What Happened???

Did ya ever have one of those days? You know … one of those days where you felt like you were living somebody else’s life if only for that day??? Probably not. I mean I never thought such a thing even possible – and I’ve lived through some weird days in my life. Please take this little story you are about to read as a warning. As both a warning to the effects of alcohol and a bit of a wakeup call for those of you out there that think prisoner rights – heck, civil rights in general – are merely concerns for others. The following narrative clearly shows there could be a situation where you could quickly become one of those “others.”

My story begins, innocently enough, in my room at the Radisson Hotel in Longmont, Colorado. It was the day after my birthday – a birthday spent completing the tasks required to basically turn what was once my property of residence into merely an investment. I had successfully transferred the tasks required to rent out my house to a property management company and had a few days left before I needed to fly back to my new home in California. It was a Wednesday. My return flight was scheduled for the coming Saturday at 3:15pm.

Since I do enjoy playing a little poker now and again, I decided that it would be much more fun to spend my last two nights at a hotel closer to the casinos in Black Hawk. There was really no reason for me to be staying in Longmont anymore so I booked a room (a suite, actually) at this hotel up in the mountains. I don’t recall the name of the place but it doesn’t really matter – I never showed up. I did however call down to the desk at the Radisson and request that my checkout day be switched from Saturday to Thursday believing that I would be heading up to this new resort the next day. They kindly obliged my request…

I called my buddy Doug – he’s a poker player as well – and let him know that I had booked this room. We arranged it so that he would be heading up Friday afternoon. That was cool, I’d have someone to hang out with on my farewell night out in Black Hawk … who knew the next time I would be returning to Colorado now that I really had nothing holding me there…? My house was basically gutted and put on the market as a rental and I was now living my life as an official Californian. As a matter of fact, I had just received my California driver’s license in the mail the day before I flew back to Colorado on this last trip…

It was then that I received a call from Todd requesting that I head on over to Old Chicago’s. For those not in the know, the Radisson Hotel in Longmont is located directly next-door to Old Chicago’s. I had no other plans for that evening so I made the short walk across the parking lot. I met up with Todd and Dave, had a few of those large warm pretzels with dips, one pint of Guinness and a couple CC Manhattans before deciding to move the festivities over to the Fusion Food & Spirits. The Fusion was the bar located inside the Radisson – the hotel I was staying at, mind you…

You see, the way I figure it, there’s really no safer place to be drinking than at a bar located in your hotel. This assures that you will have absolutely no need to be going elsewhere when you decide to leave the bar. At the worst, it’s just a short stumble back to your room where you can sleep off any condition that you may have acquired that requires being slept off. Heck, you don’t even have to worry about needing to take a cab home – you’re already there… It was decided that, if the need arose, anybody was more than welcome to crash in my room with me. What could possibly mess up such a great plan? Read on, my friend, and find out…

So Todd, Dave and I grab seats at the bar. The place was pretty much empty – I seem to recall there might have been a couple of people there, but it was most definitely not packed … after all, it was a Wednesday evening… Finding three seats together at the bar was no problem.

This is where the vividness on my recollections starts to become foggy. I remember noticing the array of rather interesting drink containers that Fusion had – they had these large glass tanks on display behind the bar with various alcoholic concoctions to choose from. There was this rum drink with large pieces of fruit floating in it as well as what could be described as the ultimate in dirty martinis made up of vodka with a whole lot of olives floating in it. The latter was called a “Dirtini” although I don’t remember the various other drink names. We began ordering drinks.

I remember Dave leaving rather early. Todd had moved to the now empty bar stool next to me (the one formerly occupied by Dave) and we were having a conversation with this other guy that had come in and joined us at the bar. I have no clue as to how long the discussion was nor what we were talking about. This was, however, the last thing I remember of that night…

The next memory I have is waking up. It was weird though – I was still a bit intoxicated however something just didn’t seem right to me. The bed that I was lying on was very firm and I was still wearing my clothes from the night before (although I would soon discover that certain items – shoes, socks, my belt, my phone, my wallet, my keys and my “Green Smoke” e-cig – were missing). And, upon rising, I noticed that I was not in my hotel room. No, as a matter of fact, the room I was in was somewhat confining. It consisted of a cot, a very crude toilet and sink and one very massive, very securely shut door. I was in a jail cell!!!

What the hell?! Why was I coming to in a jail cell?! What had I done?! What do I do now?! How the fuck do I get out of here?!?! I spent the next what seemed like hours pounding on the door, looking out the narrow window panes and trying to ignore the various ruffians that would stop by from time to time to taunt me. I had absolutely no idea what was going on; although I was somewhat expecting a police officer to be stopping by sometime in the near future to possibly explain things to me and hopefully let me out. This never happened…

What did happen (and bear with me a bit; although I remember most of this, it’s somewhat foggy as to the exact details…) was that, in time, an officer retrieved me from my cell and led me to some other location in the building. I don’t recall anybody ever telling me why I was there. What I do recall is getting finger printed and escorted to a small room where I was told to strip down and put on the clothes provided – underwear, an undershirt and a red jumpsuit with “BCOS JAIL” printed in black, block letters on the back.

I was then given a couple sheets, blankets and a plastic coffee mug containing a comb, a small bar of soap, a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste and a plastic spork before being escorted to a large room where a couple dozen other guys – all wearing very similar red jumpsuits – were meandering about amongst loosely strewn chairs and tables. I was put into this room, the door was shut behind me and I was given no instructions by anybody. I found an empty seat and sat down. Nobody spoke to me and I didn’t try to start any conversations with anybody else. I had no idea what was going on and absolutely no instruction on what I was supposed to be doing. I figured I’d just sit there until somebody decided to fill me in…

There were a couple TVs on the wall I was facing. They were both on however the sound for both was muted and nobody seemed to be paying any attention to them. I just mention this as an observation as their existence meant nothing to me at the time. I just sat there for some unknown period of time basically staring at the wall and waiting – for what, exactly, I had no idea.

And here is where I will be leaving you today. I’m planning on continuing this story soon enough; however, being that I actually am a productive member of society I need to get back to being productive. You can rest assured that this story will be continued as I firmly believe it needs to be told. For now I am going to have to leave you starring at the wall…

bis später,

Coriolis