DOWN BY THE RIVER

Warning:  drunks on tubes! Do not approach!

DOWN BY THE RIVER
Greetings gentle readers. Today’s story begins with a warning. If you do not feel you should be exposed to adult situations you may wish to divert your eyes to something else. I would suggest a training video on treating chainsaw injuries or perhaps a film on slaughterhouse procedures. This story won’t be pretty. No story that features middle aged, wrinkled, flabby men, and the women who are stuck with them, can be pretty. Not with this group, anyway.

The story began several months ago when friend Donna scoured the internet looking for a good place to stay in the Texas hill country where we could tube in a river. Donna is a chronic over-achiever. I don’t know how she has time for anything extra like this. She has recently bought a medical practice and manages it. She is going to school to get her 3rd or 4th Masters Degrees, and she is also in the army reserve. She was recently promoted to Lieutenant Governor, or Vice Admiral or some high rank, and now we all have to goose step and salute her. You should see the epaulets on her bikini.

I’ve known Donnas’ hubby Dan for many years. He has a perpetual “I’m clever, aren’t I ?” grin on his face. He is one of those “engineer” types that wants to fix everything, especially if it aint broken. And he loves to argue with my wife just to get under her skin. This weekend’s topic for skin evisceration was that teachers should not get tenure, and society spends too much money on schools. Certainly both were polarizing opinions, but my wife, being a former teacher, knew the facts. She cannot stand to deal with ignorance, (Just how has she stayed married to me for 30 years?) , and is not bashful at giving her opinion to Dan. While she really just wanted to find a quite spot and read a book in peace this weekend, she had to defend her profession.

Another couple was Steve and Rene’. Steve is a cheerful fellow who never met a beer or a flatulence joke he did not like. Steve is quite a cook and claims some Cajun heritage. I believe his heritage has not necessarily assisted his culinary skills but it sure has helped him cultivate bodily function gags. Steve brought his lady friend Rene’, whom he grew up with. After many years of lost contact, they ran into each other at a Wal-Mart. Rene’ privately confessed to me that she will never set foot in a Wal-Mart again. (Too late) Rene’ is currently a teacher, Special Ed, I believe, and I am sure this helps her cope with Steve.

The fourth couple was Kirt and Cynthia, who are avid hunters. They put out corn each morning and evening to lure the deer near to our cabin. I was expecting Kirk to attack them with a dinner fork. Cynthia was in to hunting too. They are both planning an African Safari. I think they want to hunt down any living relatives of Barak Obama and bitch slap them. Cynthia wears glasses and I think I saw cross-hairs etched on her lenses. Cynthia had a compact digital camera that I believe had been surgically attached to her hand. She took photos of any moving object. The chip in that camera must have had more capacity than the Library of Congress.

We spent most of the first full day floating on the river on bright yellow fake inner-tubes. These were Disney-fied versions of large truck inner tubes. Real men wouldn’t normally use yellow inner tubes but the River Outfitter suggested them. These giant lemon- yellow floaties were embarrassing. Luckily we had the embarrassment antidote: several cases of ice cold beer. I began treating my embarrassment immediately with a cool one. I had my dignity to think of. Since we were going to be in the water, I was not wearing a shirt. And, of courses, my flabby, wrinkled, boney torso was much more unattractive than that yellow tube. (How I have flabby and boney together is a medical mystery)

We were carried up-stream by the River OutFitter (a cool sounding name for a guy who rents fake inner tubes and delivers them in a school bus.) We put in and wasted no time in consuming mass quantities of beer. This river has a limestone rock bottom. The algae growing on the bottom, in spots, is as slick as snot on a doorknob. Watching Dan and Steve fall out of their tubes, then try to stand up on the slick rocks to get back in again was quite entertaining. They looked like injured alligators in a death roll. America’s Funniest Home Videos should have been on location with us. I was fully inoculated with anti-embarrassment liquid by that time, so maybe their antics were not funny, just sad.

I was on my back in the tube the entire time I was in the water. I had put sunscreen on a few hours earlier but was really getting red. I looked like a steak that the cook forgot to flip. Kirk did just the opposite of me. He had to wear a long sleeve shirt and a hat while on the river. Apparently he will sunburn while watching re-runs of Hawaii 5-0

As I mentioned earlier, if you can remember reading that far back, each night a different couple prepared the evening meal. We ate like kings, except the night that Gwen and I cooked. I am severely limited in my cooking repertoire. Fajitas are about all I can make, but I could not find any fajita meat at the store. I used a thicker cut of meat, but it had not been tenderized and was too tough. If you could lose weight by chewing, I would have the perfect diet food. Gwen made peach cobbler for dessert in a Dutch oven. She is an expert at cooking that way, but the fire did not cooperate. Fortunately we had consumed enough beer to dull our delicate taste buds. I could have served prickly pear instead of that meat.

The rest of the three day weekend was about the same. River, beer, food, and football. Dan is a maniac when watching college football. He was switching back and forth so quickly between games with the remote that my brain started to have an epileptic seizure. Maybe Dan should try de-caffeinated beer. Sunday morning we cleaned up and headed back to the big city. None of us looked forward to the 6 hour ride, but it was nice to have gotten a long weekend away from home.

As a small momento of the long weekend, I took the leather couches and loveseats from the cabin. I don’t think those things will be missed, because I replaced them with yellow inner tubes. Turns out that yellow is a really good indoor color.