LouLife

Like any good party, the devil is in the details.  In 1998, my brother was renovating his basement.  Since it looked like a crack house anyway, we decided to paint the walls. The top edge was bordered with past Super Bowl teams and final scores.  My other brother and mom painted a football field featuring tiny horses and wedges of cheese (Broncos vs. Packers).  Derogatory phrases and images of Art Modell could be seen throughout the basement.  And for the record, his basement would never look that awesome again.

Super Party usually had a theme song that could be heard by calling my brother’s answering machine.  One year it was set to the Monday Night Football theme (not the douchey Hank William’s song, but the one that sounds like a gang of Vikings are coming to burn down your house and eat all your pita chips and hummus).  Another time it was to the Monkees theme and contained the lines, “We encourage all to be naked, and floss after every meal; Have your pets spayed or neutered, and party with a lot of zeal.”

In the backyard, a makeshift goal post made of PVC pipe was erected for a supposed field goal kicking contest.  In reality, it just ended up being a bunch of idiots violently swinging and missing a football.

Super Party always began at noon, which you would think would be a recipe for disaster.  Sure, there was plenty of drunkenness, but even so, no one ever got in a fight, fell down, threw up, made a scene, cried, humiliated themselves or someone else, or tried to drive home drunk.  When was the last time you were at a packed-to-the-walls hardcore party and none of those things happened?

In 1998, Fox 41 decided to cover Super Party.  On the Friday before the game, Fox sent anchorman John Young, who my wife and I often referred to as “The Shunt,” because his on-air ear piece always seemed to poke out of the side of his head as if it was draining fluid from his brain.

Young did a nice piece about the effort we put into painting the basement walls, and even made the controversial move of putting my brother on television (controversial because A) Fawcett’s have faces made for radio, and B) we drop more f-bombs per sentence than any family in the free world). 

But what I remember most about that evening was that between takes, Young would sing loudly and to no one in particular the Eagles “Take It to the Limit.”   For some reason, that seemed like a bold move on his part.  His voice was very tender though and I think we all sort of fell in love with him that night.