The Worst Stories From This Weekend: September 10

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You know what sucks? Moving. You know what sucks even more? Unpacking all the shit you moved. And you know what sucks the most? Being too lazy on Sunday to do it so you just sit in your new apartment surrounded by boxes. Sunday Scaries on a whole new level.

If you haven’t done so already, subscribe to The Sunday Scaries Podcast. If you have a spare 15 minutes every Sunday or Monday, it’ll cool your jets a bit. You know, a hard reset that leaves you feeling refreshed. If you’re not sold, try yesterday’s episode where I ranked the most anxious nights of the year, explained season depression, and offered up a new hangover cure that saved my life last spring.

Here, I’ll even make it easy for you. You’ll be done with it by the time you’re done reading this column.

Feel better? Good. Now let’s get into this week’s worst weekend stories. As always, these are submitted anonymously to will@grandex.co. If you want, you can even submit one of your own. Don’t be afraid. The water’s fine.

Let’s start with a couple leftover stories from Labor Day, the second most-anxious night of the year.

Spent the long weekend hiking and camping in Washington which was tight. Realized I lost my wallet four hours before my flight which was not. I thought we were gonna beat the scaries taking the Sunday night red-eye back to Texas, but all I have to show for it is 8 hours of poor sleep in the last two nights and what was supposed to be my decompression Labor Day spent cancelling and reordering all the IDs and credit cards I lost.

Bonus: AC was broken when I got home and the puppy chewed up the baseboards while the house sitter was out

Honestly, the first paragraph was as to be expected. People think they’re going to go on vacation and come back refreshed. Nappenin’. That second paragraph though. What a kicker. The A/C being out in Texas is brutal, and knowing that you just lost your security deposit because of a cute puppy is just a kick in the nuts.

Hi, it’s me again, the expert Google sleuth who found out a few weeks ago my newly minted boyfriend was married!

Turns out he was separated and it’s because his wife left him for a woman. No biggie. We have continued our courtship for the last several weeks, only to have him blindside me with the “I really really like you but I want to keep my options open,” yesterday; this after he told me two days prior he “saw something special in me” and “wanted to continue exploring this.” Sounds so “Bachelor in Paradise,” no? Drink every time someone says they want to continue on this journey. …and I am very, very drunk.

10-4, man who’s wife left him for a woman. Keep your options open. I just won’t be one of them.

Last night involved a lot of introspection, wine, Kleenex, and a massive headache this morning from a combo of said wine, and being so dehydrated from crying. Cheers to better days ahead!

Signed,

Not good enough for him but always good enough for me

Saying that this sounds Bachelor In Paradise-y is the understatement of the century. Just so spot on. When you said you did some introspection with a bunch of wine and Kleenex, I figured you would say that you texted him as well. Props for not.

My boyfriend was supposed to go on a fishing trip with his friends, but it ended up being cancelled. We all decided to go to his friend’s farm up near The Dells. We got in Friday night and the single guys wanted to give the only bar in town a shot. There were no single girls, but all the guys in our group ended up arm wrestling with some Mexican laborers we met. We made it back to the farm safe and sound, half of us in the bed of a truck.

Saturday was supposed to be raining on and off so we decided to go golfing. The girls drove around behind the guys, supplying refreshments. One of the guys decided he was too drunk to keep playing, so he would ride around on his cart and hang out with us. Somehow, he ran over his own leg and we had to cut the game short after only 5 holes to take him to the hospital. Turns out he broke his leg and had to be put in a cast.

Those of us who didn’t take him to the hospital went back to the farm to keep drinking. There was a family staying in a cabin on the property with us as well and I found out they were Polish too. We ended up making friends with them and riding on a sled they had hooked up to the back of their car. One of the dads had a glass eye, a tattoo that he claimed was from some Cold War shit, and as it turns out some real anger issues, so that was scary. We decided to go to bail and go back to our house and go to sleep and meet back up with the guys who had just gotten back from the hospital. We spent the whole night listening to broken leg guy screaming in pain because he had refused pain meds.

By Sunday morning, broken leg guy realized he had made a mistake and we went and got his Vicodin prescription from the hospital. He decided he wouldn’t stay any longer and had his family come pick him up, leaving his truck for us to take back. We didn’t want to hang out with the Polish family again so we set up our own fire. A neighbor had come by and dropped off some trash he needed to be burned. We threw in a bunch of things, including some that looked like empty paper towel rolls. Turns out they were fireworks and after a couple minutes they started shooting everywhere. We all booked it to safety and luckily, because of the rain, nothing caught on fire and nobody was hurt. We ended up spending the rest of the night around the fire, occasionally making a run for it when another firework shot out.

We left first thing in the morning Monday. The usual 3.5 hour drive back to Chicago was going to take us about 6 hours because of traffic. About a half hour into the drive, we got a call from my boyfriend’s friend’s roommate. He said their house was flooded, including the basement where my boyfriend’s friend’s room is. 2 feet of water. Plus the street out front where both mine and the friend’s car were parked was underwater. We sat in the car for the next 6 hours in a pool of anxiety. Hands down the most terrible drive of my life. Took at least 10 years off my life. Get there to find out that both of our cars are flooded beyond repair, and everything my boyfriend’s friend owns is ruined.

I ubered back to my apartment and found out my fridge door had somehow opened while I was away and all my food was spoiled and there was a puddle of, hopefully, water in my kitchen.

Spending Tuesday on the phone with my insurance in hopes of just breaking even. Honestly, I think I would have taken the broken leg over having my car flooded. Also, my contract position ends in 27 days and unless my company ends their hiring freeze by then, I’m out of a job.

Need all of the thought’s and prayer’s. PLEASE.

Okay, I know that this column is supposed to be about being irresponsible, but I’m just going to say it — your group of friends is downright irre-fucking-sponsible. The whole fireworks thing is just gross negligence.

And now for a brief side story. My uncle once had a huge scar on his leg. Being a small and curious child, I asked him what it was from. “A shark bite,” he told me. “Wow,” I thought. My Uncle Rick got bit by a real live shark. So cool. It wasn’t until his funeral where people started reminiscing about him when I told everyone, “Yeah, I always thought it was really cool he got bit by a shark.” Everyone looked at me with a puzzled look on their face. “Bit by a shark?” one of my aunts asked. “Yeah, on his leg,” I responded. “He didn’t get bit by a shark, Will,” someone finally told me. “He got run over by a golf cart.”

And that, my friends, is the danger of being drunk on a golf cart.

Last weekend I was finishing up my Eurotrip in Prague and was staying at a small party oriented hostel. It was Friday night and after some pregaming at the hostel, we headed off to a nearby club. The club had a great deal of 1 beer and 1 shot of absinthe for about 5 USD (love Prague’s prices). Needless to say, we were all getting drunk very quickly. After a few rounds of this deal, the group and I started dancing on stage. In my wastedness, I accidentally elbowed one of the Canadian guys (Derek)’s beer onto the ground. Being the nice (and drunk) person I am, I offered to buy him another one. We headed back to the bar where we agreed it financially made more sense to both get shots of absinthe with our new beers.

By this point Derek and I are both drunk out of our minds and started making out. After about 30 more minutes of more beers and shots of absinthe, sloppily making out, and lots of dancing, we agreed to leave to hook up. As we were both staying at the same hostel, I assumed we would make due and find somewhere to hook up and it wouldn’t be that hard (people hook up in hostels all the time). Derek then claimed “he refuses to have sex in a hostel and we had to get a hotel”. This is where things get a little blurry and I started realizing what a douche bag this kid was. After a bit of me arguing to just go back to the hostel and Derek claiming he doesn’t have hostel sex, I finally agreed to go to a hotel but made it crystal clear I was not paying. The first hotel we ended up at was completely sold out. As we left I started walking into the next door hotel when Derek claimed “that hotel isn’t nice enough” as he tripadvisor searched for the next best hotel in Prague. After a 10 minute walk we ended up in another hotel (that apparently met his high drunk sex standards). At this point it is 2:30 in the morning and we are at a very fancy hotel wastedly trying to check in. This hotel had one suite left so Derek immediately agreed and paid for it. We were then told we needed our passports to check in (which is standard in most hotels in Europe). Neither of us had our passports and we were then told by the front desk staff a photo would also work. When I applied my job a few years ago where I had to email a photo of my passport and luckily was able to dig up this photo (cheers to never deleting emails!).

After finally getting to the room (which was gorgeous by the way), I did what anyone else in my position would do, I raided the hotel’s mini bar for more alcohol. After chugging some vodka, we finally started getting naked and hooking up. By this point I was trashed out of my mind and was ready for some sex. Unfortunately, Derek’s cockiness and his wallet were more impressive than his penis as after all of that… HE COULDN’T GET IT UP!! After a lot of trying with no success, I finally passed out and went to bed.

When I woke up, Derek was already gone and had left a note on the hotel notepad saying he would see me back at the hostel. Due to his extreme cockiness and terrible/non-existent skills in bed, I was more than happy to sleep in a little later knowing worse case he would get charged for a late checkout (along with the alcohol from the mini fridge).

When I finally got back to the hostel after one of the most beautiful walks of shame through old town Prague, I obviously googled the hotel and saw it was a 5 star luxury hotel with rooms going for over 250 dollars a night.

Pretty sure this may be a worst weekend for Derek way more than me as he spent $250 (plus whatever the mini bar charges were) to be too drunk to have sex. I on the other hand got a free night at a 5 star hotel in the center of Prague with my biggest regret being sleeping through the free breakfast.

Moral of the story, if you can’t get if up when you get drunk, probably better to just go ahead and hook up at the hostel. Hostel sex with a working penis is always better than no sex at a five star hotel.

When I opened up this email, I thought, “Holy shit, this might be too long.” But then I read the very last sentence and knew I had to run it back and read the entire thing.

1. I hate to admit this, but I get not wanting to have sex in a hostel. That just feels dirty to me.

2. Going to a five-star hotel while that drunk is not the move in place of a hostel.

3. Congratulations on the comfortable bed in a nice hotel. Shouts to Derek for footing the bill.

LTFT, you know the deal. I’m about 3 years post grad and all of my problems are starting now thanks to a failed law school attempt, two major break ups, and a 150 mile move.

I dated the same boy from on and off 18-23 when it ended the biggest crash and burn and a restraining order against him (this is important later). Almost immediately I start a “summer fling” with a groomsman I’m in a wedding with. Summer flight my ass, we’ve been together for two years after he tells me he loves me after three weeks (I hate it too) when he breaks up with me over the phone on his way home from work one day. I moved to a new city 150 miles away from my hometown for him, we live together, his mom and I are looking and rings – the whole thing. Needless to say, I’m now 25 and now how to date in a post graduate environment in a relatively new city where most of my “friends” picked him post break up. Moving along to 3rd of July I’m out one night with with friends and we run into a girl’s ex’s fringe friends. I’m drunk, make out with one of them and we start hanging out. Things are going great – sex is good, I like his friends, we can chill out/run errands or go out together – when he leaves for vacation and visiting family in Europe for about 3 weeks. We don’t talk much because I don’t want to bother him but we communicate via snatchat and instagram every few days.He comes home, we see each other immediately, but something feels off. The next few weeks we don’t go out but continue to hang out at home with his or my roommates. I take this as us getting comfortable. Keep in mind that I am fully aware that I have no idea how to date and I’m just a stress ball because I don’t know what it’s like for someone to not be obsessed with me. I know that’s fully my problem but come on. Love me?

Fast forward to Labor Day weekend – I’m going to a nighttime pool party on Sunday with my friends and as luck would have it his roommate got them tickets too. The friends I’m with are either rolling or doing blow so I hop on the coke train a couple drinks in. I’m coked out by the time we realize we’re at the same party and decide to invite him + roommate over to our table to hang out. A few drinks in, I think it’s a great idea to aggressively call him out for being on Bumble and tell him that I don’t want him sleeping with other people. Going on dates is whatever because I’m not his girlfriend nor am I ready to be, but I want him to stop sticking his dick in other people because STDs/STIs are peaking right now. I fade in and out throughout the rest of the night, but what I do remember clearly is almost getting into a fight with a stranger who is attempting to mooch off our table and asking said boy if he wants to cash in on a threesome because I’m definitely drunk enough to be okay with it. I wake up at his house the next morning, we have sex, he gets me a Lyft home after breakfast and kissing me goodbye.

It is now Wednesday I haven’t heard a peep from him but his parents and siblings are here & they’re going to Tahoe for a long weekend. We usually don’t talk throughout the week because he works for the government in a secure area so this isn’t WILDLY uncommon, but I’m stressed. I called in sick to work yesterday because I had to deal with restraining order paperwork and my company isn’t generous with PTO. The coke come down, “how badly did I just fuck this dating situation up”, and dealing with my crazy ex has me in a trifecta of Wednesday Scaries and I don’t think I’ll be ok. I have my bi-weekly therapy appointment tonight and I’m scared to tell her what I’ve done because I don’t want to get lectured. Please send help, an IV, and chik-fil-a.

What I’m about to say may sound insane. Like, just a wild statement. But I honestly think you should’ve just gone into work hungover/reeling-from-the-coke-hangover. I know, I know. Idiotic move. But hear me out.

Does sitting around all day thinking about the regret of this situation sound fun? No. Does distracting yourself at work maybe sound like it’s more the move than not the move? I don’t know, but I think there’s a case to be made. Shouts to your therapist for hopefully helping you through this mess.

And she followed up.

Just to follow up – I found two 6+ inch scratches on my back and have no idea how they got there or who they’re from. Here’s to hoping I don’t need a tetanus shot. Also, I take the GRE in two weeks since the law school situation didn’t work out & my parents are already telling me if I don’t test into a certain percentile they aren’t contributing financially. Can you have week-long scaries? Please send prayers for better choices to be made.

Damn. Sounds like you better flip your coke habit for an Adderall ‘script and start studying. (Please don’t listen to my advice.)

Had myself a bit of a weekend. Left after work Thursday to head up to Green Lake, WI for a solid golf trip with the guys. Thursday night was spent watching football and drinking Spotted Cow. Friday and Saturday we played 36 each day at Lawsonia which was awesome but exhausting. Got fall down drunk at the last round and ran our golf cart into a sand trap. Rented a kick ass house on the course and spent each night getting blackout drunk with some good friends. Ended up getting back to Chicago around Noon and am now posted up watching football all day until my beloved Bears kickoff for the night game. I write to you not out of scaries, but rather to brag about how much fun I had this weekend.

I hate that I’m so old that by back started to hurt when I read that you played 36 and got “fall down drunk.” 25-year-old me would’ve traded anything for that.

Love the poddy. Let’s get down to business.

I am currently sitting in a hotel room in Durham, NC, with a hurricane slated to hit my area on Thursday. It’s my first time on the East Coast so I was really looking forward to this business trip. I’m here for a week of training and praying I can make it out Friday at noon on my flight back to West Texas (we don’t have water in that wasteland so this is new for me). The wife is still livid that I decided to make the trip despite me telling her, “Oh, it’ll just be a little bit of rain and wind. No big deal.” Obviously I was talking out of my ass.

On top of all of this, I have to be in Roanoke, VA, Monday so I’m wondering if should even mess with flying home for two days and just ride this sucker out over the weekend in a hotel and then drive up there instead? Scaries at an all time high and I didn’t even drink this weekend. Could use some advice on what to do and also any North Carolina BBQ recommendations from the PGP community so I can comfort eat the scaries away.

Also, T’s and P’s to anyone who lives on the East Coast and will be affected by this storm. Y’all be safe.

Someone help this guy out with some North Carolina BBQ recs.

Coming at you live from thousands of feet in the air. I didn’t follow the cardinal rule and decided to take the 9pm Sunday flight home after a quick weekend getaway in nyc. I had a pretty booked itinerary so I’m obviously tired and not looking my best (read: I look and smell like certified trash). As I waited at the gate and the news broke that my flight was delayed an hour (putting me home after midnight), I see the super put-together, millionaire CEO of the company I work for waltz over to the gate. Turns out he’s on the same flight as me. For whatever reason, I feel inclined to talk to him, so I do. The conversation was actually really nice, but now I’m panicking as he sits in first class because my zone 4, slob-lookin ass decided to have a 20 minute conversation with him. Not to mention my head won’t be hittin the pillow until almost 2am tonight.

Talking to him in your state is both 1. an alpha move and 2. absolutely wild. Sounds like it went well, though.

I will say, I am pretty upset that you went with the late flight though. As someone who got absolutely screwed out of a late flight of Labor Day Weekend, I must reiterate: always take the early Sunday flight no matter how hungover you’ll be. I explain why here:

Shouts to everyone in boarding Zone 4.

Since football (tailgate) season finally kicked off in San Marcos, I decided to visit my alma mater for the first tailgate of the year. I arrive in town Friday afternoon after work and things start off smoothly. I meet up with one of my pledge brothers to get some food and daiquiris then we head over to Chimys for a few drinks before calling it a night. Once I get back to my friends place that I’m staying with, we play some FIFA and I hit his dab pen A few times. I quit smoking a few months ago so I was out like a light.

Saturday is when all hell broke lose. Me and my friends wake up around 9 and the alcohol starts flowing. We head to the first pregame of the day and the shit show commences. I don’t know why but I convinced myself that Hennessy and IPAs were the best things to pregame tailgate with. We stay at the first pregame for a couple of hours then I head out to the second pregame. By this time I’m already pretty toasty but The Hennessy hadn’t really started to get me yet. I pour up one more cup and finish off my 6 pack and that’s when it hits me that I’m on autopilot mode. By this time it’s 1:30, tailgate starts at 2, and I’m blackout. The next thing I remember is waking up on my little bros couch in the middle of the post game party. The whole tailgate is a blur, the football game is a blur, and everything that happened after is a blur but from what I’ve heard, I was a mad man.

Thankfully, I didn’t get arrested, I kept the damage minimal, and outside of my brother that I punched in the face for no apparent reason, nobody got hurt (as far as I know). The Cats pulled out the dub too so I guess it was a successful tailgate. Here’s to hoping I can control myself next time I go to a game. The scaries are still pretty high because there are still a few hours that are completely unaccounted for. Btw, if you’ve never witnessed a Texas State tailgate, you need to. Let’s go Cats!

Repeat after me, everyone — Don’t. go. back. to. your. alma. mater.

I know, I know, it’s football season! Tailgating! Friends! Good times! No. No no no no no. You’re going to leave both physically and emotionally devastated because you can’t party like you could when you were 20. Tread lightly, watch the game from your couch, and thank me later when you aren’t having booze sweats come Sunday.

What’s up Will,

Ltft and all that jazz. Sending this now because I just got home from a weekend in southern Illinois and the trip home was hell. Not so much anxiety as borderline rage. Spent the weekend helping my girlfriend and her mom remodel her house to sell before she moves back to PA. Left her place at about 1 pm for the 12 hour drive home with her mom in their VW car. At about 250 miles left to go I absolutely SMACKED a pothole and blew the front tire, inconvenient but I know my way around a vehicle and we get the spare on with minimal problem and get back on the road.

About 15 miles later the dashboard lights up and the car loses a significant amount of power. Because it’s a front wheel drive car and the spare is a different size the sensors are not happy and don’t want to let me drive over 50 mph uphill. So I proceed to limp the balless car the rest of the way home. Arriving 2 HOURS later than planned. Plus the northeast is getting our first hurricane of the season so it’s also raining nonstop the entire time.

I can officially say that I will never purchase a VW vehicle in my life and will be sticking to my American made cars that have never wronged me in such a way. This late night trip and email is brought to you by a full can of Copenhagen and energy drinks. I will not be starting work tomorrow until I’ve had the rest I feel is necessary at this point.

And that, my friends, is why Sober Scaries are the worst Scaries. .

As always, don’t forget to subscribe and listen to The Sunday Scaries Podcast. Every Sunday, I give you three anecdotes that will (hopefully) help curb your Sunday anxiety and let you know that you’re not alone in feeling like a mess. And yeah, always trim the wicks on your scented candles.

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Will

Will (Twitter / Instagram) is the host of The Sunday Scaries Podcast.

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