Sorry Folks, the Mansion's Closed. The Moose Ouside Should Have Told Ya.

Well, that’s it. Pack it up folks, it’s all over. Hef has decided to once again close up the Mansion. No more parties. And I never got to go. Dammit.

The Mansion was closed once before. In ’89, Hef got married and sealed up the place. By the time I arrived in Los Angeles, the famed Playboy Mansion had been quiet for six years. The parties remained a thing of legend. Nobody I knew had actually been to the Mansion, but everybody knew somebody who knew somebody who had been there…once upon a time.

10 years later, Hef separated from his wife. He soon did what guys in his position normally do, he amassed a small clan of plastic breasted blondes and paraded them around the city. It wasn’t long before ol’ Hef decided to get out some Pledge, dust the cobwebs out of the grotto and open the Mansion back up for business. The word was that it was wilder than ever. Sordid stories of debaucherous flings in the nooks and crannies of the Mansion could be heard in every bar in the city. True or untrue, one thing was for certain, the Mansion had been restored to it’s former glory.

This should have been my time. I just had the relationship equivalent of walking away from a five car pile up without a scratch—I ended my engagement to a woman who I had no right attempting to marry in the first place. The career was starting to take off a little bit, so I had a few extra shekels in my pocket. I had a do over! I was ready for fun and adventure. But fate never showed me a path to the Mansion.

Now I want to make one thing clear. I do not want to go to the mansion because I expect that I’m going to get laid (not even when I was single). Believe me, I'm not the guy who's going to roll up to the Playboy Mansion and walk out with a woman--Playmate or not. I'm not rich, I'm not famous and while I sport a kick-ass beard, I don't have high male model cheekbones or awesome hair. I would go to the Mansion for the same reason people on tropical islands get up early to watch the sunrise—because one should appreciate a thing of beauty.

But alas, Hef has said that he’s closing up shop. And this time, he means it. My window of opportunity has shut and locked itself from the inside.

It was a nice dream while it lasted.