It’s all the Democrats’ fault, of course. Los Ángeles has been cruising along for over 80 years with nothing more than an atmospheric river every once in a while and then HILARY comes along and ruins everything.

Wake up, sheeple!

As of Saturday morning, Hurricane HILARY is a category 3 hurricane off the West Coast of Baja (aka OG) California. It is traveling north northwest at around 11 to 13 mph and it’s expected to hit land somewhere between Rosarito and TJ sometime Sunday.

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Old Uncle Ballsy is going to tell you a story now. It’s the story of how to properly survive a Pacific Ocean Tropical Storm.

It was a long time ago in a land far far away. That land was called México and Ballsy and his brother were there on a vacation. Nay, an adventure.

We were in Manzanillo, Colima, MX at an all-inclusive resort for Spring Break. We were in college. The place was great because it had a disco/club, multiple bars, good restaurants, a gigantic pool, a grocery store stocked with bottles of liquor, private access to the beach, and, best of all, it happened to be a week when a local beauty pageant was being hosted at the resort.

Of course, there is always a catch and that came in the form of a Tropical Storm whose name has been lost to the sea. Like many things were that week.

Earlier in the week, we had made friends with a couple of Canadian girls (my love of you peeps goes way back!) and a couple of Mexican dudes that were also on vacation. This was the core group that went to the club every night and got up to shenanigans.

In what should have been a sign of things to come, I went surfing sometime midweek and got caught up in a riptide. I stupidly thought I could work my way back to the shore and quickly tired myself out. I also swallowed lots of seawater. Only then did I do the right thing and make my way to the side before coming in.

As soon as I hit the sand, I collapsed and threw up some of the most vile Prestone-coloured bile I’d ever seen. Vile bile indeed.

It shocked me because the water had been great all week. There had been talk of a killer “Green Wave” but I chalked that up to surfer lore made up over beers on the sand.

I was wrong.

The “Green Wave” was associated with storms and one was a’comin’.

We were officially notified by the hotel that the Tropical Storm would hit land right over us and that we should remain in our rooms. Luckily, it would land overnight, so we would only lose one night of partying. We decided to do the only logical thing: We raided the store for as much alcohol as we could get, invited our new friends over to our villa (if you have the means, I highly recommend a villa. It is so choice!), and prepared to ride it out drinking.

The evening started out decently and we were joking about how the locals were exaggerating. However, soon enough the winds started to whip through. The rain swiftly followed.

It started to rain sideways. The glass door sounded like firemen were pounding on it trying to break it down. The roof sounded like large animals were stomping on it. We put towels on the floor as water was coming in through the tiny gap between the door and the floor.

And we drank.

Through the night, it felt like the villa was going to collapse on itself. The sheer force of the winds and rain was something we had never experienced. Eventually, we all fell asleep and/or passed out.

In the morning, the worst of the storm was over, but the aftermath followed. We still had rain but the winds had, thankfully, died down. I remember distinctly going out for a walk to see if there was any damage and looking at the wall of the club in shock as the all-white wall was now mostly black with patches of white. And the black was moving.

Every single insect and bug you could think of was crawling on that wall. The storm had disrupted their homes and now they were trying to find somewhere to live. Unfortunately, that included my room that night.

I wrapped myself in a cocoon with my sheets and prayed nothing would bite me that would kill me as I stared at the ceiling that was crawling with bugs.

The following day was sunny and you would have never known that anything had happened.

***

Since I know you want to know:

No, I didn’t. My brother did. The Canadian girls hooked up with the Mexican guys. A little bit of pre-NAFTA cooperation, you could call it. I still have an epic picture somewhere, taken the morning after, of our large round table filled with empty bottles of booze.

***

All of this is to say that the SoCal contingent needs to take this shit seriously. Tropical Storms are no joke. Stay indoors and prep as best you can. That includes buying lots of alcohol.

It helps.

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Allow me to remind you about DFOCon in Vegas this November. The details are first weekend in November, staying in Downtown, and good times to be had.

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Enjoy your Saturday night! Stay safe!