On one occasion, when I was due to drive for the weekend, Uglich and I arrived at Kopo’s house. He informed his girlfriend that he wouldn’t be available for this weekend because he was out with the lads. As we arrived at his pad, he was already slightly tipsy but completely capable of communicating. He offered us straight away some Polish vodka, which his partner had organised from somewhere. One could hear the mystery in his words about the backstory of the vodka, which he did not share. I’m talking here about a two-litre vodka bottle, which one will not find in a normal Austrian supermarket. I didn’t even know until then that this existed. I saw a three-litre vodka bottle too, years later in London, an original Smirnoff, right from the duty-free shop from Vladivostok, Russia, but this is a story for another day and I do not promise, but guarantee that it will be an amusing one too. At the right place in this book, I will expose it.
“The girl with the vodka bottle and a plastic bag full of cash.”
Kopo took a shot glass, which was more like half a pint glass, and gave it to me. I said, “Look, if I put that into my system, I will not be driving today.” I was also not comfortable lending my car to anyone to drive. I appreciate it was a very old car, but to me it was the best car I’ve ever had. It was my first car! Nobody ever told me, so I just realised over the years that tools, instruments, girlfriends, and cars are not things one should lend to their friends. I’m pretty sure there are people with different opinions on this. A joint car can work between good friends, a wife, a girlfriend, or a partner, of course.
That is a completely different ballgame, but giving the car to someone who is less drunk than me was never on my agenda. Kopo said, “Come on, have a shot! It’s Saturday, and we are going out to have a good time. I repeated: “If I drink this, I will not drive. Some people need a second or even third reminder, but I am not making shortcuts when it comes to driving drunk or even tipsy. I just don’t do that! He insisted, “Come on, have a shot; just one! Come on. I went for it, but it was clear that I would not be driving. For me, it was clear-cut. Uglich went for it as well, but he knew me well enough to know that I would park my car next to Kopo’s house. After the third one, Kopo said, “OK then, let’s go to the club! I know a great place that has various choices of cocktails and some draught beers too. This pub also has connections with the brewery, he added.
Kopo: If my memory serves me right, today is your turn to drive Baxxl, as we had agreed last time.
Me: I told you half an hour ago that if I hit that glass, I could not drive.
Kopo: Don’t be a chicken, man, and drive. I drove last time.
Don’t be this, don’t be that, he went on, raising his voice while releasing some colourful words into the atmosphere.
This went on for 45 minutes, but I was not willing to drive.
Kopo: Uglich could drive because he drank a little.
Uglich: I am not comfortable driving anyone else’s car while intoxicated.
He knew that Kopo would be quite happy to lend his car to him, but he did not want to drive either, and I do not blame him a bit for it!
There was another issue I did not want to happen. I was a tightly puffed person, and I knew what was going to be coming next, but I just went on with it.
He pulled out his Philips Diga TCD308, the only mobile phone I have ever seen to accommodate the full size of a credit card. So when you bought the sim card, you took the whole thing and, without breaking out the sim itself, you inserted the whole card into the phone. He said: “I am going to call a taxi. That was my concern, because I did not want to pay for it. I don’t believe in spending money on taxis. “Uber” is a cool thing, but random taxis are far too uneconomical for my budget.”
We didn’t have the internet on our phones back then, so it took us another half hour to find some leaflets, advertisements, and business cards before he found a phone number to call. It took another 25 minutes to actually get a signal in his house, because there were only certain pockets in the house where he could use a mobile phone, and they depended on the weather and the wind. He desperately kept calling the company, but I was dictating the numbers wrong. I mixed them up on purpose, so he couldn’t call a taxi because that would cost me money. He ripped the card out of my hands. Seeing that I had dictated to him the wrong numbers, he went ballistic.
“What’s the matter with you?” He was shouting. I said: “Sorry, but you know, I have poor eyes. For goodness’ sake, give me those things. Uglich was sitting behind him, cracking up in laughter, but didn’t really want to be that obvious, but couldn’t hold it back.
Kopo: “What the heck are you laughing at? Do you think it’s funny being blind like a bat? “
Uglich knew that I would have been happy to stay in, get wasted, and watch a movie. He would have been equally happy just to chill.
Now and then, Kopo got through, but nobody ever picked it up. Only God knows how old those numbers were, some of them out of service, the others straight to a full voicemail box. He got frustrated because we kept taking the mickey out of him. Uglich had a Nokia 6150, which had better reception but no call credit, and he kept telling him, “There is a signal,” then he ran there, then there wasn’t any on the Diga. I found a bit of signal in my SAGEM, but you needed to stand on a chair to get the signal. It took him ages to get up there without help, and there still wasn’t any signal, because he was shorter than me. It was an absolute blast. He got so frustrated that he smashed the Diga on the sofa with such a force that it bounced back, the battery separated itself from the phone and broke the huge 100-Watt designer bulb from Ikea, which was dangling down from the ceiling on a fancy velvet-covered twisted brown cable. As the light bulb imploded, it created a loud bang and took out the fuse. Razor-sharp glass splitters were embedded throughout the sitting room in the fluffy grey carpet. The fun and the laughter stopped immediately. We were caught up in an awkward situation. It was pitch-black, and no one knew exactly where the other person was. We were all tipsy, and he was the drunkest at that moment in time. All in socks, sitting somewhere on the sofa, except Kopo, who was standing somewhere.
Kopo: We are screwed because I cannot see a bloody thing and my lighter is in the kitchen, and if I see blood, I will faint, so I will not move.
Uglich: Me neither, because I don’t want to chop myself up.
Me: OK, boys, those are our three options.
Kopo: Are you mad? What do you mean, three options? I would be happy to have one that works to get us out of here to the fuse box.
Me: The first option is:
We stay put, fall asleep on the sofa, and wait till the morning.
Uglich: No, screw that, I need the loo right now, otherwise I am going to let it run right here.
Kopo: Do not dare. This is an idiotic idea anyway, because I can barely stand, so I wouldn’t make it for another 5 minutes, let alone all night. Apart from this, I want to go out and have a drink.
Me: The second option is that we undress and throw our clothes all over the room so one of us can go outside and push back the fuse.
Uglich: That’s a bloody good idea, mate. Let’s do this!
Kopo: Are you guys out of your heads?
Kopo: Three guys naked in the middle of the house. I feel very uneasy about this. Also, Baxx, you told me that for the past few years you have been walking around commando.
Uglich: After he told me, I tried, and I will never wear pants or boxer shorts again. A lot more comfortable without them!
Kopo: So you really believe I want to be with two guys naked in a room? What if we touch each other?
Me: Listen, don’t be stupid. Because you lost your temper, we are in that situation, so shut up and start undressing. I’ve already removed my shirt.
Uglich: Me too.
Me: This is serious. We need to get the light back!
Kopo: This is precisely my biggest concern. It’s around 9pm. Imagine the light comes back and my neighbour goes out to dinner with his wife and sees me standing naked in the room, Uglich sitting naked on the sofa, and you walking naked in the corridor. I don’t have any curtains, so they can easily see us through the window. I mean, if they see me, that’s fair enough, I live here, but he believes I’m running here an orgy, and that cannot happen.
Me: OK, OK, there is still an option I can think of.
Kopo: Whatever it is, no one will get naked in my house.
Me: OK, I gather that. Uglich and I take out our mobiles and use their display to see what is on the carpet. Then we remove the bits and, step by step, hand in hand, we follow each other out of here.
Kopo: OK, this sounds reasonable, but my phone is gone.
Me: You follow in Uglich’s footsteps.
Kopo: But why do we have to all go?
Me: Because we are pissed: If we hold our hands, we have more stability. The lead person who checks the floor needs to be helped and held by the other person in case he was to lose the balance. Also, if my SAGEM runs out of battery in the middle of the room, I need Uglich to have his phone ready.. So Kopo, please let me do the thinking and you just do as you are told. I am fed up with explaining things to you!
Kopo: OK, OK, that makes sense.
Of course, those display lights weren’t dazzling back then, and none of the phones we had had flashlights. Millimetre wise, we stepped and worked ourselves out of the room, and unbelievably, none of us stepped on a piece of glass.
This was more or less the scene from Pulp Fiction, as Travolta and Jackson went to those guys’ flat, and one guy jumped out from behind the wall with a pistol and fired six shots randomly, and none of the bullets hit them.
After we made it out, Kopo took Uglich’s phone and went to the kitchen to search for his lighter. He had also found candles and tea lights.
Me: Kopo, where is the fuse box?
Kopo: No idea. I just moved in a few months ago. What did I care about fuse boxes?
Me: Well, people with an IQ over room temperature move into a property. They ask the agent or the landlord to show them the fuse box.
Kopo: Oh, get out of it! I am only here because it became too risky at my partner’s place. The other day, I took her wazoo on a ride on the sofa in their house. Her hubby came down the stairs to get some water, so we almost got caught. So she organised this pad for us because we could not do it at the homeless shelter either, and in my car it was inconvenient. I had ass prints all over my windows, so every morning when the new staff came and the weather was frosty, people could see her bum prints all over the place. It was rather annoying for me to clean it all the time, so I just didn’t bother. People got suspicious anyway, because they saw she got into my car a few times, so we needed to make sure we didn’t get caught. She is my therapist, so I don’t want her to lose her job just because she has fallen for me, and then you ask me about stupid fuse boxes. We don’t fuse or box when she’s here; we just do!
Uglich: What a combo! Did you fall for her too?
Kopo: Well, the only fall I had was the fallout with the head of the homeless shelter because she insisted that I give her my new address so she could come and check on me, but that’s not on, because if she snoops around and sees my birds’ car, she gets into trouble, and we do not want that to happen, do we?
Uglich: Of course not, it is understandable. The less they know, the better.
Kopo: Bingo!
Uglich: So, how does it feel to be with a mature woman?
Kopo: What exactly do you mean by being? It is just like with every other human being.
Uglich: No, I mean, like, literally.
Kopo: What are you doing, running around the hot porridge, buddy? You want to know how she is in the bedroom, don’t you?
Uglich: Yes.
Kopo: To be honest, in the beginning it was a bit shrivelled, which bothered her a lot, but she sought advice and they did some cleaning out, some sort of keyhole procedure, and it helped. Now all it takes for me is just a gentle stroke over the little bold gentlemen and I literally feel the vapour around me when I am sending it. I often wonder: Am I at the entrance or at the exit when I am tipsy during the act?
Uglich: Whoa!!
Kopo: I don’t fancy her hair though, and she does not want to colour it, which puts me right off but now with this place, I have somewhere to live and she is paying for it too, so I cannot complain. Have you ever met a mature lady, Baxxl? I’m just asking because, if not, I could ask her if she wants to be doubled up!
Uglich: Would you really ask?
Kopo: When not?
Me: Listen lads, I appreciate this little chitchat and I value the inside as well, but let’s focus and find the fuse box, shall we?
We were all looking for a fuse box with the tea lights and candles providing some visibility, but there wasn’t any to be located.
Kopo: I found something, guys! We went there. It was a 10cm x 10cm little wooden door with a small handle.
Me: “Well, whatever that might be, it’s not what we are looking for, man.” “This is a 3-bedroom house, so we need a fuse box.”
Kopo pulls on the handle and there were two porcelain fuses possible from the late 30s.
Uglich: What the flipping hell are those?
Even though we went to the same college, and he was only four years younger, he had no clue. He grew up in Austria, and his dad was a pipe pig, according to him. How could he have known?
I knew immediately where we were because my old man was a sparky in Romania and there were fuses like that all over the place. Plenty of flats or country cottages still have those, I bet, so this was not new to me at all!
Me: I know what they are, but the problem is that if you don’t have a spare fuse, it will not be that straightforward to fix it. Do you have a spare fuse, Kopo?
Kopo: Fix this shite and don’t take the mickey out of me. You guys are electronic specialists, aren’t you?
Me: We are not specialists, we are generalists!
Uglich: Why are there two?
Me: Well, one is for the lighting and one is for the sockets, as common sense would suggest. I mean, this is a crazy set up. Totally out of date, of course! It was possible that it was illegal from the very day they built it! Let me not go into this right now, though.
Uglich: Why don’t you just swap them over? We don’t need sockets now, anyway.
Me: And if the broken bulb is still shorting out, we’re going to have the same problem, don’t we?
Kopo: How big are the chances of that happening in percentage?
Me: Sod off! “
Uglich: Yeah, but why don’t we turn the light switch off?
Kopo: Exactly, it’s not a big deal. Let me do it now!
Me: That’s fair enough, but it is still risky because the switch contacts could have been stuck together as the shout occurred!
Kopo: How big are the chances, in percentage, for that to happen?
Me: What’s the deal with those percentage questions, dawg? Did you apply for a job at a bank lately? Those are the only people who talk all day about percentages, so shut up, will you?
Uglich: This is Mickey Mouse poop! Why and how would the switch stick together?
Me: I am not here to give you bloody lessons in electronics, pal! That was the job of your teachers. Instead of attending all those classes, you skipped most of them, hung out with Jonny, running from one shop to the other, sampling mixing tables around Vienna back in the days, weren’t you? I am here to solve the problem and get the lux, not to wipe your bum, give you extra lessons, and to explain myself.
Kopo: Are you running out of knowledge, Baxxl?
Me: Listen up, you morons! Look at what it’s written above the fuse. The whole house is on one light circuit, which is insane! They mark the fuse at 30 amps. They should secure light circuits with 6 AMPS. So when the bulb got busted, for a split second, the high current running through the cables could have spot welded the switch contacts together before the fuse popped. I am not suggesting that this is the case, but it is not worth risking. If I can’t fix the fuse, we can still plug a reading lamp into the sockets, so we will have at least some light.
Kopo: I am not reading! How big are the chances, in percentage, for that to happen?
Me: Possibly higher than the figure printed on the bottle of your vodka. Take my word for it, squarehead! You do not want to risk it while drunk in the middle of the night. So shut up and give Uglich a plier and a flat screwdriver so he can twist out that broken bulb and disengage the switch from the wall. And while you are at it, I need some sort of cable and a knife so I can chop it up and pull out a thin copper strain to fix that fuse.
Kopo: OK, OK, no problem.
Uglich slipped into his shoes, went inside the room, removed the broken bulb stump, and bypassed the light switch. Kopo was holding the tea light on a dessert plate for him so he could see.
Kopo gave me an old guitar cable, so I took out a thin wire and fixed the fuse. Kopo took the bulb from his gaming room and we put it up in the lounge. I popped the fuse back in and there was light again.
Me: Uglich, grab the vacuum and start cleaning up the lounge.
Kopo came with a vodka bottle. Thanks Baxxl! Have another shot! We all did another one. Uglich finished the cleaning and said, “Look guys, it’s 10:30 pm.” “Let’s chill and call it a night!”
Kopo lost it. “I don’t give a flying duck what the time is. He pulled a big sip out of the remains of the vodka bottle and said ,”I am going to drive you boys to the pub.”
We did not want to subscribe to this idea, but Kopo said: “Hold my bottle!” He removed a peacock feather from a crystal vase that was standing on the windowsill and entered the toilet. Ten seconds later, he was vomiting like a woman during the difficult days of pregnancy. He came out looking like a Mangalica sloped in a gob of muck and said, “I will be ready in five.” He went into the bathroom and took an ice-cold shower. That Valiant gas boiler never fired up during his stay. After exiting the bathroom, he shoved a package of Wringel’s Double Mint into Uglich’s hand and said, “Start opening them and get it done.”
He pushed back his thinning hair with a mahogany-coloured comb, which was infused with William West Pure beeswax. He changed into Levi’s Strauss jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, and took off his leather jacket from the hanger. Uglich was done with the task, and he popped all five sheets of chewing gum into his mouth at once. He took a box of TicTac, emptied it into his palm, and mixed it in with the gum for good measure. Then he pulled a package of Marlboro menthol out of his inner jacket pocket, lit one up, let out a massive burp, and said:
Let’s bounce fagets!
The car was occupied with two rather tipsy passengers and a fully confident, capable, and sober driver, and off we went. I was sitting in the back, on the driver’s side, because apparently that is the safest place to sit in a car. Uglich rode shotgun.