lawrence

in wyoming, us georgia boys rented a basement in downtown casper. our friends named it "the peach farm"(georgia peaches... pretty lame state name). for what we were using it for, it was a decent set up. washer-dryer, full kitchen and a bathroom (it had a shower curtain). but that was it. we all bought air mattresses, lawn chairs, tupperware, a small grill and a TV. the plan was to come home every friday, take a quick nap, then head to the tetons/big horn mountains for some fishing/backpacking. but some fridays we were just too worn out from work. as the weekends in town became a tradition, we knew we needed some more comforts to our house.

when our crew got in on friday nights, we hit the town hard; another "cowboy way". one night, while i was DD-ing (designated driver), we saw an old recliner chair and a huge couch out on the sidewalk. we threw them in the truck and excitedly drove straight home. the time was about 2:30 AM.

our basement had only one door, and after that, three 90 degree turns in a compact area. somebody lived upstairs, but none of us had met him. he was an oil digger; in charge of a giant well out on the prairie. he worked for 7 days, then he was off for 7 days. we were also told by our landlord that he was fresh out of jail and was on probation, but could be trusted. when he was home, we could hear him and he could hear us. and for fans of Office Space, he literally looked like lawrence, just a little thicker:


back to the couch. since 3 out of the 4 of us weren't operating on all cylinders, it became the nights mission to get the couch through the series of turns and into the basement. we tried to snake it though quietly, and when that didn't work, we went to forcing it in very loudly. it didnt take an engineer to see that it was not going to happen. one of my roomates, thinking that "lawrence" (we named him) was out on the prairie, decided to go up the basement stairs and into his apartment to open the front door. the couch would totally go down the basement stairs. long story short, "lawrence" almost killed my friend that night.

the next morning, we saw "lawrence" working on his car. me and breaking and entering decided to go apologize. here is the conversation:

us: "hey man, we're sorry about all the noise last night and for trying to get into your apartment. we had just a little too much fun and we really wanted that couch down there"


"lawrence": "aww, its cool man. i was just pissed cause i had my lady friend up there. know what i'm sayin'?"

us: "yeah. it wont happen again"

"lawrence": (staring into space, deep in thought for a few seconds). "Let me ask you boys a question. The couch, 'zit got big f-ing arms on it?"

us: "yeah. i guess."

"lawrence": "yeah. i reckoned it did." (then abruptly walks off, down the sidewalk)