80's Parties

They happen all the time. All over the country. Its theme is almost as well known as Halloween, St. Patrick’s Day or the Fourth of July. But the 80's party is a completely different animal. The 80's party is not for the weak party goer. And you realize this early, exactly when you done one of the most ridiculous get ups of all time.

Who goes to 80's parties? Those who want shit to go down. Everything will need to go over the top, in one way or another. In fact, by just labeling something as "80's" it pretty much will guarantee that someone will be on drugs, someone will be naked, and at some point, however brief, you think the cops just might show up.

When you wake up the next day you think “There was no way that was real. That could not have happened". That is when you spy the camera. Someone, in their infinite wisdom, has brought a device that will chronicle the past events in graphical detail. This is typically a girl, who also is also most likely hosting the 80's party since planning and decorating are not guy activities. This device will be desired immediately after the party with a fervor that is almost inhuman by those who will be hoping to hold on to whatever dignity they have left. Fortunately, the host knows this, and typically gets to the camera first.

What is on that phone is a human train wreck. People all kinds of mangled, smiles that beam with insanity, eyes half open and unable to comprehend what is actually happening. Because everyone....EVERYONE who showed up in that ridiculous outfit went and got absolutely hammered. Dancing, drinking, drugs, and sex. The 80’s were just the quintessential party era, and it gets re-lived on a pretty regular basis.

This story is about my recent experience. It was grand, it was crazy. It made so much and so little sense at the same time my head nearly exploded. It started officially at 6 pm.

I've known about this party for probably a month. I had requested off work, I had intended to go, yet I had put zero effort into the costume aspect. This is okay, because I have at least one hour before I have to go over to my friends place and I have knowledge of where the Goodwill is. Goodwill and the thrift stores across America are the one stop shop for any kind of vintage costume. You can typically find ten to fifteen items that will work within ten minutes of simple browsing. I have decided on an old sky blue Nike running t-shirt and a pair of turquoise shorts made by Speedo. I did not initially think the shorts were swimming trunks, wrongly assuming that in years past Speedo was branched out and made types of pants that were not intended for swimming. However this would later prove fortuitous as I later learned there would be a hot tub at the house. I then picked up a set of glasses and wore my running shoes and 'bam': I was 80's jogger guy. (Except my shorts were swim trunks, but they certainly accomplish the look of jogger guy.)

Needless to say, as you put on your assembled outfit, you begin to realize just how over the top the shit is going to be. It has to be this way out of necessity because as you look in the mirror you cannot believe what you are actually wearing. And once you know how absurd you look, you know that the binge must occur, for no other reason than to settle your nerves and make you feel comfortable wearing tight, obnoxiously loud clothing.

As I arrive at George Michaels house (not his real name, WAS his real costume), I’m immediately offered a gravity bong hit. This is not where the party is, rather, George Michael will be driving me to said party since he has been to the house before and apparently not even the power of a GPS can direct me there. I accept the gratuitous hit of pot and proceed to watch a little bit of the Lakers game and talk to George about how I feel about wearing very short shorts and really hope I might be better off just staying with my sweat pants on.

The drive is about 20 minutes and we are one of the first to arrive. We are greeted by George Michaels girlfriend, who looks like an older version of one of the girls from Kids Incorporated, and friend who I can't really remember real well, but resembled some kind of grizzled hillbilly who also loved marijuana, but not as it appeared to enjoy brushing his teeth or getting haircuts. He seemed nice enough, but clearly was more into George Michael’s girlfriend than he should have been, but George did not appear to be threatened by this behavior. George Michael seemed way more interested in entering and getting out of the cold.

The house was large. I was told it was a big place but in reality I had no idea what to expect. I haven't been to a big house for a party in a long, long time, having recently been spending most of my party time at small college apartments and town houses or bars. The house had wood flooring for the most part, and in reality the whole of the house is wood. It feels like a giant, deluxe edition of a Lincoln log cabin. Hippies would probably love this place.

As I enter the main room, accompanied by George Michael, his girlfriend, and Grizzle, I am being warned by George Michael that these people are a little on the young side. This is fine by me, for although I’m 26 now, my maturity level is approximately lagging by 4 years. As I look across the crowd and see the other party goers I now know that I definitely will not quite fit in. There is a guy wearing a Boy George outfit, who seems like he has quite the personality, but unfortunately also quite the gut. He will later become part of the life blood of the party, crushing shots and beer like it was his job, and dancing throughout. There is a young couple, who I think literally just got out of high school and clearly need to split up, because they are not quite prepared for what happens to people right after high school. With new found abilities to acquire booze, pot, and other assorted nefarious goods that seemed way out of reach when living with your parents, after high school is the first time to really expand you mind about what it is to live and make decisions. This is not conductive to a relationship in the slightest. There are more, but I’ll get to them later. Right now, I’m taking off my pants.

I'm taking off my sweatpants, making sure to smile and laugh because I’m nervous as shit, and it seems to put everyone else at ease. I'm a 6'3, 230 pound man at this point and not in any way on the small side. I've often been described as intimidating, which I find terrible because I want to often be seen as very kind and friendly. My mind and body could not possibly be at further ends of the spectrum. Because it is January, and it is very very cold right now. The lack of pants now seems like a huge mistake. I literally feel like I may play up the jogging man angle just to keep warm, and will at no point attempt to go outside. Instead I suggest a game of pong. Everyone just looks at me like I'm crazy. I know none of these people, with the lone exception of George Michael and his girlfriend. So I'm met with no eye contact and one guy angrily says his beer isn't here yet.

This is no good. I need to get drunk. I need it in a hurry. I don't want to start shot gunning beers or using the beer bong or begin taking shots because that's just what either rookies or alcoholics do. I need George Michael. George Michael knows at least half of these people. He must begin the pong. Thankfully he comes up the steps from the basement and also asks if anyone wants to play. This gets people in motion. Because George Michael is older, and probably cooler than everyone else, and they know George Michael.

As we begin to play, I team up with GM. and we start with typical early rust. Failing several times to hit the starting cup. This is of course due to the sober rule of beer pong, where it is literally impossible to hit a cup without taking a drink first. That ping pong ball might as well be air in your hand. And trying to throw air accurately is not possible. Eventually, after sipping on a beer I had in my off hand, I hit one cup, then another, then three, and then George Michael hits his first. All of a sudden I realize we are an unbeatable team. This proves to be mostly true. We win 5 straight games and several go to the wire and we decide it may be best to stop, since it's roughly 9 pm and we are already drunk. We decide on the resignation from the pong table. This actually has a dual purpose. I don't want to get drunk too early, and George Michael wants to smoke more. I kind of want to smoke, but more than that i want to take it easy and keep my wits about me. Because at this point I decide I really want to watch the oncoming train wreck more than experience it.

As we walk towards George Michael's girlfriends room, we are introduced to her cats, and I'm reminded how much I like cats. I have no real basis for liking cats except for that in my extreme youth, I read a ton of Garfield books. I thought Garfield was cool as shit, and thus all cats would be cool as shit. This is not a great reason, but I think that would be where my fondness of cats probably began. I think if I had watched lassie first, or read an equally funny comic about a dog, perhaps I'd be a dog guy first. I also wonder if anyone else thinks about this kind of shit but I doubt it.

We return upstairs, and now I'm feeling real good. Some girls are dancing, and somehow a circle forms. I don't know why circles always form when dancing but they do. I think it's some kind of weird ritual that is subconsciously handed down within human nature, no different than birds flying south for the winter. We like watching other people dance, no matter how bad it may be. I get peer pressured into the middle. I have no idea how, although the drugs and alcohol probably have something to do with it. I dance for what seems like hours, by myself in the middle of a circle. It was probably 2 minutes.

As the song finishes i head to get a shot. Someone then brings to my attention that there are moonshine soaked cherries. Now i have never had such a thing before and I'm the kind of guy that has a really hard time saying 'No' to new forms of fucking myself up. So i agree that moonshine cherries will definitly suffice since I see no jagermeister.

The taste was like nothing I've ever had before, and I seriously do believe it was a true moonshine, because it felt more like some kind of serum that doctors are dreaming up. I had either taken some serious form of booze or tried mystery cough syrup designed to kill water buffalo.

Now the party has picked up. Roughly 35 to 50 people were now throwing down drinks at a near record pace. 3 handles of liquor are gone and people are scrambling to locate beer. One kid leaning against a stove inexplicably just lost it and fell straight to the ground like he just got shot by invisible bullets. Soon after, someone decided, on their lonesome, that it was time to hit the hot tub. He was the only one, and I immediately felt bad for this guy. He wanted the hot tub, but jumped the gun on it. Hot Tubs, while greatly need the perfect situation to get into. You can't just say "I'm going to the hot tub" and go and expect everyone else to join. So when George Michael passed the guy and asked him how he was doing, he seemed pissed.

"Well everyone said they wanted to go to the hot tub but nobody fucking showed". This is probably because that guy kept asking if people wanted to go to the hot tub. You don't ask that question. You just suggest it, and if people are dropping their shit to get to the tub then it'll happen. If they say "Yah probably, in a bit" and then take another swig of Sailor Jerry, you will no doubt be that guy ends up all by himself in the hot tub.

Now the dance floor has become the proving ground. Dudes are break dancing, and the pong table is being danced on by a professional motorcyclist lacking a shirt. At some point there appeared to be a lack of shot glasses and instead of asking the host if they could use something from a cubboard, someone decided that the candles laying around were roughly the right size for a shot glass. This would later give me a strange sense of happiness that the people loved to get super fucked up but had enough respect for the host that they would not go into a cubboard, or even ask to. Instead, they chose waxy shots of watermelon vodka.

I am laughing hysterically pointing this shit out to anyone in my vicinity. Which at this point been is either a) A really hot girl who finds me amusing, but probably too weird and old to really go for it now, b) A wall flower that's drunk as shit and still insightful BUT still super insecure about acne, their weight, or both or c) one of the guys who thinks he's cool and finds me mildly threatening due to my size and wants me to stop talking to the hot girl that he may or may not be fucking.

As I'm laughing, a girl comes up to me and grabs me by my shorts, hard. Like about as aggressive as I've ever been grabbed by strange girl. She says something i cannot decipher but included 'body, upstairs, and party.' to which I said..."excuse me?" hoping that in someway this would result in non blacked out sex. This would not be the case, as I was then promptly asked if i wanted to do Xanex and Red Bull. This girl was absolutely out of her mind and wanted to know if I wanted to get on her level. This is the aforementioned point where it briefly crosses my mind, that maybe, even in this remote mansion/cabin, the cops may just come by.

I decline the offer and ask if she's ok. Someone says she was passed out earlier and woke up, like some kind of partying zombie. Later in the night she would ask again if I wanted to party and do shots. I agreed to shots but confessed that I doubted that there was any alcohol left.

"Oh no, there's this red stuff." I looked down in terror to see she had picked up a bottle of grenadine, which to a young blacked out girl could be confused with a bottle of some kind of liquor.

"No no, I know what that is. That is definitely not alcohol, and you should not drink it." She looks at me like I'm somehow trying to stop her from having fun. Like it's somekind of ingrediant she couldn't handle. "So you don't want this?" she repeats.

"I most certainly do not, and neither do you."

After a pause of considering that I am not her partying enemy she puts down the bottle. I feel tired and head down to my futon, for seeing the amount of bodies still standing and not getting home, optimal sleep conditions would be at a premium. I finally put my sweatpants back on and slumber. It is roughly 3:30 in the mourning. The amount of insane things I've seen over the past 9 or so hours is mind boggling, and will clearly not be forgotten anytime soon.

I awake 6 hours later to the haunting smell of bacon. George Michael's girlfriend has gone through the trouble of making breakfast for everyone, which to be sure is one of the nicest offers i've ever heard of after such an epic party. What i find most interesting is how much closer everyone is post party. We all saw each other in such ridiculous states of inebriation that we will never mention this to anyone ever again. (except me, undercover journalistic integrity, or I'm an ass, whichever.) All in all, it was a fantastic journey, one i'm not sure that I'll revisit, but certainly one that should be done at least once in a life time. Excess should always be done in moderation. I also notice some grenadine on the floor which was not there when I fell asleep.