Sloppy Seconds: The Tucker Max Leftovers (42 page)
Fast forward to a few months later:
This was 2005, back before the Green Zone in Iraq was just a normal US military base, and soldiers needed pretty basic stuff like toilet paper and shit. Since I have so many friends and fans in the military, my buddies and I stateside organized a series of parties called “Tanked for the Troops” where we’d do some bar event to raise money, then use the money to buy sundries and supplies for soldiers in Iraq, and ship it to them. Pretty basic, but it was a ton of fun, and there was no bullshit involved. Most charities are 30% or more overhead. We took every dollar we got (and more) and used it for stuff that helped real people who really needed it. That’s what charity should be.
Anyway, I scheduled a Tanked for the Troops event in NYC, and invited Morimoto to co-host it with me. Morimoto agreed. This turned it from a rinky-dink little thing my buddies and I were doing, to something that was a much bigger deal. We amped up promotion and billed it as something where Morimoto and I would do like an Iron-Chef-style competition, but with shots. It didn’t work out that way for two reasons:
- I know food, but I am not even qualified to be one of his assistants on “Iron Chef”—those guys are all amazing and accomplished chefs in their own right—much less actually COMPETE with him.
- Sadly, the bar we booked it at was a complete clusterfuck. I am not even going to name the bar and give them any press, fuck them. But basically, they had nothing ready and were totally unprepared.
Thankfully, Junior and I are resourceful motherfuckers. We pulled together a ton of random items and Morimoto and I went behind the bar with the other four regular bartenders working alongside us to get drinks and shit for everyone else in the place. Then, instead of competing with him, I became Morimoto’s de facto assistant, like on “Iron Chef.” Someone at the bar would pick an item from the things Junior and I had collected earlier, like tortilla chips, and give it to Morimoto. I would gather up all the other things Morimoto asked for and then, using that patron-selected ingredient, Morimoto would make up a tasty shot. He not only did it, he made up fantastic shots for EACH of the things below:
Tortilla chips
Tabasco
Salt
Pepper
Maraschino Cherries
Whiskey
Lemon
Olives
It was kind of amazing what he could do with these things, and I wish I had either recorded it all or written it down, because some of the shots were good enough I’d want to have them again. Sadly, I was too busy getting hammered—remember, we DID the shot for each one of those theme ingredients.
Despite all the problems, it was a great time. Even normally standoffish Morimoto was drunk and happy. As we walked out from behind the bar, he pulled me aside:
Morimoto “This…very fun. I do event with you…anytime.”
Tucker “Thank you chef, I had a great time too.”
By then, the bar was totally packed. I was talking to the two girls who’d come out to fuck me, and everyone else was getting pictures with Morimoto or just having a good time. Not paying attention to anything, about maybe 45 minutes pass, and some people convince Morimoto to get back behind the bar and make another exotic Iron Chef shot. Neither Junior nor I noticed this as it was happening, otherwise one of us would have gone with him to be his assistant, because the idiot bartenders weren’t going to do it.
I didn’t see what happened next, but my buddy was right there and saw the whole thing go down. He said that Morimoto was a little drunk, and I guess just assumed that the normal bartenders would assist him the same way that I had before. He’s fucking Iron Chef Morimoto, why wouldn’t they, right? So he’d need Jack Daniels, and yell out for Jack Daniels, and these meathead guido bartenders would just look at him like he was an idiot and go about their business. This frustrated Morimoto obviously, and at some point, one of the bartenders bumped into him. My buddy says he thinks it may not have been intentional, but the dude basically hip-checked Morimoto into the bar sink. This is about when I turned around and saw the commotion.
This did not sit well with Morimoto. He turned around and got in the dude’s face and yelled something in Japanese at him. The bartender did the only thing a meathead guido can do: he got violent and pushed Morimoto. Well, Morimoto went straight-up Billy Martin on the bartender, and chest-bumped him back so hard the bartender fell back against the back of the bar. Three of the other bartenders tried to grab Morimoto, but he pushed them off of him, and then grabbed three pint glasses and threw them down on the ground so hard they shattered on the floor. The four bartenders then converged on Morimoto, like in a cartoon.
At that point, Junior saw what was going on and did a full-on leap OVER the bar like he was Mitch Fucking Gaylord or something, took out two of the bartenders, and got up swinging. He went fucking nuts; I think he may have knocked one bartender out cold. It was like
Tango & Cash
meets
Cocktail
. My buddy and I ran to help. We pulled one bartender out, but by that point the bouncers had come over, and the Action Jackson bar fight had dissolved into a scrum of limbs and pushing. The next thing I know, me, Junior, and Morimoto are out on the street.
It took a second to process…but then it dawned on me: I just got thrown out of a charity event.
No—I JUST GOT KICKED OUT OF MY OWN CHARITY EVENT!!!!
How does this happen? I didn’t even know that was possible. Who has ever done that? Who has ever been kicked out of their own charity event?
Tucker Max, that’s who.
About a year later, I was hanging out with Morimoto and Junior again, and that incident came up:
Morimoto “That…pretty funny.”
Tucker “Yeah, it was pretty funny.”
Morimoto “Your writing…now, I understand.”
JUNIOR’S MARRIAGE
Occurred, December 2001
And then there’s this story. As you read this, you’re going to think, “this can’t be real.” You’re going to think that there is no fucking way this could happen. I agree. Had I not been there when he got back to my place, seen the evidence on his sweater, and then seen the article in the paper a few days later, I’d have trouble believing this too. But what can I say? Real life is stranger than fiction.
When I moved to Boca Raton after law school, I lived in Mizner Park, right above my dad’s restaurant. I had a two-bedroom apartment, and coincidentally, Junior was looking for a place to live. Perfect situation: I get to live with my best friend; he gets a nice place that he couldn’t get otherwise because his credit is worse than Lenny Dykstra’s.
Nothing comes without a price, not even living in a sweet apartment with your best friend. As we were figuring out the apartment details, we had this conversation:
Junior “OK, but just so you know my girlfriend is going to be spending a lot of time over here.”
Tucker “Well, you’re dating her, I’d expect that I guess.”
Junior “I mean…a LOT of time.”
Tucker “Motherfucker—do not fuck with me. You know I will set that bitch on fire and throw her off the balcony.”
Junior “Dude…she is my girlfriend.”
Tucker “You know me…”
Junior “I’m dating her…”
Tucker “Bitches ain’t shit!”
Junior “Well…we’re engaged.”
Tucker “Why…when…what is wrong with you?? You fucking asshole. The only way I’d let her live here is if you are paying DOUBLE rent.”
Junior “Done!”
Tucker “FUCK!”
Let me explain. At the time, Junior was dating/engaged to a woman named DemonWhore. Her name was not actually DemonWhore, that’s just what it should have been if her parents had been responsible citizens. In my humble opinion, DemonWhore was the most vile she-devil cunt in the history of women. I fucking HATED everything about this bitch. You may think I’m being harsh. You are wrong. Imagine the worst woman you’ve ever known; DemonWhore is worse. I could go on and on about what a horrible piece of shit DemonWhore was. A perfect example of the type of person she is: DemonWhore was like 39 at the time (Junior was 26, I think) and had a 19 year old daughter who was a homeless crack addict, literally sucking dick on the street for rock. And DemonWhore is such a horrifically selfish human being that she refused to help her out in any way. DemonWhore is probably the most classic case of Borderline Personality Disorder I’ve ever actually met in person. [BPD is what Hitler and Stalin had. Basically pure evil.]
[And yes, the next question is what does it say about my friend that he was dating her? Believe me, I ask him about this all the time now. He doesn’t want to think about it.]
So they move in, and because DemonWhore knows I hate her fucking guts, she is on her best behavior around me. She also makes sure to keep basically everything they do a secret from me. It wasn’t hard: she had Junior so fucking wrapped, it was ridiculous. The extent of their secret life was so complete that they got married while they lived with me, and I didn’t know. Not kidding at all.
One night they are out to dinner alone, kinda drunk, and they decide they want to get married. Not eventually. THAT NIGHT. Well, because DemonWhore is a whore who has fucked most of the rich and powerful men in Boca, she called up two friends of hers: A priest who could marry them, and a lawyer to witness it.
Since this was the very definition of last minute, they couldn’t set up anything special or do it anywhere appropriate. So they decided to get married in the next best place: a public park. Like where homeless people shit and old people wait for death. I’m not joking one bit.
At the end of Palmetto Park Road in Boca Raton is a park called South Beach Park. Palmetto Park Road is a major thoroughfare, but it dead-ends into the parking lot for that park. At the far end of the parking lot is a public gazebo that overlooks the ocean. It’s a pretty cool place, and people go there all the time to have picnics or drink and hang out or whatever. Or sometimes get married.
They told the priest and the witness to meet them there. It was about 11:00 at night, and when they got there, there were some teenagers sitting in the gazebo, smoking some swag weed and drinking warm beers they stole from the convenience store. Junior could sell gag reflex to a hooker, so he has no problem convincing these kids to leave…so he can get married.
The priest and the witness show up, and they get started on their marriage ceremony. The wedding is being held in a gazebo, in a public park. With discarded Natty Light cans and stubbed-out roaches still strewn about.
Anyway, they are exchanging their vows, and they get to the part where the priest is talking bullshit about the ring symbolizing some nonsense…when they hear a loud tire squeal out on Palmetto Park Road, and then an engine revving. They look out to the street, and about half a mile away is a BMW 3 Series, quickly accelerating down the street right towards them. BMWs can fucking move, and this thing had the pedal to the floor.
It caromed down Palmetto Park, bouncing off a few cars before straightening out, headed straight towards the gazebo where Junior and Demon-Whore were drunkenly and surreptitiously tying the knot.
The car wasn’t slowing down…20…25…30…35…40…45…
It was probably going well over 50 miles an hour when it crossed A1A and slammed directly into the sea wall, not 20 feet from the gazebo. The front of the car crumpled, twisted metal and glass flew everywhere, and the airbags exploded in the two passengers’ faces. The incredible noise of crashing car was immediately followed by the horn going off and getting stuck.
After the initial shock, the four of them ran over to the car. If you’ve never seen a fresh accident scene, it’s hard to describe. You really should google “car accident pictures” and look at some to get an idea of what they encountered—it was that grisly.
The person in the driver’s seat was male. His face was a mess of contusions and trauma. He wasn’t dead, but he was really fucked up. The woman in the passenger seat was fucked up as well, groaning, bleeding everywhere, but not as bad.
Junior pulls the woman out of the car as DemonWhore calls 911. He holds her in his arms, and she starts blabbing incoherently. Eventually Junior starts to make out clipped phrases like…“
No, please…I’m so sorry…no, don’t do this…it was a mistake…no, please…he tried to kill us…”
Eventually the cops and paramedics show up to deal with the scene. The EMTs started working on the woman right away, but had to wait for the fire department to cut the guy out of the driver’s side with the Jaws of Life. By the time they got him out of the car, he was in critical condition. They gave him CPR as they loaded him into the ambulance and took him to the hospital. The cop wasn’t sure if she was going to make it or not, either.
The cops interviewed Junior, DemonWhore, and their two witnesses, and got statements from all of them. The cop at the scene tells Junior that he isn’t sure, but he would guess that this is a domestic case, and that they are going to treat it like an attempted murder-suicide until they get more evidence. So basically, at this moment at least, it appears that a couple was in such a horrific and fucked up fight that the man tried to kill them both with his car. At Junior’s wedding.
By the time this is all done and the cops tell them they can leave, it is probably 1am. You can imagine the mental state of the wedding party at that point. Everyone is worked up and emotionally exhausted—they just witnessed a traumatic car wreck that was a potential murder-suicide. Junior has the woman’s blood on his sweater. Everyone of course assumes that the wedding is over.
Junior “OK, thanks for coming out guys. We’ll try this again next weekend.” DemonWhore “I bet the Deerfield Beach pier will be empty right now.” Junior “What? Deerfield? DemonWhore, I’m not getting married right now.”
She starts getting hysterical.
DemonWhore “If we don’t do it now, it’ll never happen!”
Junior looked at her like she’d just punched a baby.
Junior “You can’t be serious.”
DemonWhore “Well, we wanted to get married tonight!”