St. Pat's Day (III) Duke Puke

There is one contest I would pay large amounts of money to see: the puke for distance contest. Now, I would never take part in this myself, and I agree that it is a disgusting contest, but I simply can't stop laughing when I watch it. What happens is that these guys take turns drinking a beer, then they stick their fingers down their throats and puke as far as they can. They have to stay behind this white line when puking or they are disqualified. A referee with a measuring tape actually measures each contestant's effort. Some job, huh?

I was amazed at this one big fat guy who reminded me of a pig, and who seemed proud of looking like one. Anyway, this guy slammed a beer and puked twice as far as the second place guy. He had style, too, kind of like a discus thrower. He drank the beer, leaned forward with his big feet just barely behind the line, made this terrible sound as he puked, like an elephant, and the green stuff shot about twenty-five feet. The crowd roared.

All of the contestants get two chances, and the second time the pig guy did even better. He won at twenty-eight feet and seven inches. The announcer said the guy had beaten the all time record by about two and a half feet. The crowd went wild; the pig guy slammed a beer and puked all over the crowd and a riot broke out. Everybody was throwing beer on each other and fighting, it was terrible. I had green beer all over me.

But that wasn't the problem I mentioned before. The main problem that year was that a couple of students apparently died of alcohol poisoning and the university was criticized for allowing such contests to take place. The newspapers mentioned the puke for distance riot and some other bad incidents, so the university and the town cracked down on the festival. They even banned the puke for distance contest. That made me sad.

The next year the festival was not as fun, there were too many police and too many new regulations. I never went again after that. Still, you should go see a St Pat's day festival if there is one near you, because you would definitely enjoy it.