Law

I soon learned that almost everyone that lived in the Halfway House had at least a police record, and many were in the process of some form of adjudication. Megan and Jim were on probation as was Clint. Clint was charged with destruction of federal property after being caught four-wheeling on a closed National Forest Road. Jim took a DUI for Clint one night, and was also involved in an identity theft case in which he presented his brother's ID on the DUI arrest. How one can “take a DUI” I’m not quite sure, but rationalization is the lynchpin of friendship I guess. Megan had done jail time for dealing pot and was currently on probation for DUI. Sam got a DUI the day before he moved to Creede. I myself had been arrested on three occasions. Needless to say we were a little freaked out about the possibility of a search warrant being served at the house. Although my house, my roommates, co-workers and I all had a mixed reputation with the law; we had a tie that bound us all together and that was our ability to party hard night after night, and the necessity of rules in the house. Because two underage girls lived in the house and we were paranoid at the prospect of police involvement; there were a series of conditions on who could be at the house and if you disrespected the house you would be shown the door. I wondered what sort of relationship I would have with the local law enforcement this summer.

Tommies

My first night partying with my roommates was spent barhopping between OMI and Tommies one of the other bars in town. After some Jager and a lot of beer, we went to Tommies. Tommies was a bar right around the corner from the OMI owned by a couple of Okies from Stillwater. I quickly became friends with the dudes that worked there. That night our bartender Megan got fucking wasted and couldn’t even walk she was so drunk. She went into the bathroom at the bar and locked herself in the toilet. After about 30 minutes we had to grab the keys to unlock the door as other people were banging on it trying to get in. Jim and I carried Megan two blocks back to the house. She stumbled the entire way at one point tripping and twisting her ankle. When we got her home the underagers were partying hard and drinking whiskey. Megan fell in the middle of the floor and demanded some whiskey. Alesia poured her a shot which she inhaled. Once we got inside where it was light we realized that Megan had sprained her ankle pretty bad and had a cut that was pouring blood or what would pass for blood with the amount of alcohol in her system. Jim cleaned her up and Alesia took her to bed. Those of us drinking had a good laugh and knew that this would set the stage for some crazy nights the rest of the summer.

...the next installments are where it gets really good!

Creede

I drove 11 hours to Creede on 4 hours of sleep. The night before was spent dealing with my friend Clay who had gotten popped in the side of his head in a bar fight which resulted in two patrons throwing glass beer bottles at random through the bar on their way out. The town of Creede was as I remembered it, tiny with the most beautiful mountains I’d ever laid eyes on. I strolled into my friends’ bar and made myself at home sampling the western beverages that I remembered from my times in Bozeman. The bar was filled with an eclectic group of hippie types, working class folk, and bikers. My friends introduced me to the bartender whose name was Megan, as well as, many of the other local patrons. One could tell that Megan must have experienced some crazy things by the amount of respect others in the bar gave her. Whether the respect was warranted or not I would surely find out as Megan would be one of my roommates. Megan had a spirit about her that was hard to pinpoint, but she seemed to be dedicated to working relatively hard and partying much harder than most.

The bar was relatively busy that night with the highlight being a minor skirmish that resulted in a 325 pound old drunk getting dropped to the ground by the bouncer LJ who was at least a buck smaller than this obnoxiously drunk dude, who kept trying to befriend me all night but would then slip in these one liners as if he thought I didn't get the fact that he was trying to make fun of me (likely due to the length of my hair). It was as if I had brought the drama of the fight in Oklahoma City the night before with me to Creede. But the truth was that I had stepped into an environment in which drama was a given.

Home Improvement Projects at the Halfway House

My first night moving into the halfway house was uneventful except for the fact that Daniel had an old dusty amp which I needed to power my turntable. I found a choice Maranz amp for free, went home and hooked it up and it sounded great. I had a small collection of vinyl and a nice pair of 80’s Bose Interaudio speakers. I would be looking for vinyl for the next few weeks. I went to bed early, although I could hear Phil Collins “I Can Feel It in the Air of the Night” clearly through the wall from the stereo which was located on the upper floor of our brown double wide. The house I moved into was pretty filthy, downstairs had a peculiar smell; something of a combination of vomit and cleaning products and there were some suspect looking stains on the stairs. There were beer cans about and heaping ashtrays. I got to know more of my roommates throughout the next few days. Alesia a 19 year old local was a cook in the restaurant lived with Megan upstairs in the house. Megan, Alesia, and her younger sister Danni had stayed up until 4 that night partying and acting crazy, I could hear yelling at one point through my earplugs about how one of the girls loved cock and wasn’t into girls, I thought about getting up, but knew better. This would be a common theme, my lesbian roommates trying to hook up with girls in town. I needed sleep after partying with Daniel and Laura for the two days before I started work. I could only imagine how crazy the summer would be. I didn’t know what to expect coming to Colorado, I was keeping an open mind. I had partied quite a bit myself during my days, but had been very sober in New Zealand. I had learned to rely more on myself and to expect things to work out.

Mac’s Old Mine/OMI/Archibald’s Exchange

I started work the next day and worked in the kitchen the first day learning to roll dough and throw pizzas. This was certainly a change from the financial analysis I was doing in Austin albeit a welcome one. I had realized in my previous employment that sitting behind a computer for 8 hours a day was and is the most mind numbingly boring way to spend a day. The corporate/professional world could wait maybe forever for me. The next day I was pouring drinks and learning bar tending and by my second day serving I did $312 in sales and made $70. Daniel and Laura, my friends from college would be employing me as a manager at the bar and restaurant. I would be doing a little of everything, and had a lot, to learn. There were two really cute little waitresses Kate and Katie, one blond and one brunette. Katie was from Austin, Texas where I had been living before I had travelled to New Zealand and was 21. She was the one I had heard the night before defending her heterosexuality, in an estrogen permeated atmosphere. Kate was from Creed and was an under-ager. There were also two other waitresses Hadley who was dating a local law enforcement officer named Rory and Brooke who worked two jobs, supported her child and was into Malcolm one of the only two black dudes in town. Malcolm played in some local bands and ran Karaoke on Thursday at the restaurant. Two other bartenders worked at the bar both locals named Clint and Mel. Clint was a fourwheeling enthusiast with a souped up X-terra (this kind of says it all) and basically represented the entire local male contingency in the town, and Mel sang with the local bands. Jim and Sam were cooks at the restraunt and also lived in the Halfway House. Sam was also from Austin and was dating Dannielle from Monte Vista, CO a few hours from Creede. Sam and Danielle lived in the room next to mine and were rumored to have some loud sex on occasion, but it never was a problem for me. Jim was a 40 year old with the heart of an 18 year old that claimed to have had more experience with every sort of situation, hairstyle (including the perm mullet he sported), and hard drug we could encounter. Jim had lived in Creede for around 3 years and knew just about everybody in Creede. He literally walked into town on the Colorado Trail from Denver and never left.

more to come...

AD replaces LT for biggest current badass in the NFL (with Randy Moss) close behind. Let me remind you how much I've talked up AD since his days in the crimson & creme. Let those Dickerson comments be vindicated and exceeded. Here's to 296 yards in a game!

Ok so here's the first installment. It all starts a little slow as I got to meet people and is told in 3rd person. I thought about changing names but I might as well just let it fly. It gets funnier and crazier by the day

Mis-adventures at the Halfway House

A Creede Chronical

Once I decided to move I knew it would be a totally different experience. After quitting my job and going to New Zealand and ending a relationship I knew that new relationships would be very important. Creede, Colorado was to be my new home; I would be employed by some friends from college. I would be a shift manager at the long-standing miners bar in town. This after quitting my first “real” job fresh out of graduate school; financial analysis might have been a little to ambitious of an undertaking for a male in his mid 20’s. So I settled on managing a bar during the height of the tourist season. My restaurant experience amounts to having washed dishes at a banquet hall in Oklahoma City when I was 16. This would be a whole new ball-game. Not to say that I haven’t worked in the service industry before, I have been a bicycle mechanic more on than off in the last decade. Life is about cycles, and I was about to enter a new cycle in my life.

I knew that taking time off work as an American was as close to un-American in the post 9-11 landscape as could be. But the service industry is one of the few markets that has remained strong in America. Consumerism is king. So what better way to come back to America after traveling abroad and reintegrate myself to the US than by living in a tiny town of 500 which blossoms to about 10,000 during the peak of summer tourist season. Mind you I would be living in a place that is surrounded by the mountain ranges which separate the waters flowing east and west. This was going to be a totally new beginning and a summer I would likely never forget. I was girlfriendless for the first time in 6 years and on my own, I had saved a bit of money before traveling and would have to make a decision sometime about what I want to do next. But that could wait, for a summer that would prove one of the craziest of my life.

Halfway House

The house where I was to live in Creede was $175 a month and there lived 6 other service industry employees. I am no stranger to cheap accommodation after spending 2 months living with my ex-girlfriend in a camper van and numerous similar situations of living in 600 square feet or less in the past several years. My previous living experiences included massive flying roaches, filth, meth dealer neighbors, and numerous floods both sewage and otherwise. The frat house had to be the most disgusting, and so I knew I would be able to “handle it”. What I didn’t know was that I was to step into a new world. I would be living in the “Halfway House”. What I quickly learned is that at least half of my co-housemates were on probation and currently trying to steer clear of the law’s eye, while hiding out in one of the most notorious trailers in the town. Proof positive of this point was that one day before I was to move in a search warrant was served at the house; not for the current residents, but due to a previous resident who had hidden stolen property in the room directly next to the one in which I would live. This was going to be an adventure.