Smalls Buys a BB Gun
Monday, April 30th, 2007
By: Mairk
I have now been unemployed for over two weeks. One of those weeks I spent with my mother and grandmother in Disney World only to be saved by the Willey sisters for an extended weekend.
It was somewhere in the middle of Florida that I realized that not only was Utah the weirdest state I had ever been in, but that I was starting to get the general feeling that the majority of America just blows. I finally understand why and how our Mr. George W. is our president, and why so many people have a general dislike for the U.S. of A. Everything about it from our waist lines to our servings to our borders is just way to big.
To top everything off my flight back to Utah from Tampa Bay was via Las Vegas. As we all know from my previous post, me and Las Vegas are not exactly on speaking terms at the moment and I don’t think we will ever patch up our relationship. The moment I stepped out of the runway I heard the digital noise of slot machines. For those of you who have never been to the Vegas airport let me just tell you it is just as shitty as the city. The Las Vegas Visitors Bureau has done an incredible job at portraying the character and emotion of their city in the atmosphere of their airport.
I arrived back in our little mountain town Tuesday night and by Friday afternoon I had submitted one application for a job that I don’t even want. However in feeling a sense of accomplishment we set our sites on the night and proceeded to get shitfaced. After all, it was Friday and I didn’t have a job, and I didn’t have shit to do. As usual, while pre-gaming we got more inebriated than one should before going to drink at a bar for the rest of the night. The most spirited drinker award was presented to Mr. Small, and that is where my story ends and his begins.
We embarked for our local throw-your-peanut-shells-on-the-cement-floor alcohol serving establishment. It was at this very same bar where no more than a week ago our hyper-man child decided to take a piss on that very concrete floor near the Big Buck Hunter gaming machine in the back. Not to have himself outdone by himself on this night he chose to pull the trigger right at the end of the bar.
Of course everyone working behind the bar was well acquainted with the entire Small experience. At this point Smalls was swiftly dragged out of the bar by his shoulders, shit eating grin on his face, shaking his clasped hands from left to right as a 1920’s bare knuckle prize fighter may have once done. Following not twenty feet behind was his baby sitter we had hired for the night, his younger sister.
Reports from the babysitter tell us that once outside the bar, Smalls chose to take a piss in the middle of the street as well as on a nearby car, bringing up memories of the piss he took a few weeks ago on the porch of a bar only steps away from the entrance.
As per usual we didn’t leave the bar once our friend was kicked out, instead we stayed and drank more, assuming that if he was drunk enough to get kicked out of the bar he was drunk enough to find his way home. Instead he found his way to the bar across the street, where he was shockingly allowed to stay and drink till closing time. We stumbled home at staggered times from various places in solo squadrons.
The next morning, feeling as confused as a newborn as to what had happened the night before, we chose to take a trip to Wal-Mart to purchase nothing other than what any other 24-year-old would want to buy. You guessed correctly we were looking for Heelys at Wal-Mart.
With wild images running through our heads of rolling down the hill three abreast, to the bar on our heels. Being at the cement floored bar rolling around on our heels with oversized fish bowls filled with PBR. We were going to be Royalty, maybe a heely 360 to impress the ladies. To our amazement it turns out that Wal-Mart doesn’t sell them. Not to be deterred we perused the aisles of Wal-Mart, only to come upon the BB Gun section. “YES, let’s get a BB Gun!” exclaimed Smalls (if you couldn’t tell by the exclamation point).
Apparently Smalls’ parents would never let him get a BB gun as a child, and after seeing Smalls with a BB gun, I can say that his parents are incredibly intelligent people. They obviously knew the character of their child better than us asshole friends. Living in a rather residential area we weren’t comfortable walking around our canyon neighborhood armed, so we chose to set up a shooting range inside. With a spare piece of rug left on our apartment, we created a pad to “safely” shoot into and attached beer cans and targets. So with our range up and our blinds closed we spent the afternoon drinking beers and shooting the BB gun inside our apartment on a blue sky Saturday with highs in the seventies.
By the way we purchased a dog mascot head for a dollar at the thrift store.
In retrospect I suppose I chose not to wear an undershirt for a multiplicity of reasons – and they all seemed good at the time. For one thing, I was (as always) running late, and finding the time to put on two whole shirts seemed downright impossible. Even one was pushing it, and I was grateful I had the time for that. But even had I not been so rushed, it seems safe to say that my torso would never have received an undercoating. After all, every undershirt I owned was crammed into its usual storage place – my dirty, over-filled hamper. Like more than six ounces of butter a week in times of war*, laundry has become a luxury that we cannot all enjoy as we should. Of course, I’d be the first to admit that my decision was also based on pure aesthetics. With no undershirt cramping my style, I was free to unbutton my top-shirt just as much as I pleased, thereby flashing the outside world generous amounts of my muscular upper chest – and that, I tell you all, is a luxury that I will never ration. Finally, the decision seemed just plain safe. It was cold and grey outside – how, I wondered, could moisture ever materialize in such conditions?
