The 5 Reads Of Christmas
No. 4 - "Darts" By: Chug Monky
“I can still hear the screams in my nightmares,” he tells me.
Sitting across from me at the bar, my young Ridley Park friend is unable to bring the lit match to his cigarette. His hands are trembling too fiercely. Under normal circumstances, my comrade and I would be swapping jokes and sharing new stories - but not tonight. Tonight, I find my friend fraught with distress – to which the source was unbeknownst to me. I calm him down - tell him it’s OK. I light the cigarette for him and tell him to sip his drink. It’ll help. After a minute, he steadies himself. With his eyes locked on the bar floor tiles, he takes another drag. When he exhales, the smoke ominously creeps upward until it finally settles above his head as if to signify the cloud of terror that has followed my grief-stricken pal for the past few weeks.
“OK, buddy,” I say reassuringly as I put my hand on his shoulder. “Start from the beginning.”
The cigarette is hauled up to his lips again and he begins…
Now I am not 100% certain that the story that followed dealt with something purely Delconian, but I can say with complete confidence that the questionable acts that occurred in the tale were born out of the same drunken valor and haphazard machismo that accompanies almost every Delaware County male after a night of raucous revelry.
Perhaps it starts like this…
Sitting across from me at the bar, my young Ridley Park friend is unable to bring the lit match to his cigarette. His hands are trembling too fiercely. Under normal circumstances, my comrade and I would be swapping jokes and sharing new stories - but not tonight. Tonight, I find my friend fraught with distress – to which the source was unbeknownst to me. I calm him down - tell him it’s OK. I light the cigarette for him and tell him to sip his drink. It’ll help. After a minute, he steadies himself. With his eyes locked on the bar floor tiles, he takes another drag. When he exhales, the smoke ominously creeps upward until it finally settles above his head as if to signify the cloud of terror that has followed my grief-stricken pal for the past few weeks.
“OK, buddy,” I say reassuringly as I put my hand on his shoulder. “Start from the beginning.”
The cigarette is hauled up to his lips again and he begins…
Now I am not 100% certain that the story that followed dealt with something purely Delconian, but I can say with complete confidence that the questionable acts that occurred in the tale were born out of the same drunken valor and haphazard machismo that accompanies almost every Delaware County male after a night of raucous revelry.
Perhaps it starts like this…
It’s 3:30AM. You either have already returned from the bar or decided to stay in and enjoy the surroundings of your own comfortable abode with a few drinks and a few friends. It doesn’t matter – either way you are inebriated in a house, the bars are closed and you’re looking for something to do. You and a buddy hang a picture of Eli Manning on a dartboard and let him have it. (The number that represents the amount of penises drawn going into good old #10’s mouth is so astronomical that it has not been invented yet.) Drunken bar-goers trickle in the back door intermittently; some go straight to bed, some hang around to check out the late-night scene. One of them has been way over-served and is making a beautiful mess of things. As you keep chucking darts at little Eli, he tells his tales of the night but at no point during his incoherent ramblings does he come close to achieving what most would consider rational thought, so you don’t pay him much attention. Now, even though the drunken bastard’s comprehension has been severely suppressed by a tremendous amount of alcohol, he soon notices that you’re no longer listening to him, so he starts getting animated… and by “animated” I mean “violent.” So he goes up to the dartboard, slaps his extended palm against it and with an intense fire in his eyes he looks right at you and says:
“THROW IT.”
You and your darts partner stand there and share the same look of bewilderment that Mike Myers had when Kanye West announced on live television that the president of the United States did not care for African Americans. Then you shrug and say, “OK, tough guy,” and throw the dart. It lands in between the slobbed-up asshole’s thumb and index finger. The drunkard looks back at you victorious as a wave of adrenalin pumps through his veins. Everyone in the room exhales breaths of relief / amazement. The bastard, all riled-up now, looks at you and says:
“YOUR TURN, TOUGH GUY.”
You are a bit hesitant being put on the spot like that but then you look around the room – you don’t want to be thought of as a nancy. So you make your way to Eli Manning. (A reputed scientist once noted that Delconians place a high amount of personal value in acts of self-jeopardy.) The walk to the dartboard is longer than the walk down The Green Mile.
You slap your hand on the board and say something cocky, something bold. Something Biff Tannan would say.
“HEY DICKFACE!! THROW THE FUCKIN DART ALREADY SO I CAN GET BACK TO DOUBLE-TEAMING YOUR SISTER WITH DIKEMBE MUTOMBO!!”
Now he’s pissed. He goes into a full windup and even though he is drunker than Randy Quaid trying to fly a plane to save the world, his pitching mechanics are better than Cole Hamels – lucky for you. You turn your head and face the wall because the anxiety you created for yourself is worse than the anxiety you get with your weekly “Sunday scaries.” Your heart is pounding so hard that you can hear your pulse at every pressure point in your body – your chest, your neck, your temples, your testes. Next thing you know you hear a WHACK against the wall followed by a “FUCK!” Your friend whiffed. He missed the dartboard completely. With adrenalin surging through your body you do a little, let’s say, “exaggerated celebration.” And even though you just escaped certain doom, for some ungodly, asinine reason YOU PUT YOUR HAND BACK ON THE BOARD and start talking trash worse than Hamilton Porter ever attempted.
Another dart comes by. Right above the middle finger. They’re getting warmer. You pound a fresh, ice cold Budweiser (skunked, lukewarm Natural), give everyone the one finger salute and put the hand back up there. Another Biff Tannan remark.
“AFTER YOU WHIFF THIS TIME, SWEETIE, WOULD YOU MIND SCRATCHING MY NUTBAG? IT’S A BIT MUSTY SINCE I FORGOT TO SPRINKLE SOME GOLD BOLD ON IT AFTER MY MIDDAY RUN.”
WHACK. This time it lands right next to the knuckle on your pinky. Now, we all know that there is nothing more satisfying to a Delconian than talking heaps of trash and coming out on the winning side, because usually that is not the case. Usually, the trash talking is followed by a swift kick in the ass. So, at this point you’re so jacked up that it’s not even adrenalin running through your body - it’s steroids. Steroids and HGH… and cocaine. They might as well call you The Macho Man Randy Savage because the manner in which your body is expressing itself and the words that are barely escaping your mouth are baffling, indecipherable and, quite frankly, offensive.
Then appearing out of nowhere is your buddy’s girlfriend. She’s been standing against the back wall the whole time watching people throw darts at you and now she thinks it’s time to get off the bench and into the game. Timidly, she asks, “Can I have a try?” It’s so cute that you figure, “Sure, what the hell…”
Your hand goes back on the board. Since she’s a girl, you cut back on the trash talk.
“I CAN SMELL YOUR VA-JAY-JAY FROM HERE, PUMPKIN TITS.”
You laugh. The whole room laughs. You’re the man. You don’t even turn to face the wall this time. You watch her lob the dart towards the board. It rainbows through the air like a high arch softball pitch. It’s adorable. It’s charming. It also hurts like a son of a bitch because it lands right in the inside cuticle of your middle finger, completely separating the nail from the skin. The alcohol in your system is making sure that this sucker is gonna bleed, and that it’s gonna bleed for quite a while. Nobody even laughs. Everyone’s faces are tense and pursed. They are almost vicariously feeling your pain. You were, after all, asking people to throw darts at you. When it would inevitably happen, what did you think it would feel like - a handy?
Now it’s pandemonium. It’s like the ECW Arena was just dropped in the middle of your house. Normal people shy away from activities that end with having to get a tetanus shot. But you’re not in normal people-land. You’re in Delco. And once those sharks smell blood, they frenzy. Before you can say “donkey dick,” two more guys take one in the hand. Things are escalating quickly now and next thing you know, that same drunken son of a gun that starting this “hand-dart” spectacle stands facing the board and rips his shirt off like Hulk Hogan on methamphetamine and screams:
“THROW IT YOU SILLY MOTHER FUCKERS!!!!”
Without hesitation a dart flies right in between his L3/L4 vertebrae (which will most likely be a game changer when we’re talking long-term physical damage). The hit makes everyone in the room go silent – everyone, that is, besides the “back-dart” recipient. He slowly turns around - his white knuckled-fists clasped, every vein in his neck exploding in a range of reddish purple, his eyes bulging out of his head. He still hasn’t taken the dart out and the maniacal laughter coming through his clenched teeth makes you consider, “Holy Christ, my friend drank himself insane.”
At this point it’s 4:30am and there are enough hand-darts and back-darts flying around to make you feel like you are in Darfur. Just then the door kicks in. The newcomer is FUBAR. You look into his eyes – his lifeless eyes, black eyes… like a doll’s eyes – and you realize there’s nothing there. He sees your buddy facing the wall with two darts in his back and instinctively pushes him aside. He unbuttons his pants. Drops his trousers. Drops his tighty whiteys. He bends over and touches his toes so that everyone can see right up his ass and out through his mouth. He pauses to assess the precarious situation he put himself in and puts his index finger up between his legs to cover up his cornhole - because safety always comes first in Delco. (Editor’s note: This is a true story about the first time I met somebody who became one of my very good friends. It was a magical scene. I wish I could draw a diagram.) In unison everyone screams, “Ass-dart!!”
-------
Perhaps this was how you were introduced to hand-dart. Perhaps it wasn’t. But I can guarantee you it was a similar occasion; as it was similar to my Ridley friend’s first experience with it.
You see the first time I met my Ridley Park buddy, it was a snowy day in 2009 and a girl I was trying to impress – a Ridley Park girl – decided to have The Beer Olympics at her house (typical Delco chick). I rounded up a mean crew and headed over there with a full head of steam - and by “steam” I mean “whiskey.” We rolled into the party like how Pat Burrell rolls into a drinking and fucking competition. I am not ashamed to say that we dominated every single event and took home the gold medals – which I later gave to my Mom for Mother’s Day. The last event – Baseball Darts. After thoroughly kicking the piss out of everyone, I decided it was time for some hand-dart – remember, I was trying to impress a lady at the time. I throw my hand up on the board and take a good one. Probably the best hand-dart I’ve ever taken. My buddy who threw it decided to be a real asshole and wound up and gave me a Tom Brady laser right between the webbing of my index finger and thumb. It went in one side, out the back, and into the dartboard. Well, these Ridley folk were not prepared to see this. (The thing about Ridley Parkers is that where most people will take something right to the edge, they will walk right up to that edge with a rope, tie a noose on one end, put it around their necks, and do a cannonball.) As I jumped about shouting obscenities and holding my hand as it gushed, I watched their jaws drop. Their minds were blown. In particular, this one guy - the friend aforementioned in the beginning on the story at the bar. He had such an itch for someone to throw a dart at his hand – it was like he had ants in his pants, and if I recall correctly, he took a nice one himself. I would see him from time to time in bars as I eventually started going out with the Ridley chick I was trying to impress (I’m positive it was the hand-dart that made her fall for your gracious narrator), and he would always tell me about how he introduces his other Ridley friends to the game and they all share his enthusiasm for the new pastime. We would split drinks, laugh, high five. I knew this kid had a future.
But the day I found him on the verge of a breakdown, I knew something was wrong. I couldn’t imagine what it was until the story began.
“So Chug, I was at a house party in Interboro. And we were getting ripped and having fun. Some chicks were there – I even felt some boobs.”
“That’s great, man. So what’s the problem?”
“Well, it was getting late and everyone was just so delirious. We started playing hand-dart.”
“Nice - your favorite game.”
“Yeah it was going awesome too. Billy took one in the wrist…”
“Hahaha, Billy – that son of a bitch.”
“Well, things started getting out of control, man. Phil took a few back-darts. His girl, Jaime, even took an ass-dart…”
“Jesus, I wish I was at this party, man!”
“Well, yeah but Frank came over and just start pushing it, man.”
“What do you mean?”
At this point my friend begins to unravel. I’m starting to get nervous.
“Well, he took the dartboard off the wall,” he tells me. His hands trembling as he’s acting out the scene.
“He set it on the floor and leaned it against the seat of a chair,” he goes on. Now I’m worried my friend might pass out he’s shaking so badly.
“Then he pulled down his pants, sat in the chair, and… and he…”
“What man? What the hell happened?”
“Awww Chug. Awww Jesus. Have you ever played Nut-Dart?”
--Chug Monky
“THROW IT.”
You and your darts partner stand there and share the same look of bewilderment that Mike Myers had when Kanye West announced on live television that the president of the United States did not care for African Americans. Then you shrug and say, “OK, tough guy,” and throw the dart. It lands in between the slobbed-up asshole’s thumb and index finger. The drunkard looks back at you victorious as a wave of adrenalin pumps through his veins. Everyone in the room exhales breaths of relief / amazement. The bastard, all riled-up now, looks at you and says:
“YOUR TURN, TOUGH GUY.”
You are a bit hesitant being put on the spot like that but then you look around the room – you don’t want to be thought of as a nancy. So you make your way to Eli Manning. (A reputed scientist once noted that Delconians place a high amount of personal value in acts of self-jeopardy.) The walk to the dartboard is longer than the walk down The Green Mile.
You slap your hand on the board and say something cocky, something bold. Something Biff Tannan would say.
“HEY DICKFACE!! THROW THE FUCKIN DART ALREADY SO I CAN GET BACK TO DOUBLE-TEAMING YOUR SISTER WITH DIKEMBE MUTOMBO!!”
Now he’s pissed. He goes into a full windup and even though he is drunker than Randy Quaid trying to fly a plane to save the world, his pitching mechanics are better than Cole Hamels – lucky for you. You turn your head and face the wall because the anxiety you created for yourself is worse than the anxiety you get with your weekly “Sunday scaries.” Your heart is pounding so hard that you can hear your pulse at every pressure point in your body – your chest, your neck, your temples, your testes. Next thing you know you hear a WHACK against the wall followed by a “FUCK!” Your friend whiffed. He missed the dartboard completely. With adrenalin surging through your body you do a little, let’s say, “exaggerated celebration.” And even though you just escaped certain doom, for some ungodly, asinine reason YOU PUT YOUR HAND BACK ON THE BOARD and start talking trash worse than Hamilton Porter ever attempted.
Another dart comes by. Right above the middle finger. They’re getting warmer. You pound a fresh, ice cold Budweiser (skunked, lukewarm Natural), give everyone the one finger salute and put the hand back up there. Another Biff Tannan remark.
“AFTER YOU WHIFF THIS TIME, SWEETIE, WOULD YOU MIND SCRATCHING MY NUTBAG? IT’S A BIT MUSTY SINCE I FORGOT TO SPRINKLE SOME GOLD BOLD ON IT AFTER MY MIDDAY RUN.”
WHACK. This time it lands right next to the knuckle on your pinky. Now, we all know that there is nothing more satisfying to a Delconian than talking heaps of trash and coming out on the winning side, because usually that is not the case. Usually, the trash talking is followed by a swift kick in the ass. So, at this point you’re so jacked up that it’s not even adrenalin running through your body - it’s steroids. Steroids and HGH… and cocaine. They might as well call you The Macho Man Randy Savage because the manner in which your body is expressing itself and the words that are barely escaping your mouth are baffling, indecipherable and, quite frankly, offensive.
Then appearing out of nowhere is your buddy’s girlfriend. She’s been standing against the back wall the whole time watching people throw darts at you and now she thinks it’s time to get off the bench and into the game. Timidly, she asks, “Can I have a try?” It’s so cute that you figure, “Sure, what the hell…”
Your hand goes back on the board. Since she’s a girl, you cut back on the trash talk.
“I CAN SMELL YOUR VA-JAY-JAY FROM HERE, PUMPKIN TITS.”
You laugh. The whole room laughs. You’re the man. You don’t even turn to face the wall this time. You watch her lob the dart towards the board. It rainbows through the air like a high arch softball pitch. It’s adorable. It’s charming. It also hurts like a son of a bitch because it lands right in the inside cuticle of your middle finger, completely separating the nail from the skin. The alcohol in your system is making sure that this sucker is gonna bleed, and that it’s gonna bleed for quite a while. Nobody even laughs. Everyone’s faces are tense and pursed. They are almost vicariously feeling your pain. You were, after all, asking people to throw darts at you. When it would inevitably happen, what did you think it would feel like - a handy?
Now it’s pandemonium. It’s like the ECW Arena was just dropped in the middle of your house. Normal people shy away from activities that end with having to get a tetanus shot. But you’re not in normal people-land. You’re in Delco. And once those sharks smell blood, they frenzy. Before you can say “donkey dick,” two more guys take one in the hand. Things are escalating quickly now and next thing you know, that same drunken son of a gun that starting this “hand-dart” spectacle stands facing the board and rips his shirt off like Hulk Hogan on methamphetamine and screams:
“THROW IT YOU SILLY MOTHER FUCKERS!!!!”
Without hesitation a dart flies right in between his L3/L4 vertebrae (which will most likely be a game changer when we’re talking long-term physical damage). The hit makes everyone in the room go silent – everyone, that is, besides the “back-dart” recipient. He slowly turns around - his white knuckled-fists clasped, every vein in his neck exploding in a range of reddish purple, his eyes bulging out of his head. He still hasn’t taken the dart out and the maniacal laughter coming through his clenched teeth makes you consider, “Holy Christ, my friend drank himself insane.”
At this point it’s 4:30am and there are enough hand-darts and back-darts flying around to make you feel like you are in Darfur. Just then the door kicks in. The newcomer is FUBAR. You look into his eyes – his lifeless eyes, black eyes… like a doll’s eyes – and you realize there’s nothing there. He sees your buddy facing the wall with two darts in his back and instinctively pushes him aside. He unbuttons his pants. Drops his trousers. Drops his tighty whiteys. He bends over and touches his toes so that everyone can see right up his ass and out through his mouth. He pauses to assess the precarious situation he put himself in and puts his index finger up between his legs to cover up his cornhole - because safety always comes first in Delco. (Editor’s note: This is a true story about the first time I met somebody who became one of my very good friends. It was a magical scene. I wish I could draw a diagram.) In unison everyone screams, “Ass-dart!!”
-------
Perhaps this was how you were introduced to hand-dart. Perhaps it wasn’t. But I can guarantee you it was a similar occasion; as it was similar to my Ridley friend’s first experience with it.
You see the first time I met my Ridley Park buddy, it was a snowy day in 2009 and a girl I was trying to impress – a Ridley Park girl – decided to have The Beer Olympics at her house (typical Delco chick). I rounded up a mean crew and headed over there with a full head of steam - and by “steam” I mean “whiskey.” We rolled into the party like how Pat Burrell rolls into a drinking and fucking competition. I am not ashamed to say that we dominated every single event and took home the gold medals – which I later gave to my Mom for Mother’s Day. The last event – Baseball Darts. After thoroughly kicking the piss out of everyone, I decided it was time for some hand-dart – remember, I was trying to impress a lady at the time. I throw my hand up on the board and take a good one. Probably the best hand-dart I’ve ever taken. My buddy who threw it decided to be a real asshole and wound up and gave me a Tom Brady laser right between the webbing of my index finger and thumb. It went in one side, out the back, and into the dartboard. Well, these Ridley folk were not prepared to see this. (The thing about Ridley Parkers is that where most people will take something right to the edge, they will walk right up to that edge with a rope, tie a noose on one end, put it around their necks, and do a cannonball.) As I jumped about shouting obscenities and holding my hand as it gushed, I watched their jaws drop. Their minds were blown. In particular, this one guy - the friend aforementioned in the beginning on the story at the bar. He had such an itch for someone to throw a dart at his hand – it was like he had ants in his pants, and if I recall correctly, he took a nice one himself. I would see him from time to time in bars as I eventually started going out with the Ridley chick I was trying to impress (I’m positive it was the hand-dart that made her fall for your gracious narrator), and he would always tell me about how he introduces his other Ridley friends to the game and they all share his enthusiasm for the new pastime. We would split drinks, laugh, high five. I knew this kid had a future.
But the day I found him on the verge of a breakdown, I knew something was wrong. I couldn’t imagine what it was until the story began.
“So Chug, I was at a house party in Interboro. And we were getting ripped and having fun. Some chicks were there – I even felt some boobs.”
“That’s great, man. So what’s the problem?”
“Well, it was getting late and everyone was just so delirious. We started playing hand-dart.”
“Nice - your favorite game.”
“Yeah it was going awesome too. Billy took one in the wrist…”
“Hahaha, Billy – that son of a bitch.”
“Well, things started getting out of control, man. Phil took a few back-darts. His girl, Jaime, even took an ass-dart…”
“Jesus, I wish I was at this party, man!”
“Well, yeah but Frank came over and just start pushing it, man.”
“What do you mean?”
At this point my friend begins to unravel. I’m starting to get nervous.
“Well, he took the dartboard off the wall,” he tells me. His hands trembling as he’s acting out the scene.
“He set it on the floor and leaned it against the seat of a chair,” he goes on. Now I’m worried my friend might pass out he’s shaking so badly.
“Then he pulled down his pants, sat in the chair, and… and he…”
“What man? What the hell happened?”
“Awww Chug. Awww Jesus. Have you ever played Nut-Dart?”
--Chug Monky