Case #4.18: "Awomp-Bomp-Aloobomp, Alopp, Bamboom"

Admit it, you just mentally sang that like Little Richard. In the Chapel, Judy, Doug, Harry, and Tom are huddled at their desks in coats and scarves. The water in the cooler is frozen. A maintenance man (not Blowfish) is trying to fix the radiator. "I want heat! I want fire! I want a vacation!" Judy gripes. Tom looks at a centerfold of bikini-clad coeds titled THE GIRLS OF SPRING BREAK. Doug cleans the glass on a picture frame that holds a black-and-white photo of his wife Marta, who was deported earlier in the season.

Harry says, "Can you believe Sal has 2 weeks off? Think of what you could do with 2 weeks off." There's a hint of jealousy in Judy's voice as she adds, "He's in Florida...the sun." "The beaches," Harry puts in. Tom shouts: "Busch Gardens!"

Cap'n Rufus comes out of his office, dressed like the rest of them. Nobody is happy that they aren't on vacation; cops should outrank janitors. Rufus explains that Blowfish put in for this vacation over a year ago. All the Jump Street officers start shouting at once. Rufus tells them to relax, summer is around the corner. "Summer is around the corner and down the road," Judy argues. Doug adds, "My brain is turning into chocolate pudding!"

Cap'n Rufus tells them that it's mid-semester and they're all on cases; nobody is going anywhere. Besides, as ranking officer, Rufus should get the first vacation. Everyone starts yelling about how that's unfair. Theme song.

In a dingy room on a college campus, a group called the North American Workers' Front is having a meeting. "Break the chains, question authority!" one member shouts. Doug chimes in with, "Release the bonds of imperialistic...roughage." The club's president Lance announces that while the rest of the "bourgeois make the pilgrimage to Florida to petrify their livers", the Workers' Front is initiating two new comrades: Doug and Tom. Tom certainly has the right furry hat for a Communist meeting.

Doug tosses his and Tom's membership dues into a box presented by one of the other members. Lance has Doug and Tom stand up. He tells Doug to take out his credit cards and cut them up with scissors to prove he "rescinds [his] capitalist habits." Next, Lance looks through Tom's backpack, finds the swimsuit issue of Co-Ed Magazine and scolds, "This is exactly the kind of manipulation we fight against." Doug asks, "You mean like that college paper you blew up?" Real subtle. The president shakes Doug's hand and tells him, "Welcome to the struggle."

Harry and Judy sit at her desk with an Italian dictionary trying to learn the language. She has posters of Italy taped on the wall. Doug and Tom look at a stack of New Orleans brochures. Cap'n Rufus has thought more about vacation time, but he can't afford to let them all go at once. He doesn't want to make law enforcement into a competition, but whichever team cleanly solves their case first will get a week off. Doug mutters, "We just got initiated into the Workers' Front. This could be weeks." 

Judy kicks in the door of a filthy apartment, shouts, "FREEZE!" and handcuffs a scruffy man. She grins widely at Harry. "YES!" they cheer.

In the Workers' Front meeting room, Lance opens the copy of Co-Ed Magazine. He looks closely at the picture of a girl wearing a skimpy orange bikini and mutters, "Ashley." He furiously breaks into the cash box and stuffs his pockets. Doug and Tom, coming down the stairs, see this. Lance doesn't seem to notice them. He tears the picture out of the magazine and grabs his coat. "He's making his move," Doug hisses. Tom promises to call the travel agent.

Tom and Doug follow Lance out to the parking lot where a charter bus is waiting. A man in a suit approaches Doug and Tom, asking, "Round-trip for an Alexander Hamilton?" Doug gives the man $20 and they get in line to board. He's sure the bus isn't going far because the tickets were so cheap. It so happens that they're in line right behind Lance. They tell him they want to be a part of his struggle. Lance says he's on a mission. Doug won't take no for an answer and asks if everyone on the bus is part of Lance's mission.

The bus belongs to a church that "reduced life to some pseduo-mathematical equation. They offer cheap rates to college students. Once they're on board, Mr. Bean brainwashes them with starvation techniques." Doug doesn't like the sound of that. At the bus steps, an attendant roughly tosses people's luggage onto the bus. Doug gives the guy his backpack and tries unsuccessfully to keep his Snickers bar. 

The bus drives on through the night. "I'm starving!" Doug complains, "It's been 6 hours!" Tom tells his partner to relax, they're almost there. "Where's 'there?'" Doug demands, "We passed Baltimore hours ago!" He wants to suck the jelly out of a jelly donut. Tom tells Doug to shut up. Doug hears a noise and frowns at his partner, saying accusingly, "That was your stomach!" Tom says it's Doug's fault for talking about food. "This is inhuman," Doug goes on, "We should arrest Mr. Bean." "For what? Hoarding Snickers bars?" Tom asks incredulously.

Mr. Bean, the man who sold them the tickets, sits next to Tom. He smiles and asks how Tom is. On his way out of the bathroom, Doug sees a guy with glasses a few rows away eating something. He offers Glasses Guy $25 for a Corn Nut. The guy shakes his head. Doug tries to wrestle the bag away from him. Mr. Bean, who looks a lot like Steve Buscemi, offers Tom a Slim-Jim. Tom practically drools.

Across the aisle, Lance tells Tom not to listen to Mr. Bean's crap when Tom starts trying to use the church's mathematical logic. He's interrupted by Doug screaming from the back of the bus, "I WANT A SANDWICH RIGHT FRICKIN' NOW!" Everyone stares. Mr. Bean reminds Doug that he's a guest and needs to act accordingly. Doug refuses. 

The rest of the passengers, for some reason, cheer and clap as Doug checks the overhead bins for his backpack. Tom ignores him, writing something in a pocket notebook. Mr. Bean orders Doug back to his seat. Doug finds his backpack, rips open the Snickers wrapper with his teeth, and practically swallows it whole. Mr. Bean looks pissed. "We're gonna get thrown off this bus!" Tom warns his partner. Doug doesn't care. 

In the morning, Tom, Doug, and Lance walk along the roadside with their luggage. Lance tries to thumb them a ride. "If life is like math, I'm totally screwed up," says Doug, "I got a C in geometry." Which time? Tom's always thought of life as an equilateral triangle. Doug thinks Tom is losing it and they need to get him a burrito. Lance says he and Doug are a lot alike: "You care and you don't want power to bring harm to people."

Doug asks if anyone could get hurt on their mission. "If anybody gets hurt, it'll be me," Lance says mysteriously. A red convertible driven by a middle-aged man in a cowboy hat and Hawaiian shirt pulls over. "Hop in, boys," he invites, "Unless you's a commie, a queen, or a cop." Tom, Doug, and Lance look dumbfounded. Cowboy Hat asks where they're going. Lance tells him Spring Break. As the convertible pulls away, we see a vanity plate that reads YEE HAW.

Now they're driving in what looks like Miami. We see various shots of crowded beaches and college kids drinking on hotel balconies. Lance asks, "Where are the Girls of Spring Break?" "Hell, open your eyes, they're everywhere you look," Cowboy Hat chuckles. Lance asks him to let them out and he does. Cowboy Hat tells the boys to have a good trip. 

Back at the Chapel, Judy and Harry discuss their vacation plans. Her friend's brother works at resort in Hawaii and he could get her an oceanview room cheap. Harry wants to visit a girl in San Diego and stay at the famous (and supposedly haunted) Hotel Del Coronado. The phone rings and Cap'n Rufus answers: "You followed him...Florida! You guys better be pullin' my leg."

On the beach, Doug warns Tom that Lance is getting close to the payphone. "Three French poodles and a box of Q-Tips, thank you," Tom says nonsensically before hanging up. 

In the Chapel, Cap'n Rufus laughs, but gets a slightly menacing look on his face as he hangs up.

Doug reports to Lance that Tom's called "all the crappy hotels" and none of them have vacancies. Lance, fortunately, has managed to get them a room nearby. Unfortunately, it's the same beachfront motel where several fraternities are having a loud, raucous pool party. Tom thinks this could be his living hell. 

A guy in a neon pink Harvard T-shirt invites them to play a drinking game involving math with a couple of guys in Tri Lambda polos. "It's not just a drinking game, it's also a mental exercise," says Harvard dude in a fake surfer's drawl. In the same voice, Doug responds, "So, like, while they're building their brain cells, they're also killing them at the same time."

Harvard Guy asks where they're from. "What'sa Matta U," Lance replies. Harvard Guy thinks it sounds familiar. Tom and Doug wonder what Lance's mission is. Tom walks around the pool edge and finds Lance's backpack: black with a red sickle and hammer printed on it. He roots through it and finds the picture from the magazine. Tom pockets it.

At the keg, Harvard Guy shows Tom the GIRLS OF SPRING BREAK centerfold and says they were all bitches except for the one in the orange bikini. Harvard Guy adds that Orange Bikini was on a mission. She's staying at high-rise hotel that's 2 blocks down, 3 blocks up. Harvard Guy isn't sure, though, because he was so drunk the day before that he thought he was in Morocco.

Lance has gotten into some kind of confrontation with the Tri Lambdas. He doesn't want to pay for more than half the room; the frat guys want him to pay for the whole thing. Harvard Guy says he and his frat brothers already invested their half of the room rate into a keg. He wants to play against one of them in the drinking game; whoever passes out has to find somewhere else to stay. Lance isn't good at drinking and Doug isn't good at math, so this won't end well.

Lance loses the first round and has to chug his cup of beer. Tom tries to wave Doug over. Doug motions for Tom to go by himself. Lance loses round 2 and has to chug again.

Tom tries to weave his way through the mob to get to the high-rise hotel. Back to Lance as he chugs another cup. He looks sick. Doug advises him to give up, but Lance won't. Tom seems to be lost. Lance passes out. Doug helps him up. Lance mumbles that they have to cruise the strip. "We don't have a car," Doug reminds him, "And even if we did, you couldn't drive it." Lance will walk then.

On the sidewalk, Tom admits he's officially lost. Doug leaves a note on the motel bulletin board telling Tom that he went to Blowfish's condo on 1175 Oceanview Drive. Tom crumples up the picture and tosses it toward a nearby Dumpster, accidentally hitting a girl in the head. She turns and asks, "Do you mind?" She has more clothes on, but it's definitely Ashley from the photo.

We hear Lance vomiting loudly onto the ground somewhere off camera. Doug winces, makes faces, and shivers. Lance crawls into view on his hands and knees and asks if Doug has any gum. Doug helps him up. Lance vows that he's never drinking again. It appears they're in a cemetery. Doug asks why they came to Florida. "I can't find my eyeballs," slurs Lance. Doug pats him and reassures him, "They're still there."

On the porch of Blowfish's condo, his two daughters are squirting him with water guns. Doug appears with Lance leaning heavily on one of his shoulders. "Penhall?!" Blowfish cries. Doug introduces Lance. Lance knows Blowfish; Comrade Banducci is very active "in the movement." That's news to Doug. "It's a pleasure to--" is all Lance gets out before he starts retching again. "Likewise," Blowfish says somewhat sarcastically.

Blowfish asks if "Comrade Rufus" knows about this. Doug asks if the kid can go inside and lie down. Blowfish invites them in.

Back in town, Ashley apparently knows where Tom is staying because she tells him just how lost he is. Tom notices what look like arcade tickets sticking out of her windbreaker pocket and lies that he was looking for an arcade to play Skee-Ball. Ashley can't believe he didn't see the arcade a few blocks back. 

Tom and Ashley go to the arcade and share a Skee-Ball machine. She rolls a ball into the 50-point hole on her first try; Tom can only get 10 points. Tom tells her she looks familiar. "Past life? Separated at birth?" she suggests, "Girls of Spring Break?" When Tom nods, she asks him not to mention that again. "I just did it to tick some people off," Ashley explains, "like my mom, my dad, my old boyfriend Lance. They're just such control freaks, you know? I couldn't stand it." The free trip was also a nice perk.

Ashley adds that Lance thinks they're still together. She says he became "a leftist radical" to annoy his parents, then started to control her. Tom suggests they turn the tickets in for some "fuzzy dice, big combs, and furry animals." 

In the Chapel, the maintenance man has taken the radiator completely apart. Cap'n Rufus asks what Judy and Harry are still doing there. "We're not doing anything, we're on strike," Harry informs his boss. Judy surmises that Tom and Doug weren't kidding about where they are. Rufus is sure there's a reasonable explanation. Judy and Harry aren't so sure.

At the motel in Florida, thousands of college kids are passed out around the pool. There's a windsurfing rig floating in the water. Tom and Ashley pick their way through the mob. They find Harvard guy and the two Tri Lambdas, who inform them that Doug and Lance left the day before. Tom thanks Ashley for helping him find his way back. Ashley thinks she knows where Tom's friends are. Just as they leave, one of the Tri Lambdas passes out, revealing the note Doug left.

At the condo, Lance sits on the porch. We can hear Blowfish yelling at his kids to "put that down" and "stop hitting Uncle Doug." Doug joins Lance outside, dodging a flying sand bucket on his way. He says Lance might feel better if he got a good night's sleep. Lance explains that he came to Spring Break looking for his girlfriend Ashley. 

"You didn't come here to bomb something?" Doug asks. Lance looks confused. Doug elaborates, "Didn't the Workers' Front bomb the school paper?" Lance says that was an accidental chemical fire and the Workers' Front just took credit for it. He became a Communist to offend his parents, but the only person who got upset was Ashley. 

Lance would gladly give up "the cause" to get Ashley back. Doug knows how he feels. He shows Lance his wedding ring and explains that his wife is "away." Lance shows Doug a photo of Ashley that he has in his wallet. Doug thinks maybe Ashley misses Lance too. 

Downtown, Blowfish, Doug, and Lance get out of a taxi in front of a bar called Enrod's Beach Club. Blowfish says that anybody who's anybody goes there on Thursday nights and it happens to be Thursday. He promises they'll get in because he knows the owner. By the beach club's pool, a group plays volleyball with an oversized beach ball. Tom and Ashley watch girls box in an inflatable ring. The combatants are covered in what looks like red Jello.

Ashley moves closer to the action. Tom sits down, so do Doug and Blowfish. Doug helps himself to someone else's half-finished slice of pizza. Ashley freezes when she recognizes Lance. She hails a passing waiter, writes a note on a napkin, and asks him to give it to Tom. The note is delivered. Tom reads it, then crumples it up.

Referring to the Jello boxing, Lance says, "This is gross, man." Doug and Blowfish seem entranced by it, much the way I get hypnotized into watching The Jerry Springer Show. A piece of Jello flies out of the ring and hits Lance. He asks someone for a napkin. The napkin he gets just so happens to be Ashley's note. "Tom, I had to leave. Meet me outside," it reads. 

Out front of the club, Ashley tells Tom she saw his friends and gets on a bright orange trolley. Tom follows her. The trolley leaves just as Lance arrives. He tells the security guard to stop the bus. The security guard informs him, "That bus is for couples only, couples who don't want to drive after they've been drinking." The bus drops its passengers off at the subtly named Makeout Beach.

Harry and Judy arrive at the Chapel. "Heat," Harry says happily. Cap'n Rufus sings, "And that ain't allllll." The Chapel has been decorated with strings of lights, beach chairs, and a table with an umbrella. "Welcome to my island," Rufus says in a faux-Jamaican accent he probably picked up from Kip. The captain is dressed casually and has two leis around his neck. When he snaps his fingers, generic hula music plays from a boombox.

Rufus gives a lei to Judy and one to Harry. Since Doug and Tom haven't called, they can't go on vacation, so the captain brought vacation to them. Judy and Harry sit on beach chairs placed under an inflatable palm tree. Cap'n Rufus tries to hula.

It's nighttime at Makeout Beach, where, strangely, little making out seems to be going on. Tom and Ashley walk together. She asks if Tom sees his friends and suggests they head back to the bar. Tom wants to stay awhile and make some S'mores.

Lance is still sitting outside Enrod's Beach Club. Doug finds him. Blowfish isn't far behind. Lance sadly says that Ashley left with Tom to make out on the beach. It's too far to walk there. Doug flags down a bicycle taxi, shows his badge, and says to the driver, "Official police business! I'm commandeering your vehicle." Doug gets on the bike and rings the bell. Blowfish and Lance climb in the back. As he starts to pedal, Doug groans, "I gotta lose some weight."

Doug nearly plows over quite a few people as he bikes down the strip. They pass a sign that reads BEACH PARKING STRAIGHT AHEAD. On Makeout Beach, the couples are finally making out, except for Tom and Ashley. They sit on the sand watching the ocean. She asks if Tom could find a blanket. "Really?" Tom asks. Ashley nods.

Tom walks up the beach to a place where there's apparently stacks of blankets for people to use. He bends over to pick one up. Doug handcuffs himself to Tom's wrist. Tom asks what Doug is doing. "He's playing Cupid," says Blowfish. Tom doesn't need Cupid; he needs keys. 

Lance, wrapped in a blanket, shyly approaches Ashley and asks her to dance. He apologizes for being a jerk and they start to slow dance. Further back, Doug tells Tom, "That's why we came down here. That was our mission." "Mission accomplished," Blowfish says happily. Doug unlocks the handcuffs. He watches the couples, no doubt thinking about Marta.

The next morning, Doug sits by himself on the beach. Tom notes that he's been there all night. "At first, I thought Lance was, like, this major nutcase," Doug starts, "And now, I kinda respect him for what he did." Doug is thinking about going down to El Salvador and bringing Marta back to the United States. 

Tom thinks Doug is crazy; he knew Marta for 5 days before they got married and there's a war going in that country. And if Doug insists on going, Tom doesn't want his best friend to go by himself. Doug thanks him. TO BE CONTINUED appears on the bottom of the screen.

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