Short & Silly 04/06/2015

My Guzzling Granny

On my old blog I posted about my wild grandmother who took me to a strip club for my 18th birthday. This same woman lived to be 93 years old, drank and smoked and was funny as hell.

It was a family joke that "Mom-Mom" would throw a party if someone sneezed. A joke, but true. On a Tuesday night, for no other reason than it was Tuesday, she would have dozens of people over in her finished basement--complete with wet bar. She always started the night with a 16 oz glass of half water and half whiskey. With each drink she would ask for "a little less water."  So by the third glass, the old lady was drinking straight whiskey. The crazy thing was that she never got drunk.

By our teen years, my brother and I realized we could profit from Mom-Mom's drinking. Yep, that is what I said. We actually bet people our little old granny could out drink them. $500 was to go the man or woman who could out drink Granny. We'd bring our biggest, most rugged men friends and neighbors to our parties. Without letting Mom-Mom know, we would pour the men a drink at the same time we poured Mom-Mom her requested drink. By the end of the night, she would get up and walk out --- and often drive home--- and they would be puking under the table.

I honestly have no idea how much money we made, but I can tell you I had some really nice jewelry during my early 20s lol.  The only time I ever remember her being tipsy was a comedy session in itself. She had to be about 85 years old. Her husband of 38 years (he was her THIRD husband!)  was 10 years younger than her. This one night, Mom-Mom rubbed up against him and said in front of us all, "Jim, let's go home and make some babies."

"Marie, please."

"Jimmmmm..... I'll put on the red mesh nightie you like so much.. with my red puff ball mules. What do you say?"

"Come on, Marie. It's time to go home."

She turned to everyone and yelled, "We're making some babies tonight!" Then staggered out the door. Even then, she was not fall down drunk. She was completely aware of her surroundings. It was amazing. At her 80th birthday party, she and her friend named Alice danced most of the night. Alice was over 90, and these old ladies knew how to laugh and have a good time.  I remember someone asking them how they could have so much energy and someone else said, "Cause if you slice their wrist, Seagram's VO will shoot out. They aren't human anymore."

When her third husband died, (yeah, the guy 10 years younger than her), she cried about how much she missed my biological grandfather-- who died 14 years before I was born. She went on and on about how great a lover he was, and how much she missed him. I don't know about you.... but imagine my grandmother have sex with a live guy was bad enough.... but now she was bringing decades old corpses into the picture!

To this day, I'm not sure if she out drank the bio grand dad, or if she killed him with her bedroom olympics in an attempt to "make babies."  What I do know is that the woman was very attached to her whiskey... and very healthy despite the drinking.

She'd moved into an assisted living complex that was where? You guessed it, right next to a liquor store. She could no longer drive a car, but was quite able to put her walker on wheel across the complex and through a huge parking lot to get to the liquor store. I went to visit once and she said, "I stopped by the store earlier to get you soda. I needed some VO also... but I had to put the potato chips back cause it is a far walk and the bags were just too heavy."

Uh.. the 5 oz bag of chips was too heavy, but the gallon of whiskey was no problem?

She passed away a few years ago, but her fun memories are with me always.

Visit my online book store