Jersey Jello

What do you get when you have a beautiful day, a grill, a bunch of people from high school, a ton of alcohol, an inflatable pool, and five pounds of industrial jello powder? A kickass time. When my friend told me I should go to this bbq with jello wrestling I was less than enthusiastic. To me it sounded like a bro out of bro epic proportions right in the bro epicenter of the world, Jersey, but I wasn’t really doing anything so I told him I’d stop by. As soon as I saw the keg and coolers filled with reserves I knew there was no chance in hell I’d leave.

Upon first arriving there were 15 people just eating and drinking. Nothing too wild and I played the conservative new guy role, keeping fairly quiet and limiting my interactions to the people I knew. Drinking does such wonderful things though. The atmosphere began to open up on my third drink as I shared a particularly vulgar joke involving peanut butter with some hysterically amused guys and terrified girls. The reaction between the genders was like night and day and from that point on I was “that guy.” I said the things no one else would dare to say (more likely no one else would ever think of saying).

When two guys grabbed hold of an unsuspecting female guest (one got her legs, the other her arms) and started carrying her screaming body toward the gelatinous inflatable tub I commented to a group of laughing onlookers, “Isn’t rape a wonderful thing?” The guy next to me spit out his entire beer in shock…the women vowed never to talk to me. The night generally went like that with the exception of a few brave double x chromosomes that could stomach or look past the utter profanity of my speech. I was having a great time though; I met some surprisingly cool guys, and actually started to wonder why I hadn’t spent more time in Jersey. I was drinking a shit load of free booze, eating free food and watching girls in bikinis writhe around in green jello. Call me a bro, but it was awesome. The stuffiness and perpetual sense of having to impress people or know what you’re doing in NY was refreshingly absent. In its place stood a few drunk, senseless people trying to impress with their shirts off, but the majority just relaxing with the crowd. Maybe a bro isn’t that different from an intellectual, one tries to impress with frosted tips and biceps while the other tries to impress with obscure quotes and favorite authors but the intentions are the same. And then I was splattered by jello. It was a threesome…not in the old fashion two girls one guy sense, more like the wrestling free for all of three men. Oddly it didn’t feel as gay as it should have. I didn’t even mention that everyone wore those ridiculous wrestling masks while in the jello ring, you know the ones that closely mirror those used in S&M except they’re bright and colorful and don’t have zippers across the mouth. Again, somehow it was not as gay as it should have been.

I think I arrived at 3:30. It was now 7:30 and I had been drinking constantly for four hours which was fine…but now I was getting drunk and there were more people, all of them strangers and it was getting harder for me to not get my ass kicked by some bro because I called his girl friend a “ragged meat curtain.” In my defense she wasn’t suppose to hear it and I didn’t even know who she was when I said it.

The keg was empty so I started drinking Heinekens and eating cupcakes. I met two girls one of which continued to claim that she knew me from high school. Despite speaking with them for the rest of the evening even now I am unsure of their names. I do remember repeatedly asking my friend when they weren’t looking to remind me, but some things just don’t stick as well non edible green jello. After finding out one of the girls was a self proclaimed feminist I launched into an ill advised tirade detailing all of the many reasons that women were inherently lesser beings than men. I then pretty much spent the rest of the night trying to convince them that I wasn’t as big of an asshole as it seemed and quickly asked for their forgiveness for all previous and future uses of the word, “cunt.” They reluctantly agreed. At this point the cloud of inebriation was thicker than the residual remains on the bottom of the kiddy pool. People were leaving. It was time for me to go too. I had met some cool people, made some friends, offended many more and had paid absolutely nothing to fill my system with unhealthy food and drink, Jersey, what a wonderful place.