plus they are affordable to one and all at only five dollars a set!

They come three to a set and there are four sets total. A perfect gift for that person who has everything! You can read more about them and purchase them right here:

Fab Tops.

Check out some of Joe’s other Etsy items here:
Retroscope

Kokino Roboto

To Tuesday!

Okay, Monday is a done day so onwards we move. Hopefully in an upwardly fashion. Or something like that.

I’ve got a good show lined up today. Today’s Daily Story is about a year I spent in Des Moines, Iowa in 1976-77. It’s about how my brother Jim and I used to spend Sunday nights, which has always been my favorite night of the week. I’m also going to be showcasing a new product from my friend, Joe Freedman. They’re called Fab Tops and they are really cool, you know Joe has good taste because he published my 99 Beers Off The Wall book! I’m also going to throw up a Crossbreeding episode. Maybe “throw up” wasn’t the best choice of words, but you know what I mean.

“Boris” comes through with another classic vintage Home Page art today! TMWS goes Go-Go! I love it, very cool, Daddio! If you’ve got a website and would like some custom made art like this, “Boris” is available for freelance. He also designs logos, does CD and book cover art, retouching and basically about anything you can think of. Just send me an email from the Home Page and I’ll forward it along to him.

Okay, The Daily Photo is up within minutes and then Condensed Gossip. You know the drill, stay tuned or check the links at the bottom of the Home Page for current updates.

A happy and snappy Tuesday to you and yours! TO TUESDAY!

Closing Credits

Produced, directed and written by Marty Wombacher

Theme song and announcer: Slim Volume

Resident artist: “Boris”

Contributing Writers (Comments section, listed in order of comment):
"Boris"
biff
Emily Schein
JHwang
Joey D
grompf
jaws the cabbie
Gene1

Daily Video

Norm MacDonald

Norm MacDonald is like Bill Murray, he’s one of those guys that just cracks me up no matter what he’s saying. Here’s a great clip of him telling a Bob Eucker story to Letterman, who is cracking up too.

Enjoy the Norm!

And Now A Word From Our (Fake) Sponsor

New Photoblog is Up!

I just put up a new Photoblog from last night's dinner, check it out here: Cheesy Photoblog.

Daily Story—Category: Reprints

I originally wrote this for the NY Press weekly newspaper a few years ago and then re-tweaked it for my book, The Boy Who Would Be A Fire Truck. And now I’m presenting it to the readers of TMWS. Enjoy!

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Blowing Up the Gin Room

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In the summer of 1977, I was nineteen years old. I moved out of my parents’ house and into a dump of a three-bedroom house on the bad side of Peoria, Illinois. My two roommates were Chris and Moon, and the main thing we had in common was a powerful thirst for all things alcoholic. Our drinks of choice were Blatz beer and shots of cheap gin. To fortify ourselves in the midst of so much alcohol consumption, we bought more than a thousand hits of speed and kept them in a large candy dish on a crumbling secondhand coffee table in the front room. Whenever we felt weary from the constant drink-a-thon we called life, we’d pop a couple hits of speed and it was–boom–back to the liquor store.

Our dilapidated house had a basement that was divided into two rooms. One had a door, but it also had a window on the outer wall. Since the basement was musty and came furnished with a variety of insects and rodentia, we didn’t spend a lot of time down there. We did, however, turn the sealed room into something we called the Gin Room. We dubbed it thus because we would take our empty gin bottles and smash them on the cracked cement floor. After a couple of months, the broken glass was nearing ankle height. It was really quite something to see.

Smashing the bottles was a great release when you were about to jump out of your skin from too much amphetamines and alcohol. Being constantly drunk and raging on speed leads to some weird behavior. Once, Chris and I turned everything in the house upside down and watched the sunrise while debating whether or not it would be a good idea to hang meat from the ceiling. But the greatest release came sometime in August when Moon came home clutching a large shopping bag.

"You’re not going to believe what I’ve got in here," he announced to me and Chris, a curious grin creeping across his face.

"Girl Scouts?" I wondered aloud.

"Fuck you,” he shot back. “I've got enough fireworks here to blow up a tank."   

Then he overturned the bag, and the goods spilled out onto the floor. A friend owed Moon a hundred bucks, and when Moon threatened to break the headlights on his car if he didn’t pay up, the guy offered him the fireworks and the deal was done. There on the floor were M-80s, firecrackers, Roman candles, cherry bombs and things I didn’t recognize. We huddled around the explosive pile, and it became painfully obvious what was to be done.

“Let’s blow up the Gin Room,” I said in quite noble fashion.

Of course Chris and Moon were in total agreement, and we moved the artillery downstairs and set it up on a pile of newspapers that would act as a mass fuse.

But first, celebratory drinks. And a handful of speed.

When the beaners had kicked in, we moved to the basement and argued over who would light the newspaper. (Moon won, as they were his fireworks and all.) The fire set, we quickly exited and watched the action from the outer window. Soon, an orgasm of colorful explosions, smoke, fire and ear-shattering bangs and booms belched out of the room. After a minute, the glass on the window cracked and fell out. After four minutes, it was over.

Four minutes. Of pure joy. Pure joy unfettered by the everyday worries magnified ten times by the booze and speed. Worries about money, a busted-up car, a dead-end job at a downtown discount store, running out of cigarettes, the question of what I was going to do with the rest of my life, and the greatest worry of all: would we make it to the liquor store before closing time. Nothing mattered for those minutes but the colorful explosion in the gin room.

It took two minutes to put the fire out on the left wall. The whole room was covered in black soot. In fact, the whole house had a smoky gunpowder scent that we would never be able to eliminate. A month later, we were thrown out. We didn’t recover our security deposit needless to say. 

Moon went on to become a financial director for a loan company and now owns and runs his own financial loan business. Chris went back to college and became a lawyer. I moved to New York and went to work at a shitty night job while trying to peddle my writing.

I still like to blow things up.

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O.F.I.M.

Oh fuck it’s Monday. Why do the weekends speed by and melt back into the beginning of the week? This shit goes on and on and it makes me feel like a hamster on a wheel, running in circles and getting nowhere fast. See, Motherfucker?

But it’s on with TMWS! It’s a full-fledged show today, complete with the Daily Photo, Condensed Gossip and today’s story is one about blowing up a gin room. And of course the Fake Ad and a Daily Video.

And since it’s Monday, it also means TMWS resident artist, “Boris” is back with another great piece of Home Page art! Great work today, Daddio! And remember that if you have a website, “Boris” could be adding some custom made artwork to it. He’s also available for CD and book covers, logo designs, retouching and mucho more! Just send me an email and I’ll forward it to him.

So good luck getting through Monday. Stay tuned or check the links at the bottom of the Home Page for the current updates.

And it’s birthday week here at TMWS! Today I’d like to wish my friend Michelle a happy snappy birthday! Happy Birthday Michelle! Have fun and I hope a beer or six in your future! Here’s a video for you!