NURDIN' by Stephen R. Bonniol

Title: Nurdin’: What a long, Strange Trip it Was. Memories of a misspent youth in 1970s America
Author: Stephen R. Bonniol
Genre: Historical
Audience: All Ages
Released: 8/11/2024
Price (USD): $18.50 Paperback, $22.50 Hardcover

Vibes: If you missed out on the 60's read this!

Synopsis:

If you were too young to enjoy the 60s, then this book is for you! NURDIN' is a series of true, totally crazed, dangerous, highly illegal adventures in the years 1973 to 1977. This book tells of attending the biggest concert in United States history, to, under the influence of acid, getting "Lost in the Trunks" under the UNIVERSITY OF Rhode Island, sneaking into the police station while tripping, to watch a film of traffic accidents, or going to the Mardi Gras and getting thrown in Parish Prison for the weekend. By all rights, we shouldn't be alive. Three of the six of us didn't make it.

Along the way, we unwittingly created a new word. The word is NURD. Read all about this new word in "A Word About Nurd"

While a lot of my more responsible friends went off to college, I like to think we went into research on the terrors of drug use. Read all about it in "How the U.S. Government Made Me Do Drugs."

We've all heard of Woodstock. Read how I attended a BIGGER concert known as Summer Jam in Watkin's Glen, NY. This was only three bands, The Allman Brothers, The Grateful Dead, and The Band. At 600,000 people, it was the largest outdoor concert in US history. Read how a fireworks mishap caused rockets to rain down upon us and how we watched a man die, burning alive while sky diving.

Or grab some popcorn for "Afternoon Movies at the Police Station" where some friends and I attended one of those gory films of traffic accident meant to scare young drivers. Of course, to prepare, we did we thought seemed appropriate. We dropped acid.

Then grab your car keys and read exactly what happens when the drugs kick in while you're driving down the road. Take a short drive into cartoon Land in "Driving With Laughing Sam's Dice." A hint: Remember Your true road. Then my friends, descend further into drug-fueled insanity underneath the University of Rhode Island, at the time, Playboy Magazine's #1 party school. See if you agree with our banishment.

And certainly not to be missed is "August Jam 8/9/74." We attended the 3rd largest concert in US history in Charlotte, NC. and then on the way home we were the subjects of the biggest drug bust ever in Prince William National Forest in Triangle, VA. They didn't know what to do with us.

Then read how we unwittingly caused a riot among normally peaceful Deadheads at a Grateful Dead concert in CT. Here, through a series of unplanned events, we managed to trigger the normally peaceful Deadheads to start rioting. This may or may not be due to the Nixon Campaign materials that we handed out, two years after he stepped down in disgrace.

Then take a trip to "Deliverance" country in the little hamlet of Lehigh Tannery, Pennsylvania, for "The Great Mushroom Caper," where a drive straight into the woods, driving over sapling trees on an old carriage road led us to an old, abandoned railroad bed. From there we walked about a mile in the dark to where we climbed about 50 feet down, crossed the present-day tracks, and then climbed another 50 feet up all so we could magic score mushrooms and bomb the trains.

And then, take another crazed adventure to "Mardi Gras 1975" as we partied in the streets, got kissed by random women, watched strippers disrobe on Bourbon Street balconies, encountered crazy people howling at the moon, and witnessed a class of out-of-control, Atlanta Police Academy graduates hired to help the NOPD with crowd control. Read all about our trip, first to Central Lock-up, where I witnessed a cop with down syndrome waving a .38 and saying "Kill 'em all!" then at 4 AM to Parish Prison where we were stripped naked in front of the female prisoners to have our crotches sprayed for lice. I'll tell ya all about "Fat Albert, aka The Godfather, a 350-LB African American Man who was king of the cellblock. He was serving two life sentences and was awaiting the death penalty. This was the man who told me, "Time to go take a shower."