Vampires in the Lemon Grove

Dougbert Shackleton’s Rules for Antarctic Tailgating

Perhaps it is odd to have rules for tailgating when the Food Chain Games themselves are a lawless bloodbath. And that is what a lot of fans love about the games: no rules, no refs, no box seats, and no hot pretzels — not below the Ross Ice Shelf! So take these rules of mine with a grain of salt. That said, I’ve seen too many senseless deaths over the years. Some people think they can just hop down to the South Pole with a six-pack of Natural Ice and a sweater from the Gap, and that is just not the way we do it for the Food Chain Games. The Team Krill vs. Team Whale match takes place every summer in the most dangerous and remote tailgating site in the world. With the -89°F temperatures and the solar radiation, not to mention the strong katabatic winds off the polar plateau, it can be easy to lose faith, and fingers.

Antarctic tailgaters know exactly how hard it is to party.

So: how to get ready for the big game? Say farewell to your loved ones. Notarize your will. Transfer what money you’ve got into a trust for the kids. You’ll probably want to put on some weight for the ride down to the ice caves; a beer gut has made the difference between life and death at the blue bottom of the world. Eat a lot at Shoney’s and Big Boy and say your prayers. Take an eight-month leave of absence, minimum, from your office job. Kill your plants, release your cat, stop your mail. It’s time to hit the high seas.

Rule One: Make friends with your death

Tailgating in the Antarctic is no joke. We are trying to do nothing less ambitious than reverse the course of history. We want Team Krill to defeat Team Whale.

Look, if you want to tailgate in comfort, don’t get on a boat. You can buy some quail eggs or snails or whatever you people eat and you can watch the Food Chain Games on your flat TV. Stay in Los Angeles. Hug your wife on your plush banquette. Cheer for the Antarctic minke whales, like every other asshole.

No, wait a second, here comes the real Rule One: if you are a supporter of Team Whale, you can go fuck yourself, my fine sir. This list is for the fans of Team Krill.

Rule Two: Plan to arrive early

Honestly, for the March game I like to get down to the Ross Ice Shelf by mid-January. The cousins will joke that I’m a little bit of a stickler for punctuality, but I don’t see the harm in reaching the ice caves early. I’ve seen too many Antarctic tailgaters killed in the Drake Passage over the years — even I get choked up when I see a Team Whale vessel cracked to bits on a ’berg, its flags faded so bad you can’t read them.

So plan for frostbite and Aeolian terror. Personally, I don’t like to risk the easterlies in the Gerlache Strait any later than November — the pack ice is on the move, a bad traffic. All those gentoo penguins looking at you, frizzy and ruby-eyed. It’s uncanny. Team Gentoo is a decent franchise but I’ve never been a fan. They beat Team Squid again last season but got smoked by Team Orca and Team Elephant Seal.

Another reason to haul ass is that all the good spots in the harbor outside the ice caves go by Valentine’s Day. You don’t want to have to motor in sixty miles on your Zodiac boat come game day.

A note on etiquette: People have to do terrible, terrible things to arrive there on time. When you make small talk, use your judgment. Keep it light. Nobody wants to kill the spirit in the ice caves with some downer questions about the recently deceased. Be prepared to see a black-nosed victim of frostbite; a boatload of probable cannibals, suspiciously fat and sheepish in their snug parkas; a scurvy-riddled tailgater in a lifeboat, vestless and begging oranges. Don’t ask questions. Maybe offer the guy a nectarine, if he’s wearing Team Krill gear.

Rule Three: Before you leave for the big game, make a tailgating checklist

At minimum, you will need to bring Zodiac boots and gaiters; first-aid kits; survival bags; both VHF and HF solar-powered radios; a SeaRover Remotely Operated Vehicle with sonar imager; a fluorometer; a Conductivity, Temperature, and Depth Sensor; a Bio-Optical Multifrequency Acoustical and Physical Environment Recorder; an Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler; nachos.

And of course the tailgate is not just potentially fatal glacial navigation — there is also a fun component. Inspired by our brethren in the football stadium parking lots of Florida and Alabama, some Antarctic tailgaters have brought ale tankards in recent years, although this is not requisite. You might also choose to prioritize more of the room in your hold for auxiliary drinking supplies, like sea-sickness bags and barrels of aspirin.

If you’re not a drinker, you’ll still be in good company. For example, I was sober as a judge until recently, when Maureen took off and I discovered that rye whiskey is a terrific complement to every meal at sea. Plenty of Team Krill tailgaters party “dry” during the voyage to avoid accidents; if you’re abstaining, you could bring orange juice or seltzer or melt big bricks of ice for fishy-tasting water. In fact, you will almost definitely have to do this at one of the army stations, unless you want to go the pricey Reverse Osmosis Desalinator route and get your water supply directly from the sea. Tip: this water will taste a little like movie popcorn unless you doctor it with Tang or Crystal Light lemonade.

Here is a recipe we like for Team Krill Kool-Aid Punch:

1. Pina-Pineapple, Pink Swimmingo, or Double Double Cherry Kool-Aid brand flavored drink mix

2. Glacial ice blocks (Lake Fryxell is a reliable source)

3. Vodka (Russian crew members are an excellent source)

4. Plastic Krill stirrers

You may have heard of pemmican, the Spam of Antarctica? A big favorite with the early polar explorers? Pemmican consists of a repugnant arithmetic of dried beef + beef fat. We don’t eat that dog food on my ship.

Dehydrated foods, nonperishables — these are Antarctic tailgating staples. Apocalypse food is appropriate for the Antarctic tailgate, the sort of stuff you’d find in a Cold War bunker: jerky, canned tuna, powdered milk, soups in envelopes. If you’re a health nut, don’t tailgate in the Antarctic. You can always put balsamic vinaigrette on salted meat and sort of pretend it’s a salad.

The tailgaters for Team Whale employ a wicked stratagem of culinary intimidation: they feast on krill cocktail, on krill risotto, on a humongous red velvet cake shaped to look like a krill with chocolate eyestalks. It’s a macabre business. You are aware it’s just icing, but still: the cake looks like a krill. Those Team Whale pricks have a five-star French-Guyanese chef on board.

Of course, those bastards are probably also pouring liquid gold onto their organic arugula leaves or something. Well, fuck them. Potato flakes and ham-in-a-can and army MREs from mid-century wars are plenty fine for Team Krill.

Rule Four: Pack a Victory Cooler

When Team Krill defeats Team Whale, you’ll want to have the provisions for a true Antarctic feast. I’ve been tailgating around the Frozen Continent with these items in my Victory Cooler since Ronald Reagan was in office: Arm & Hammer baking soda, Crisco, Nestlé Quik (powdered), a sack of sugar, dried corn, dried prunes, Hormel corned beef, astronaut candy, air horn. On the day that our team finally wins, it will be a bacchanalia. That said, rookie tailgaters, take note! You can get caught up in the moment in those ice caves and then — boom! — botulism.

Rule Five: Wear Team Krill colors — but insulate

In the katabatic winds, a “balmy” game day is 0.5°F. You are going to want to cover your extremities. Put your Team Krill outer shell over your Team Krill neck gaiter. Buy a pair of badass goggles.

Science hasn’t proven the efficacy of tailgating in costume (yet) but we believe that the visible support we provide to Team Krill by dressing up and moving our antennae and plastic krill thoraxes in the characteristic undulant motion of a school of krill is vital to their eventual victory against Team Whale. Through mists of ice, we tailgaters lean over the gunwales of our boats and shake our pinky-beige swimmerets, tracing moody shapes onto the dark surface. What does this do for Team Krill? Skeptics, marine biologists, and my ex-wife, Maureen, will tell you: nothing. Can the krill hear us cheering for them? Probably not. Do they understand what they are seeing with their shrimpy compound eyes? Yes. Definitely. After seventeen seasons I am sure of this. I’ve seen the magic of cheering, in costume, for the almost invisible, indefatigable krill. I’ve seen krill accelerate toward the maw of Team Whale, streaming bubbles, a mute shrimp battle cry. It’s a beautiful sight, and beautiful to feel you were a part of it. That our screaming and our gyrations on the surface reach down to them, to the tiny, tumbling bodies deep below the ice: our team.

In fact, sometimes the little guys wave their plentiful legs back at us, as if they are cheering on our cheering.

If you’re really serious about tailgating, like my cousins and me, you’ll want to sequester yourself in your bedroom for two to three months prevoyage with old National Geographic footage and practice swishing. Most people lead with their hips, but for me it’s all in the ribs.

Denny Fitzpatrick, who is like the commissioner of our tailgates down there — this red-nosed Irishman who looks a little like a krill himself, whiskery and furious, and who started tailgating around the South Pole when I was still in diapers — Denny can do this one waggly thing, with his elbow. It really seems to get them going.

I mean, you really should try to look as much like a krill as you can.

Rule Five-A: If your wife leaves you for a millionaire motel-chain-owning douchebag fan of Team Whale, make sure you get your beloved mock-bioluminescent Team Krill eyestalks out of the trunk of her Civic before she takes off

Rule Six: Tip the Russians well

I’m assuming that you rented a boat crewed by Russians. They control a lot of the Antarctic tailgating industry, so treat them well. We usually tip 5 percent of the charter cost of the ex-polar navigator. If and when you make it to the ice caves, you’ll be family.

Team Whale tailgaters fly into Ushuaia, Argentina. Typically, they roll into the harbor of the ice caves on the day of the game, their fleet puttering through the blue archways as lazily as a series of yawns, all those hundreds of Team Whale fans looking so smugly upholstered in their Disney-manufactured whale suits. I hear those cushioned baleens are as comfortable as pajamas. Just the fin portion costs three thousand dollars. Good for you, Team Whale tailgaters! It must be nice for you, to have that kind of money. It must be real tough, you cetaceous fucks, to support the best team in the league.

Excuse me.

Your average Team Krill tailgater can’t afford that kind of luxury. He wouldn’t want to. We like to travel in our own style. For example, my cousins and I have converted a Russian schooner into The Krill Cruiser, whose only purpose is to visually and audibly support Team Krill. Cousin Larry is an electrician and he did just an incredible job on the cabin. Strobe lights, a birch bar for beers and “hot” peanuts. The Russians love that little flourish, though theirs is not a culture of tailgaters. I sometimes get the sense the Russians think us a little silly.

You might also want to bring a little gift for the mailman at Port Lockroy. They had some British guy installed there last time we sailed through. Young guy. He gets so lonely. Some magazines, some chocolate mints. It’s really just the thought.

Rule Seven: Tailgating is all about sharing

Quick and easy cooking is a must for the Antarctic tailgater. Here is a family recipe that will give your Antarctic tailgate some “regional flavor”:

1. Whale meat

2. Fire

Salt to taste and all that.

Although, typically, I don’t bother with salt. I don’t really bother with forks and such, either. I like to pluck the meat from the burning coals and bare my teeth and let out a piercing, unearthly howl at the Team Whale tailgaters moored across the ice floes, personally. Just to razz them a little.

Rule Eight: Be a good sport — but watch your back!

You want to have a sportsmanlike attitude while tailgating in the Antarctic, even when it is difficult (e.g., snow-blind/mourning a loss/drunk on Crown Royal). Show those Team Whale fans that even though their players weigh ten tons to our players’.038 grams, we krill supporters are the bigger people. Some of the tailgaters for the minke whales are homicidally devoted to their team. Rich psychopaths. You’re likely to find the rowdiest bands of them near the Grytviken whaling station, drinking cabernet and hissing across the calved icebergs at us.

Pull your rubberized Krill earflaps down — that’s what I do. Be civil. Tragedies happen in the lower latitudes, particularly when some of the younger guys get their blood up. Fights seem to spike about a month or two before the Big Game, when you hit that traffic in the Bismarck Strait.

One sad example, from a coupla seasons ago: This teenager called the minke whale fans “dickriders.” A poor freckled kid from Decatur City, Iowa. God, we all liked him. He wasn’t the brightest bulb but somehow he’d memorized every Krill statistic going back to the Cretaceous Food Chain Games — he just loved the franchise. It was his first tailgate, he told us — his first time below the equator. Sweet kid. We all liked him but we kept forgetting his name.

Anyway, the dawn after the whole “dickriders” altercation? Our Krill boats were all still at anchor but the Team Whale tailgaters were long gone. We found the kid’s body floating amid blocks of ice, already meat, three blue skua jawing on it. An orca sailed by him like a sunken moon, its wake engulfing the kid in black ripples. His feet were bare, I remember that. Those monsters took his Krill feet and his Krill Scamper-socks. Can you imagine that level of evil — sock robbers? We could see the boats of his murderers like a line of ants in the distance, entering the hole of the midnight sun.

You can lose at tailgating, too, just as devastatingly as Team Krill keeps losing to Team Whale.

Rule Nine: Should you have to bury your dead, do so in the proper receptacles

Nobody likes a litterbug. You can’t get much lower class than a boat of tailgaters who just leave their dead around.

Rule Ten: Don’t fall overboard

The game lasts twenty seconds, tops. You don’t want to come all that way and miss the game.

Rule Eleven: Don’t stop believin’

Some (like my ex) will tell you that it’s a special sort of masochist who supports Team Krill, since all evidence suggests that they have been consistently losing the Food Chain Games for eons. Paleobiologists’ molecular-dating methods reveal that the krill have never won a game. Team Krill loses to Team Blue Whale, Team Humpback Whale, Team Fin Whale, Team Sei Whale, Team Skua, and Team Albatross.

To this, I say: sure, it takes a special kind of fan to love the league underdog. Something Maureen would know very little about. Listen. The krill are in a rebuilding year. The krill are always in a rebuilding year. Every year the whole franchise of 60,000,000,000 krill gets eaten. Team Whale sucks Team Krill into the primordial combs of its baleen plates at twenty-eight knots. We’ve got a decent offense but we’ve got a pretty dismal record on defense.

But this is going to be our season. With all your might, try to believe that.

The greatest feeling in the world is getting there. Rowing over to the ice caves on game night, after all that travel. Krill will surge along either side of your boat in a rosy pregame warm-up. Lots of excitement in the frozen air. Inside the ice caves, you can glimpse the minke whales grouping into pods.

“Surge, krill!” Denny Fitzpatrick always screams at this juncture; you can bet that he’s been drunk since April. “Surge, you godless bastards!”

Antarctic tailgating is such a nice way of socializing on a balmy evening, when the sun goes down in flames behind the caves, while you share the end of your two-year supply of liquor and chips (how did it last only eight months?) with the Russians. We wear our costumes on the stern of the boat, our Krill eyestalks ogling the polar stars, huddled, shivering, convulsing with victory dreams. We munch and munch in the most extraordinary silence.