The Tale of the Agee Warrior

Recollections of an Ale Knight gathering at the Shore House, May 1981.

I don't remember much about the Agee (a-GEE) Warrior, except that his spirit invaded my body at Dave's Shore House Memorial Day of 1981. Looking back, I don't quite remember if it was 1981, but it was some time after I became friends with Val and Kev, but some time before getting a job, which would put it late in high school or early in college.

Beer Pong: A Fun Summer Pasttime

The Shore House is a magical place. Arriving there on a cold, rainy, New Jersey, May day marks the beginning of summer; Blue claw crabs, beers, and late twilights mark the end. In between: vacation, swimming, boating, Jersey shore amusement parks, cheap pizza, long, hot boring days, and plenty of visitors.

The advance summer entourage arrived on Memorial Day weekend: Dave, Val, Kevin, and Paul, and maybe a few others I can no longer remember. We passed the cold dank day by playing board games and drinking beers on the porch. We played Pass Out, a cheap Spencer Gift store game in which one tries to collect 10 tongue twister cards, drinking a beer for each successful acquisition, and drinking a beer for each failure. At the time, 10 beers was well above our limits. The afternoon passed and soon it was night.

Despite the frigid water temperature of the New Jersey shore in May, we drunks plunged into the lagoon in the dark. The next memory I have is of standing on the roof of the porch in my bathing suit with a towel dangling from my soldiers like superman. I couldn't understand what everyone below said, but it sounded like "a-GEE," and so there I stood on the roof pointing and shouting "a-GEE, a-GEE, a-GEE." With drunkard's courage I lept off the roof to the sand lot below. Nothing was injured, so I ran upstairs and out the second story bedroom window onto the roof, again and again, leaping to the sand, and shouting "a-GEE, a-GEE."

This seemed like a good idea, and so I ran around the house, charged with the spirit and the courage of the Agee Warrior. Those thought ended abruptly as my shins met with the steel beams of the boat trailer on the side of the house. Luckily, to this day, I still have my original teeth.

Recounted by Sir Porkalot