PART FIVE of: "Gomorrah", Wisconsin

I feel like I need to make up for PART FOUR. PART THREE was a bit of a hit. PART FOUR was rushed and wound up like a sloppy cross-stitch. Or a half done pancake. Or? Like a wedding dress made without a pattern… No. Here it is: It was more like an anti-climatic, run-on to nowhere sequence of things that were not properly described. I let you down, Reader. I left you on the edge of your seat in PART THREE, and I completely failed to satisfy in the following post. Believe me, I realized this the moment I posted it. It was late at night. My judgment was based on this factor alone: “I’m too lazy to fix this.” But my laziness was temporary, and I’ve come through with a full recovery, and I promise that the tale I’m telling has a great ending. Not a good ending. A great ending. I recklessly guarantee your satisfaction. PART FIVE is going to make up for my previous bout of “I’m too tired to write or care about writing” spell. This is the part of the story I’ve been waiting to tell you. It's going to get a little bit tricky because in the first half of it I have to tell it third person. Or is it second person? Definitely not first person. I was curled up in my stupid car trying to sleep when the real excitement began. The first half of this post was recounted to me by my friend, and now I’m going to try to do her story telling justice by relaying it in my own words to you. So, if some of it comes off a little first person, I apologize for it. If some of my embellishments seem dishonest, I’m sorry. My imagination can put myself directly into a story that I wasn’t even a part of, and who knows what’s going to come from that… But I promise, Reader, that this part of the tale definitely makes your loyalty to read my adventures all worth it.

It seemed to be that by 4am the baboons finally passed out. It was quiet for a total of thirty minutes before a staggering, lose headed baboon suddenly made his presence known to the cold, early, dark morning air. His voice rang out with a, “Who the F is in my mother F-ing tent!” (Now here I can say that I will be censoring the language, but I’m sure you’ll get the picture...)

My friend attested to the fact that she could hear his voice right next to our campsite and could safely assume it was most definitely one of our primate neighbors. Through listening only, these were some facts that were picked up from the Lose-Headed baboon and his friends that were trying to get him to shut up and go to bed:

They had apparently been bar hoping, had been drinking and driving for quite some time before realizing that there was a shuttle service to the campsite. The Lose-Headed baboon’s name was being said as, “Riser”. One of his friend’s was “Sievert” and the other, “Digger”. I am not making this up. Riser, Sievert and Digger. Obviously, last names (though "Digger" is questionable...). But come on… Riser? Digger? It’s just too perfect.

Riser continued to obsess about the fact that his bag was sitting outside of his tent. To be fair, it had stormed, so it was most likely waterlogged to the hilt, and even being sober that would tick anyone off. But the truth of the matter was this: no one heard him open the tent and even look inside of it, so there was no real proof that anyone was in there, no one to have taken his bag out of the tent and put it in the rain. His rant went on like this:

“Is this my F-ing bag?" (He's not even sure it's his?) "Who put my F-ing bag outside my tent! Get out of my F-ing tent!” He said these phrases over and over and over and over again, at the top of his lungs mind you, in a I’m-so-drunk-I-can’t-think-past-the-phrases-I’ve-already-said-so-I-keep-saying-them-like-a-broken-record sort of way. Those of you who’ve partied with some heavy drinkers (or have alcoholics in your family), you know exactly what I’m talking about. There is something about alcoholic brain damage that sets your brain on “repeat”, and listening to someone suffering through this tragic phase of wastedness is, well, kind of annoying. Even when I’ve been drinking myself these sort of drunks annoy me. I’m glad I wasn’t there for it, truth be told, because I’ve had my fair share of experiences with the drunk stuck on “repeat”, thank you very much.

And then, the ultimate moment of climactic hilarity. My friend attests to this being “the quote of the night”:

“On a scale of one to ten, I am so F-ing angry I’m going to start cutting off people’s head with an F-ing machete!”

My friend says to her husband, “That must be a fifteen.” And her quote makes the joke complete.

Sievert was in another tent laughing at his friend and suggesting every once and awhile, “Dude, you probably just didn’t put your bag in your tent.” This outraged Riser and gave need to put his friend in his place with: “Sievert? You are so F-ing stupid that you left your F-ing bag in your F-ing Acura in F-ing Bloomington!”

Sievert shut up for awhile.

Raging Riser finally decided that he was going to go to jail.

“Someone take me to jail! Because I’m gonna start cutting off people’s heads with a machete! I’m going to jail! I’m going to kill people!”

(As funny as all of this was, let’s face it, this would’ve been the opportune time to call the cops…)

Riser suddenly realizes that Sievert’s keys are in his pocket. Victory! He very triumphantly exclaims, “So! When I go to jail you’re [Sievert] going to be so F-ing screwed because I have your F-ing keys!” I imagine a bulbous headed villian with short little legs cackling with a "Muhahahaaa!" while violently and passionatly dangling the keys with evil triumphant mirth...

I’m not sure if it was Digger or if Sievert decided to gain courage to keep at it, but for story-telling sake I’ll just make the executive decision by saying it was Digger (give him a little stage time) who said, “Just to go to bed, Dude…just go to bed!”

“No!” cries Raging Riser. “I can’t go to bed because there’s F-ing people in my tent!” He then proceeds onto, “When I find out who put my F-ing bag outside my F-ing tent I’m going to cut off their F-ing head with an F-ing machete!”

My friend said, “He kept to the machete theme all night. He never cut loose from it.” (No pun intended).

This all eventually dwindled and ended. No one knows if Riser ever made it into his own tent or not, or if there were people inside of it at all. Sunrise eventually dawned. The birds came out ( I think…). My friend woke up to the sound of civil, sober voices having a descent, normal conversation about sports. She listened for a time before coming to the conclusion that, “maybe they’re not the jerks we thought they were now that they’re sober…”. She came out of the tent with great hopes to find that the civil, sober voices talking about sports were not the baboons at all, but our two other friends that came with us.

“My hopes for their [baboons] lives were diminished,” she said.

And then she ended the story with a slow joking nod and said:

“So. I guess the real question is – Who did put Riser’s bag outside of his tent?”

I woke up to the boom-booming of the bass around 9am. Honestly, I was grateful that I had been able to sleep in until 9am. I was okay with the boom-booming, but was wondering what would happen now when we gathered at our picnic table that was (thanks a lot to the ridiculous before mentioned campsite set up) directly next to the baboons’ picnic table. Would they have breakfast there? Their breakfast turned out to be more vodka. This wouldn’t have been a big deal if they hadn’t then packed up all of their stuff and drove off after having that breakfast.

The night was definitely a blessing in disguise, Fate throwing me a bone. I remember telling my friend through the whole trip, “I can’t wait to write about this…”. However, I’m now going to have to do a very ugly deed before wrapping this up entirely with a more deep studded, glimpse-into-my-personal-life ending. I am now going to share my nitty-gritty complaints of the Apple River Hideaway, and it’s going to feel good. And from there, I’m going to post my complaints on every forum and travel review site I can get my teeny little hands on, and I’m going to sabotage this business wickedly with my finger tips, keyboard, and my faith in the power of the written word.

Why? You ask. It wasn’t that bad… I mean, come on. So what? Bad service. People don’t go there for the service. They go there to party. I completely understand this. However… the safety of myself as well as my company was compromised and I’m not okay about it.

Let’s begin with the bad service (just to give extra support to my case):

1) We were asked if we wanted a campsite around people or away from people, and when asked politely to be away from people, we were put next to the volleyball court smack dab in the middle of Main Street, Sin City.

II) When politely denying the need to spend an extra $5 on a cooler tube, we were told quite rudely that we were boring people. This is not satisfactory, and I’m not afraid to say it.

C) After clearly explaining a disturbance to a group of four Staff who were drinking on the job, they blew us off and never came to deal with the situation. They had disappeared entirely. After two phone calls later, one of which was rewarded with nothing but blatant insolence, they still did not come to rectify a situation that could have become far worse had any of us chosen to take any sort of matter into our own hands. Apple River Hideaway is lucky to have had this happen to five people who were sober enough to try to do the right thing.

This is my problem:

It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what I say about it, the argument will forever be, “Hey, if you knew it was Gomorrah, you shouldn’t have walked through the city gates.” There is truth to this. There is. But allow me to remind everyone that this was not a private party we walked into. This was not someone’s house we crashed. This was not a concert filled with security guards turning the other way at the light-up of a joint. This was a public place, a business that here in America should be following the rules that all other businesses have to follow to keep people safe. Your staff should not be drinking on the job, especially when you know that 99% of your customers are partying like it’s a free-for-all. Here’s an interesting story I’m going to use to make my point that much more clear:

A friend of mine went to a concert/festival, a similar (identical) environment, and was almost forced off the premises because she tried to climb a fence (rather intoxicated) and fell off of it (yes, this is funny). She wasn’t hurting anyone, she wasn’t harassing anyone or causing a disturbance, but a security guard (who was not drinking on the job) had told her that if she didn’t go back to her tent she would be made to leave. So explain to me: is it really too much to ask that if you’re going to foster an environment of hard core partying, you should at least have a semi tight clasp on the security? I’m not asking for much. Really. I’m not. I’d just like to know that if I’m going to pay money for a service, to enjoy a night of camping and a day of tubing down a river, that, can I just say twice: THAT I PAID FOR, to be able to count on the employees running the joint to come to my rescue when some goat-headed, under-aged drinking, pit-brained imbeciles are ruining my paid-for experience with disturbance and harassment. The fact that we were not treated as paying customers enrages me. Should I throw out the "D" word? Discrimination? That should get someone's attention, right? Maybe I’m being a little over the top. Maybe I should just let it go. But I can’t. And here’s the ultimate reason why:

What if I was in a more dangerous situation? What about that random guy that tapped on my window? I could’ve been some naïve, ignorant, under-aged woman that thought he was being nice and took him up on his offer only to be hauled off and raped. What if I was being sexually harassed by the baboons? Technically, with the name-calling and the things they were saying after F’s husband and I headed off to talk to the moronic drinking staff, we had been sexually harassed. If I wanted to go an extra leg with this, I can safely say it would’ve been permissible in the court of law. Especially, let’s not forget, the obviousness of the baboons being under-aged. We should have called the cops… We truly should have. Then it would’ve been on record that the staff was drinking, and that the Apple River Hideaway would’ve been responsible for having under-aged drinkers on their property who were causing a disturbance and were never dealt with by the staff, who, let me mention it again: were DRINKING ALCOHOL ON THE JOB. It also would’ve been on record that paying customers made an attempt to rectify this disturbance and nobody did anything to help us because they were, again, DRINKING ON THE JOB. It would’ve been a more satisfying means of justice. I’m all about the justice (in case you hadn’t picked up on that….). And apparently I like to repeat things too (sober no less), to you know, make a point of course...

So, this is the best I can do for justice: I’ve copied and pasted a few excerpts from the Apple River Valley Hideaway website to show you that I’m not so wrong in having the expectations I demand.


(If you go to the website, click on the CAMPING tab, and page down a long way before getting to the rules)

• Quiet time is 10 p.m. Please turn off your music and keep noise to a minimum at this time.
• WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO MODIFY THE RULES
AT ANY TIME WITHOUT NOTICE!
WE DO NOT RECOMMEND BRINGING CHILDERN ON WEEKENDS, BUT THEY ARE WELCOME WEEKDAYS.

Kegs, beer bongs, glass containers containing alcohol and fireworks are not allowed; they will be confiscated.

No speakers outside of cars, PA systems or DJs are allowed - you will be asked to leave.


So. Turns out I was wrong about quiet time being 11pm. It’s actually earlier. And they ask people to turn off their music… And if you’re not allowed to bring speakers and PA systems and DJ’s, and will be asked to leave, is it really okay to be blasting club music at 2:30 in the morning from your vehicle? They’ve reserved the right to modify the rules at any time… Does this mean that if any of these rules are broken and their moronic, drinking-on-the-job staffers aren’t responsible for anything that happens on the property because, Hey. We get to change the rules to cover our asses. HOW VERY EFFING CONVENIENT.

Okay. Wrap this up, Miss Dawn… Wrap it up.

When the calm of Sunday came as the cars packed up and drove away, we were left at our picnic table with a much needed solitude. My friend’s husband said, “I really don’t want to go tubing again…” I was so unbelievably relieved! I promptly said, “Me neither.” And neither did anyone else. It was time for us to pack ourselves up and go home.

As I was rolling up my little pup tent that I never got to sleep in, the folks next to us were playing early 1900’s bluegrass on a portable stereo, or as us Generation Xers like to call a “boom box”. I sighed looking over at their parked, refurbished Model T and thought, “Now this, is nice.” Call me “old fashioned”. Call me “old”. Call me “grandma” for all I care, but in this moment I was thinking, “This, is nice.” And I smiled.

As I was watching my friends pack up their own stuff, I was psycho-analyzing myself and my reaction to the baboon in the SUV. I was psycho-analyzing myself about everything, really, like my Anger Management that I felt I clearly needed, but I was most concerned with the rage I felt toward Blue Bandana. It felt, personal. I really had it in for him specifically. And then? I remembered… I remembered things that I have tried to shove into the Black Cave of my memory. I knew there was something very familiar about the whole scene, about waking up in the middle of the night to booming music and having to deal with someone who was so drunk it made you want to hurt them for it…

It is a chief reason I had to move back to Minnesota in the first place, three years ago. I was stuck in a bad situation, living with a loved one who was a raging alcoholic. On top of this misery, someone I loved had died of brain cancer, I was working three jobs I hated, was poorer than I’ve ever been in my adult life, and was fed up with trying to move forward in any direction at all. But the person I lived with was my greatest cause of depression that year, and didn't fully realize how much until 25 pounds of weight gain later... Not to mention the fact that I abhored my life.

Those eyes I saw in Blue Bandana were the same eyes I’d seen a thousand times before. 'Waking up every single night to the sound of a stereo system shaking the house to pieces because he-who-shall-not-be-named would pass out in front of his television, so drunk that not even the blaring of his own stereo system directly into his face would wake him up. Every night. For months and months and months. Fights ensued over the matter. Things were thrown. Things were shouted. Nothing ever changed. This was only one of the torments from my roommate, one of the more stupid ones, and to spare him a little I won’t tell you everything (he is, in fact, getting his life together for the time being…), but this was definitely a deep rooted, unearthed grave of emotion that literally came back from the dead to torture me, to make me realize that in truth, I’m still angry. I still cannot tolerate it. 'Not even from stupid strangers. Those eyes… so selfish, blank, and possessed by some dark force in the form of nothing more than a shelf full of empty bottles. Addicts destroy families. Don’t be one, okay? That’s my advice for the day. Pass it on. Ga med den. Kwenda na ni. Andare con esso. Ale avek li. Aller avec elle. GO WITH IT. It means, go with it.

On the way home we crossed the river into the little town of Stillwater, Minnesota. I remember thinking on the way in (before our crazy adventure), “I’d love to check out this cute, little town!” Little did I know, my company in their car ahead of me was saying the same thing. So, on the way back I decided to grab a few snapshots of Stillwater saying to myself, “This would’ve been nice for my blog, too… We should’ve just stopped here instead.” But then I gave that idea a second thought and said, “Nah. Let’s be honest. I have a helluva story to tell when I get back home.”

The End