Ban my river drinking and

I’ll just up and pee my pants

I’ve been hearing everywhere lately about the furor over the ban on alcoholic beverages on the Boise River this summer. I’ve read news articles, letters to the editor, and columns, and had to listen to countless friends rant and rave about what a sham the new law is.

Apparently, much ado has been made about how the river is no longer a safe or fun place for families to take day trips because of alcohol-induced nonsensical behavior and hooliganism. I, for one, am very much in favor of alcohol being allowed on America’s rivers. It is at the very heart of what it means to be a river floater. I don’t recall ever having heard any fellow floaters talk about what a great can of Coke they had during a float.

From what I can gather, lawmakers believe that the recent rise in public urination, violence, and littering are due largely to what floaters are toting in their coolers as they make their way down the Boise, and is not, in fact, correlated with the fact that half of the recreational users of the river in the course of the summer are gigantic idiots.

It’s frustrating for me to see police officers being paid tax dollars, standing in Barber Park and floating alongside me down the river, trying to peek in my cooler or eyeballing my Nalgene bottle, wondering what’s inside it. If I laugh too loudly, are they going to ask to sniff my bottle? And if they were to smell alcohol, even the slightest bit, would I then be a criminal?

Seriously, why make it against the law to drink? If they were going to post the police along the river anyway, why not just put them there to accost the rowdies, the litterbugs, or the public pee-ers? Couldn’t they leave the drinkers who actually behave themselves alone?

Honestly, here’s my complaint. Outside of the bar scene, there are two activities I do in this town when I really want a beer by my side: when I watch a football game and when I float the river.

No offense to Boise State administrators, but nice call on keeping alcohol out of Bronco Stadium. I can only imagine the lost concessions sales by not offering beer at games, not to mention a serious blow to ambiance. Beer and football go together like . . . hell, like beer and football! And when I found out at the start of the summer that alcohol would be banned on the river? Let’s just say I had some choice words to say about it – mostly ones that can’t be aired on broadcast television.

So, anyway, I’m not an alcoholic by any means, but I have to hand it to lawmakers for putting a serious damper on the spirit of my summer by kyboshing river drinking. As a means of showing my disapproval, I plan on recruiting as many people as I can to be hooligans, litter everywhere, and publicly urinate – all while sober.

Okay, maybe not, but at the very least, I plan to pee my pants in plain view of police posted in the park. It won’t do much, but, beer or not, I’ve been looking for a good excuse to pee my pants.

Travis Estvold

Related Posts:

1. The (non) alcoholic river:
2. Drunk or sober, river floaters cut loose: The Naughty
3. Drunk or sober, river floaters cut loose: The Good
4. Fun on the Boise River
5. Kayakers find man’s body in Boise River