Party Crashers
Posted at 6:00 AM on November 30, 2009
by Dale Connelly
(21 Comments)
The couple that managed to get into last week's state dinner at the White House without an invitation have a desperate hunger for attention and no shortage of nerve. That's a combination that will get you far in 2009.
Of course now they have lots of attention in the form of intense scrutiny from the Secret Service, CNN and the National Enquirer, just to name a three very different organizations that are most likely seeking every available personal detail about our gregarious pair.
Welcome to FAME, party crashers!
It's amazing the places you can go if you simply pretend that you belong and act like nothing's wrong. I suppose some people get a thrill from slipping through security. Well, I know they do. They're called burglars, and occasionally they go to jail for it.
My experience closest to the State Dinner Fiasco happened more than 20 years ago in San Francisco. My wife Nancy and I were at the end of a vacation and we wanted to finish by taking the boat out to Alcatraz. As our bad luck would have it, all the boats were full that day - we could only buy a ticket for tomorrow and tomorrow we would be on a plane.
I am a habitual rule follower, so I was ready, maybe even eager, to give up. Nancy, however, noticed the ticket takers on the gangway weren't looking closely at the passes as people went by. She saw an opening. Against all my obedient instincts, I agreed to buy tomorrow's tickets and we walked, boldly. towards today's boat.
We were admitted without a question.
Just as we headed down the ramp, there was a camera to take souvenir photos of the tourists. Here we are - one of us giddy with the delight of successfully running a harmless scam, and the other full of tension, anticipating an official hand on the shoulder, then a sack over the head and a brutal dragging into a deep, dark waterfront dungenon populated with bear-sized rats and cockroaches that can tear your skin off.
At the very least I feared we would be detained on the island - after all, it was once the nation's highest security prison and we were breaking IN.
Have you sweet talked, finagled or conned your way into a place where you knew you weren't supposed to be?
Comments (21)
When my sister got married there were actual wedding crashers at the wedding dance. This was long before the movie. As the video demonstrates, they ate the shrimp. drank at the free bar and led the dancing.We all assumed that they worked with my new brother-in-law and his family was too dysfunctional to care. At about the point that their presence seemed a little oddt they vanished. We assumed they had friends at the hotel that let them know which affairs were worth attending.
Dale, how nice that your hair made an appearance on today's blog.Welcome back Heartlanders!
thanks for the interesting story, Dale - and the question, wow. no, i don't think i or we have ever done anything like that. and i like to think of myself as disobedient but i guess i act that out mostly in not following recipes or reading directions. Steve is more obedient, but even more frugal and he would NEVER have shelled out cash for tomorrow's tickets on the chance that he wouldn't get on the boat. very cool that Nancy pushed you a little past the boundaries of comfort and it workked. (and we're glad you didn't get thrown in the slammer).
good morning, All!
Thanks for the nod to my long-lost hair, Beth-Ann. If there had been a wig available, I would have worn it to confuse the pursuers.
The moustache looked fake to begin with!
I took a chance and engaged in breaking and entering a few weeks ago. I didn't take any thing, but I did leave our dog.
The kennel where we board our dog was locked and no one was there. I needed to leave the dog at the kennel because I was about to leave on a short vacation. An arrangement had been made to leave the kennel door unlocked so I could go in and leave the dog, but it was locked and no one was home.
I looked around the back of the kennel and decided that I could climb over the kennel fence and go in the dog door. I did this and then let myself in the front and left the dog.
The kennel owner apprently never found out what I did and I didn't tell her. I don't know what she would have said if she found out what I did, but I guess no harm was done and I was able to leave for my vacation on time. I don't usually do things like this.
Thanks for the delightful blog entry, Dale.
Frequently, and much to the horror and embarrassment of my children, I trespass to make photos. Once they watched me climb the fence at the cemetery next to the Glensheen Mansion in Duluth with all my camera gear only to fall into a snowbank on the other side while they waited in the parked car with my husband. In general, I sneak rather than talk my way into places so it's not quite the same thing.
Happy Monday, Heartlanders!
I have a vague memory at the age of 4, riding a kiddie train at a park somewhere in Iowa, over and over again, without paying for a ticket. I'm quite certain the operator gave me leverage for sheer cuteness.
Great story Dale! And picture, too. You remind me of someone in that photo and when I put my finger on it, I'll make another post. Sorry to leave you all hanging.
i wish we had photos of Jim crawling thru the dog door and Elinor crawling over the fence at Glensheen (is there a statute of limitations on crawling and entering, you two??) pretty funny
I'm afraid I'm too much of a rule follower (or perhaps just meek) for getting in someplace I'm not supposed to be. I had the vague feeling that I was doing something I ought not to when I was briefly the treasurer for an organization (I was nominated by someone else and was too sheepish to say "no! not me!) - but that was mostly because I was pretty sure they'd figure out I wasn't good at math and perhaps not really a grown-up...(thank heavens for Excel which was good at covering for me).
Hope all had good weekends.
in baseball there is a rule they plugged in about 30 years ago. if the fan runs out on the field the cameras are not allowed to follow. i think the thrill is to read about yourself.
i do whatever it takes to reach my goal on a regular basis. i use the phrase it is easier to ask forgivness than permission. i have to teach my kids not to ask because sonmeone will say no. those rules are all in place for a reason but that doesn't mean you need to handcuff yourself for crying out loud.
Good Morning!
Great story Dale, as a habitual rule-follower, I can relate to the fear you experienced. My gate crashing experience was back in the early '70's when I went to Meet my brother who was in the Air Force completing his initial electronics training. Well when I arrived, he was enrolled in two weeks of additional training. Well I didn't have any lodging for the two weeks so he and his buddies agreed to have me sleep in the extra bunk in their room. At the time I had very long hair so I spent two weeks with it tucked up under a hat so as not to stand out. When he completed his training we headed off on our planned camping trip in Colorado. It was a mostly fun but occasionally terrifying couple of weeks but we pulled it off so my brief time in the Air Force is a fond memory.
I hope everyone gets away with having a great Monday!
Barb, I guess some of us criminals, including Dale and Elinor, can't resist telling our stories. I the think the goats, if they could talk, would having some stories about you, Barb. I don't think we can include Donna among the criminals for her 4 year old "cheating".
I get busted even when I DON'T try crashing a party. I'm a rule follower too (except when I'm cooking), but I had to argue with two bouncers once who tried to throw me out of a concert even after I paid my admission and even had a hand stamp. Turns out it was a "new" stamp they hadn't seen yet. And, I got stopped and searched for shoplifting at the Renaissance Festival once in front of the crowd...innocent again.
I must have a guilty look on my face!
Elinor, I think all photo folk are good 'sneakers.' We have to be. I can't remember how many times I went trespassing to get a good shot (or what I thought was a good shot). Used to climb around fences along the General Mills dock, next to AzGot caught by the property caretakers a few times, bawled out, threatened to call the police, blah, blah, blah...
I used to duck the fence on the dock next to the Azcon Scrapyard in Duluth on Sunday mornings to take pictures of US Steel's S/S Joshua A. Hatfield and M/V Eugene W. Pargny. Got an interesting progression of the boats disappearing from week to week as they were scrapped out.
I guess I tend to be a rule follower under normal circumstances. Having been a security type guy for ten years, I always took it personally when someone bluffed their way past me or snuck around me and I feel a bit of a kinship at not wanting to make the other guy look bad. ...but... I if there is sufficient motivation, I have been known to do a little sneaking or bluffing my way into plaes every now and again.
Morning Heartlanders -- love hearing all your stories this morning. The only time I can remember feeling like I was breaking all the rules was actually in Paris. The client and I were being toured around by a very aggressive ground supplier (teeny little French Vietnamese woman). She pushed her way through every crowd and flashing her badge, budged us into every line. It was a little embarrassing at the time, but looking back on it, she did make it possible to see some of the big highlights of the Louvre (Mona Lisa, Winged Victory....) in about 20 minutes flat (which is all the time we had)!
And I'M glad you didn't write "my wife, Nancy, and I....!"
Howdy, all, and hope you had a lovely thanksgiving weekend!
i once inadvertently snuck in to the dog show at the excel energy center with my friend terri. she had driven around seeking a cheap metered parking spot, and when she found one, the closest way to enter was through a set of doors at the back of the building. we saw exhibitors with their dogs going in, so figured it would be okay.
once in, we realized we had come in a door with no ticket booth....but with pure hearts! so we just laughed and went with it, and felt happy to save the $20 or so it would have cost to go in the front.
okay, gotta get back to work!
I'm commmenting late today. When my grandmother was a young girl and lived in Germany in the early 1900's, her parents took her and her sister into the country for a picnic somewhere near Hamburg. The girls went berry picking in what they thought was a public woods. They were stopped by a forest ranger type person who informed them that they were tresspassing on private property owned by Kaiser Wilhelm. The ranger told them to leave and took their buckets of berries and emptied them onto the ground. My grandmother was always pretty indignant about that, and stated she would always remeber how scarey the man looked in his uniform and shiny boots.
I envy most of you your carefree lives of innocent crashing. My people come from the same place as Renee's grandmother. Even though I have never heard a story like that, I think the sensibility got passed on anyway.
The very thought of getting caught gate-crashing gives me the shakes. Now I know why. Don't want to get my berries dumped by the Kaiser's guard (or worse).
I was fortunate to have a grandmother with a prodigeous memory who lived until she was 99. She really had no respect for authority that was capricious or abusive. Her stories certainly had an instructive effect, though, and I would never gate crash and run the risk of encountering a character like that ranger.
Wow! 99!
Be glad she talked. Information is never forthcoming in my family.
I think they were glad to leave the past behind. I'm always glad when someone of my parents' generation lets something slip that is new information.
Clever Listeners,
By now you've probably noticed that Hour 2 of the today's Dale Connelly Show Rebroadcast didn't play at noon like it was supposed to. But all is not lost! Thanks to the fine work of Bucky, the "JASPER Whisperer", that missing hour will now be heard at 11pm tonight.
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