I have a confession to make. I know this may come as a shock, but sometimes I bring external beverages into the movies. Not just any beverage either, but wine. Jesus Juice, as Micheal Jackson put it. Cougar fuel. Nectar of the gods.
It doesn’t matter if the glass is half empty or half full. There’s clearly room for more wine.
I know, I know, it's shameful of me. I'm supposed to buy a half-gallon of Diet Coke at the snack bar for $17, and therefore I'm cheating the movie theater out of much needed revenue. Well, I say that the movie theaters should be ashamed of themselves, selling fountain drinks and shitty popcorn at a 10,000% mark up. But the truth is, I usually still get that giant barrel of Diet Coke, along with my illicit contraband. It's win-win. It also means I spend the last 30 minutes of the movie doing the seated pee-pee dance.
The fatal flaw in my plan.
Some movie theaters sell booze now, so I don't pull my little smuggling game all that often anymore, but sometimes I still do. It's just so fun for some reason. I think it's the danger. Sneaking it past the sharp eyes of that pimply-faced guy who takes your ticket and tells you which theater your film is in takes nerves of steel.
It's so thrilling to stare such grave danger in the face and get away with it. I don't know, maybe I'm just an adrenaline junkie. I mean, it's either this or learn how to skydive in one of those wing suits. Not only is it super fun to do, it greatly improves the watchability of some movies that I have been tricked into seeing. Bridget Jones's Baby springs to mind. Ugh.
The actual sneaking of the wine isn't rocket science, but I have learned that every method has its pros and cons. Some sort of obvious basics: no corks--only screw caps, you'll also need plastic wine glasses (only alcoholics drink wine from the bottle), and you should wait until the previews start and the lights are lowered before you start breaking out the booze.
Toilet Wine
They sell wine in cartons these days, easy for sneaking and disposable--but it's usually some sort of ass-wine that tastes like it was funneled into the carton using the butt-crack of a sweaty water buffalo. A pretty big negative.
Some brands sell single-servings in cute little glass bottles, but then you're left trying to walk in with these little bottles clinking against each other. Also, the wine gets warm quickly in these bottles, and I'm a very discerning sneaky boozer.
This turned out to be a very useful gift.
A really good method I have used requires a good coffee thermos and a female companion with a large purse. I've carried it in myself in my jacket, but that's a pretty risky move, because a dude that looks like me with a large metal object hidden under his coat looks a little bit threatening to some people. I suppose I could carry a purse, but I just don't think I could pull that look off. On the plus side, it keeps the wine perfectly chilled and comes with its own cup. The bad news is you still have to sneak it back out.
My current favorite smuggling method is to pour a bottle of wine into a nalgene water bottle. It still gets a little warm after a while, but much more slowly than the little bottles. Also, it looks a little less incriminating, and makes less noise.
So there you go. Wine Smuggling 101. I just spent two hours explaining drinking wine secretly in movie theaters, and it was great. Didn't think of the dumpster fire that is our presidential election once during that entire time. I actually wrote this a week ago, but didn't publish because...I guess because who gives a crap? Anyway, if you're reading it, I think we both need to get out more.
I live in Baltimore, and I like it. Yes, that Baltimore. The one with the riots. Remember the TV show The Wire? The setting of The Wire is now where I live. They call it "Charm City" here in town. I used to find that funny, but I've come around to a different attitude.
The Marine Corps sent me here to work at a reserve battalion headquartered in the city. I wasn't crazy about it, but the Marine Corps calls them "orders" for a reason, so here I am. It's a command position, and I was happy to get it, but still.
For some reason, I had the idea there might be violence.
I mean I'd driven through the city a few times, while living in Virginia. I even had a previous girlfriend who tried to get me to like it, but I was having none of it. I found it dirty, crowded, and noisy. So when I found out I was moving to this dangerous and dirty place, I had a bit of a bad attitude about it. When I saw the riots on TV (two months before moving), I developed an even worse one.
The approach most previous Marines in my position have taken is to just avoid the problem by commuting to Baltimore and living someplace else, and this was the path I intended to take as well. But then there was this little niggle... I was a country boy from the Deep South. I have never lived in a big city. The Marine Corps was offering me an adventure, and I would be a real fool to pass up an experience like that by living in the freaking suburbs. So I did it. I rented a row house in the Canton neighborhood with a rooftop deck, and proceeded to fall in love with Baltimore.
One of the two pistol bullets I found on my deck.
It wasn't all rainbows and unicorns, I'll admit. There's a police helicopter that flies overhead constantly. There's a couple of seedy bars frequented by ancient alcoholics nearby, so sometimes they'll decide to pass out on your front stoop, leave an empty bottle of Wild Irish Rose on the steps, shuffle slowly down the center of the street, or some other such hilariousness. Once a drunk, scrawny old geezer with no shirt and a carpet of dirty gray chest hair pounded on my front door at 2 in the morning demanding that we "fight it out." I hear gunfire, every once in a while. I try to convince myself it was fireworks, but I've been in the Marines for 26 years, and I know damn well it's gunfire. I even found a 9mm pistol projectile on my rooftop deck. Twice, that's happened, actually. My truck has been broken into several times, and it was stolen last Thanksgiving. It was recovered a few weeks later, with an empty gas tank, a partially used box of condoms, and some baby socks (not kidding). Visiting the Baltimore City impound lot is an experience, by the way. Not an experience like at Disney World, either.
60 acres of sadness.
Condoms and baby socks?
At least they left my safety glow belt behind. Thank God.
But even with all of this, I have to admit, I like living here. I have a great rooftop deck, with views of the whole eastern part of the city, all the way to the harbor. I have never much enjoyed jogging, but I do it now because I can run from my doorstep along the waterfront and it's just beautiful. Unless you look closely at the water of course, where there's often so much trash floating that I can't stop picturing the old crying Indian commercial from the '70's.
But even the trash has a silver lining. I learned about a thing called Mr. Trash Wheel, a funny little invention that picks up the trash from the water and is just as charming as shit. I was so charmed I donated a bunch of money to the fund to build a second one in my neighborhood, and those of you who know me know how rare that is. So then there I was, being a part of things...
Mr. Trashwheel
I mean, whoever thought of adding the eyes--GENIUS.
This new job I took in Baltimore, it's working as the Inspector-Instructor of a reserve Marine battalion. The Marine Corps Reserve is pretty well known for its Christmas charity, Toys for Tots. Perhaps you've heard of it.
It's a pretty popular charity and a lot of businesses and civic groups donate to it. When they hold their big publicity events, they all want a few Marines in dress blues to show up. So we get inundated with requests for Marines to do all sorts of terrible duty, like going to NFL games, attending parties, etc. Of course at those events you're treated like a celebrity, with free drinks, lots of female attention, etc. But believe it or not, I have a hard time finding enough Marines to cover these events. Anyway, it came to pass that I finally got on one of these difficult assignments personally--judging the Parade of Lights in Baltimore's Inner Harbor, which if you've never heard of it, is when a bunch of people decorate their boats for Christmas, get drunk, and drive around the harbor. Yes, it's as fun as it sounds.
I'm the really attractive one.
My job was to show up at the Polish Home Club in my dress blues, mingle with some old Polocks, and then to go out and stand on a little boat while all the drunks come by in their boats, dancing and singing and being drunk. A unique experience, I think.
The most handsome judge of lighted boats.
I drank hot cider spiked with rum, I gave my completely unqualified opinion vis-à-vis boats decorated with Christmas lights, and had a great time. So, Baltimore was starting to win me over.
There's also a festival every time you turn around in Baltimore. There's HonFest, The Running Festival, the Baltimore Whiskey Festival, SpringFest, Beer, Bourbon and BBQ Festival, Saint Patrick's Day (big here), Fells Point Pirate Festival, Kinetic Sculpture Race, Wine Festival...the list goes on and on. Add to that an almost total lack of the kind of douchebags that DC is overrun with--You know the guys I mean--the ones in salmon-colored pants and popped collars.
If you see me in salmon pants,
please kick me in the balls.
Baltimore scares these kinds of people away, I think. And for that, I thank you.
Couple all of this with the many great restaurants where you can always find a table, that an Uber shows up at my door 3 minutes after I order it, and the fact that I can walk to something like 50 bars from my house, and Baltimore succeeded in winning my heart, in spite of my prejudices (and the grand theft auto).
