What I’m Expecting From My First Ever Trip To New Orleans This Weekend

Rob Fox10 years ago

To die? Truth be told, this isn’t setting up well for me. A bachelor party in New Orleans with half the TFM office and the groom’s drunken, Lone Star and whiskey guzzling, extremely Texan cousins and friends? The last time I went away on a bachelor party with that sort of lineup – in Chicago with my fraternity brothers — I ended up having to chug Red Bulls and Five Hour Energies just to keep what was at that point more my corpse than my body animated, after a day of drinking so aggressive that the first three hours alone would have knocked most people unconscious, all so that I could continue breaking bottles in bars and accosting strangers for drunken shits and gigs. And that was just in Chicago, which, though a great drinking city, seems like Mayberry compared to New Orleans.

My liver hurts just thinking about this weekend. It’s a mysterious, sharp pain; as if there’s some voodoo woman pricking a doll made in my likeness (made out of white sheets and stuffed with, I don’t know? Candy? As symbolism for my general immaturity?) right in the liver, because she had a vision of a blackout drunk me taking a dump on the table she reads tarot cards on.

Just kidding. Someone taking a dump on your property is a standard Tuesday in New Orleans, from what I’ve heard. Yesterday I was having a discussion with Dorn and NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLING AUTHOR W.R. Bolen about the differences between Vegas and New Orleans, what I would consider to be America’s two best party cities (Sorry New York, fuck off Miami). I said I was most excited for New Orleans because, although Vegas was fun, it’s a very clearly a manufactured sort of entertainment. Vegas is basically fake tits, and all the positives and negatives some giant, man-made sweater cannons entail. To me, New Orleans seems more organic; the fun seems more natural.

“You’re right,” Bolen replied. “Vegas is fake. But New Orleans is too fucking real.”

Even though I’ve never been, that seems like a perfect, and thus terrifying, way to describe New Orleans. I wrote a similar “What I Expect” type column before visiting The Grove at Ole Miss last year. That preview was more a facetious romanticizing than anything. If I walked into The Grove with arms open, I’m probably walking onto Bourbon Street with my eyes open. That’s partly because I don’t want to forget any of the ridiculous shit I see, and partly because it seems like a good idea to keep your head on a swivel when you’re down there, lest you want a tranny to pull a switchblade out of his fishnet stockings and jack your shit.

That’s not even made up. Got this text from one of my fraternity brothers today.

The famous home of the Hurricane, Pat O’Brien’s, also promised to kick my ass this weekend.

So what do I expect from this weekend?

1. Gratuitous nudity (and not just because the party is paying two nice ladies to hostess a beer pong tournament topless Saturday afternoon).
2. Meeting the real life personification of the funniest mental image I have of a hooker.
3. Seeing at least three different types of bodily fluids being expelled from people (likely in public).
4. A drug deal gone wrong.
5. A drug deal gone right.
6. TFM’s three highest-ranking employees to blackout harder than anyone else on at least one of the nights (especially the CEO).
7. Someone doing something in front of a police officer that would get you tazed and cuffed in most cities, and being ignored.
8. So. Many. Strippers.
9. My happiness to vanish in a casino.
10. Someone getting fucked up on something that’s main purpose is not for recreational ingestion.
11. Ruining at least one pair of shoes.
12. To be suspicious about pretty much anything I drink.
13. But to really not care about it, either.
14. Anyone who texts me to be ignored, to receive gibberish in return, or to deserve an apology on Monday for whatever I responded with.
15. And at least a 50% chance my AmEx has a large charge that I really, REALLY fucking regret on Monday.

Mostly I expect to make a fantastic ass of myself. If you see me, buy me a shot to fuel the fire. Also do that because I’ll probably be drunk enough to buy you like five in return. But hey, fuck it. As long as the wedding isn’t ruined by Sunday we’re good. I probably shouldn’t be the one in charge of that though.