Aside: Janie Crawford is the main character from "Their Eyes Were Wacthing God". Don't worry, I didn't actually remember the main character's name from "Their Eyes Were Watching God". I don't remember anything about that book, except that it was the worst assigned reading I had to choke through in high school. In college, the worst was the first piece of assigned reading: "Refuge". This memoir has two parallel plots: one is about a mother and daughter who struggle against breast cancer; the other is about a dying wildlife sanctuary in Utah. Gaaaah.
I don't know when someone will finally get around to writing a high-school-assigned-reading-style novel about me, but future author take notice: I had my worldview-shaping moment this past Wednesday.
Since graduating from the fake world, I have been unable to answer the tough questions. OMG, what do I want to do with my life? OMG, what am I truly passionate about? OMG, do I believe in MG? OMG, is that song Death Cab For Cutie? I was lost. I was unsure what really mattered.
Enter The Honest Godfather (THG). Actually, enter THB. THG was already there, there being Boston Beer Works at 6:30pm on Wednesday, April 1, 2009. Celtics vs Bobcats in t-minus-one-hour. I was so busy talking to people I already know that I almost turned a cold shoulder on the smartest guy in the room. Thankfully, THG was not deterred. THG saw the disciple in me, crying out for guidance. He slapped me on the shoulder, and said eight words I'll never forget: "I'm going to be on the Jumbotron tonight".
How could he be so certain? I looked him over. I had to admit: he was Jumbrotron material. It wasn't so much the shoes: white, worn in Asics. It wasn't so much the jeans: a light shade of denim that none of the cool kids wear anymore and cut in a style that tapers in to the ankle ("white Asics sneaker cut" is the technical term, I think). It wasn't so much the jersey: a green Larry Bird (jersey 33, as noted by the Light Funky Ones) paired with a t-shirt of the exact same shade of green. A really nice jersey - don't get me wrong - but you don't stand out in a Celtics jersey at a Celtics game. It wasn't that he had a sign or a wig or some such gimmick. No. It was the mullet. It was beautiful. It was formed of tight gray curls that looked like chain mail. It may function as chain mail, too; I don't know. It stopped just below the shoulders. He had a matching goatee, which he kept neat.
I google-imaged "mullet", and, while some mighty fine 'dos pop up, none are too similar to what THG brought to the table. The closest likeness I can find is JCVD's brother in "Kickboxer". This doesn't do THG justice, but it's the best I can do. JCVD's brother is on the left. See the tight curls, matched with facial hair? Shorten the front, lengthen the back, tighten the curls, color it gray, and you have THG's 'do (roughly). Remove the muscles and insert a low hanging beer gut, and you have his physique.
So he looked the part. But I had to ask:
THB: "How do you know you'll be on the Jumbotron?"
THG: "All the camera guys know me. As long as one comes to my section, he'll put me on. Were you at Game 6 on the Finals?"
THB: (blushing) "No, unfortunately I wasn't."
THG: "I got on the Jumbotron that game, too. I was the guy with green hair! And my hair was a little longer back then. I was on the Jumbrotron a bunch of times. The best part was when I came here. I walked in and said hello to the bouncer. He knows me because I come here all the time. Then I was in here and some guy had green hair dye. So I was like, 'Why not?'. I went in the bathroom and dyed my hair. When I walked out, the bouncer was like, 'What the heck is going on?!'".
THB: "Because you walked in with normal (what was I talking about) hair and left with green hair?"
THG: "Yeah! He was like, 'what the heck is going on?! Is this a bar or a hair salon?!'"
Or a classroom? Because THG wasn't finished imparting his wisdom. The lecture went on:
THG: "This place has some pretty good beer. But it's pricey. The way to do it is to brew your own beer. You go up to IncrediBrew in Nashua. If you get a group, it's buy five kettles and get a sixth free. Each kettle holds 77 bottles. And not regular bottles, 22 or 24 oz bottles. And you can brew whatever kind you want, they have lots of good recipes. You bring those home, and you're set. It's much cheaper than buying beer. Wherever you go, you bring them with you. Parties, wherever."
THB: "That sounds like a pretty good deal."
THG: "Wherever you go, you bring them with you. When you fly, you pack 15 bottles in a cooler. Wrap them in newspaper, and you can check them. When I travel with my wife, we check three coolers and one bag with clothes (if that ain't love, then I don't know what love is). It's a great deal, you have all the beer you need. 45 beers. And those are 22 or 24 oz bottles, so it's really double. But airlines charge you for checked bags now. It sucks. That's why you gotta fly Jet Blue. They let you check one bag for free. That's 15 beers! And the second bag is only fifteen dollars. That's a dollar a beer. 22 or 24 oz bottles too, so it's more like a dollar for every two beers."
THB: "Not too bad. Especially compared to what they charge in bars."
THG: "I know. It's way better. I just went out to California for a long weekend to visit [I forget who]. I checked my clothes and took two coolers. When we came back, they were all empty. That's thirty 22 or 24 oz beers over the weekend!"
THB: "Holy mackerel!"
THG: "Yeah. It's good stuff too. My buddy here used to only drink Bud Light."
He points to his buddy, to whom he hasn't said a word in the last half hour. His buddy is wearing cargo pants and has a wicked crew cut, one of those with the completely shaved sides. Except his is only shaved three quarters of the way up, so he kind of looks like he has a bowl cut. Aside: I called a "bowl cut" a "bull cut" for my entire childhood.
THG: (continues) "Used to drink nothing but Bud Light. Now I got him trying all kinds of things. Stouts. Even a Chocolate Raspberry wine. And he loves it. Hey, I was just telling this guy how much you like the beers we brew at IncrediBrew. Stouts and everything."
THG's friend with bowl cut: "Yeah, they're good." He orders a Hub Light (Boston Beer Works's equivalent of Bud Light).
THG: "The best part is people don't know what to think when you take out one of the 22 or 24 oz bottles. They look at you and are like, 'What is that?'. Because you have a 22 or 24 oz bottle with a label that no one recognizes. It's great. If you share one, people love it".
THB: "Do they have labels? Or do you have to make your own?"
THG: "They've got some labels there. But I make my own sometimes. I made a glacier beer once. It was a nice beer, a glacier beer. I made this label, it had a pair of tits on it, and they were pointing at two beers. On the label, it said: 'Which one of the beers is cold?', and one of the lady's nipples was hard! Because it's a glacier beer! Get it? But you can do anything you want."
We saw THG at the game. We were in the top row of section 307, riding the wall. THG's seat was over in section 304, in the second-to-top row. THG did not use his seat. He stood throughout. And sure enough, when Ray Allen sunk a tying three with time winding down in OT, the crowd exploded, the DJ put on Metallica, and there on the Jumbrotron was THG, celebrating like crazy, his mullet swinging gloriously across the back of his neck. When Ray Allen hit the game-winning three in double-OT, THG graced the Jumbrotron a second time.
It was a good day for Ray Allen (two clutch three-pointers). It was a good day for THG (two Jumbrotron appearances). But it was a great day for me. I now know what kind of man I want to be.
Appendix
1. Whoever is working the Jumbrotron at the Cleveland Cavaliers arena is doing some good work. During one Cavs possession this afternoon, he played Dr. Dre's "Still D.R.E.". On the ensuing timeout, he played Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up". What range.
2. IncrediBrew exists. I will be planning a trip to Nashua sometime reasonably soon. Let's get a group together to take advantage of the buy-five-kettles-get-one-free offer that THG told me about.
3. IncrediBrew has a competitor in the Boston area. Deja Brew. What a name! It almost lures me in. But I'm going to trust THG. I'm sure he has been to Deja Brew, and he must prefer IncrediBrew.
4. If you aren't in the know about Foodler, you're missing out. You enter your zip code, and everywhere that's open and delivering to your door pops up. You have ratings, menus, even ratings for each menu item. I like telling people about Foodler because it's so cool and I know about it and that makes me cool by the transitive property.
5. IncrediBrew has a beer called the Hopzilla. The below image is either part of the label or the marketing campaign.
IncrediBrew says: "This monster will stomp on your taste buds with gigantic citrus flavors, full pungent hop flavors (in a good way) and a full mouth-feel. We don't even think about filtering this bad boy!"
I'm going. Soon. With a car full of 22 or 24 oz bottles.
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