Joe, The Stripper, and the Swine

ICOM was still inhabiting two downtown apartments when Scott Miller, Bill Gilgenbach and I decided to throw Joe that surprise birthday party. We planned a pig roast, made the arrangements, and silently spread the word through our little company. It sounded as though everyone would be there.

This would have been what, 1987, 1988? It escapes me now, along with the excuse I concocted to get Joe to come along to the back hall of the bar we'd rented for the occasion. Doubtless Joe realized something was up; it was, after all, his birthday, and he was no fool. I knew he recognized some of the cars in the parking lot when we pulled in, but he went along with it.

When Joe walked into the place, everyone yelled "Surprise!" anyway, and we joined the party, already several beers into the afternoon. We found a well-oiled Scott Miller, and I told him that Joe hadn't been quite as surprised as we'd hoped. At which point Scott blurted out, "Well at least he doesn't know about the stripper!"

Oh, dear. He does now, Scott, he does now. Well, sort of...

We'd found the stripper in the Yellow Pages. I did some initial calling around to various places, asking about pricing and services. That bit of research was both funny and a little embarrassing. I narrowed it down somewhat, Scott and I talked over the options, then Scott made a follow-up call and closed the deal.

For the record, Bill was blameless in the plan Scott and I came up with. Had he known, I think he would have warned his date, who, as I recall, was not amused with the show. Something less risqué she probably could have dealt with, but after the stripper sat Joe down, danced down to her underwear, and pretended the act was over, she played one last song and lost everything but her stockings.

Well, Happy Birthday indeed. Bill's date headed for the bar.

The dancing wasn't particularly good, but we weren't expecting ballet, and the dancer seemed to have a sense of humor about herself. As she was finishing up, the door from the bar opened and several men in their seventies stumbled through. They'd been looking for the bathroom and found a naked girl instead. They seemed okay with that, and watched as she turned off the music and started dressing. I paid her, and several of ICOM's chivalrous young men offered to escort the lady to her car. How kind!

The old men joined our party. There was a brief moment of alarm when one of the gents said, "You showed me something I haven't seen in a long time, so I'd like to show you something," and reached into his pants. Fortunately, he pulled out a deck of cards. As the party raged on and the pig was devoured, a bunch of us gathered around while this fellow showed us one jaw-dropping card trick after another. He was either really good, or the beer was making us stupid.

Maybe both.