My Week-Long Vacation Inside the World of Energy Drink Commercials

I don’t know if it’s the summer heat, the relentless throngs of seasonal tourists, or the opiates I take with my morning gin, but by mid-summer, this New Yorker’s brain has all but turned to mush. (When you take the phrase “city that never sleeps” literally for five years, it catches up to you around the 90-degree mark.) And so, every July, I cash in a few vacation days to recharge at my favorite rejuvenation destination: the 5MonsterBull Day Camp for Adults. Founded by Richard Branson’s illegitimate offspring, this “high-octane oasis” was built on the idea that fatigue (i.e., heart rates of 124 beats-per-minute or less) needs to be driven from our bodies like a herd of poisonous snakes—by using a herd of even more poisonous snakes. In short, a week of 5MonsterBull is kind of like reclining in a La-Z-Boy while skinny-dipping inside a tornado.

This all sounds pretty antithetical, probably, but here’s something I’ll bet you didn’t know: the word “extreme” isn’t just a marketing ploy to push guarana-gorged products to impressionable soccer moms in need of a chaser. In fact, 90% of all energy drink commercials are filmed live on 5MonsterBull’s 551-acre property, where things are inexplicably extreme AT ALL TIMES.

A certain someone at Unreality, of course, wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of footing the bill for my annual 5MBDCA vaca (hint: his name rhymes with the last part of Sean Paul). Or the prospect of me missing a weekly deadline just so my mind, body, and soul could head-butt each other into serenity, one carbonated glug at a time. It actually took a full hour to break him down:

P: I’m not quite sure where the disconnect is here, TJ. If Unreality wouldn’t pay for your Wolverine cosplay last Halloween, why the hell would we pay for you to go have some weird heart attack out in the middle of Nevada? Or, like, anything weird at all that you do in your free time?

TJ: It’s funny you should bring that up, actually. You know how someone might be sending Comic-Con pictures to your ex-girlfriends every other day? Perhaps I could arrange for that to stop.

P: It would be odd if I didn’t remember, since Gretchen e-mails me about it almost every week. And those aren’t Comic-Con pics, either. From what Ashlee tells me, they’re just of you on your lawn wearing an expensive-looking Wolverine mask, claws made out of forks, and absolutely nothing else.

Halloween 2011. Never forget.

TJ: Whoa, whoa, whoa, don’t put that on me, man. Maybe I could have afforded the pants if somebody—

P: OK, you know what? Fine, I’ll dig up a stipend or something, but only if you can prove an energy drink day spa or whatever seriously exists. I better get a list article out of this, and you better have been serious about those pictures. I swear, if—

TJ: Are letters OK? Can I just send you those? You’re allowed to send letters home during Liquid Lunch, I think, but they have to be written in your own blood…

Sorry in advance about the blood. I honestly didn’t think they were serious about that. But boy oh boy, does it feel good to be back in the “extreme” (haha) outdoors again! Most of the other campers are still settling into their imaginary hover-cots, but I’m already on my third 5-Hour Energy shot of the day. A day I’m TOTALLYREADYTODOMINATE, by the way. Or night. Sometimes it gets hard to tell which is which around here after 24 hours or so.

We got to meet our counselors after breakfast (i.e., roasted weasels each camper has to catch themselves), which is exciting because every year they surprise us with a celebrity guest. And you’ll never believe who they got this time: Mike Tyson!! I guess they imported him from 5MonsterBull’s Poland location, and I hear he’s incredible with campfire sing-alongs. (They’ve already budgeted 38 pianos for this week alone!)

Counselor Tyson is super helpful, too. I got lost during our mid-afternoon scavenger hunt and found myself wandering along some deserted highway, but eventually he sneaked up on me with like ten gorgeous chicks to lend a helping hand (nobody’s explained why yet, but those girls follow him everywhere and just smile at things…like a mute, mobile brothel). Before long I had some black power of my own, and I swear to Christ I’m not trying to be racist by saying that.

Seriously, that’s their tagline.

OK, gotta run. Counselor Tyson said that if I help him with some poetry or monologue or whatever, he’ll let me snort a Pixie Stick off somebody’s boob.

July 24, 2012

LOL, saw the funniest thing today! Some newbies tried to drink coffee after lunch. Around 2pm, I think. What a couple of dicks.

httpv://youtu.be/ylEFp1MPak8

July 25, 2012

Ohmygod Paul, I’m having the best time. It’s been two nights now, and I haven’t been able to sleep a wink! You’d think it would be because of the Kocaine Kocoa everybody gets during our Midnight Metalocalypse Marathons, but it totally isn’t. Paul, I need you to sit down for this one. This is serious. I’m going to put the next sentence into its very own paragraph for emphasis.

The movie Little Monsters is totally real.

Not joking. Each camper is assigned their own monster to scare the shit out of them every night. Do you have any idea how terrifying it is to be woken up every hour and a half by a demon that’s hopped up on energy drinks? Good lord, I can’t think of a more refreshing way to start the day.

httpv://youtu.be/ts72PxHx2cY

July 26, 2012

Went for a jog this morning that got out of hand in a hurry. Destroyed the hell out of most of the dormitories. Counselor Tyson might be dead.

httpv://youtu.be/3zFHKNFTj88

July 27, 2012

Today we got to spend more time in the woods, where I learned they don’t do tons of government-approved testing on the energy drinks we’ve been bathing in.

httpv://youtu.be/3jOR_RCVdKc

And yeah, that raw footage looks pretty awesome, but only because squirrels are playful by nature. Bugs are a whole different story:

httpv://youtu.be/XWGXc0qAwXw
Leave a can full of this stuff near an ant hill, and you can kiss our dumbass species goodbye.

Nevertheless, afternoon Gym-N’-Swim is pretty sweet when you have a sea turtle as a lifeguard. There’s no way he’s qualified to perform CPR, though.

httpv://youtu.be/bh-SRATvytY

July 28, 2012

Well, well, well, Paul, it looks like an apology is in order. While a certain Negative Nelly was editing words on some website or something, a certain Me was co-inventing the next great energy source of our generation during Arts and Crafts. I present to you: The Cat-Toast Reactor!

httpv://youtu.be/Z8yW5cyXXRc

I’m telling you, man, I’ve been trying to make cat batteries for years, but I finally fou

———

[Ed. Note. This is the last correspondence I’ve gotten from TJ in a while. Wherever he is, I’m pretty positive he’s not making inventions out of cats and toast. But if anyone has any information of his whereabouts, your help would be greatly…well, I told his mom I’d find him.]