Alcohol Therapy

  ** I wrote this my Junior year of college and thought I might as well add it here for anyone's casual amusement. Forgive any spelling / grammar errors as I'm too lazy to proofread it.

  For reasons that are to infuriating to go in to, I am being forced by a maniacal Virginia judge to go through 18 weeks of "intensive alcohol therapy." In order to help maintain my sanity and in addition to the massive amount of heroin I plan on smoking, I am going to keep a sort of journal to catalog each class. In these postings I will describe in detail the goings on of the classes, with only slight embellishments, as their absurdity will most certainly show them in their correct light.

Class #1


Upon arriving at the building where the class was to take place, I pulled around around back to find an anticipated first impression of my "classmates." WIth fifteen to twenty people milling around outside the building, it looked like the bastard child of NASCAR tailgate and a narcotics anonymous meeting. After I absorbed the first impression of whom I would be spending my Friday evenings with for the next 4 months, I parked at the far end of the parking lot. This was necessary as I didn't want to come outside to find my car covered in dip spit and with the tail pipe breaking out in sores. I then quickly hurried inside to avoid the contemptuous stares that were probably directed towards my outfit. The clean white t-shirt, jeans and boat shoes were most likely the kinds of clothes reserved for Sunday Pentecostal church service and the KKK meetings that followed.

Inside the building I eventually found the room which would accommodate the class. Imagine a room in the basement of an insane asylum that was previously used for either giving lobotomies or the storage of dirty laundry for the mental patients who shit themselves after every Pancake Friday. In addition to the overall foulness of the room was the stench of the dregs that had infested it. Each of these people had apparently used urinal cakes and industrial disinfectant for soap since the seventies. Not to mention the permanent odor of cigarettes that permeated every inch of clothing of every person there. At this point I was subject to an alcohol breathalyzer test. For some unimaginable reason it has occurred to some people that drinking before coming to an alcohol therapy class is a good idea. Actually, it kind of is. Fuck.

Now I don't remember exactly how many people were in the class, nor what they all looked like, but I'll give the highlights.

1. The first person to stick out to me was a 30 something man dressed in an odd combination of military fatigues and Lynyrd Skynard apparel. He was moderately nice and well spoken, but he secretly seemed like a fucking psychopath so I'm going to refer to him as Charles Manson from now on.

2. The girl sitting next to Charles Manson (who he was blatantly masturbating to the entire time) was some sort of truck stop hooker I think. She almost might have been semi-attractive at one point, but has just been destroyed by so many truckers since she was like 13 that she now looks a disfigured, hellish, she-devil version of carrot top.

3. The next people I can remember were two women sitting next to each other. They looked to me like the unseen wives/moms of those rednecks from Deliverance and now that I think of it also had many swine like qualities.

4. Next were two separate redneck hood rat teenagers. These two kids seemed like the type to want really bad to join a gang of black guys and to have to do really fucked up shit to do. I think they probably had to go sodomize a stray dog or something and did so with weird, pathetic enthusiasm.

5. The guy sitting next to me looked like he was on the wrong side of the Civil Rights movement and had never quite gotten over it. At one point when it was near our time for a break, he started whispering "break, breaak, breaakk" in increasing volume and ferocity, and sounding like a crack fiending version of Rain Man. He was the second most sane one there.

6. The guy sitting two spots down from me was my personal favorite. He basically looked like the ass baby of Ed Gein and the Unabomber. He also had a lot of hilarious comments about his extensive knowledge of methamphetamines and how at one point his BAC wasn't under 1.0 for over a year.

7. Lastly were the two girls sitting to my left. The each looked like they probably grew boobs in 7th grade and realized that they could make a fortune giving handjobs for 20 bucks a piece to middle schoolers and homeless people. One kept mentioning how she had to grow up really fast when she was 13 and I assume this is what she was referring to.

Now that you have a semi decent grasp of all the degenerates in the class, ill highlight some events from the class. First one of the teachers said that we were going to need to lock the doors to the building so that none of the deranged spouses of the people could come and try to stab them. To me this was shocking, but to all the others this Jerry Springer esque drama was nothing out of the ordinary. What the fuck is wrong with these people? The teachers then talked about lots of psychiatric bullshit until one of them got into a debate with Charles Manson on whether on not black beauties were uppers or downers, which was pretty hilarious. Then the child molester guy got all excited when the discussion randomly drifted toward rufies and other date rape drugs. And by excited i mean he had a huge boner that he didn't try to hide at all. By the time the class was halfway through and we were about to be given a break, half of the fucking class was shaking uncontrollably in their urge for cigarettes. When the break was finally given, these animals stampeded outside, briefly confused by the locked door, and sucked down half a pack each. I even stepped outside for a second to get some air but was immediately suffocated by a cloud of cigarette smoke only comparable to that 100 burning christmas trees. I can't really remember much else of the class so it was probably boring as shit and not worth mentioning.

Class #2
 
The day leading up to my second class was cold, rainy and quite dreary overall, ominously foreboding what my second class might hold. The thought had occurred to me that this weather might deter my classmates from smoking heavily before we were jammed into our hellish basement room. Unfortunately I underestimated these abhorrent backwoods folk and found that each of them were waiting in their cars, ensconced in thick grey clouds of smoke that would've made smokey the bear shit in his pants. I then casually made my way inside, not worried about my outfit, as I had intentionally dressed in cut off jean shorts and a wwjd tank top. It was cold as shit but I didn't think I could brave such insults as "fancy little bitch" or "obama lover" two weeks in a row.

We then went through the painstaking breathalyzer test, which shockingly nobody failed, and settled in. I intentionally sat near a guy who looked like a pedophiliac dana carvey cause he seemed particularly maniacal that day. Even though this guy had probly smoked like 20 cigs immediately before, he was already beginning to shake and mumble to himself. hell yes. The class then got off to a boring start, with the teacher going into a long explanation of neurons or some garbage. Then things got interesting when a new woman raised her hand to ask a question. and by raised her hand I mean she just started yelling her question like a fucking mongoloid. "well i git that those neutrons do that but what about them gabba jammas?" The teacher looked extremely confused, looked right at her and decided that she was a psychopath that he should ignore. Annoyingly, she persisted and asked the same question like 10 more times, using the word gabba jamma each time. I guess her family just hadn't had any variation in their gene pool for a such a long time that her vocabulary had deteriorated into arbitrary potpourri of clicks and clacks. Eventually the teacher looked back in her direction, with a look of utter disgust and rage, to inform her that the gabba jammas were in fact important, probly hoping that she would finally shut the fuck up. And she did, with an infuriatingly smug look on her face. You win this round you congenital trash.

The teachers then informed us that we would be watching a movie for the remainder of class, thank jesus. But unfortunately my misery didn't subside for long. The rapist sitting next to me began to burp. Just a little at first, but they quickly grew so noxious I could barely fucking breath. I am usually not (to) much of a whiney bitch but I swear to god this guy had eaten a twelve pack of uncooked hot dogs and an entire jar of mayonnaise in his car right before he came in. I was literally solely breathing the disgusting gas from this guys digestive tract for like 5 minutes straight. By the time this barrage had ended, the previously deplorable stench of menthol cigarettes now smelled like an extraordinary infusion of mint and high quality tobacco, with a slightly nutty aftertaste. This was only the second class and I've already hit rock bottom, fuck.

Getting to Class #3
 
Lying in bed last Thursday night, I outlined in my head all of what I was going to do the next day. A civil war test in the morning, 2 furniture delivery jobs in the afternoon, then my alcohol class that night. Little did I know that this would be the most psychotic and infuriating day of my life. For that reason, most of this post is dedicated to describing my day leading up to the class.

My morning started at 4 am to study for my test. I hadn't been to class nor done any of the assigned readings for the past month, so this was the epitome of cramming. I read over all notes posted online one time and assumed this would be sufficient. Turns out it was because I later found out i got an A. After I got home from the test, I grabbed a quick breakfast and me and chad headed over to the furniture store where would pick up the beds we were delivering. As always the owner of the store was suspiciously nice, like someone who probably makes necklaces out of human teeth, and gave us directions for the delivery. Now this first delivery went very smoothly. A nice drive east through the rolling Virginia mountains, through multiple picturesque country towns and finally to our destination, where we quickly unloaded and were paid. We then made our way back to the store to load up for our next delivery.

For this second delivery I found out that they had bought a massive amount of shit and that it would definitely take two trips to get it all there, which would be an enormous pain in the ass. With this in mind I called the lady and asked if we could come drop off the first load early so i wouldn't have to worry about getting to my class at 5:30. Skeptical, she asked "Well you ain't gunna charge me double is ya?!". I said no, but deduced from her dialect that this delivery would be no less terrible than dealing with a retard during a fire drill. Supposedly only 20 minutes away, I prayed to god that her place would at least be easy to find. Not surprisingly, god screwed me again and the directions turned out to be nothing short of a mystery wrapped in a fucking riddle.

The directions read something like this - First drive 5 miles down 114 until you see what may or may not be a Wal-Mart, then look for a dead deer in the road, if its on the right, go left, if its on the left, go right. Now you're gonna travel 3 kilometers down this road till you reach a bridge. Here you'll meet an immigrant named Julio. Tell him "el perro corre rápido, pero el gallo es el rey". Julio will then tip his hat in the correct direction and provide you with a baby goat. Take the goat and go down the road that has many bends like a snake. At the end of the snake road, you will come to a closed gate and will need to sacrifice the baby goat with a jagged rock. Once you do this, the gate will open and you will find me lying nude, completely filling up a kiddy pool in my yard and screaming in gibberish.

Well after we figured out most of this psychotic puzzle, and with the minimal help of our gps, we were able to find her "house". Deep in the bowels of the hellish dreg infested Virginia mountains, surrounded by massive heaps of trash, was her filthy single wide trailer. We quickly unloaded the furniture and loaded up some crappy dirt ridden furniture that we were supposedly taking back to the store. After going backwards through the "directions", we finally made it back to the store but were only half done the job. At this point it was about 4 o'clock and I was getting nervous as to whether or not I would be late for the alcohol class. We then loaded up the rest of the stuff, a fucking massive king size mattress and bed, and hurried to get back to the backwoods nightmare.

We got back to her house by 4:40. I was pretty worried now because I had been warned that if I were more than 10 minutes late to the class, then it would count as my single excused absence. Because of this, I tried to expedite the rest of the process as much as possible. Unfortunately dealing with this lady was like have your ass hairs plucked one by one. Even after I had informed her of the reason for my haste, she inconsiderately continued to lay on the couch, glued to the t.v., occasionally shouting directions. After we had moved all of the stuff into her trailer, which took up over 75% of the entire thing, she insisted that we tediously remove all of the plastic wrap from each piece. mother of fucking christ. Eventually, at 5:15 we were finally done and ready to head out when she asked us to attach the mirror to a dresser. After screaming serenity now a few times, I gathered my composure and tried to quickly attach the mirror. Not surprisingly it was a huge pain in the ass and eventually ended up breaking anyways because the furniture was crappy ass hell. By the time we were done it was 5:30 and we were still 20 minutes away from my class, serenity now. The scenery then turned into a blur as we maniacally maneuvered down the backcountry roads back to the highway.

Upon getting back on the last stretch of highway, we noticed all of the cars ahead of us were going abnormally slow. Eventually the road curved and we saw the impediment, a person riding a god damn scooter. I wanted to scream, cry and throw up all at the same time. Now this wasn't a normal moderately fast scooter that could keep up with the speeds of normal cars. This scooter made foot powered razor scooters look like fucking lamborghinis. And not only was it slow as shit, but it was being driven by the most oblivious fuck in the world. However after being behind them for 15 minutes, with 30 cars behind us screaming and honking, it finally occurred to this person that there may be other cars on the road and they pulled over. Now it was 5:50.

By the time we made it to my class, everyone was lingering outside on break. My arrival was greeted with hoots and exclamations as to how fucked I was. Thanks assholes. I hurriedly went inside, praying that the teachers would have pity and let me into the class. After 20 minutes of me laying on the ground sobbing and trying to explain my story, they finally told me to shut the fuck up, give them handjobs and let me in the class. Thank god. Nothing happened the rest of class and we ended up getting out only 10 minutes after I got there. Fuck.

Class #4
 
My fourth class was set up to be awful when I learned that my visiting girlfriend would arrive in the midst of my confinement. This news caused the expectedly terrible class to become twice as excruciating. Good thing my classmates are so consistently preposterous that their entertainment was sufficient to temporarily ward off my pending suicide. Here are the highlights.

The beginning of the class was relatively uneventful while everyone signed in and took the breathalyzer test. Then I saw the notorious gabba jamma lady. Semi-hidden in the corner of the room, she was sitting with her head limp against her chest as if she were either really tired or heavily drugged. I suspected the latter. Either way everyone else in the class was ignoring her, assuming she would come-to at the start of the class. Surprisingly to me, she did. Not surprisingly she started screaming in some sort of insane, incoherent redneck babble. Literally as soon as she lifted up her head up and took in her surroundings, turned to the teacher and asked a question in which she didn't say a single word in english. In contrast to when she asked about the gabba jammas, I couldn't even begin to come up with the spelling for any of the noises that came out of her mouth. This lady made Ozzy Osbourne sound like fucking Barack Obama. Not only was her original question incomprehensible but every fucking thing she said after that sounded less and less like anything. It was as if the speech control part of her brain was deteriorating before our eyes and it was god damn hilarious.

Meanwhile our teachers looked on in disbelief as she continued to ramble in a language only understandable by her and her meth induced invisible friends. I literally would have an easier time interpreting Van Morrison lyrics than trying to convey to you any of what she said. Eventually she tired herself out, gradually decreasing in volume and stature until she had her head once again flaccid at her chest, softly mumbling to herself. At this point the teachers were legitimately concerned at her well being and began to question how the fuck she drove herself there. But she was asleep so they decided to ignore her for the time being and attempt to proceed with the class.

Thinking back I actually have no fucking idea what we talked about after that so I probably spent the first half of the class contemplating the best way to swallow my tongue or if it was possible to slit my throat with a broken debit card. Eventually I zoned back in to hear an announcement for a break, and to see one of the teachers try to wake the gabba jamma lady from her meth coma. As everyone drifted outside to fulfill their nicotine lust, I stayed glued to my seat, hoping to see her start foaming from the mouth or turn into a zombie or something. Unfortunately the teacher spoke quietly to her and led her out of the room, leaving me bored and still unaware of what hilarious affliction she was enduring. As the rest of the class slowly trickled back into the room, that lady and one teacher were conspicuously absent. The other teacher then put in a fucking agonizing movie about how to hold an intervention for alcoholics. Though there were a few pretty great parts like when an old lady didn't know she had a broken arm cause she got so wasted all the time. And one about guy who wakes up at 8 am to go to work but instead decides to sit on the couch and drink a shitload of scotch, then call his wife a bitch for not calling in sick for him. hell yes. After the movie ended the teacher tried miserably to find something to talk about, but instead gave us another break. I took this opportunity to go talk to him about some stupid trash, i.e. suck his dick, cause i realized that if i become friends with these guys that they may be able to testify for me in court (on June 2) and relieve me of this hellish obligation. When the break ended the teacher told class about one of the questions I asked him and was met with blank stares. Regardless he spent the rest of the class going into the details of it cause he was at a loss for shit to talk about.

The final moment of hilarity occurred when we could hear talking in the hall, presumably about what was happening with the drugged out lady, until the one teacher went and closed the door. A hilarious old hippy/biker, who I suspect is whoring out the younger girls of the class (for a later discussion), then blatantly got up, went and opened the door solely for the purpose of hearing the conversation. The teacher was so shocked that he didn't even do anything and we got to hear how the lady was definitely completely fucked on a cocktail of sleeping pills and how she would need a state trooper to drive her home. The lady then attempted a muffled protest but was immediately led away, probably to have her psychosis waterboarded out of her. Yes.