Previous installments: Part 1, Part 2.

Author's note: Once again, I'm not including the last names of the people involved or identifying the university at which these events occurred. Feel free to make guesses, but understand that I will not publish comments that contain the exact names of the people or places in question. I'm just trying to avoid any...Imperial entanglements...so to speak.

By the time Mat finally woke up, Brett had already taken Shelly to the airport. This caused Mat to be unusually bummed out all day. I say "unusually" only with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, since I didn't really know much about his habits at the time. But he was dispirited enough to make small talk with me, much of which had to do with Shelly and what I thought about her.

"She was pretty f***ing cool, wasn't she? Man, dat woman is fine. You thought she was fine, right? Damn, I miss her already. This sh*t sucks. I wish she was home already so I could call her. Maybe I should wait, you know, be cool. You think she'll call me? I can't believe I met her right before she was leavin'. Can you believe dat? Aw, man, f*** me." ("F*** me," I would soon discover, was Mat's go-to phrase for virtually every situation, good or bad.)

Eventually, he got around to asking questions about me. Sadly, I had little to tell that he would care about or understand, so he focused on two things: my interest in basketball and my love life. Unfortunately, his knowledge of the NBA wasn't that broad. He knew Rik Smits (who was a fellow countryman) and loved Michael Jordan (which was something of a gimmie). That was pretty much the extent of it. I asked him about his prep school career, and all I got out of him was that he was "really good" and hit "about 80 percent" of his free throws. He claimed not to remember his rebounding numbers, which I found bizarre. The dude was seven-plus feet tall and weighed 300 pounds. I expected him to boast Wilt Chamberlain-esque boarding stats...and the fact that he didn't probably should have told me something.

The discussion of my love life was pretty uncomfortable. I tried to explain the fact that I loved my not-quite-girlfriend Aimee despite her refusal to have a committed relationship with me. ("Shit,man" he said, "you need to tell dat ho what up.") And when I admitted that we hadn't had sex -- that we hadn't, in fact, so much as kissed -- his eyes nearly bulged out of his giant head. ("What the f***? How you love somebody who don't even have sex wit you? F*** me. That's some f***ed up sh*t.") I don't know if we were bonding, but the conversation certainly earned me his rather unique form of sympathy. It also made me feel like a gormless stooge.

"Look," he said, waving off my explanation about how sometimes loving someone means waiting for little things like physical intimacy, "here's what you gotta do. Tell dat girl, 'You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.' I'm telling you, dat sh*t works every time."

I was certain he was right...assuming the line was clumsily delivered by a physical freak who appeared to be -- based on his size alone -- a mortal lock for the NBA. But for me? All I could see was a pathetic, perhaps even lethal dose of fail. When I expressed my skepticism, he suggested I enhance the line by playing Sade's "No Ordinary Love" in the background. He wasn't just paying lip service, either. The "most beautiful woman" line/Sade combination would go on to become a staple of Mat's many hookups, which is probably why, to this day, "No Ordinary Love" makes me want to punch myself in the groin until I pass out.

I was able to hold Mat's interest for only so long, and eventually he simply got up and wandered out of the room. He was gone for several hours, during which time I copied my schedule into my daily planner and mapped a route to each of my classes. I sharpened pencils, packed my backpack...you know, all the things a good little freshman nerd does. Once I ran out of preparations to make, I called Aimee. She had moved into her dorm room at Butler University the day before, and she had been having a blast ever since. She dug her roommate (a nice but socially awkward girl named Latrisse) and had spent the last 24 hours partying and making friends. It made me feel angry and jealous.

When I told her my first couple days at college had been lousy, she was incredulous. "How can you not be having a great time?" I told her I didn't know anybody to have a great time with. "Go out and meet people then!" was her answer to my problem. If only I'd known it was that simple. After a while, I tried to turn the conversation to our budding not-relationship, but she dismissed it. "You know how I feel about that." Maybe Mat was right. Maybe I really did need to "tell dat ho what's up."

Talking to Aimee did nothing to improve my mood. It only turned it from "black" to "blacker." Then one of those strange "only in college" things happened. My door opened and in walked a fat guy with thick glasses and an even thicker belly. He was wearing nothing but a towel that was about 50 percent smaller than it should have been. He took three or four steps into my room before he realized his mistake.

"Oh," he said in mild surprise. "I don't live here. I'm sorry." Then he offered me the hand that wasn't holding his too-small towel closed. "I'm Ron. I live...next door, apparently. Nice to meet you."

I shook Ron's hand and introduced myself. "Well," he said, seemingly in no real hurry, "I'm sure we'll be seeing more of each other. Hopefully I'll be wearing more clothes next time. If you ever need anything, feel free to stop by. In fact, feel free to stop by even if you don't need anything. I'd be happy to have you over, and I'm sure my roommate, Nathan, feels the same way." I couldn't help but wonder if this guy was for real. On the one hand, this was the closes I'd come to making a friend so far. On the other hand, he was weird and mostly naked.

After Ron left, I sat down to do the only thing I had to do at that point: watch an old basketball game. I really needed to get off that crazy rollercoaster of fun.

Mat got back around 10 p.m. and immediately called Shelly. (So much for being cool.) She had only just made it home and was unpacking, but they still sweet-talked each other for the next 45 minutes or so. It was weird to hear this monster of a man cooing like a lovesick teenager, but I found it kind of endearing. By the time he hung up the phone, I was getting ready for bed. "Good idea," he said. "First day of classes tomorrow. Gotta be ready." I asked him if he had his schedule. "Yeah," he said, glancing around, "it's here somewhere."

Then he collapsed into his bed with a huge grin on his face. "Dude, she told me she loves me."

"No kidding?" I said. That seemed pretty fast to me.

"Yeah, she loves me." Then he heaved a deep, self-satisfied sigh.

"So, what, you guys are dating now?"

He thought about that for a few seconds and then said, "I guess so."

So the girl I'd been friends with for five years and had bent over backwards for on more occasions than I could count had never said she loved me nor would she even consent to dating me seriously, but this goon meets a girl, sleeps with her immediately, and then gets an "I love you" the next day? I was pissed, but I played it off.

"Good for you," I said.

A few minutes later, we killed the lights and went to bed. Despite my bitterness over his luck with women, I thought things had gone pretty well between us that day. We'd talked and gotten along. He was apparently in a long-distance relationship, which I took to mean he wouldn't be banging a different girl every night of the week. And he was even going to bed at a reasonable time. I smiled. It looked like this was going to work out okay after all.

The next day was a blur. I had three classes and a seminar for my scholarship group. Even though I'd already picked up the books listed on my course schedule, a couple of my teachers gave us another list of additional books we needed to pick up. I was immediately assigned a couple hundred pages worth of reading, a term paper and a huge Calculus assignment. After my classes, I had to work an evening shift at the dorm's food service, which lasted a grueling four hours. (I was tasked with restocking the dining room, which included a large salad bar, a soft drink station, a tea/lemonade machine, a milk machine that dispensed three different kinds of milk, and two ice cream machines. I also had to clean up any messes. In case you didn't know this: men are sloppy pigs. That is all.)

When I finally dragged ass back to my room, Mat wasn't there. I settled down at my desk and dug into my homework. I was at it for three hours before taking a short break, during which I went down to the grill for a hamburger. When I got back to the room, "No Ordinary Love" was playing because -- you guessed it -- Mat was in the middle of sexing up some girl. She was squealing and laughing like a 12-year-old, and the festivities didn't stop when I came back into the room. Mat had dimmed the lights for obvious reasons, so I stooped down at my desk and quietly munched on my hamburger. Once they finished -- mercifully, it rarely took long -- the girl got dressed and left.

A few minutes passed before I said anything. "So," I finally said, trying to keep the judgment out of my voice, "I thought you were seeing Shelly."

"I am," he said in a casual voice.

"Well, uh, who was that then?"

He glanced toward the door as if trying to recall the girl's name. Apparently, he either didn't know or didn't care, because he said, "Just some girl."

"I don't think Shelly would be real thrilled," I said.

Mat rolled his eyes. "Man, she a long way away, you know?"

I didn't "know," but I kept that to myself and got ready for bed.

Shortly after I crawled under the covers, Shelly called. After the perfunctory greeting, she and Mat began talking dirty, discussing all the naughty things they'd like to be doing to each other. It started to sound a little too much like phone sex to me, so I pulled my pillow around my head and tried to pretend I was alone, in a cave, on the moon. With some effort, I was eventually able to drift off.

Part 4

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84 Comments:
Blogger Cortez said...
"He was wearing nothing but a towel that was about 50 percent smaller than it should have been."

"By the way Starsky, those are the hand towels. The big towels are up top."
~Chris Penn (R.I.P.)

Blogger Will said...
1. With all the f-bombs in today's post I thought you would've at least thrown us a "word that KG mouths on the sidelines".
2. How long after this did you and Aimee break-up? Whose decision was it?

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Blogger chris said...
Bill Walton could've taken you to the moon with one of his overwrought metaphors...speaking of which, I assume footage from the '86 season served as one of your coping mechanisms.

CAPTCHA: "exiate" as in "Aimee would soon exiate Bawful's life."

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
So are we talkin' Purdue here? It's in Indy, they have had solid teams in the past....

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
Added note: God, this is becoming depressingly real. Your life sucks, Mat's life rocks. School work, job for McHale.

Mat has sex-y time with random laaaaaadiiieeeess.

It's like watching a taped train wreck. AKA, it is fantastic.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Best series ever!

But the bit about "Matt sexing up" in close proximity to "...like a 12-year old girl" is a little disturbing.

Blogger JShaw said...
She goes to Butler, you drove from Kokomo (great strip club place HipHugger) so im guessing Purdue or IU.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Bawful, can you at least tell us if it's anyone of these players?

Beenders, Hank 1946-1948
Elson, Francisco 2003-2007
Gadzuric, Dan 2002-2007
Hammink, Geert 1993-1995
Nater, Swen 1973-1983
Smits, Rik 1988-1999

http://basketballreference.com/players/bycountry.htm?code=NED

Anonymous Anonymous said...
God that sounds too much like my freshman experience except my roommate was a pot dealer, not an athlete

Blogger Wild Yams said...
I'm gonna attempt to move away from my fascination and questions surrounding the treasure trove of basketball tapes (and chris's comment isn't helping), and instead join in with the others so far who have adroitly noticed that this long ago relationship with Aimee seems headed for a sad ending. This seems to be the first time in these fantastic tales that a tinge of bitterness has crept in, so I'm curious if things were completely hunky-dory before college, or if there were already signs that things might be heading south before then. I have a sense that asking too much about Aimee now is akin to reading the last page of a book first, but I'm definitely curious if you two are still in touch or subscribed to each other's Twitter feeds or anything like that. It'll probably ruin the surprise to know all that this early though.

I can't tell you how much I'm enjoying these :)

Blogger Victor said...
I forgot to ask this yesterday: Did Mat wrap up beforehand when he offered you sloppy seconds? Hm... Maybe sloppy answers the question.

I still can't believe you turned down:

Shelly grabbed the joint, then came over and crawled onto my lap. She held the joint up to my mouth and whispered in my ear. "C'mon, baby. Get high with us."

for this:

my not-quite-girlfriend Aimee despite her refusal to have a committed relationship with me

Anyone with a name spelled like that is just trouble.

Blogger elefes said...
Loving the "Livin' Large" posts!

I have to agree with Victor, anyone with a name spelled like that is indeed just trouble.

Blogger Barry said...
A brutally honest account. This "Ron" seems like a freak however - that is some odd shit to be telling someone you've never met.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH. A HipHugger reference!!!!

Blogger Will said...
dandruff- I'm pretty sure it's not Hank Beenders. The thought of an 80-year old pulling those kind of moves just cracks me up.

Blogger Bcstein said...
This comment has been removed by the author.

Blogger Henchman #2 said...
This is why Syracuse puts all of the basketball players together in off campus apartments, away from all of the guys who weren't so capable at getting some. Though by that logic, they should have put Carmelo Anthony in an orbiting satellite.

Blogger Basketbawful said...
Cortez -- Dude, that very thing went through my head while writing this.

Will -- Replies
1. I promise to go back and insert that at least once.
2. There's more to the story, keep reading.

chris -- You know, it's funny, but for some reason I was obsessed at that time with Bird's later career ('90 through '92), when he heroically played through pain but had no real chance of winning it all. I guess I was just a glutton for punishment.

Anonymous #1 -- ...

Buck Nasty -- Nice try, but I'm not naming the school.

Anonymous #2 -- Yes, I understand how that could be disturbing, but that's what she was like. Oh, and she'll be back.

JShaw -- Yeah...not naming the school. And how is it EVERYBODY knows about the Hiphugger?! It's not that great. For my money, best strip club in Indiana is Brad's Brass Flamingo in Indianapolis. It gets Basketbawful's official Seal of Approval.

dandruff102 -- The mere fact that I've published this comment should tell you that it's none of those players.

Anonymous #3 -- Sorry if the flashbacks are unpleasant. If it helps, I promise things get better (though not for my relationship with my roommate).

Wild Yams -- Not to ruin anything, but here's a little pre-postscript to the story. Aimee and I obviously did not end up together forever, despite the fact that 18-year-old me really believed we would. And even though things ended "badly" -- otherwise they'd never end, right? -- we had some pretty good times before that. I have no leftover bitterness about anything that happened, I'm simply trying to honestly express the emotions I felt at that time. I was definitely irritated that she wouldn't just commit to me, but looking back, I get why she wouldn't. Long-distance relationships suck, and college is a time you should be dating around. But I couldn't really see past what I felt at the time, which was "She is The One." It's a silly, immature way to look at things, but there you have it. I was young and stupid.

Victor -- As I said, I never once spotted Mat's schlong, so I never saw it wrapped or unwrapped. That said, I don't remember ever seeing condoms or condom wrappers in the trash, so I'm going to have to assume he left it up to the girls to protect themselves from his giant splooge.

And yes, I can see why my choices confused you. But I was a little slow on the uptake back then. As BadDave will tell you, I once came home from a kinda-sorta date and said to him, in complete seriousness, "She took off her shirt and just sat next to me topless for, like, an hour. Do you think she wanted me to make a move?"

That sound you just heard was the ghost of BadDave's facepalm, which has defied the laws of time and space to stay with me forever.

Blogger Basketbawful said...
elefes -- Damn it, where were you and Victor when I was 18 and needed you? I could have used that information a tad sooner.

Barry -- Actually, Ron was harmless. He was just super friendly and not remotely self-conscious about anything...as you'll find out in a future installment.

BadDave -- Funny we never went there. Actually, it's not.

Will and Bcstein -- You are both correct: I am not yet the freaky-old pickup guy. Yet.

BleedingHeartPessimist -- My school generally kept the student athletes apart, and as it turned out Mat and I ended up together sort of accidentally, because the university ran out other athletes to room him with.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Mr. Bawful - Sorry, I meant to imply that the bitterness that crept in here was in reference to how you felt back then, not that your writing makes you sound bitter about it now. I was just commenting on your reaction to Mat telling you Shelly said she loved him and how that led to you thinking about Aimee's lack of commitment. You're definitely right though, that at that age it's probably a bit silly to be too committed to any one person when you can't have had too much time really exploring what's out there to see what you're really looking for, and that's doubly true if the relationship in question is a long distance one.

Speaking of long distance relationships, just the other day I was discussing with a friend how at this point the reality is that if I'm dating someone who lives more than 15 miles away from me, it's practically like being in a long distance relationship simply because the traffic is so bad that anything farther away than that almost ensures you can't practically see each other except on weekends. In other news, I hate where I live.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Aren't you a little concerned that your former roomie now lives in the same city as you and won't enjoy a story about him that mentions weed when he already has served one drug suspension? Just a thought...

Blogger Basketbawful said...
Wild Yams -- Gotcha. Yeah, the bitterness and general lack of understanding were all about being young and inexperienced. Everything is now, now, now, and it feels like life or death. In retrospect, Aimee probably had a better sense of that than I did, and she didn't want to get involved before she'd had a chance to spread her wings a little.

You know, reading what you had to say about traffic, it reminds me that driving to see Aimee usually took me about an hour, which seemed like an impossible amount of time to travel by car. Of course, I grew up in a town you could drive across in less than 10 minutes...through heavy traffic. Then, eventually, I moved to Chicago, where it takes an hour minimum to go pretty much anywhere. It's all about perspective, isn't it?

Anonymous AK Dave said...
@WY- 15miles does NOT qualify, sorry. In fact, if you CAN visit, even only on the weekends, it doesn't qualify. When your gf/fiancee lives in goddamned GERMANY- THAT, my friend, is a long-distance relationship. In other news, my fiancee lives in goddamned Germany.

What you have, is a mid-range game, a middle-distance relationship. You're an 800m runner, not a marathoner. You see, if you REALLY WANTED TO, you could get there, but it's a nuisance and a huge inconvenience for either of you.

Basketbawful- I appreciate your honesty and candor in these posts. I admit to squandering a few opportunities in my youth as well (though not so much in college, because I started college a couple years later than most- I was EXPERIENCED by then! lol). The important thing is that you've learned the error of your way, can now make the right move when a woman presents you with an opportunity, but you've not let go of your nerd-roots (re: larry bird shorts). That makes you a super-nerd-hero. An ueber-nerd.

NNEERRRRDDDSS!!

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
Whoa, is that inside information from Anonymous?

What are the chances Mat even reads this blog?

Other than shout outs from Truehoop and a few links under the 'favorites' category on sites like WithLeather, not many people have a chance to find this Secret Garden of basketbawful.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
It's probably for the best we never went there. Though I thought I'd told you that I have visited with folks from my old hometown - they thought it was the cat's ass. After going, I agree - it's what the cat dragged in. Whoosh.

The Brass Flamingo? I've always been more partial to Gold Club - but both owned by "Brad," God bles him.

Blogger BJ said...
Out of curiosity, how many disciplinary reports were you listed on as an UnInnocent Bystander?
-BJ

Blogger AnacondaHL said...
1) To all the commentors asking about Mat's penis, putting into context that Indiana country boy is seeing casual sex in front of him and the time era, I'm not surprised Bawful doesn't remember if his roomie was using condoms or not. Also, I think sex and porn were different back 1995 than now, so it's probably safe to assume a lack of more modern means of liquid disposal, and "sloppy seconds" really did imply "sloppy meat to juice seconds".

2) You're setup of the story with Aimee sounds exactly like the advice Bill Simmons gave in 2002 about the HS to college transition: "Just remember, when you get to college, you will break up with them by Columbus Day Weekend, probably get back together during Thanksgiving Break, then break up for good during Christmas vacation. Everyone thinks, "Oh, it won't happen to us." Believe me, it's going to happen"

3) Honestly, you can't go around saying she sounded like a 12 year old during sex. When you have seen what I've seen, seen what some people do in the anime world, you know the horror that folows next after statements like that...

4) TellDatHoWhatUp will be the name of my 2009-10 fantasy basketball team.

Blogger milaz said...
man I never thought I'd hear about an American student having a hard time with his foreign roommate having sex and drinking/getting high. When I was studying there it was usually the other way around, US students tended to be more "let's drink, get high, f*ck anything that's female".... then again I knew many cases of people in college to drink until they're sick (for me it was something I grew up with so I could never understand it) vs those that were there for all the rest and the partying.... in any case... Does he make it to Thanksgiving before he's kicked out?

Blogger chuck_wagon said...
Alright, I know that you write for the Bulls blog. (Great job btw, it's always a great read, even if it another post about Tyrus' terrible shot selection etc.)

Anyway, you mentioned in an earlier post that Aimme went to Butler University, which is in Indianapolis. And you lived within driving distance of your own school.

Second, you mentioned NBA Jam (debuted in 1993 I think) and Unfinished Business (1992). So it's safe to assume that you started college in the fall of 1993, or '94.

My first guess was The University Of Illinois, and the future NBA All-Star I would guess would be Nick Anderson. But I think that he's a little older. I think he came in around 1990.

So that's what I've got so far, I'll look forward to future updates. Oh, and if you want to confirm or deny any of this, you can e-mail me at chuckwagon05@aim.com

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
I'm pretty sure in today's world it isn't exactly the most common thing to see another man banging away at his woman two steps from you. That s**t's weird.

True story, I was reading what was possibly a true story on a message board (linked from College Humor, it's not like I'm checking out three way fic boards) and it went into graphic detail about a guy double teaming one of his friend's (when they were kids they were friends) mom. With what he described as a slightly retarded fellow.

That s**t haunts my memories to this day.

Although it only happened like last week.

Blogger chris said...
Hey, victor, stop hating on the name "Aimee," as Aimee Mann rocks as my favorite female singer-songwriter ever. :D

Bawful: Okay, what's your advice for the college students of the future, watching Rick Adleman send Yao out there? Or the first part of the 1971-1972 Lakers' season with Elgin Baylor being the bad luck charm!?!?

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Mr. Bawful - It absolutely is all about perspective, and that's why it was a little daunting realizing that my realistic "dating radius" was as small as 15 miles. If I lived in a small town, that would be nothing; but any time you're dating someone who lives an hour plus away, that means that seeing each other will involve two hours minimum driving round trip, and on a school night that's usually too much. Granted, in the beginning of a relationship it's not bad, but as the months go by you really don't find yourself too excited to leave right from work to sit in an hour plus of traffic on a regular, ongoing basis; and when you live where I do, anything farther than 15 miles away has a very high potential of being an hour plus drive, especially at rush hour in the evening. Another similar thing which can make dating more of a pain in the ass than it needs to be: lack of nearby parking at one or both of your places.

This is why they need to hurry up and invent teleporters ASAP. It would be worth the occasional Brundlefly to make dating that much easier for those of us who live in congested major cities.

Blogger Barry said...
AnacondaHL: for me it's a toss up between Sloppy Seconds and TellDatHoWhatUp for now. Though depending on how long this story is going, there might well be some other contenders.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
[Identity guess omitted by site owner]!!

hey bro, great writing, great story, great blog.

i'm 27 years old but i can totally relate to that first girlfriend stuff and can appreciate that you're trying to tell the story from your thought process/emotions AT THE TIME. 1995 is a lot different from 2009 huh?

Blogger Basketbawful said...
Anonymous -- You said: "Anonymous said...
Aren't you a little concerned that your former roomie now lives in the same city as you and won't enjoy a story about him that mentions weed when he already has served one drug suspension? Just a thought..."

The answer: No. He lives overseas.

AK Dave -- How in the hell did you get engaged to someone in Germany? Oddly enough, the exact same thing happened to my college buddy Skip. He said it sucked. The irony is, it really didn't, not most of the time, anyway.

Buck Nasty -- Based on some video someone forwarded me of my old roomie yesterday, I sincerely hope Mat never discovers our secret garden. Oddly, "Secret Garden" plays a part later in this tale.

BadDave -- WHAAAAAAAAAA??! When the hell did you go to the Hugger? You couldn't have gone until you turned 21, by which time we knew each other. If you visited Kokomo w/o me or w/o visiting me, we're gonna have words. Bad enough you moved to Scranton, a.k.a. "Pennsylvania's Kokomo."

BJ -- Hm. Good question. Two or three, enough that I had to appear before the dorm's disciplinary board. I had to, Mat didn't. He was excused. That's a fair cop, eh?


AnacondaHL -- Replies:
2. Yeah. That Simmons article isn't dead-on, but it's in the ballpark.

3. After living with Mat, I learned to screen out what I didn't want to see/remember/think about. He actually helped me develop amazing powers over my own mind, so for that, Mat, wherever you are, thanks.

milaz -- Not to ruin the ending, but he graduated. In four years, no less. But, as you will see, there were some hiccups.

chuck_wagon -- Although your final guess was incorrect, your overall powers of deduction were pretty keen.

Buck Nasty -- Wow. Thanks for, uhm, sharing and stuff. Quick segue. During the summer before my freshman year, me and my buddy Gauvin (actual spelling) used to hang out at our buddy Hornbuckle's (last name) house because he had SATELLITE TV...which at the time was available only to rich people. Anyway, his mom had had some pretty extensive plastic surgery and was, by all accounts, a freaking knockout. But she, like her son, was completely and utterly clueless. While we were watching Speed Racer or whatever, she would appear out of the blue to serve us pizza rolls in little nighties or lingerie. Brian never noticed, but Gauvin and I were usually on the verge of hormonal explosion. So one day Gauvin finally freaks a little (after she'd left the room) and said, "Uh, Brian, why does your mom walk in front of us in lingerie?" Brian, shocked, said, "What? She...she does? What?" Gauvin then went into graphic detail about the last five things she'd worn in front of us, to which Brian replied, "Man, I don't know what you're talking about, but stop looking at my mom!" Hornbuckle's mom then walked out, in her lingerie, and asked if everything was okay. Hornbuckle asked her, totally straight-faced, "Mom, do you ever walk around in your lingerie?"

chris -- Definitely the first part of the 1971-1972 Lakers' season with Elgin Baylor being the bad luck charm. Not only does it have much greater historical significance, but very few people realize that Laker team didn't really gel until Elgin hung up his sneaks.

Wild Yams -- For some reason, your use of "Brundlefly" cracked me up, like, three different times. Thank you.

Barry -- A classic line that, sadly, won't appear in this story because I didn't hear it until I was working for the Kokomo Parks and Recreation Dept. the summer after my freshman year, is: "Pussy ain't got no face." If anyone's interested, I'll tell that story here in the comments.

Anonymous -- "1995 is a lot different from 2009 huh?" Seriously.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
@baddave, haha. I see what you did there, "Brad" and his gold club and brass flamingo lounge. Any kid growing up a hundred miles from indy somehow saw one of his calendars. Heh.

You know, I grew up a huge Pacers fan in Indianapolis. My favorite player was def. Uncle Reg. Reggie "Miller."

Blogger Will said...
Please regale us with that tale, Bawful

Blogger Mintz... said...
'Bawful... This off-season content is genius. You're like Tucker Max for nerdy basketball fans.... what could be better?

Blogger wchapman said...
Dam, Mat sounds like he is a ten.

Good story Bawful, a great way to waste a little bit of my morning.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
man, this guy sounds like he could be so big he was like ten damn men. ten dam big guys.

Super funny story.

Blogger Basketbawful said...
wchapman and anonymous -- Very clever, guys.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Buck Nasty - Here's that horrid threesome story you were talking about, but if it makes you feel any better, it's not true (the author lifted virtually every part of it from a variety of stand up comics' acts).

Mr. Bawful - Look who you're asking. Make with the "Pussy ain't got no face" story, stat.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
the all star in question is either [guess deleted by site owner] or [guess deleted by site owner] right?

Blogger Unknown said...
These stories are awesome. How many installments can we expect?

Blogger chris said...
I think we need to use the phrase "guess deleted by site owner" the same way we use "obscene word KG mouths off from the bench."

Blogger Basketbawful said...
Anonymous -- "the all star in question is either [guess deleted by site owner] or [guess deleted by site owner] right?"

It was your second guess.

Will and Wild Yams -- Okay, since you requested it. I worked with some seriously wacky characters at the Kokomo Parks and Recreation Dept. One of them was a man named Bruce who was exactly three credits away from graduating with an engineering degree...only he never went back to take that class. Instead, he worked 40 hours a week for a lousy $5.25 an hour, with the hopes that he'd eventually become a "full-timer" at which point he'd get to make a fat $11.50 an hour. Hoo-ah!

Anyway, Bruce was obsessed with hitting the pooty. The dude went out every night with the express intent of getting laid. Now, as you'd imagine, a man in his mid-30s who mows grass for a living and makes minimum wage doing it isn't exactly what you'd call an eligible bachelor, so Bruce had to adjust his standards. By which I mean, he didn't have any. Okay, he had two and two only: That they were 1) female and 2) not on fire. And if they were on fire, he'd put them out and proposition them for sex.

Sometimes Bruce would use his "powers" as a park employee to get some action. For instance, he bedded one particular woman-beast -- a morbidly obese single mother -- by promising her free lawn care for the duration of the summer. This meant that, once a week, we'd have to throw a few lawnmowers into the truck and rush over to her house during our 15 minute break, get her lawn squared away, then hot-wheel it back to whatever park we were at that day. (Kokomo, believe it or not, has over 25 parks...which means it has three times as many parks as buildings over three stories.) I don't know how I got drug into his poontang schemes, but I did.

Anyway, Bruce was usually in a great mood, I'm guessing because he got some on an almost-daily basis. But there were random days here or there where he'd mope his way into work and refuse to do his usual hour or two of actual work. On one of these days, I asked what was up. He croaked, "My lady wouldn't give me any last night." Bruce referring to anybody as "my lady" was laughable, since he stuck his man-meat into any and every willing hole, but I pretended to sympathize and asked about her. To my amazement, he yanked a picture of her out of his wallet. The woman, if woman it was, was just...grotesque. Ghastly enough, in fact, that I recoiled away from her very picture.

"Bruce," I said, barely avoiding an involuntary personal protein spill, "why do you even care? She's...not attractive. You can do better."

He then flashed me a very fatherly look and said, "Matholomew," because that was his nickname for me, "let uncle Brucie impart some very important knowledge onto your young mind. You see, young fella, it don't matter where you get it as long as you do get it. You see, son, pussy ain't got no face...it all feels the same from the inside."

Forget the double-negative and that I have since learned the last part of that statement is factually incorrect. The "pussy ain't got no face" tagline became a personal favorite, and I have tried to spread it far and wide.

By the way, I have to say that most of these stories are best told in person, because I do dead-on impressions of the Mats and Bruces of my stories. I might have to turn one of these tales into a podcast.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
[Future NBA All-Star guess deleted by site owner] approves of this story

Anonymous AK Dave said...
"True story, I was reading what was possibly a true story on a message board (linked from College Humor, it's not like I'm checking out three way fic boards) and it went into graphic detail about a guy double teaming one of his friend's (when they were kids they were friends) mom. With what he described as a slightly retarded fellow.

That s**t haunts my memories to this day."

-Buck Nasty

OK, so, of course I had to read it when Yams posted it. Why? I don't know. It's like when somebody winces after smelling something spoiled in a jar, and says "EEW- NASTY... smell this, dude!" You KNOW it's going to be wretched but you smell it anyway... and it's wretched.

If you haven't read Yams' link- trust me- you don't want to read it. Just... don't do it.

Why, self, do you do this kind of thing to me???

Blogger Basketbawful said...
AK -- Expect as many installments as it takes to finish the story. Several more, at least.

Anonyous -- "[Future NBA All-Star guess deleted by site owner] approves of this story"

Nice try, you sneaky bastard.

AK Dave -- Dude, Buck Nasty has been around long enough that you can kinda-sorta trust his judgement. Remember: He's a Clippers fan! So if he says something is haunting his dreams, it must be really, really bad. Like, crossing the streams bad.

Blogger chris said...
Matholomew. Wow. I don't know if you could ever live that moniker down.

"To replace the gaping hole left in the Magic's roster by the blockbuster Tony Battie deal, Patrick Chewing is rumored to be offering Matholomew McHale a tryout contract as the replacement lacktator in central Florida."

Blogger AnacondaHL said...
Bawful: Re: Brian's Mom: It's like how the Indians never even saw the Spanish ships on the horizon, because the concept was so inconcievable.

Yams/BuckNasty: That was the funniest thing I have read all week. Double the fun is my word verification: inton. In ton.

And I can't agree with the pussy ain't got no face comment. A few minutes browsing animated gifs and picture compilations on the Internet will easily refute this statement.

Blogger AnacondaHL said...
Really, chris, this comment thread has to be THE most inappropriate time to post "gaping hole".

Anonymous lippykissy said...
Sex, drugs, and basketball?

You should write a screenplay.

Anonymous TehJay said...
According to a comment I found from several years ago on another blog, you actually lived down the hall from this player, and not in the same room. That makes me a sad panda if true :(

Blogger Basketbawful said...
TehJay -- I know of one only blog where I commented about my old roomie, and I definitely said I lived WITH him and not down the hall from him. Exact quote from that comment: "During my first semester, I roomed with one of the varsity ballers..."

I'm not sure what blog you're talking about, but feel free to e-mail it to me (basketbawful@yahoo.com). Trust me, I'm not making this stuff up.

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
I told you. That story is terrible. When he told the thing about the shoe lace...I had mental image flashes at random moments during the day. The horror. It reminds me of when I heard that Elton Brand tore his Achilles. And then when he was going to come back as a Clipper with Boom Dizzle, but...well you know the story. My life...fail.

And you AHL! You actually found it funny. Oh the humanity.

I also just realized that I opened with 'true story,' and then immediately after said that it might be a true story. Sure, it conveyed exactly what I meant, but what an overuse of 'true story.'

Anonymous Arlena said...
"She took off her shirt and just sat next to me topless for, like, an hour. Do you think she wanted me to make a move?"
Wow, this seriously sounds like something I would have done/said in the past.

I also had a 'GF' similar to your Aimee at the end of HS. It really pissed me off right after HS, because I felt like I had wasted my time and was a fool because I really had feelings for her, but I've grown to appreciate it. Its hard to explain the feelings you have back then. Most girls I didn't want a relationship with, then this one girl I did and she wanted no such thing. We hadn't even kissed, but I was obsessed with her and ignored all other girls (much to my current dismay). It took a while to get out of her witchcraft charm, and as soon as I had my summer was much more exciting...

Anyways, it was just interesting to read the perspective of someone with a similar experience. Cheers for opening up the hidden vault for all to read on the interwebs! We should have a competition of 'ways girls threw themselves at us and we just completely ignored it' recollections.
A funny one (and G rated) in my mind was this really hot number in HS had me at her house and was mentioning wanting to go to the homecoming(i think) dance, and in passing called me a dork (which I was) and I then called her a B*tch. I think it was meant to be a joke, but it certainly didn't come across very well.
Earlier, she had been trying on outfits for me to show what she'd wear to the dance. And instead of asking her out, I call her a b*tch and then left. god damnit.

Blogger Basketbawful said...
Arlena -- The funny thing is, that was one of several times a girl used the "I'll just take my top off" seduction method on me in college. In a way, it's kind of insulting. Like, are guys REALLY that easy, that a girl can just take her shirt off and we...

...sorry, what was I saying?

As to your story: DUDE! I finally found someone as smoove as me is! Huzzah!

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
I was looking back at old posts...and I'd like to say that I'm sorry.

I'm sorry that you were ignored for so long.

The comments are now filled with sidebars and interesting banter. Before, you were lucky to get 2 comments. Way to power through, and find some internet popularity.

Google currently lists 56k some-aught results for Basketbawful. Trends shows that your popularity skyrocketed in early 2008. I wonder why?

Blogger Cerina Aragones said...
WHERE is Vinny Del Negro on your new banner???? And Larry Brown?

Blogger Andrei said...
Bawful, awesome stories, keep them coming. It reminds me of how pathetic I felt as I sat unshaven and unshowered playing Baulder's Gate 2 on a Friday night when my frat-tastic roommate showed up with two hotties under his arms asking me to spend the night elsewhere. Although, I suppose at least I did not have to witness his 5 minute sex-session. On the other hand I did find ladies' underwear in my bed later (you can be assured I had nothing to do with them getting there).

PS Are you purposefully leaving a "t" of your roommate's name to distinguish between the two of you?

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Mr. Bawful, I'm reminded of a study conducted at the University of Michigan that I read about when I was in college, in which they had men approach women they'd never met before and ask them straight away if they'd like to go back to their place to have sex, and then they had women approach guys they'd never met and ask the same thing. The results are not surprising, as 75% of the men who were asked said "yes" but not a single woman who was asked agreed to go.

While the results are not surprising, it is a good reminder of the vast difference between men and women when it comes to who decides when sex will occur. It's also a good illustration of why there is a "double standard" regarding sex, and why guys who have a lot of it are considered "studs" while women who do the same are considered "sluts". It's because it is an actual accomplishment for a man to bed a woman (even for your co-worker Bruce), but it is not an accomplishment at all for a woman to bed a man. It's the reason why, for a man, taking his clothes off will never work as a way to pick up a girl, but for a girl it will always work. This is why I never understand when people question that particular double standard: it's cause the playing field isn't even for the two sexes on that issue.

Man am I ever off on a tangent. This is what happens when there's no basketball to talk about.

Blogger chris said...
Wild Yams: Well, we can then keep the tangent a little more relevant by then wondering, how did Wilt and Vin Baker each level the playing field for themselves?!

Blogger chris said...
I wonder if the series will get so exponentially epic that we may break the century mark in comments, WITHOUT the assist of a pointless Kobe Bryant-related debate!

Cue up the Beach Boys in my tired head as I see "Kokomo" in this thread one too many times...

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
After reading Wilt's autobiography, I'd say the way he leveled the playing field was by being rich and athletic.

Also, he had sex with a lot of skanky women.

I'm not saying that they were all bad, but I will say that they probably had sex with many, many men.

One got it on with him in a plane. In front of everyone. A stuardess then brought them a blanket to cover up, and later had sex with Wilt.

When a woman sees you banging another woman in public, and thinks 'Hey, I need some of that!', she probably isn't incredibly picky, gigantic penis or not. Did I mention that he was huge. Generally speaking, that is.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
chris - Money and fame are great ways to tilt the playing field in your favor if you're a dude. I'll bet even players as ugly as Keith Closs probably got tons of hoops groupies (hoopies?).

Anonymous AK Dave said...
I guess the one funny thing in that 3some post was the "my dick is like corn!" comment.

/facepalm

Anonymous dunkside said...
"she didn't want to get involved before she'd had a chance to spread her wings a little"

and by wings you mean legs ...

Blogger AnacondaHL said...
Buck Nasty: That was when Bill Simmons mentioned Basketbawful in a column, or something. Note in Google trends, the highest city is Boston.

Anonymous euro anonymous said...
anyway maybe it is a good thing that you don't want to mention his name because something like that could happen to you:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKil5Ibrq-8

:-D

good blog, greetings from Poland..

Anonymous AK Dave said...
AHL-

I'm seriously psyched about the CB Shut up and Jam: Gaiden review.

Can we get a teaser/trailer or something at least?

Blogger chris said...
OT:

So I googled Basketbawful and "Bill Simmons" and came across this blog post elsewhere (which Matholomew here commented on) documenting Bawful's continued smack on Larry Hughes!

http://thecityline.wordpress.com/2009/02/19/a-loathing-look-back-basketbawful-hates-larry-hughes/

Anonymous tony.bluntana said...
Gentlemen. One summer night, the last words I heard from the big-breasted girl straddling me in our respective underwears were, "I want you inside me, now!" Then, I passed out.

Needless to say, there are plenty of unimpressive moments and comments in my memory of this night. But, I think the punchline is enough to know that I feel your pain.

What's worse? I was 23 or 24 at the time, no longer in college, and not a virgin.

Also, if you guys aren't leaving me with a red-herring, I am so excited about who the NBA star was. It's more fun for me to think of him as the roommate (while the description doesn't fit, the nickname and post-NBA bio works for me).

And, finally, in my research, I had a brief moment of joy when I thought you might've been at UMASS with Marcus Camby. Oh well.

Blogger Unknown said...
Way off topic but the Pistons just landed Villanueva for 5 years, 35 mil. I'd call that a steal for a bigman considering the deals Dampier/Dalembert/Kaman got.

Anonymous tony.bluntana said...
WARNING: irrelevant, current-NBA related comment, cominatcha...

From TrueHoop:
"...the summer of 2010, when both Marcus Camby and Ricky Davis will also come off the books -- nearly $20 million."

Um.. is Camby making $19.99 million? Do they actually pay Ricky Davis?

Is this like that time that Kobe and Luke Walton combined for 81 points against the Raptors?

Oh, and Yams, I'm still waiting for the obvious Clerks quote in your "Double Standards" comment. Also, what's wrong with driving where the roads carry 2 cars per person? Remember that scene in Swingers? I'm so glad I lived in LA for 2 years before I saw those six guys each get into his own car to drive to the same bar. I wouldn've thought it was funny for the hyperbole; but, it's 100% true. Ah, yes. I love LA.

Blogger Unknown said...
Bawful needs to just hurry up with the next thread. This damn suspense is driving me crazy.

I think your room-mate was none other than Nick 'the Brick' Anderson.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
For a nonUS resident - can you please describe how a dude can be having sex metres away? do you have separate rooms? please say u have separate roooms - there is NO WAY you could've been 5m away from live sex unless you were paying for it on the shores of Amsterdam!

$BDW$

Blogger elefes said...
nonUS Anonymous resident: have you never seen any American college movies? Two beds, one room. As seen in such movies as "Dead Man on Campus". Now I'm showing my age (and love for Jason Segel.)

Blogger Nick Flynt said...
Just to be clear: People, his roomie was a seven foot tall Dutchman. Not Nick The Brick.

Blogger Barry said...
I can safely say that there's no longer a toss-up as to what my fantasy team name will be.

And I thank you, Mr. McHale.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
tony.bluntana - I'll just give you this Clerks quote instead: "Try not to suck any dick on your way through the parking lot!" And you are 100% right about that scene in Swingers being a good example of why traffic out here is so damn awful. Gotta love how they all have The Club for their cars too :)

elefes - Holy cow, a Dead Man on Campus reference! I think I may have actually seen that one in theaters. I remember prior to that movie there used to always be all these rumors that Zack Morris was dead. Speaking of which, the scene where Zack helps Jesse break her caffeine pill addiction still ranks as one of the all time best YouTube videos.

Blogger chris said...
All this epic tome needs now are some...seemingly unrelated pieces of stock photos and clipart. :D

Blogger CassavaLeaf.com said...
maybe this is easy for me to figure out cuz i graduated from 123456 University and lived in C Quad.... but I remember seeing that 'Dam' guy all the time..