Even though Travis isn’t doing a Memoir Monday this week, I’ll pick up the slack and write about yet another spring break vacation that was oh so much fun.  After awhile, I stopped even going on spring break because no matter where I went, it seemed to end in some sort of disaster.

I wrote the first one a long time ago when I started this whole blogging thing, so if you want double the Memoir on your Monday (as well as if you want to make fun of my writing skillz from awhile back) go ahead and click on that as well.  If you can’t handle the double dose, just keep reading like you normally would.

Sophomore year of college, I my roommate was dating a girl from Houston, Texas.  She convinced us to go to Houston on spring break, and then drive down to Padre Island for a couple days.  This sounded better than staying in Wisconsin, so we agreed and hastily bought tickets.

First of all, let me just say: Houston sucks.  I’m sorry if you’re from Houston and take offense to this, but go live somewhere else for about 5 minutes, and you’ll realize how much Houston sucks.  Trust me, 5 minutes is all it will take.

Second, she got us hotel rooms in Padre Island, not SOUTH Padre Island, where the party actually is.  Padre Island National Seashore is a stretch of beautiful coastline (if you like medical waste and globs of oil/tar in your sandcastle) but there is very little drinking, carousing, or carrying on.

Third, the girl from Houston made it sound like it was really close to Padre Island.  It is not.  Per Google maps, its about 400 miles, and 6 hours of driving.  And at least the part of Texas we drove through was flat and boring.  There were actually signs that said “Last Gas for 100 Miles,” and when you stopped to get gas at these places, they sold handguns in the impulse racks near the register.

“Yeah, I got $20 on pump four…I’ll take the bag of Nacho Pretzel Combos….oh, and that Glock 9mm you have on sale.”

Fourth, my roommate and his girlfriend really didn’t get along all that well, so I spent 800 miles round trip listening to them fight.

So eventually, we got down to Padre Island, and as we come into town, she sees a Whataburger.  Being a Yankee, I have no idea what a Whataburger is, but she goes on and on about how good they are.  I’m easily convinced to get whatever special type of burger it is that they have.

Worst mistake of this whole ill-conceived vacation.

This burger gives me the worst food sickness I’ve ever had.  Hell, it was the worst sickness I’ve ever had regardless of causation.

I spent two days borderline comatose in a crappy hotel bed, unable to eat, drink, or look at any sort of food or liquid.  My skin was actually bruising anytime something touched me.  If I slept on my side, my entire side would be bruised.  When I managed the strength to shuffle downstairs and get a smoothie, the space between my toes where my sandals and the bottoms of my feet were bruised.  If I looked to hard at the ceiling, the back of my eyeballs would bruise.

I left the hotel room for a little bit one day because my roommate and his girlfriend were getting really upset with me for never leaving the room which they wanted to use for other purposes.  I was sitting on a bench near a small park, and some nice migrant workers came by and wanted to take me to the hospital because apparently I looked like a plague victim.  I had to use all my limited Spanglish to avoid getting abducted and sent off to a quarantine zone.

Never have I wished for spring break to be over as much as I did that year.

Eventually we made it back to Houston, which made me kind of nauseous all over again but in a different way.  When we got back to school, it took me about two weeks to feel back to normal strength.

I didn’t get any souvenirs from this little jaunt down to Texas, but at least now I have gained an undying and burning hatred of Whataburger, so I did come back with something.