I've just been really fucked up. And studying stats. Because. Well. There's not much else to do except grading some 'popular fictional characters with mental disorders' homework. For the abnormal psych kids. That didn't help so much with concoting such witty dialogue as:

* * *

The moral of the story is that we can all get turned on, but where the fuck can you get thai food near midnight?

* * *

This was not the reason for the post. Rather, I've come to tell you about the magical odyssey of saturday. Otherwise known as "the day Auriel only did 30 minutes of work". Shocker to the naughty bits, I know.

It all began earlier this week. Brian and I had wanted to find a time to shoot some pool, on account of we do that and it'd been awhile since we hung out. Through some negotiating, we decided on 3pm. Again, saturday. I'd woken up, day-dreamed/lightly sleeped for an hour, and felt monstrously good. It was delightful. I forget what I did between that time and 1:30pm, but Brian called me early.

He was bored off his nut. 'You wanna head over at like 2, dude?' he asked. Considering I'd just been writing dialogue and feeling like a lazy beast, I said sure. And off he came here. I got 2 minutes of heads-up time to put on a shirt, socks, my boots, coat, gloves. Made it in time. Not that there was time. It'd ceased to exist in a puff of workless daydreams.

So we headed to the union, descended into the lower bowels, and shot about 12 games. Over the central PA we had Pink Flyod's 'Dark Side of the Moon' album (fucking excellent), and over in the corner the BET network playing rap. The mixture was curious.

So last time, Brian had schooled my ass at pool. This time, I won the first 4 games, then he won a few, I won a few, and then I technically lost some because I scratched while sinking the eight ball. We weren't really keeping track of scores. That has to be the best time we've had. Might've been the Floyd's, but we just talked shit about things in general and joked around. He's a care-free guy like that, even if he's feeling miserable on the inside.

Around then I figured, hey, I wanna see Goblet of Fire. He'd seen a bootleg but was up for the big screen. That was at 6. We were at 3. So we went over to Casa de Bueno and got our mex on. Think I had flautas in honor of my mom. Basically we talked me. More specifically, I'd mentioned that Hill wants to do a major make-over on my ass. Buzz the hair, update the clothes, generally indoctrinate me into the cult of hotness or some such. Brian hadn't wanted to say anything before, but he definetely agreed with the make-over.

"So outta curiousity," I asked, "what exactly do I need a make-over on?"

He established some important facts while occasionally laughing or grinning the way he does. These included:

*I apparently dress like an old man. I mostly wear pleated slacks (where pleats are apparently a sign of Old Man Satan) that taper at the leg. With the bottom of the leg sown up rather than left to just dangle.

*One of my favorite sweaters--polo shirt beige with a stag on it--is also something that old men wear. Brian and Hill have both said this.

*I also need to diversify my wardrobe colors. Personally, yeah, I own mostly black, but there's some other shit.

*My hair made me look older. Likely that's the receding deal. I've wanted to buzz down to stubble or go completely bald for awhile. Neither Brian nor Hill are into the total baldness. With my goatee and the right glasses, though, I think I could look cool.

Seriously. We talked for nearly an hour about my appearance and stuff about fashion or hair whatnot. He's not gay. But apparently he and Hill know a hell of a lot more than I do about what's, well, more popular. They're both committed to getting me laid. Brian because he's brotherly like that, and Hill because the thought of me being with a chick gets her really hot.

I don't make this shit up, I just go with it.

* * *

So after some makeover advice, we headed to the theatre. Goblet of Fire was a beautiful film. The details made a hell of a lot less sense than the first several films, however. There'd be these stacatto plot points that never got brought up again. And while I loved it overall (and with the main bad guy sequence, hell, who wouldn't?), I came out wondering if I'd ever pick up on the patchwork quilt of descriptions and situations that came up.

As my old friend Daniel tells me, though, I should really really really read the book. Most people have.

* * *

So we walked back to Brian's place. We talked for awhile until 9. He had to head over to the b-day bash of a mutual undergrad friend of ours, Jared. Jared was turning 21 and celebrating at the Essenhaus, and that meant only one thing: getting completely fucking shit-faced. He'd invited Brian, Tat (his g/f), and Lindsay. Brian wanted to ask to invite me but he didn't feel comfortable.

So at a certain point he kicked me out unless I wanted to see his balls after he came out of the shower. So I left, headed to my apartment, decided I'd had a full day, and started writing test questions for abnormal.

* * *

And who should ring at 10:36 but the birthday guy himself. Jared sounded like a drunk happy fucker. He was like, "Hey Auriel! We're over at--" I could swear he said a friend's house. Some people cheered. I asked for clarification. "We're over at the Essenhaus! If you're not busy--"

I was out the door quick.

Problem with the Essenhaus is that it's by the harbor, and to this day I can't really remember how to get there. So I vaguely followed my intuition. Get near the capitol, sorta stray near E. Wash., hang a right near some funky memorial building, and I'm vaguely there. Or exactly there as I came to find.

What can I say about the Essenhaus except, on saturdays, everyone is drunk off their ass and either singing to polka, dancing to polka, or yammering amongst themselves with polka in the background. I threaded my way past the corsetly buxom waitresses, drunkedly sitting mofos, and headed over to find a chair at the table. Brian and Jared seemed thrilled to see me. Tat too. Lindsay hadn't shown up, but there were a few 1st year grads there that I vaguely knew.

So, real fast synopsis:

*Stein of the darkest ale they had, check

*Irish car bomb, check

*1/8 of a liter of beer served in a glass boot, check

*Drinking whatever beer people left behind as they went to dance, check

*Dancing to the hokey pokey afterward, check

*Drinking some 1 dollar shot deal, check

There'd been a chick sitting next to me who was the drunk rambling touchy type. Gina. She had a boyfriend, but I did find out that there's such a thing as a media technology degree. There was also a chick named Liz across from me. A little under 5 foot, Irish, and feisty. Strawberry blonde hair. Just my type; one of them, anyway.

* * *

We got down to the core group after that, with Brian, Jared, Tat, and Liz trying to convince me to go to the local strip club with them. I'd been to one only once before, back in Pittsburg, when my father took me (the same 2 weeks where we went out and my 16 year old ass got drunk nearly every night).

Anyway, so I was being driven back to my place, with them occasionally saying, "C'mon, Auriel!" For whatever reason someone, I think Brian, started busting rhymes. He does that. Some of us joined in. Being of the poetic bent, I threw in some couplets. Apparently, in their drunken fit of giddiness (sans Tat, the driver), they thought I was fucking awesome and this warranted my having to go to the strip club.

I was fairly fucking drunk. So on we went.

* * *

The cover was 7 bucks to get in. We peeled out, sat down, and people ordered drinks. I stayed as is. Around this time, Hill was texting me about Liz, and asking if I was getting her #. I said I was in the process.

Most of our time was taken up admiring how a woman could swing around on a pole 20 times. Seriously, these women were dancers. There was only one that looked pretty good, though. She had this style where she'd press her obviously fake tits together to get at dollar bills. I was being conservative but, hell, I gave her extra. Around this time one of them found our Jared was the b-day guy. He got taken in back. Free BJ on the house, we learned later.

Now around this time is where the night got kinda shot down temporarily. I messaged Hill, saying I was in a strip club. Imagine my surprise when she asked me if I was serious, that that was strike 3, and I'd be seeing her around. So here I am, drunk off my ass, trying to concentrate on texting. I'd been relaxed but suddenly I thought: what the fuck? Was she that upset about me going to a strip club with ppl I'd been at the Essenhaus with?

This became drama for 40 minutes. I walked outside to end the texting and, while waiting for replies, called Rachel. She doesn't go to bed 'til 7am so I knew she'd be there.

And I was like, "does this make any sense to you?"

And she was like, "that seems kinda extreme. I mean yeah it's a strip club but there's nothing wrong with the female form and, to a degree, empowerment of women through an ironically male-savvy medium". Well not quite that erudite, but close. So after that and talking about her computer equipment and if it'd arrived yet, I hung up.

Shortly after, everyone came out. Brian was like, "Dude, buddy, what's up?" We piled into the van and looked for a place to drive through and munch. In the meanwhile, I'd gotten some msgs back. Turns out she thought I'd gone there by myself and not with a group. So she apologized for not knowing the situation. She has a tendency to assume first and ask questions later, but I'm sure as fuck not perfect either.

So I was back into drunk happy mode instead of 'how the fuck did this happen? God damn it' mode. Part of me had been mad but mostly I was scared at the thought of losing a friend over a misunderstanding, and being too drunk to really articulate things.

* * *

Our final destination was a "sweater party." I took this to mean some emo-core shin-dig. We headed back to the central part of town and parallel parked. Some chick was just getting out of the party. She gave us all hugs at Brian's prompting. She was neat.

As we walked to the party, I asked Liz what her situation was. She said she was a grad student and that, for a project, she was headed to France in 2 weeks. Well fuck. Part of the reason I'd gone to the strip club was to get to know her better, joke around, and eventually ask for her number later. But with her leaving for a semester, I figured there was no point.

That didn't bother me at all, though, because I figured 'hey, might run into some chick here.' We entered the back through a parking lot filled with drunk dancing motherfuckers. Inside I found a few sweater-clad lads, some chick talking about something or other, and people telling me to go out back to piss. I emphasized I was here for sweaters and beer, not piss. They nodded and went about their usuals.

Around this time I followed Jared underground. We entered a warren of patch-work pipes and rock, cluttered with couches and the undulating fuck of near 150 scene-tripping sex toys. There were a cluster up near a pole, getting up and down against each other. Some few were on couches. Most were talking (with words or hips) to one another as some altie rock number played. There was a grotto bar set up. Cheap drinks but I was doing just fine still.

I lost Jared's trace for awhile, so I scanned the place for any suitable prospects. It was a sea of scene people. You know, those folk who show up to be seen in the scene. I wasn't liking any of the prospects. However when I found Jared again he was talking to an emotionally disturbed dollop of trouble. She wore a white shirt, tied at the navel. They were talking about some ex dude of hers that was a cock. He walked off. She said something to me. I attempted to get into a conversation. She walked off. Eh. Maybe the emotionally disturbed ones don't smell my pheremone of fucked up mate selection anymore.

Brian and the rest were waiting in the van, apparently. I scanned the throbbing mass a few more times before weeding through the fringes and back into night-time daylight.

And so finally, as the first one, I got dropped off. Liz and I parted on a smile and a handshake. Too fucking bad on that count--considering how raunchy and uncensoredly fun she'd been--but life is life.

* * *

And thus ends the saga of my saturday.

And yeah: I write apparently a lot. It's my "like" of the evening. Apparently.

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