Yucca

Like My Local E, I too attended Ill of Bill's BBQ extravaganza. Well, the whole thing wasn't really his, but I digress.

Beer is not my thing, as some of you may know, and I am accustom to seeking out alcoholic alternatives at events where beggars really can't be choosers, since the food and beverage is gratis. Alas, my choices were quite limited, my choice that is. One, singular option. Yucca.

If you've never had Yucca, allow me to describe it. Imagine the sweetest, summer-invoking, lemon-flavored, cold beverage you can; then put a ridiculous amount of Vodka in it and serve it to the upturned mouths of others from a glass jar that has a button-operated pour spout in its base that only you can control! Yes, well, I drank it by the glassful.

You might think to yourself, "She must really know her co-workers and feel quite comfortable to drink so heavily while among them." Ha! I've been working with them for a little over two weeks! Am I an idiot or what? No, actually not yet; idiocy comes later.

I drank; I ate; I conversed with many. Burrito seemed to be enjoying himself. All was good with my world. I decided that now would be a great time to go get to know our fearless leader better because he too was drinking Yucca by the glass! So I engaged him in conversation, about fishing. An easy conversation topic, I think. I find that most people, especially guys, immeadiately relax when you talk to them about fishing, particularly when you ask them to give you fishing tips and advice. Perhaps it is partially the gentle stroking of the ego that is so enjoyable, as we all know a man likes nothing better than to have his ego stroked, or perhaps it was that connection between fishing and relaxation that simply talking about fishing can invoke. I know not which to blame for our instant friendship, for we spoke at length as we walked to the mechanical bull pen.

Yes, we walked to the mechanical bull pen. Another coworker of mine, who I shall affectionately refer to as The Cowboy, decided he would ride the mechanical bull for our pleasure. I have no idea what he had been drinking. When we arrived at the pen, The Cowboy was nowhere to be seen, but my fellow ex-English teacher, My Local E, was being strapped into a bungie contraption that on a normal day, in a normal state of mind, I would never dream of allowing anyone, even a couple of cute, young, cowboy-hat-and-boots-wearing guys, to strap me into. But she looked like she was having so much fun!

I am that person, who when visiting relatives in Atlanta, saw a gyroscope in a mall courtyard and thought, "Oh, what fun!" I am that same person who could not walk straight for three days after I spent 2.6 seconds on that gyroscope. I learned a very important lesson that day: I don't do well with amusement rides.

That night, I learned another lesson: Yucca negates all previously learned life lessons.

So, as this young guy in a ten-gallon hat strapped my thighs into a bungie harness with a shit-eating grin on his cute little face, I felt nothing but elation. As I bounced up and down on this trampoline, I felt nothing but thrilled. As the guy with the wry smile pulled my feet down and tightened the bungie cords so I'd bounce higher and higher, I felt futher excited. As I realized that I could do backflips if I pulled down on the cords and threw my knees toward my head, I became seriously amused and obsessed with doing as many as I possibly could.

Now, I began to notice that the adolescents who had also been bouncing up and down to my left and right, had been replaced with new adolescents. Yet, I was allowed to bounce on. And bounce on I did, through what amounted to three rotations of various adolescents bouncing up and down to my sides during their turns on the bungie/trampoline cowboy ride. My legs grew numb and my breathing slightly labored, as if I had been running for some extended period of time for no real logical reason. I began to become concerned. How long was the cute guy going to leave me here, I thought.

I can only assume that he was telepathic as, at that very moment, he came to release my thighs from the infernal contraption.
He walked up to me and said, "You're tired, ain't you?"
"Yes," I replied.
He let me down and walked close to untether me. He grabbed one thigh, looked me dead in the face and said, "Feel like you just had rough sex, don't you?"

Why yes, yes I do, I thought.

"You really like your job, don't you?" is what I actually said.

I stumbled away from the bungie ride and the forward, cowboy boots guy, stumbled because my thighs were numb mostly, and found Burrito. We then found our group at the rock wall, where our fearless leader who had succumb to the wily wares of the Yucca was engaged in his own harnessing. Someone, I'm certain, had challenged him to climb what appeared to be about a 30- foot rock wall, a wall, I would have to guess, that would have given him no problems on a good day. But today was not a good day. I feel somewhat sorry for him. Particularly now as he asked me yesterday how my head had felt Saturday morning. I told him it had not been too bad. It had been the residual dizziness and my extraordinarily sore muscles that had delivered to me the last laugh of the Yucca. He chuckled at me, shook his head, and said, "That damn Yucca!"

Indeed.