Lily's last fireworks

2005 REWIND - THE YEAR IN DRINKING

JULY

For the second straight year, I spend Fourth of July in my friend Emma's backyard. Attendance comes and goes all day, but the comic MVP is my buddy Greg "GTO" Oakes, who's been babysitting his wife and her friend from out of town all weekend. The wife makes me promise to get Greg trashed, since he so clearly deserves it, and a trip to the convenience store yields two pints of Jagermeister and a four-pack of Red Bull. On top of the twelve pack he's already consumed.

With an apparently razor-sharp Frisbee, Greg manages to decapitate a porcelain yard gnome and then insist on paying for it.

EMMA'S MOM: Don't be silly, just put it over by the garage and I'll Superglue it.
GTO: Nope, I'm buying you a new gnome. I insist. I just need an estimate, a price check on a gnome. Price check on a gnome, please!

Then, while running backward to retrieve a giant beach ball, Greg knocks a board loose in Emma's decades-old wood fence and yells for her boyfriend.

GTO: Johnny! Johnny! Need a hammer! Johnny! Hammer! I'm serious! Dead serious about the hammer, buddy!

Then, as we're watching a fireworks display from the roof of the Ameristar Casino, Greg manages to bellow louder than the fireworks themselves.

FIREWORK: Boom!
GTO: D'ja guys see that one? They call that one the Cincinnatti Sizzler!
FIREWORK: Eeee-eeee-eeee-eeee!
GTO: Hear that one whistle? That's the Birmingham Banshee! Huge in the South!
FIREWORK: Kablow!
GTO: That green one, that one's pricey! It's imported from Ireland! The Dublin Detonator!

Greg is concerned with making sure Johnny's decrepit grandmother Lily, who's sitting on a stool three cars over, gets to see every firework.

GTO (yells): Like that last one, Lily? Sure you got a good view?
LILY (yells back): I can see fine.
GTO (whispers): Just wanna make sure she has a good time. This might be her last fireworks.

Lily will pass away in December, and Greg will walk around for weeks after, shaking his head and saying somberly, "I killed that poor woman."

We head into the casino after the fireworks, and Greg sucks down three double Screwdrivers in twenty minutes time. Then latches onto a sixtyish black woman who keeps hitting Showcase Showdown bonuses on The Price Is Right nickel slots.

GTO: Pick the deodorant! Pick the deodorant!
BLACK LADY (picks the deodorant)
SLOT MACHINE (dings with victory)
GTO: You got it, sista!

Greg passes out in the back of Jason's car upon our return from the casino - not the back seat, the actual hatchback area - but regains his comic poise as we sit around Emma's pool and watch Johnny's makeshift fireworks display. Johnny has rows of storebought fireworks set up on two sheets of sawhorse-supported plywood, and GTO has a one-liner handy after each firework.

The police soon arrive to break up the proceedings and promise to arrest the homeowners and issue disturbing-the-peace summons for all the guests if we don't quit with the fireworks and head inside. The fireworks cease, but we continue our horseplay in the pool for another three hours, and Greg somehow makes it to work at eight the next morning.