Drunk of the Month: May 2004
Welcome to "All Access" KCDrinker Drunk of the Month interviews. Over
the next few months, on and off, you will get inside the alcohol-soaked minds of KCD's
finest - writers, creators, lawyers, gurus, priests, and parole officers. Finn's first.
The following is far less coherent than other interviews because this is what a TRUE Drunk
really sounds like.
KCD: You are one of our main contributing writers, and we're going to find out
more about you.
Finn: How many drunks are there? Do you want some lotion?
KCD: Thanks for the lubricant, but no. I hope we won't need it for this. Anyway.
We haven't met most of them, the drunks, but we have been with a lot. We try to keep it to
the more interesting ones, like you. So, where were you born?
Finnegan: Lawrence. Lawrence Kansas.
KCD: Happy childhood there?
Finnegan: Um. . . .Drugs rock and roll . . . lots of booze.
KCD: When did you move from Lawrence to KC?
Finnegan: Roughly nineteen ott two.
KCD: Ott two. Was that when the Kaiser stole our . . . .
Finn: That was when the um. . [unintelligible] being shot down by the Nazis. I was
about twelve. I went from a hippie commune life style to Johnson County. I got in, like,
six fights my first year there. I was in sixth grade. I had long hair, and the wrong kind
of attitude.
KCD: Sounds like a good workout.
Finn: It really wasn't that bad.
KCD: Tell us more about the commune.
Finnegan: My father grew marijuana to put me through elementary school. He would load it
up in a truck and sell it in California.
KCD: So he was taking it to the west coast? I always thought it ended up here from
there.
Finnegan: It's much easier to grow it here.
KCD: First drink, what was it?
Finnegan: Um. . . Pabst Blue Ribbon.
KCD: How old were you?
Finnegan: Four.
KCD: Four? Alright, that's a champion! Cans, I imagine?
Finnegan: Yeah. I used to get quarters for taking beer to my old man. The tips got
worse as the beers I brought kept having more gone. First, it was a couple fingers gone,
then half the beer was missing. He would always ask, "What happened to my quarters
and where is that kid?"
KCD: What's your drink of choice?
Finnegan: Redbreast Irish whisky.
KCD: Just straight up. Nothing else. If you chase it with something, what would it
be?
Finnegan: Beer.
KCD: Any particular beer?
Finnegan: I like the reds. I really like . . . .
[Beer delivery distraction, and a round of shots.]
KCD: I got to know. Everyone wants to know. Blackouts! What's your most
interesting morning after one? Or afternoon, if all went as it should have.
Finnegan: I've never had a blackout.
KCD: Ever?
Finnegan: Mostly there have been times I wished I blacked-out. But I have a
remarkably good memory of what I've done.
When I was seventeen my cousin and I drank a bottle of Bacardi in the course of
about an hour and a half. I remember my uncle taking me upstairs, and putting my head in
the toilet. He stuck my head in the toilet and closed the lid on my head. About an hour
later he came and got me. He threw me in bed, but I remembered I had to get up. There was
one more thing I had to say. I came downstairs in my underwear. And all I remember after
that is waking up in the bed the next day.
[More shots]
Finnegan: I want to vomit. Where's my lotion?
[Laughter]
KCD: That was another round of shots for the record. All right we made a dent in
that. I don't know where it all went, honestly.
Favorite bar, where do you love to go?
Finnegan: Um?
KCD: Come on where is your home away from home?
Finnegan: Finnegan's Pool Room.
KCD: Really? No I want where you go when you actually leave your house. It's a
damn fine bar, your house. I have an open tab there and I really love hanging out, but
where do you go in the outside world to drink?
[Another round]
KCD: So you won't leave your house anymore. Damn recluse. Tell me about O'Connors.
Finnegan: That was a damn fine bar. In my first ten minutes there, the owner
busted open a one hundred dollar bottle of Irish whisky and poured a shot.
KCD: Middleton's?
Finnegan: Yes.
[More shots]
KCD: Good times. Good times. Like Phil Hartman always said.
Finnegan: I spent time at Gilhouly's.
KCD: Yeah!
Finnegan: I can't go back. I tried to beat up the manager. He deserved it! You
were there. You know what I mean.
KCD: It's OK. We make fun of Joe on the web site. He's not that bad of a guy.
So if you are on a boring Tuesday night and don't want to drink at home, where do
you go? Where are you going to migrate?
[Yet another round of shots.]
Finnegan: There is a little place called Johnny's Tavern out on Shawnee Mission
Parkway. It's got good liquor, cheap waitresses and the drinks are priced all right. I
like to hang out there for a little while. It's got bikers and yuppies from Johnson
County. It's not too bad.
[More shots. A small fight breaks out. Ike is bit on the neck really hard by
LaToya. He cries like a girl.]
Finnegan: You pussy!
[More crowd interaction, more shots.]
KCD: We've been quite distracted.
Finnegan: Were we talking about nuns?
KCD: No. What's your take on Coors Light?
Finnegan: Is it lotion?
KCD: Sort of, but without any flavor.
[More shots]
Finnegan: What's the name of their album?
KCD: Who?
Finnegan: Not the Who.
KCD: We should go find another bottle of whisky.
Finnegan: I agree!
END
Coming in June: LaToya Prater, Drunk of the Month
