First, let me thank both Tony and Sandy for opening up their home and hosting such a wonderful gathering of friends from all over!
Second, let me thank all the drama llamas for reminding me what it's like to be back in high school all over again. I missed my 20th reunion last year so now it's like I'm a little kid all over again.
Third, I'm going to clarify a number of things about the practical jokes that seem to have a couple of people all up in arms:
I bought the shrink wrap, the air horn, the silly string, and the firecrackers (which were actually left over from the Indy convention). With the exception of the firecrackers, I have the receipts for all the novelty items should anyone doubt my veracity.
The original "plan" was to shrink wrap the Spray Paint Kid's car, as well as to possibly shrink wrap the drunkest person to a light pole. Everything else was made up as the night went along. Shrink wrap was chosen in lieu of tape to ensure that no damage would be done and it could be easily removed. I am after all a car guy at a party with a bunch of other car people and several really nice cars.
Because SPK was at his car screwing around with a starter problem from the late afternoon on, playing a joke on him kind of lost it's appeal so we had to come up with someone else on whom to play the gag. As Tom said (and we all know his feelings about SPK), it just didn't seem right to kick a man when he's down. Keith's car was picked first because it was furthest away from the house and because we thought it would be fun to play a gag on him. We were careful not to do anything to scratch or damage the car while applying the shrink wrap.
From what I understood, Keith was a little frosted at first, but lightened up after realizing that it was done in fun and wasn't anything personal. We originally expected that after finding his car shrink-wrapped that he would come back to the group to tell everyone so they could go see for themselves, everyone could have a good laugh and help him remove the shrink wrap. It didn't work out that way, but Keith still didn't get all pissy about it and go stomping off in a huff.
Later on, we taped Neno and his girlfriend to a light pole. Everybody was having fun. Afterwards we realized that we still had a lot of shrink wrap left, so we figured it would be fun to shrink wrap another car.
*I* was the one who selected Adam & Michelle's car, as I
thought they were both friends and thought they would enjoy being part of a good gag.
Zach and I did 90% of the shrink-wrapping of Adam and Michelle's car, and as with Keith's car we were careful not to scratch or damage anything in the process. The roll of shrink wrap got a little screwed up at the end, so while Zach was straightening that out I took out my camera to take some pictures. James and Tom came along and finished tying off the shrink wrap at the rear bumper, which took less than 30 seconds. That was the extent of James' and Tom's involvement with the caper -- less than 30 seconds.
When Adam and Michelle were getting ready to leave, the plan was for all of us to follow them over to their car to be there when they found it shrink-wrapped, to have a good laugh and help them remove it. It took longer than expected for Adam and Michelle to say their goodbyes (at least a half hour or so) and we lost track of them when they headed back to the car. We didn't realize until Adam was seen walking back towards Tony's house that they had left.
Adam was pretty bent out of shape thinking that someone had broken the RH muffler off the car while shrink-wrapping it. I went over with him to take a look and realized that the muffler had just been pulled out of the rubber hanger,
probably by Adam himself when he was pulling on the shrink wrap to remove it. I hung the muffler back in the hanger and it was fine. All the while I was trying to reassure Adam that it was just a joke and that if something had been accidently broken it would have been taken care of. Unfortunately this was lost in the fact that Adam was pretty drunk, and the Spray Paint Kid was there doing his best 5-year-old-kid tattle-tale act telling Adam that it was James that was responsible for shrink-wrapping the car.
I said goodbye to Adam and Michelle and thought they were over the whole thing. I headed to the back yard to get a beer, and a few minutes later Tony and Angela came out back pretty ****** and explained that Adam and Michelle had driven by and thrown the shrink wrap from their car into Tony's driveway and sped off. They found that very disrespectful.
After we talked about it for a while, I told Tony, Angela, both Jameses, Steve, and everyone else who had gathered out back by this point to see what all the commotion was about that I would call Michelle and apologize and explain what happened.
So, I called Michelle to explain that it was all a joke meant purely in fun and nothing else, and that it was *ME* who was responsible for the whole thing. I apologized several times and tried to smooth things over, but she wasn't having any part of it at that time.
Those of us remaining at the party talked about the whole situation quite a bit and all pretty much seemed to agree that it was just an innocent joke done in a spirit of fun with our friends, and that in the end nobody's car was damaged and nobody was injured.
I was fully expecting to wake up the next morning and find something done to my car. Just like all the other gags, I figured it would be something funny but that did not cause permanent damage like letting the air out of my tires or something. Nothing happened, but I firmly believe that if something had that I would have taken it as a joke and had a good laugh about it. I even thought Michelle and Adam might have driven back to do something.
The next day, while I was in Detroit, I received several text messages from Michelle accusing me of lying about being responsible for the shrink-wrapping in order to protect James. This couldn't be further from the truth. I explained to her again that I was the responsible party and that the blame should be placed entirely on me. Unfortunately, she still doesn't seem willing to believe that.
I've apologized several times now. If Michelle and Adam can't accept my apologies and believe that the joke was done entirely in a sense of friendship and fun -- and not malice -- there is nothing more I can do to convince them. I'm not going to keep apologizing. I really have no interest in being friends with anyone who a. can't take a joke, and b. refuses an honest an sincere apology. While I can't understand why Adam and Michelle are still so upset by the whole thing, I do feel badly and hope they eventually get over it and come to realize it was all done in a spirit of fun. Nobody has tried using drunkeness as an excuse, and there is no reason to.
Whether it's Carlisle, the convention, Tony's BBQ, or any of the other countless events during the year when this group gets together, there are always some practical jokes, and up until now everyone has always been good humored about it. Every year, there are burnouts and people's cars get driven around the area at 100+mph and nobody cries. Heck, I think Jason actually enjoys having others beat the **** out of his cars each year (although he missed it this year). In any case, he knows it's all meant 100% in fun. ****, I'd personally be more ticked about someone doing a burnout next to my car and the risk of damage from that over a simple practical joke of shrink-wrapping. Anyone who has been to any of these events knows this, so I would think they'd be prepared for the possibility of practical jokes being played on them. Chris Gates was probably the best example of a good sport when he laughed right along with us after we silly-stringed his car while he was sleeping in it (and please note that I shot my OWN car with silly string first to make sure it wouldn't do any harm).
When James accidently broke Ryan's car, I really thought Ryan was going to be ****** off, but he really took it well and we could all learn a lesson from him how to handle ourselves in a similar situation. (And, for the record, James offered countless times to take care of whatever was needed to repair the car.)
So, if anyone wants to be ****** at anyone else, be ****** at me. It's unfortunate that I've lost Adam and Michelle as friends over a silly practical joke, but I can sleep well tonight knowing that it was all done in jest.
