For perhaps the most tasteless of all tipsy fieldtrips, Tipsy and I decided to head down south-WAAAY south-- for Spring Break. It really wasn't spring break, per se, since we are neither of us students and both of us about a decade too old to celebrate in such a fashion. We knew someone who was on South Padre Island working for the week, and he invited us to stay with him for a few days.

The weather was not cooperative for most of our brief stay, and looked something like this:

The kitchen and bar of this condo were unimaginably unstocked. We brought things like squeezers and muddlers and strainers, but it didn't occur to us that the condo would be lacking in basics like...glasses. Not to be deterred, I found this measuring beaker to make for a perfect highball-in-a-pinch. (Please note that the dolphin statuette was an amenity of the condo, and not a souvenir I purchased.)

I had never really given drag much consideration until I saw how incredibly foxy and Baywatchy I look as a female.

You will be glad to know that your taxpayer dollars were well represented at many points accross the Spring Break celebration area, which is the Radisson "host hotel." Unfortunately the Radisson property owner is some kind of party pooper and would not allow the Trojan condom company to sponsor a booth. However, she doesn't have a problem with exploitation of our youth by the military industrial complex, and so as a result the US Army seemingly took the beach at SPI for this one week. Army paraphernalia was everywere, but in the spirit of outsourcing(and probably because anyone who can hold a weapon is already deployed), many of the employees working the Army booths were not soldiers themselves, but subcontractors. Essentially, the military equivalent of Red Bull Girls--handing out koozies and t-shirts and flashlights, with a few uniformed recruiters nearby in case the swag convinced someone to actually sign up. (For the record I have utmost respect for the men and women of the armed services. I do not however respect the decision makers who recklessly put these people in harm's way; nor do I care for the way they use rock-concert marketing tactics to convince the young to make "the ultimate sacrifice.")
Back to the beach:
If you are a hot chick, or better yet, TWO hot chicks, the poonhound mechanical bull operator will give you a long gentle ride, dipping the bull strategically as it turns to face him. (One rider experienced a "wardrobe malfunction" and was allowed to continue riding for what seemed to me like an impossibly long time. Meanwhile the bull operator, who was wearing both hat and sunglasses to obfuscate the direction of his gaze, pulled his shades down a tad for clearer viewing)

If, however, you are a beefy dude, you will get a spin or two before being expeditiously bucked off the bull.

I think the Coors Girls are a perfect example of why people come to SPI. Every few hours they announce the Coors Girls like they are the headlining act, then the girls come out and throw out a bunch of cheap Chinese crap emblazoned with the Coors logo.

The Beefy and the Beast: Nobody could quite figure out the hirsute fellow on the right. In his trucker cap, mustache, aviator shades and shiny black Speedo, he was quite a sight among all of the scantily clad students.

Bear Sighting on SPI! Big Poppa looked like he would fit in at a Bear round-up, but he was quite popular with the ladies, if only for the same reason that Leslie is popular with frat boys. The girls would freak Big Poppa while their friends took pictures for Facebook, then they would make an "Ew" face and run off.