WELL then.
I figgered it's about time I revealed what our weekend in Key West was like.
Fun. Mostly. If you've ever been on Duval Street during St. Patty's Day, you'll know you pretty much wear a silly grin the whole time. Unless you're taking a drink, that is; why let that beautiful Guiness go onto your shirt instead of into your belly, just because you're grinning like a mule eating saw-briars?
But back to the NOT-so-fun part. If you're wondering why this story is in this thread, well, there is a lot of my son in it, and he was the topic when this thread died out. You know, how danged PROUD we are of the li'l nipper, an' all.
WELL then.
He had one of his buddies that he's known since we were in Ft. Meade fly down here (we even bought him the ticket), and he accompanied us to Key West. Plan was to come back to Tampa and these two would go back to the other guy's house in Atlanta: my son wanted to move out and live on his own with his pal before leaving for the Army in July. Said youngster also recently joined the Army, so PV2
Blueskid and PV2
Bluesbuddy were going to spend some time together cruisin' the town. I told 'em to look out for each other and don't do nothin' dumb.
I should've taken my own advice.
Bluesbuddy shows up at our domicile at 0500 Sunday morning DEAD DRUNK, and
Blueskid is nowhere in sight. Both are 19; under-age for drinking.
Lt.
Bluesman and I head for Duval, last known location, with the absolute certainty that we're not going to be able to find him, no matter what's happened. We see a cop going into a diner, though, so we stop him to ask if he knows anything about it.
Now, there must've been over 300 cops on duty in Key West that night, and we run into the ONE GUY that picked up our son and threw him in the drunk tank. Oh, ain't I just the proud poppa?
ANYhoo, we went and got him later that morning, and he doesn't remember what happened, nor how he got all the scrapes on his back. According to the cop, he was found on a guy's front porch, bellowing for the guy to come out and fight him, and there's simply no way to know WHAT the hell was going on.
Bluesbuddy apparently had a similar adventure, as evidenced by the fat lip and busted front tooth.
Neither young soldier remembers anything after the first bar, and getting their fake IDs
taken away from them.
I gave 'em the Platoon Sergeant's Best Rip for about thirty minutes. After that, I gave 'em a serious talking-to about the 75,582 different ways that could've gone bad.
He's out of the house as of 1000 this morning. He's dam' lucky I let him go, and didn't either lock him in his room, or throw him out the door with just the clothes on his back, but he's gone now.
JAYZUS. What an absolutely Army thing to do. He's gonna fit right in.
