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ROB
PACKER
By Mike Brown
mikebrown@slugmag.com
twitter: @Fuckmikebrown
For this year’s beer issue, I wanted
to do brief interviews with some
of my favorite local drunks. It
sounded easy in my head, but
coordinating such interviews
proved to be a daunting task,
like herding feral cats. Aside
from most megawastoids not
being the most calendar-friendly
people, I had a couple of other
prerequisites for the miniinterviews.
I needed super-drunks, not just
bar flies—men or women with
a liver built to last and haul ass
like a freight train. I didn’t want
to deal with any self-loathing
bullshit, either. I needed real pros
at swilling. People who make
drinking what it should be: fun. I
know a lot of “poor me” pity-party
alcoholics who replace their once
robust self-esteem with a handle
of Popov. Why would I want to
write something depressing?
That narrowed my search
tremendously. I thought about
calling my old-time friend, Sweet
Pete, who lives in Sioux Falls,
S.D. I stayed at his house once
while on tour. He’s amazing: a
the bartender was prompted to
cut Sweet Pete off due to stupid
state regulations. The bartender
explained to him why he was cut
off. Sweet Pete tried to explain
that he was from South Dakota
and that’s not how they did things
there. Sweet Pete got in his car
and drove back to Sioux Falls that
night, knowing he could never live
in a state that would put restraints
on his thirst. Ironically, the amount
of his dad’s money that Sweet
Pete spends in bars really could
fix the local economic crisis by
itself, but we all know how stupid
this state is when it comes to
drinking anything. I fucking hate
our Legislature, but that’s another
article.
When I stayed with Sweet Pete, he
took us to all the best strip clubs
Sioux Falls had to offer, told us
he’d buy all of our drinks (but only
if they were liquor) and paid for all
of our lap dances. He knew every
stripper’s real name and even
tipped all the bouncers. Class act
all the way, I tell ya—my kind of
drunk.
The only local drunk I got around
to interviewing for this article that
I could put on the same level of
sloshy bliss as Sweet Pete is my
man Rob Packer. The only time
Packer has even come close to
making me mad was when he
tried to put his dick in my pocket a
couple months ago, and even that
was pretty funny.
Packer probably came out of his
mom’s vagina holding a Pabst.
Seeing Packer without a Pabst in
his hand is like seeing a unicorn
or Bigfoot. Packer has put more
Pabst through his liver than all
the hipsters at Twilite Lounge
combined. I refuse to drink PBR
these days. No offense to Rob
Packer, but to me, that beer reeks
of skanks and American Apparel
apathy.
Packer is also a vegan. I asked him
what he had been longer, drunk
or vegan. I was surprised that
the answer was vegan. It seems
to me that vegans sometimes
don’t eat as much, and the less
you eat, the faster you get drunk.
When I pointed this out to Packer,
he cheerfully admitted that the
concept of beer as food was a
great one.
Then, Packer asked me how many
times I had ever seen him eat. I
thought about it, and, you know
what? I have never seen Packer
eat, and he’s a fucking chef for a
living. Then Packer asked me how
many times I’d seen him drink. I
pointed out that I’d never not seen
Packer drink. To which he simply
replied, “Case closed!”
When I asked Packer how old
he was when he had his first
beer, he got a puzzled look on
his face and said he didn’t know.
Then mumbled about a time he
remembered when he was 13 and
found a bottle of champagne. The
more I think about it now, though,
asking Packer when he drank his
first beer is like asking a normal
person if they can remember the
first time they tied their shoes.
Another neat-o fact about Packer
is that he has never been to an AA
meeting, but he has been invited.
I’d imagine if he ever went, all
ofthe alcoholics in the room would
be severely jealous over how
drunk Packer is and how happy
he is. To me, that’s the difference
between an alcoholic and a drunk:
Alcoholics know they have a
problem—drunks just ignore it.
I asked Packer if he has any
drunks he looks up to. He said,
“The mirror.” Case closed.
Rob Packer wins first place
in Mike Brown’s heart when it
comes to local drunks.
trust-funded meth-head alcoholic.
If only we could all be so lucky.
Sweet Pete looks like Uncle
Fester and has the noticeable
meth twitch, which he makes no
attempts to hide.
Sweet Pete lived in Salt Lake for
two weeks. He came out here to
snowboard, but went to a bar,
which I shall not name, and was
drinking liquor at such a rapid rate
Illustration: Sean Hennefer
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