10/22/12

Man Weekend Goes Viral

My sister calls me at 10:30 at night.  I am concerned, normally family does not call me that late.  In my head I am thinking the worse.  My parents maybe?  Grand parents?  I answer the phone.

"What the hell!" She says.  "How come you didn't tell us!"

I'm not thinking the worst anymore.  I'm thinking that I shouldn't have answered the phone.  I am in trouble with my sister and since she used the word "us" I'm thinking that I am in trouble with my whole family.  Of course, my head is now thinking of everything that I have ever done to my family that I have not told them. 

I used to keep my teenage porn collection at the back of the laundry in the bathroom when I was young.  Maybe someone finally realized why I liked doing laundry so much.  I used to open all my Christmas presents early and then re wrap them.  I did that for like 5 years.  Have they finally clued in?  And once, only once, did I take apart everyones favorite toys and then ran like the child coward that I was.  Is it time for payback? 

Other than that, I can't think of anything that I haven't told them.  I give them updates from time to time on what's going on.  "Hey, we are having another kid."  Then I hang up.  Admittedly, I don't talk long on the phone but I do inform.  Kind of.  Mostly.  Probably not much. 

"Seriously, how could you not tell us?" She says again while I'm thinking.  I've got nothing and I tell her that.  Now she thinks I'm hiding something, which I should have once I found what what it was. 

"We were reading the news and guess who's picture is on the front page!"  She says.  Now I know what she is talking about and yup, probably should have told her that. 



For those that have followed the blog for any amount of time, probably know about Man Weekend.  It's the annual weekend that alot of guy friends get together, dress up with some ridiculous facial hair, roll to Walmart to create a scene, then drink the rest of the weekend.  Here are some pics to help you remember.
 

It's a great time to just be with guy friends and not have to worry about anything else. And there's beer, lots of beer.  We think it's funny.  We think it's hilarious.  And apparently the world does to.  Thus, my sisters phone call.

Last weekend something odd happened.  One of the guys took our Man Weekend and put them up on Reddit.  Within hours, we were the front page.  Apparently, this is a big deal and I'll admit I wasn't ready for what happened next.  Over the next three days our little man weekend pics got 3 million views, 1000 comments and a whole lot of What the Hell.  Click here to check them out.

Viral, weird man, very weird.

Then CNN called and wanted to do a story.  Weird and surreal.  Somehow our little fun weekend had gone online and found a small bit of popularity.  And I neglected to tell my family about it or call my sister, who loves this kind of stuff.  When we shot the pilot of for the reality show she was calling every night to see what was happening.  That I had forgot to tell her about the CNN thing is a pretty big blunder on my part.

Because now, as my sister had just informed me, we were on the front page of CNN.com under the headline "When man weekend goes terribly right."  And there, for the whole world, was man weekend in all our skeevy glory.

The dirty stache weekend.  Biker weekend.  Amish weekend.  Pencil thin weekend.  Elvis weekend.  All 5 years that we have done this was right there.  And now my sister was reading it and demanding why I had been so lax to tell her that her brother has embarrassed her on a global scale?

"So I guess they printed the article, huh?" I told her.  "Probably should have given you a heads up on that one......"

"You think!"

I left it to my sister to call the rest of my family and let them know that they probably didn't want to associate with me anymore.  It would be in their best interest if they said they didn't know who that Fat Elvis was and just go on their merry way.  She disagreed.

But as quickly as fake Internet fame comes, it goes.  We reached 3 million views and the CNN article in 3 or 4 days.  Then, nothing.  Quiet.  The little ticker on the picture page has not gone up by 1 since then.   It sits at 3,007,101 views and I think that is probably where it stays. 

I will leave everyone with a bit of advice though:  Drink Beer, get famous.  That's apparently how this works. 


1 comment:

  1. That first picture is a classic but I still love the one with you on your side...cracks me up every time. btw,...tell me these things next time!

    ReplyDelete