You see...there's this tape.

I have two very close friends. One I've known since 1984 and the other since around 1989. The most important events of my life in the last 20 years have had these two nearby. We're close in that we have this loose brotherhood. Less like Stand By Me and far from Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants...but more like a sequel to Animal House that was never made...we know each other so well that we don't require catching up on each other's lives over a cup of some hot international coffees.

I introduced these two guys to each other which brings me to the topic. You see...there's this tape. To conceal their identities I'll give them Animal House nicknames. Otter and I worked together and were responsible for writing this column in the company newsletter that went out monthly. We worked for a very large family owned company. To get ideas for our column we decided to tape record ourselves talking while at his apartment. On this night I brought Bluto over and this is where they met.

The tape ended up having things on it that went far beyond just ideas for a column but Bluto and Otter got along great and exchanged rude barbs back and forth over the course of an evening that also involved completely finishing roughly a case and a half of the best beer that pre-21 year olds could afford. In other words the tape is a train wreck. Maybe more like a train hauling lots of beer going over a tall trestle that is booby trapped with dynamite. As the train comes off the track it lands on an elementary school killing everything in its wake and leaving the remains soaked with the smell of beer. It was that kind of evening...and much of the audio was captured.

At the end of the evening (that trailed into the morning) I popped the cassette into my pocket. Later when the question of the where the tape ended up they were both relatively relieved that I was in possession of it. I was voted the least likely to use it to exploit the others.

Preserving the audio has been important for me because it is the first moment where our lives collided. So for reasons of sentiment I wish to have this audio live on for a few more decades. This means of course performing an analog to digital conversion. As I mentioned that I'm going to do that my motivation has been called into question as Otter thinks I'll release it to the press when he runs for office. Bluto thinks the whole thing is funny and would also like to see it released to further embarass Otter.

Personally I think that most of it isn't that humorous and the humor doesn't translate too well to the mainstream. I'd compare it to watching David Hasselhoff eating a hamburger while hammered. Fascinating yes, but also pathetic at the same time.

So that said...who wants to hear a clip of it?