They kidnapped ME this time

OK, this time it was MY 40th birthday. My wife and friends concocted this great surprise for me. All my wife would tell me was that for my birthday I was being "kidnapped" - that we were going somewhere and that I needed to take 3 days off from work. And that's all she'd tell me. I needed more info. It was October. If we went north, I needed to pack warm clothes. South - not so warm. So she had to tell me we were heading south.

The day arrived and the 5 of us left, heading south. What an exciting concept. I had no idea where or how far we were going.

10 hours later, we arrived in Destin Florida and pulled into a condominium on the beach that I'd ALWAYS wanted to rent before, but it was WAY too pricey. With the help of our friends, we rented the place for 4 nights.

Let the games begin.

It's all kind of a blur as that was back in my drinking days. That's one of the many, many dumb things I've noticed about my drinking - why spend all that money and then not be able to remember it? Stupid. Anyway, what I DO remember is:

- Finding Christmas tree lights at the grocery store (in October, what luck!) and stringing them on the condo's beach balcony so we could find the right place at night while walking the beach in a less than lucid state of mind.
- Duke's creation of the saying, "All God's creatures go good with butter."
- Calling the cops on a huge group of teenagers that had gathered in front of our condo because THEY were being drunken and disorderly. TRY explaining THAT to a cop while YOU'RE drunk.
- Dancing on the fireplace mantle wearing glow-in-the-dark Taz (Tasmanian Devil) boxer shorts, uh, on my head. True, unfortunately.

Hey, it WAS my birthday.