Man! July is just about over? Just one more week left and then we slide into August. Remember when we were in school, our 3 month Summer Vacation seemed like it went on forever? At least for me…I remember cramming so much into each vacation.

My best Summer vacation? I’d have to say the year I turned 14 [let's not mention the year]. This was the Summer my friend Jimmy’s folks went out of town for a week leaving him and his 2 sisters to watch their house. Jimmy, being the responsible 16 year old that he was, had a party that lasted 4 days. All the kids in the neighborhood all remember this as “Jimmy’s 4-day Party“.

[Cue the "Bad Company" music]

Man, what a great party that was. Jimmy had the largest house of all my friends though that never really dawned on me until just now. We never thought much back then about “whose house cost more“…”how many bathrooms” or “how many square feet“…We DID have “teenage priorities” though. Things like a POOL, Loud Radio, Piano, and the latest Video Games…and most of all.. A CAR….Those types of things ranked much higher and Jimmy had ‘em all.

I know it’s hard to imagine, but this was back before computers. Well…I think the Commodore 64 had just come on the scene. We entertained ourselves without email…Amazing huh?

I can’t go into too much detail about Jimmy’s party but if you have ever seen a silly 1980’s teenage coming of age movie, that was pretty much what was going on. Hell, I think we even had a TOGA PARTY. HA! And um…one of the nights I recall being out at 4am in a fucking GRAVEYARD [no, I wasn't there to dig]. Ok… I need to stop giving details before I ruin my reputation as a respectable human who wasn’t affected by peer pressure and stories of Truth or Dare games where someone usually ended up with their pants down racing across Plymouth Road. I could write book just on this subject alone but for now….Enough said.

That was such a great Summer though… And what’s funny about it is…We all knew it was a great Summer WHILE IT WAS HAPPENING…. Usually, we don’t realize that sort of stuff until long afterwards, but not in this case. Sending out a Special Thanks to Jimmy’s folks for leaving town for that Risky Business, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Animal House week.