Florida-Georgia Weekend: Wet and Wild

Well, as most people in the free world know (especially those from the south) this week Jacksonville hosts the annual Florida Georgia weekend. This is the time when the football teams of University of Florida and the University of Georgia square off for bragging rights and all night parties. The game always happens around Halloween every year and the local Fair comes to town. But the antics that happen around the Florida Georgia weekend are something to behold.

The game and the parties are always known as the World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party! I think it should aptly be renamed, THE WORLDS LARGEST GATHERING OF DRUNK REDNECKS WHO ARE WILLING TO HOLD CONVERSATONS WITH ANYONE WHO WILL LISTEN AND WANT TO GET NECKED AND WET AT A MOMENTS NOTICE!

I have a love-hate relationship with the game. Number one I enjoy football but the city goes into gridlock every year. Number two people can be fun except for the fact that open container laws are suspended for outdoor activities during Florida-Georgia weekend and this rarely happens when schools like Florida A&M University, Southern University or Bethune Cookman College come to town. Quite often I believe that it is a double standard. But again, the antics are truly off the chain.



So against my better judgment one of my partners, INFINITI, called and told me he was going out that night and I should tag along. I thought about it and decided my Thursday night was pretty clear so I went and I'm still laughing today.

First we ended up at downtown spots - Mark’s, TSI, and The Dive Bar. These were supposedly the hot spots and a lot of the Florida and Georgia fans were already there and drunk. Again, with no open container laws in place for the weekend, they were all outside having a ball. That's where the interesting night started.

Mark’s was supposed to be an upscale joint and for the most part it was. I guess you could call it a watering hole for the high class and the want to be high-class. The DJ wasn’t the best but he wasn’t bad either. Anybody who can mix David Bowie's Let's Dance with Will Smith's Get Jiggy Wit It deserves some kind of praise!

Now those of us who have friends that are Caucasian know that once they get a beer or heaven forbid some liquor in them, things become a whole new territory. I met a guy there named Christian. This guy was interesting and I will have you know that he spent 30 minutes trying to apologize to me for slavery! At one point, I thought he was going to cry and offer to be my slave! He went on to tell me about all the black friends that he'd had during his life and he even wrote his number down and began giving it to black people in the club saying, “Call me let's hang out sometimes, I'm cool”. Had I not been there witnessing this with my own two eyes I wouldn’t have believed one word of a story like this. Even as I left, trying to get away from the apologetic white man, he continued to apologize for the perils of slavery. I thought unless you are going to give me back pay right now – get the heck on!

So I go down the block to this joint called TSI. It was pretty cool except it was very dark inside and the night was called Hip-Hop Hell. Now I don't know about you but I'm not one to tempt fate, so I really didn't want to go to any place called "anything- hell". Once I got inside I saw a couple of rappers that I knew. It was pretty cool. I even bought a CD from DJ Therapy (he’s mad on the wheels of steel). I can't wait to check it out. But it was so dark inside and there were these spinning red lights on the wall. Ominous, huh? So I decided however to stay for moment and all of a sudden as I turned to my right, there was a white guy sitting there with locks, yes dreadlocks! But that wasn’t the interesting part. His face was completely deformed and melded into a weird shape. It was obvious there was some kind of cleft palate issue but at that exact moment when I turned to him it looked like a demon was staring back at me! Mind you the place had hell in the title – needless to say DADDY WAS OUT! Yep no offense but I was out.

Finally, I ended up at the Jacksonville Landing. It's a mall on the riverfront where people hang out and all of the Florida Georgia fans congregate during the weekend. In usual form, everyone there was drunk. Not just regular drunk, NO staggering piss drunk!

Club Paris, which is in the venue, had a Halloween party. Truthfully I don't know what the white girls are drinking in these days but there were some that were fine as all get out. (I still love my
sistahs tho!) All of there costumes were seriously skimpy and of course breast flashing was the activity of the night. But I digress.

Now in the center of the landing there is a fountain that spouts water about 10 feet in the air. Well, something told one of the Georgia girls to go jump in the fountain and get completely wet. Now far be it from me to tell her to stop because she was making a fool out of herself. In the end the joke was on me. I pulled out my phone to take a picture of her in the fountain, she saw me smiled started screaming loudly and came over to me and before I could move she gave me the biggest hug. she could muster. Her wetness was all over me. I wasn't completely drenched but my entire ensemble was ruined because of this frolicking, friendly, country nymph! I laughed and even had a few other conversations but it was a done deal for me.


The night ended with a tirade from a drunk that I luckily got on tape. Thank goodness for the video camera phones. He was crazy as they come.

Now don't get me wrong, I love to have a good time but that was overkill. I'm having a party tonight at the Leopard Lounge and hosting another one on Sunday at the Ocean Club. If the Florida-Georgia fans show up, I know I'm in for something crazy. The one thing I do know however, is that there is no water spout there, so hopefully things will be okay.

I’m off.

*To new slave boy* - “Now come boy, carry these packages”!