Dumpster Diving And The Day It Rained Beer!

I've always told people that in the suburbs of Baltimore, with a vehicle and some free time, one could dumpster enough food in a night to feed an army of the homeless. But dumpster diving beer? You've got to be kidding...

It was another friday night in Towson, and a slow one at that. The decision to kill some time dumpstering came quickly. The four of us piled into the comfort of Darkstar's huge boat of a car, burning rubber to our first destination, the beer dumpster.

The beer dumpster had been pioneered by Darkstar and myself a few weeks earlier, discovering that a particular liquor store stowed away broken six packs of beer in a ice machine out back. The beer would usually have one broken bottle out of the six, making the others a little sticky, but otherwise they were fine. The quailty of alcohol was higher than we were used to as well. We usually discovered cider and hard lemonade, which was a pleasant change from the 40oz's of steel reserve and king cobra we were used to.

We each rubbed our hands together pulling up to the ice machine, wondering what goodies we would find this time. There was groans of disappointment when we opened the door to find it empty. The door closed with a sigh, and Zoe and Aaron walked back to the car, shoulders slumped in defeat. I walked over to a very tall refrigerator nearby that I noticed hadn't been there before. It stood about two feet taller than me and was wrapped in bad fake wood siding. I took one look at the lock on the door and started to walk back to the car. Darkstar, having followed my lead, stood next to the refrigerator. Eyeing the lock, he gave the refrigerator a slight shove. The two of us could clearly hear the clinking of bottles inside.

"OH IT'S ON!!!" said Darkstar, suddenly picking up a piece of rebar and shoving it into the latch. He began pushing and pulling the bar back and forth making the entire refrigerator rock back and forth dangerously.

Darkstar's ninety-pound frame attacked the refrigerator with a tenacity that could only be mustered by someone with an Irish ancestry and an obsession over alcohol. His dreadlocks flew back and forth around his face and scruffy beard, and I could see how some of the younger kids in town thought he looked a lot like Rob Zombie. I was snapped out of my thoughts by his call.

"Matt! Zoe! Help!" The two of us rushed to his aid. The three of us now had a firm grip on the bar, slowly bending the latch on the fridge. The fridge rocked back and forth so far now that I thought it might topple over. Finally, the screws holding the latch tore from the fridge, the lock flew off, and the door swung open in a mighty arc.

And then... silence.

We stared in awed reverence at the contents of the refrigerator. Seconds passed, and suddenly we were cackling like madmen. Laughter and the mighty sounds of some of the last true pirates filled that back alley that night as we rushed back and forth from the fridge to the trunk of Darkstar's car, filling it with our pirated booty. The screech of spinning tires cast us back onto the road, racing back to the Towson library where everyone that we could share our booty with would be hanging out. We were cackling with delight. It felt like the heist of the century.

Darkstar's car ran over the curb near the library bench as the four of us sprawled out each of it's doors. "B-b-b-b-beer! V-v-vodka! Wine! BOOZE!!!" I stammered in my excitement. Similar incoherent ranting echoed from the others.

Melissa, being the closest to me said, "Okay, wait, Matt, slow down. What's going on?"

Darkstar yelled, "There's no time to explain! To sketchless!" Sketchless was a section of woods near where we dumpstered our pizza, and it was the safest place to drink in Towson, well out of the sight or knowledge of the cops. We were unloading our booty from the trunk as everyone came running down the hill into the trees. Everyone met up in the water tunnel that spanned a portion of the forest as we began to count our booty in the moonlight. It was nothing like we had ever gotten at the beer dumpster before.

There were cheers and pirate calls as we called out the final tally. Our booty numbered just over eighteen bottles of wine, three boxes of wine, two cases of yingling lager, a half gallon of vodka and one six pack of woodchuck cider.

In true pirate fashion, we dug a few holes in the ground and buried most of our booty, while we passed around the remaining bottles to all of the Towson kids present. The night became a blur of stories, drunkeness and slurred pirate calls. Many of us woke up in the tunnel the next morning only to dig up some of the buried booze and do it all over again.

It actually took us a few days to finish all the booze we had buried around sketchless, culminating into a drunken night of yelling at and hunting hobbits down at the resevior. Drinking a large 2 1/2 foot bottle of wine that is clearly for display purposes only will do that to you...

Towson didn't see that much booze again for a long time, and it was back to 40oz of ghetto beer until later that month when Darkstar and Aaron came crashing down through the trees of sketchless with a nearly full keg in tow.

"Jesus Christ man," I said, "Where did you get that?"

"We stole it from behind Casa Misa," Aaron replied. I thought back to this moment as I passed by the restaruant a few months later, noticing that any kegs in the back of the place were now chained and locked together.

"One problem though," I said, "How are we going to drink a keg with no tap?" Not one to be defeated so easily, Darkstar requested my multi-tool. I somewhat reluctantly handed it over. After unfolding the pliers, he heaved them into the spot where the tap should have been. I took a step back. "I don't think that's gonna work dude," He ignored me and continued trying to punch a hole in the keg from which he theorized we could simply pour out the beer. His theory was a little less than sound, and I took a few steps further back as each hit rang out with a loud clang that echoed through the trees. Everyone watched, waiting for the inevitable.

Darkstar stumbled back with the sudden spray of beer flying up in front of him as the multitool punctured the steel casing of the keg. I couldn't believe it. He'd done it! Unfortunately the flaw in Darkstar's theory was made immediately clear. The keg was still pressurized! The spray of beer flew from it's container nearly fifty feet into the sky, pouring back down apon the fifteen or so people gathered around it. People ran for cover in the trees, while others attempted to put their mouths over the spray in a valiant display of alcoholism. Casper sat in the sticky rain, the calm center of all the excitement, and simply held her book bag over her head.

It would have been a tragedy if we had actually paid for the keg, but instead, the rain subsided and sticky-haired heads popped out of the forest, slowly gathering around the now empty keg. Laughter erupted from sketchless, everyone suddenly realizing what had just happened. Admist the laughter, I could hear someone say, "Dude, I can't believe it just rained beer!"