What the crap are these? Raisins? (Part I of IV)

McDougal stole a boat. Not like a yacht or anything. Just some stupid-assed row boat or john boat or canoe or something.

Thing is, there's no goddamn water here.

Nights I can't sleep because I never know when I'm gonna open my eyes to see the big man standing at the foot of my bed with a molotov cocktail and a disemboweled otter or something.

He wants to raft the Tennessee Tombigbee, raping and pillaging the power substations along the way. Says we'll live off the fat of the land, we'll get our food from trees, our sex from local shops and gas stations, our spirits from drinking methanol.

There's no such thing as methanol.

I tell him, you can't run for president and rape people at gas stations at the same time. He responds by cuffing me with a broken chalice and eating my Wii.

"You have NO IDEA what men of power can do," he says to me.

"That was a line from Revenge," I tell him.

"No way out," he says.

"Oh yeah. I forgot those were two different movies. Man, Costner loves him some formula drama doesn't he?"

"No way out," he says again.

"I Know. I know."

"Seriously," McDougal says. "You're going to die here."

So I grab a satchel and pack the necessary accoutrements for a boat trip with McDougal: lotion, pears, grenadine, four mongol (mongrel? Maybe both?) children, boom box, pack of blank cd's, some rainwater in a goose bladder, eight Fortune magazines from 2003, and a pile of nickels.

"That's it?" McDougal asks. He seems pissed.

I run through our last outing. What the fuck am I forgetting?

"Banana-fucking-Rama!" McDougal barks.

Shit. I forgot Bananarama. And I got no idea where they are.

"Relax," McDougal says. I follow him outside where he opens his trunk and there they are ... the angels, Siobhan, Sarah, and Karen.

"Hello, Ladies!" I say with a smile.

Karen immediately and violently vomits all over the trunk, my pants, and the asphalt.

"GUFFAW!", McDougal guffaws.

"Three of my world famous Syrup of Ipecac Martinis and look who can't hold her jelly!"

I feel bad for Bananarama, but fuck, they signed up for this shit. No pain no gain.

We peel out of the driveway, McD and me in the front seat, Bananarama in the trunk, and the satchel left back in the puke on the asphalt. All of us are nude and bruised from the neck down. I can see that McDougal is heading South, which is in no way the direction of the Tombigbee, but I don't bother to tell him.

I know what's south, and all I can do is drift to sleep to gather strength.