The guys and I had been on quite the binge and the latest tape of our show revealed some embarrassing slop. So we decided to cut back on the amount of booze we were downing on the first couple of sets in an effort to make the last set not SO embarrassing. The next few nights went as planned with all of us abstaining until after the show when we would head to the Hog for late night food and adult beverages with some really cool people.
We usually hit the rack a little after sun up on any given day so the Monroe deputy banging on the band room door at 9am was quite startling. Luckily the band room had a front and a back door with several rooms and a kitchen. As band guys we tend to have pot paraphernalia laying around so it's best to avoid letting the police in.
One of the guys went out the kitchen door to reply to the deputy knocking on the front door thus avoiding any odors emanating from the rooms. "How can I help you?", inquires my band mate.
"Who owns this white van? I need to speak with him."
"I'll go get him" replies my band mate as he shuffles back around to the kitchen door.
"Wake up man, the cops want to talk to you" as he shakes my foot ever so harder jarring me awake. "What the fuck man?!" "No really, the cops are here, they want to talk to you about your van."
I'm trying to pull myself together, feeling the effects of 12 shots and 15 beers and whatnot. I hadn't moved the van in days so what could be up I ask myself as I relieve myself. I mean a first thing in the morning, 10 gallon, wobbling and holding on to the walls, WHEW! The cops are being super impatient as it's Saturday and they want to get to the Isle where all the bikini clad beauties are.
I slip out the kitchen door and notice a cop with a tape measure checking out an old scrape mark from when someone clipped the back of the van, nothing big. "This your van?" the deputy asks harshly. "Yes sir" I say politely. The other deputy is now done making his assessment with the tape measure and says "yea, it looks like the right height."
Then they ask me when was the last time I washed my van, "The last time it rained" I said as they seemed to search their minds for the last time it rained. "I don't wash my van other than to see out the windows", I explain.
As they continue to analyze the scrape mark I finally ask what's going on. They look at each other as if I should know already and one of them says, again harsh and angry, "You know what you did, it's on VIDEO!" Now I'm starting to sober up a little as I realize that something is definitely wrong. "What's on video? Where?"
After going back and forth to the point of ridiculousness they tell me that I'm going to be charged with FELONY hit and run. "Holy shit! When did that happen?" I ask. "Last night" they replied. "Last night?" I ask myself as I try to resurrect the memories from just a few hours ago.
In the mean time the guys were trying to reach the night manager, a rare fellow who actually cared about the musicians, to no avail so we have to go to the Isle and hope we can find him. We pile in with the cops and go to the Isle. The cops are telling me to go ahead and confess, make it easier on myself. Confess to what? Oh, we got you on VIDEO so you might as well confess and being quite assholish about it.
It's practically Noon now and it's hot as balls in the Islamorada summer sun and they're not even telling me what I supposedly hit the night before with a van that hadn't been moved in days. I said, "If I hit something with my van last night that means I must be insane" The cop gets extra nasty, "It's not too late to arrest you for DUI!" Cops hear only what they want to hear like most people.
FINALLY a manager and another cop come out of the office and declare that I'm free to go, "it wasn't him" he said to the other cops and without a word they piled into their cars and left, no apology, fuck you or anything.
I ask the manager what that was all about. He said someone had backed into the ice machine by the stage door. An employee told the cops that the bands back up to the stage door to unload/load equipment so WITHOUT actually looking at the VIDEO
the cops just came to the band rooms and started hassling me.
The manager took us in the air conditioned office that we could've have been waiting in the entire time and showed us the video of one of the Isle's own pick-up trucks backing into the ice machine. FELONY hit and run on an ice machine. And the employee who did it didn't sign the truck out so I don't know if they ever figured out who was driving. Peace and Love!
Dedicated to brother JR, father, friend, Bluesman, sage. Thanks for protecting us from the quick to judge. Now that's a whole nother story!
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