Doug and I met back in McKenna Junior HS. Our friendship stemmed from he and I being on the receiving end of a practial joke gone wrong. Someone thought it funny to be placing secret admirer letters in both our lockers supposedly signed by the other. And from this joke blossomed a friendship that lasted for the ages.
My fondest memories of Doug are hard to narow down, but 3 stick out most.
Before we turned 21, my mom allowed me to have New Years's Parties in a "safe" environment. Rules were you came, you stayed, you keys were locked and not returned till the following morning. Well, Doug was there that night and had WAY too much to drink and somehow managed to pass out standing up with his face planted against the wood trim in the archway between my living room and dining roon. His cheek stuck to the wood is what was holding him up. He earned the nickname that stuck with him all these years that night, Flyboy.
2nd comes from another night of drinking (notice a trend here). A large group of us had gone to a bar to celebrate that Doug was home on leave and about to return to San Diego to finish some training. A night full of good friends, karaoke and drinks. Well at one point someone decided to sing Run Around Sue and Doug grabbed me to start dancing. We make it through a good 95% of the song, he goes to dip me and drops me on my head, lol.
We closed down the bar at 4am when they kicked us out and we headed to a diner to eat. Here is Doug absolutley smashed hanging out the car window when a cop car pulled up next to us. He is yelling at the cops "hey Officimer, there is no blood in my alcohol stream!!" The cops could do nothing but laugh. We arrived at the diner and Doug orders scrambled eggs and is attempting to eat them with a spoon that is upside down wondering why he is wearing more food than made it to his mouth. He decides to get up and use the mens room to clean up. The remaining 3 of us stayed at the table. 15 mins goes by, 30 mins pass. Finally at 45mins we are getting concerned and sent someone in the bathroom to check on him. In his drunken state, he couldn't find the door to get out of the bathroom, so he told us he wandered in circles for nearly the whole time looking for the door. We got him home with about 2hrs to spare before he had to be on his flight back to boot camp.
3rd and my all time favorite memory of Doug was the fact that I was banned from his classic Mustang. Doug and I worked together for a time at Sears. He offered me a ride home one night and I don't know any girl that would turn down a ride in a Sweettt car like that. Well, ever the gentleman, Doug opened the car door for me, we got in and off we went. We didn't get a half mile from the parking lot and the ENTIRE exhust system fell off the car!!!! It is Jan, there is snow and slush puddles everywhere and here is Doug, under the car trying to mickey mouse the exhust with a metal hanger. Not 2 weeks goes by and he offers me a ride home again. Now this time I get in the car and the passenger side mirror falls off. Needless to say, from that point I was banned from the Mustang after that.