grass, and worse

originally uploaded by pr9000.

This story about a drug bust at San Diego State University reminds me of the time I was inadvertently caught up in a drug issue at Denison ...

I was stage managing "Les Liaisons Dangereuses," and my light board guy was a senior Kappa Sig who was known for behaving very erratically. In fact, he had a small but important part in the mainstage production before "Liaisons," and his role called for him to strangle an actress while the lights were down -- it's the central hook behind "The Mousetrap," the venerable Agatha Christie play.

So this actor (I'll call him "Escobar") was to come on stage when the lights were down, "strangle" the actress -- a very well known, famous TV/movie/more famous husband actress -- and then leave before the lights came back up.

Except that Escobar didn't "strangle" her ... he actually came damn close to strangling her.

Why? He was coked out of his gourd.

So a few months later, after he was almost kicked out of the theatre department, Escobar was given a last chance, by earning some technical credits by being my light board guy.

I didn't do a great job stage managing that production, and it was beset with all sorts of insane bad luck -- the guest director, who was a Jeopardy champion, was called out of town until tech week, during which he decided to change the sets and the blocking of my crew ... well, anyway, my light board guy was a massive cokehead and I had no way to control his more-erratic-by-the-day behavior. I had to do the lights a few shows myself, and by the final performance, I was ready to leave technical theatre behind.

I also was editing the daily newsletter on campus, and in that role I'd get all sorts of juicy tips that I couldn't really do anything with ... so I wasn't shocked when, a few weeks later, several Kappa Sigs -- but not Escobar -- were busted for dealing drugs. Apparently the house was the center of a massive on-campus drug ring, not unlike the one described in the story above.

And it just sounds like the college environment I knew and loved:

Danielle Patterson, a sophomore sorority member, said she was awake cramming for finals when agents raided an apartment behind her building, pounding on doors and marching boys down the block to the college arena, where they were questioned.

"I never thought something like that would happen here," she said. "To think they think drugs are such a big issue here, it's ridiculous."

Parents joined students at a campus rally Wednesday calling for more drug-abuse treatment instead of tougher enforcement.

"This heavy hand coming down is not going to change drug use on campus," said Gretchen Burns-Bergman, whose son is a month away from graduating. "There's not going to be a shortage of drugs on campus."

Stupidity apparently is hereditary -- for the frat guys too, apparently:

They apparently made little effort to launder their spoils. One fraternity brother arrested Tuesday drove his Lexus directly from a $400 cocaine sale on campus to a nearby bank, where he deposited the cash, according to court papers.

Ah, good times, good times ...