Old Frank must have been desperate to rent his 38 year old Milpitas rambler to four single guys with four cars. Perhaps it was nostalgia for the thrill of the hunt as he imagined nubile beauties sighing and sweating all over his rental. Sure, the shaggy, orange carpet and wood grain wall panels reeked of 1971, but this would be “The Ranch”, a place of lurid debauchery and nocturnal emissions unlike the world had ever seen.
The truth of what took place differed slightly.
1998 offered a bittersweet summer of vehicular mayhem, pubescent cynicism, and mysterious porn spots. It had not been more than a week after moving in with three of my good friends when my roommate Jim gave me a nearly tragic claw to the scrotum during our drive up to Tahoe, thus reducing the total number of cars to three. But Fate wasn’t done yet, as I also wound up unemployed when my employer decided to tuck tail and leave Silicon Valley later that week.
Being jobless and without a car perfectly negated any tangible benefits of a bachelor pad.
It was a recipe for disaster.
SHAKING VIETNAMESE BOY WITH CREAMY SAUCE
Prep time: About 16 minutes
Notes: For a thicker, chunkier sauce, marinate in abstinence for 7-10 days, consuming only dry, salty foods.
3 crates of porn videos from Jim (feel free to skip to choicer cuts)
2 plush pillows
1 television and vcr, positioned directly opposite end of bed.
1 Kleenex Coldcare� Facial� Soft tissue with lotion (can substitute with toilet paper)
1 universal remote control device
1 nearby waste basket
But the summer didn’t conclude in my bedroom. A week or so later, a paler, skinnier version of me resurfaced to the fraternal hearth of the Ranch. To my curious horror, yellow dime-sized spots appeared on my biceps and shoulders. I couldn’t scratch or wash them off; they appeared to dwell beneath the skin. These must be porn spots I theorized, and decided to wear mine like badges of honor.
Four bedrooms mapped out to me, James, his brother Phil, and the AntiChrist Jim. James had been a best friend type at one time, but the pressure and friction of our growing personality delta enclosed our friendship in a sedimentary tomb. Phil knew me the longest and the least, and was mostly a friend by proxy. I met Jim through an Acura Legend fetish website, and he fast became one of my favorite tormenters and confidants. Necessity brought us together at a time of cruel housing prices and skyrocketing female expectations of the measly stock options afforded us by soon to be dot-bombs. It all culminated at The Ranch…
