Here's the recipe - and the reason - for the parties that Jersey Shore locals hold to mark Labor Day
You can't outlaw stupidity.
That was the observation I heard from a local in Manasquan as he told me of an incident this summer that represented a new apex in the annals of bad bennie behavior
It seems that the summer tourists there, known as "bennies" in the local vernacular, started a custom known as the "Around the World Party." The idea is that the bennies dress up as characters from one country or another and drink lots of beer.
Sounds harmless, right?
Not when the bennies got done with it. For some reason that could make sense only to a drunken fool, they added a wrinkle: They would drink while standing on the roofs of their bungalows.
Drunks on a roof? How could that fail to work out swimmingly?
You can see the reason in an online video whose title tells you all you need to know about the hazards of roof-drinking:
"Dude Jumps Off The Roof At Jersey Shore House Party, Nobody Catches Him."
The dude in question is dressed like a knight from a Monty Python movie in keeping with the house's English theme. Not only does he jump off the roof, he does so backwards, trusting his fellow drunks to catch him.
The result was yet another call for a first-aid squad whose volunteer members spend a good part of the summer responding to bad bennie behavior.
The towns do their best to deal with this sort of thing. Several years ago Manasquan followed the lead of nearby Belmar in banning beer pong. That followed an article I did for the Star-Ledger on the practice.
The photographer and I showed up at a party in a little bungalow not far from the beach. The guys who were hosting it made a practice of inviting every good-looking girl who walked by to come and join them.
After a while they had quite a crew, including one young woman who insisted the photographer take a picture of her drinking from a "beer bong." This is a gravity-fed device intended to aid bennies in getting as drunk as possible as fast as possible.
The woman seemed to be enjoying herself thoroughly. But when I got to the office Monday, the photo editor told me she'd called begging for us not to run the pictures. It seems she worked in a law firm and the partners might not take kindly to seeing a staffer swilling beer on the pages of the state's biggest newspaper.
She lucked out. We had so many photos of people making fools of themselves that hers didn't make the cut.
The mayor and council responded to the article by banning outdoor beer pong but as my friend said, you can't outlaw stupidity.
You want to ban beer pong? Fine, we'll just start drinking on the roof.
That's how bennies think - poorly. They have such a short time at the Shore in the summer that they want to pack in more drinking and partying than they can handle.
Hence the "bye-bye-bennie-bash." This is a tradition at the Jersey Shore that goes back to the 1970s. The locals will gather in some back yard and toast the end of summer, and all the horn-honking, road rage and other bad bennie behavior that goes with it.
Here is my recipe for a good bye-bye-bennie bash: Beer, burgers, Buffett, the Beach Boys - and no beach badges. The need for the beer and burgers is self-explanatory. As for the Beach Boys and Buffett, they herald the beginning of the best time of year at the beach. Buffett's "The Coast Is Clear" is the perfect end-of-summer anthem.
The culmination of the party is the ceremonial burning of those beach badges, which are never again needed after Labor Day.
As of tomorrow, the Jersey Shore goes from being the epicenter of mass tourism on the East Coast to becoming a paradise the equal of any in the tropics. Ocean water temperatures reach Caribbean-like levels and the beaches become deserted.
My bye-bye bennie parties grew to the point they were drawing people from all over the state. Finally my wife made me stop having the annual Labor Day bash. This year we'll be spreading the fun over the entire weekend. On Labor Day itself I'll be attending a bennie bash at which a number of microbrew aficionados will be in attendance.
We will drink the fine brew slowly, as it deserves, and not from beer bongs
And somehow I suspect we'll get through the day without having anyone jump off the roof.
COMMENTS: There are two types of comments that I would prefer not to see here because they are boring and repetitive.
One is the comment to the effect that the bennies support the Shore economies and therefore the locals should be grateful. In fact, the sales tax revenue from the summer businesses goes to the state, not the municipalities. Chris Christie may love summer tourism, but that's because he collects the tax revenue but does not have to put up with the tourists.
(I see I'm getting those tendentious comments anyway. Before commenting, please read this column in which the mayor of Point Pleasant Beach argues that tourism is actually costing the town money. This is also proven by a look at the tax rates of towns with boardwalks, bars and amusements and those without. Tax rates are much lower in the towns without tourist attractions.)
The other is that inane idea that "benny" stands for "Bergen, Essex, Newark and New York."
This has no basis in fact, as Ben Zimmer explained in this New York Times language column. The fallacy here is called a "backronym" and it pleases a certain type of mind - not a good type.