Good: Realizing that your allergy has subsided and you can eat carrots without your mouth swelling up.
Bad: Rubbing your eyes after eating carrots and then finding out that your allergy has, in fact, not subsided, and that your new name is “Winky.”
Everyone knows that Gheorghe Zamfir is Master of the Pan Flute. I didn’t know whether he was alive anymore, so I consulted the Internet, knower of all truths. I still don’t know whether he’s alive, because i was sidetracked when I came across this disturbing album cover.
(Click here to see what I’m talking about)
I’m no artist, nor a pan-flautist, but that album cover appears to have captured the moment in 1987 when a despondent Bill Murray, upset that the guy who played Egon was going to be stealing his glory from that point on, tried to end his own life by shooting himself in the forehead with a pan flute.
THANK GOD IT WASN’T LOADED.
God. This past week has been quite an experience. I had a good time, though I belatedly realized that I walked around for two days in a stupor because I unthinkingly took non-non-drowsy allergy medication in the mornings. I don’t remember everything that happened, and I know each day was only so exciting, so I’ll hit the high points, more or less in order. I’m gonna have to go gossip column style.
Thanks to XVI’s timely taxiing, I got an “A” ticket on my flight from RDU to BWI. I had bought my tickets separately, so each one-way, and wouldn’t you know it I got flagged to have myself patted down. I got the royal treatment from the Al Roker lookalike Man Patter. His small talk consisted of his recounting his depressing, lonely Christmas. “You know what I had?” he asked. “I had some leftover ham, green beans, some bread, cranberry sauce, and a can of kidney beans.” (Note to Ben: Willing to bet there was a folding chair involved.) So there I am, standing there doing the air crucifix in front of a huge window, being patted down by Al “Busyfingers” Roker, and I am feeling sorry for the other guy.
Eventually I got on my flight and all was well. Justin picked me up at BWI, we picked up Melissa, and we circuitously went to the Double TT Diner in Whereverthehell, MD. Melissa got us priority seating.
The food was good, although I had the Hercules omelet, which I belatedly found out was so named due to the fact that Hercules begins wrasslin’ wild beasts in your stomach about ten minutes after you consume the omelet containing his spirit.
Hmm. Friday we headed to DC and not much of note happened there. The Washington Plaza Hotel was fairly crappy, but it served its purpose. It was offputting that we found a cockroach within 30 seconds of setting foot in our spartan room. The party was okay, I guess, though no one who I knew was really in a fantastic mood. I got too drunk and offended people. During the course of the evening, as it was winding down, I was apparently on a roll in Justin’s eyes at least. I distinctly remember seeing an absolutely leviathan girl nearby and saying to Justin “Jesus, do you see that girl? She looks like Lawrence Taylor — illiterate AND she’ll kick your ass!” Justin laughed heartily about that for about four days. Yeah, it was mean. She was probably perfectly nice, actually pretty good looking (and what’s more, I’m no great prize myself), but that was a good amount of alcohol talking. I’m gonna blame it on the firewater.
I kind of feel badly about it, but on the other hand, did you see what she did to Joe Theismann?
Jim and Aimee’s friend seem to have hit it off well. She seems like a nice girl. Jim seems like a nice guy. So I hope that goes well for him.
Saturday morning, New Year’s Day, we struggled awake and went on into the NoVa for breakfast with Bridget and Wei. We found a place called Summer’s, which was terrible. The service was horrendous. We shoulda gone to IHOP. And we should have hung out on the median outside, which is apparently where all the local cute girls go to hang out and drink coffee and make our loins ache with desire.
We parted ways with the others. This was sad. Justin and I went downtown and figured we’d go leering in Georgetown. As it turns out, there are plenty of people there who look like we did, and by that I mean there are a lot of ostensibly gay couples there. We knew that. Justin got a lot of looks from guys. Most of them were SOOO totally not his type though. We went up the Exorcist stairs and went to Georgetown University.
Georgetown University is a nice school. It is a very famous Catholic university. One little-known fact, though, is that there is only one freaking bathroom on that campus. It took an hour to find a suitable place to urinate. We spent a lot of time in a lot of nice buildings. Gave ourselves quite the tour.
We went back to Baltimore that evening. The next few days were kind of a blur. This is because Justin and I did a few things repeatedly: eat medicine, go to diners, drink beer, and leer at girls. And cough. Some high points involved going to two really good diners, the Sip & Bite and Rallo’s. Never have I seen oysters the size of the ones at Rallo’s. There were two oysters and they made a giant sandwich. But the place came highly recommended by my dad, a man who knows what he’s doing when it comes to fine dining.
Just want to confirm that the ESPN Zone in the Power Plant blows. We couldn’t watch the Panthers-Saints there because they didn’t have any free tables. If they cared about their customers they’d allow the customers to change between the feeds at their own individual tables. But the Skins won! Hooray for that! And we get a highish draft pick next year, so hooray for silver linings!
My flight back was delayed a hour and a half. I missed VT going down in boring defeat in the Sugar Bowl.
And now here I am, back in Raleigh, forced to deal with 75° temperatures. Heh.
—
I am still sick. I am mighty sore. That’s what I get for going to the gym while sick, after taking a week off, and doing a harder leg workout than I had ever done before.
Quote of the day:
Me: “I’d like an iced skim caramel amaretto latte, please.”
Greg: “What did you order? A mulatto?!”
