The Montana Chronicles

I’m thoroughly convinced that there are very few ways to actually get to know people. One is to take a bunch of hallucinogens with them. There is nothing more personal then getting a group of friends, buying some mushrooms and spending the rest of the day staring at a blank wall. First off it’s cheap. Second off, it makes something as banal and meaningless as staring at a blank wall unmistakably fun. Thirdly, it undoubtedly leads to talks about big questions: Like why are we here? What do I want to do with with my life? And really, you can learn an awful lot about a person by how they answer these questions. Lastly taking drugs makes you ask less meaningful questions, like why don’t soda companies put vitamin C in the drink and market it is “sodalicoius” or why does my dick intrude into my body like a frightened puppy when I take mushrooms? Sadly I was at an internship in Montana for the summer and with the exception of Meth, most drugs were in short supply. On the bright side this gave me ample opportunity to meet the people who I’d be spending the summer with in a coherent and legal manner.

The organization I was interning for hired around 30 interns, who arrived in a staggered fashion. I arrived in late May in Missoula, MT via a flight from Denver, and almost immediately began to second-guess my decision to take an unpaid internship working for a political organization that was based an hour away from the nearest gas station. I got there relatively early, meaning I had nothing to do for two weeks. I could have been closer to civilization if I was living in Baghdad. At least they have plenty of pirated porn there.

The first few weeks were uneventful, highlighted by the fact that one of the fellow interns, a Political Science student from Duke, told me that he’s a lot like Josh Lyman from the West Wing, in that he is intelligent, ruthless, and has problems with girls but yet gets his fair share. I should have told him that I’m a lot Will Smith in that I hail from west Philadelphia, and once took down an Alien warship by using a virus written on a Macintosh computer. Sadly, I think I would have been more accurate in describing myself. The kid was the epitome of awful and quite honestly was what I was expecting from this internship. Every thing he said somehow turned into some self righteous debate. He was actually proud of the fact that he sabotaged some kids academic career down at Duke during a ‘heated’ Freshman class President election where he was a campaign manager. I found this hilarious because I was unaware that promising more soda machines in the cafeteria necessitated the need for a campaign manager.

The girls weren’t much better; instead of an intense insecurity brought on by years of lying to themselves about being intelligent, ruthless and getting women, they developed an intense desperation that only isolation could bring out. Living an hour from civilization surrounded by a group of guys who developed an intense erection when their cousin told them they, “looked good in those jeans” somehow made them notice their vaginas slowly growing dustier. Normally this situation would be awesome. Look, I would never call myself the Michael Jordan of getting girls, but I am at least a Jalen Rose type- A solid career highlighted by a few big games. So I felt quite good about my prospects.

The problem was that when the girls who got there gazed into the mirror, it was quite simply not an attractive person that reflected back. This left me in an odd situation. I could take the easy win, and compromise the remote shot that a hot girl would come later in the summer. Or I could hold out right now and if the opportunity never arose, repeat this question in a month or so. Being a follower of sustained development I chose the latter, and quite honestly I’m happy with the results. (Side note—This choice led one of the girls, Jessie, to spread rumors that I batted for the other team. Her reasoning was stellar. That I rejected her and drank Diet Pepsi)

Eventually the summer chugged a long a new people came, new people that unlike the others could actually have conversations with the opposite sex. The first guy was from the south and named Taylor. Simply put he is the greatest drinker I’ve ever met and coincidentally one of the most outrageous. My favorite part about him was that when my parents visited he pretended to be a southern gentleman. It was awesome. The same guy who set the record for vomiting 13 times at work later in the summer introduced himself to my parents with his full name and place of birth. My only regret is that he regularly didn’t wear a white suit all the time and talk about the “colored” problem. In fact, his political opinions made me wonder how the south is Conservative. His haterd for George Bush was second only to his love of Busch Light and big women. His only downside was that he was just shy of his 20th birthday and lacked a fake id.

Clearly a Southern Gentleman

The next was a frat guy from Arizona named Jim who among other things could grow an awesome mustache (Always a plus in my book) and had a sweet laughed that was latter dubbed the “___ chuckle” (Trust me, it was a lot funnier when you use his real name). Jim and I bonded instantly. I think mainly because a) we we're both 21 and needed drinking buddies and b) unlike most of the interns neither of us had any political ambition at all and both simply needed an internship to qualify for graduation. Since both Taylor and Jim belonged to frats they shattered my perception of frat guys. Frats simply weren't big in the midwest. In fact I'm pretty sure they closed down the last remaining one at my school because no one would join. Think about it, why would anyone pay for friends?

Mandy was last. She was a journalist from out east who loved to drink, could talk to anyone, and had a really nice rack. Last time I checked I love girls with those three qualities.

Next -- A crazy girl fingers herself in the backseat of a Mitsubishi Eclipse and other hilarious observations