Which I now know comes at the end of the hottest 6 hours in a pool of drunk people who are dressed nicely if you're in the grandstand and ridiculously if you're in the infield.
My dad knows somebody who knows somebody, so he and my mom got me tickets that were entirely too good for me. Heather's step-mom gave her a bunch of custom made Derby hats last year and she gave me one to borrow for just such an occasion, so I also had a hat that was entirely too stylish for me. In the end, I went with my defacto strategy... fake it til you make it or get drunk trying.
Leigh's parents agreed to host us for Derby weekend. On normal visits to the Haus de Bodenheim I'm treated to all things delicious and exquisite, but when Derby rolls around, Big Daddy Fritz and Six-pack Suzanne put on a culinary convention. There's wine and appetizers and smoked salmon and wild boar and smoked gouda beer cheese and who needs to button their pants anyway?
We got dolled up like classy bitches and rode into Churchill Downs with some of the other Haus de Bodenheim guests. We started as Kentucky's finest. And it lasted until we saw this guy at the gate.
Getting into Churchill Downs was a madhouse. But it was nothing compared to getting out. That story is a little farther down...
After we hiked through a couple tunnels, complete with people chanting U!S!A! (what is that about?) and mud puddles, we resurfaced in what must be the hottest grandstand in the entire world. They still have ceiling fans from 1952. Big Ass Fans needs to get in there and chill that place out. People were camped out on benches fanning themselves, and the whole place smelled like a locker room. I had sweat dripping off of me, so our first stop was the bar with the ice and the napkins, which I shamelessly shoved in my cleavage for a few minutes. I think we cut a few people on accident because our brains were about to fry in our skulls.
Once we got our body temperature back into a normal range, we made our way to our box. It was just past the finish line, with an amazing view of the grandstand, and we were welcomed by some lady who said we were in the wrong place and a guy who greeted us from the next box over with, "Who the fuck are you?"
We got things sorted out with the lady, mainly by telling her she was wrong, and we got the man in his place, mainly by saying fuck back to him a lot until he bought us a mint julep. At $11 a pop, listening to a man drop f-bombs is a small price to pay for a day's supply of mint juleps.
Out in the open wasn't nearly as hot as the commute to our seat, so it actually ended up being a gorgeous day for Derby. We made friends with the obnoxious guy and his harem, we stayed hydrated with mint juleps, and just when things started to look dangerous, we got some cheese fries from the concession stand. Because nothing says classy Derby elegance like cheese fries.
I still don't know who I bet on, but I did win. I'm pretty sure I bet on 6 horses and tried some exacta boxes. I don't know how to bet sober, let alone with Early Times and liquid cheese coursing through my veins. Leigh bet on Bodemeister, I remember that, because we met one of his trainers as he walked past our box and Leigh snatched up his hat. He was very tolerant of our snatchies, as was this guy whose cigar we stole.
Look a horse!
Once it was all over, the euphoria quickly descended. Our obnoxious friend almost got in a fight with the lady's husband, and at first I thought he probably deserved it because he called her a bitch, but in my drunken state I videotaped it, and upon review of the film, I think the husband was the aggressor. I can't really describe how much gargbage there was. Trashcans overflowed like volcanoes, drunk people stumbled around like zombies, shattered glass littered the ground. It was, well, it was what 250,000 hot messes trying to get out looks like.
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| One of 250,000 hot messes. |
We were way far from the gate we entered so it took us about an hour just to exit Churchill Downs. We didn't want to make the poor sober people wait on us, so we told them to go on ahead and we'd take a taxi. Take note: there is no such thing as an available taxi at Derby. See above re: 250,000 hot messes trying to get out. At one point, we were in the car with a guy from Chicago who was going to give us a ride, but then when we told him how far out the Haus de Bodenheim was he gave us the boot. Then I insisted we go into Kroger to get chips... two big bags of Santitas that I had no reason to buy. Then we started walking, there was a tantrum thrown and "bitch" was tossed around, and finally we found some nice Mexicans who were willing to give us a ride out to BFE for $47.
I know, getting a ride from nice Mexicans, or any nice strangers for that matter, on any other day is insane. But on Derby Day, you do what you've got to do, and you're extra grateful for all that Spanish you took in school. If I was sober, I would have said, oh let's call my parents, but I wasn't so I said, por favor, puedes conducir mi amiga y yo a nuestra casa cerca de Gene Snyder?
We made it home safely, sat down to an exquisite dinner, and climbed up to bed for some sleep that our fellow dinner guests probably wanted us to have as much as we wanted it. The next day I tallied up my losses... lost eyeglasses, lost credit card, broken iPhone, broken purse, slightly diminished dignity. Dammit, I really liked those glasses.
I'm glad I got "Go to Derby" off my bucket list, but I'll never go again... unless I can be helicoptered in and delivered to an air-conditioned box on Billionaires Row. I'm too spoiled by Keeneland... my expectations of a day at the races involve rolling hills and cross breezes and contained debauchery and the chance to actually look at horses up close. You know, classy... like me.
2 comments:
you could also call your friend that lives in the same area as Leigh's family and pay her $47!!!!
That's sober thinking, silly!
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