Skipping in New York

For anybody that has paid attention to the frequency of my blog posts (yes, I am speaking to all one of you out there, including myself) you should be pushing me to express my creative self more often! I have much less time to write blog posts now that the monotonous drudgery of regular employment has begun its daily beating on my sanity. (Actually, I really like my manager, I find the work I do mentally challenging without being stressful, and I'm ambitious about improving my skills before advancing my career or going to graduate school - hence the longer than normal hours, but optimism on the internet is lamer than identity theft). In order to compensate for this long gap of posts, its time for some more post backdating! This post has been intentionally dated for the morning after...

Not much has changed since college. Yet again, I have shattered records and exceeded my ridiculous-inebriation-story potential. I have more drunken legends than Michael Phelps has gold medals, despite the fact that this post is dated before Michael Phelps won all of his gold medals. Last night/this morning, I managed again to extend my life of binge drinking while cutting my total life-span.

Yesterday night started out just like any other epic night in Saint Marks. A few friends and I gathered in the street of Dionysus to celebrate a friend's departure from a much abhorred paralegal position. We ate, drank and made merry across several of the block's establishments until I woke up. Indeed, I had blacked-out yet again, though none of my friends who joined me the previous evening noticed that I was particularly drunk. Apparently, despite losing the ability to retain short-term memory, I still continued to function and converse coherently with my usual wit. Hence, no one was worried when I left to go home by myself.

I woke up at 5am, seated in a plastic bench with my face down on a similarly plain beige plastic table at a fast-food restaurant. I never managed to catch the name of this eatery as I was overcome by a desperate need to throw up. I ran outside as fast as I could and immediately tossed on the side of the building. As soon as that physical eruption of fluids passed, I realized I had no idea where the fuck I was and for some unknown reason, I wasn't wearing any shoes. I looked for the nearest sign and discovered I had found my way to East Midtown when I should have been in Queens. Hey, at least I was only a bridge away, that's more than i can say about some other nights I've experience. My parents were coming to Queens later that day to help me move into my new apartment so somehow, I had to get to Queens.

Pushing the no-shoes situation lower in my priority queue behind finding my way home, I wandered around Midtown barefoot hailing a cab. Even though it was 5am on a Saturday, there were plenty of cabs to be found. God, I love this city. As soon as I made it back to my apartment, I retreated to my room and proceeded to sleep a short but deep sleep that was only interrupted by run-to-that-toilet-and-vomit fits. As 1pm rolled around, I was fully awake and completely hung-over. That also happened to be when my parents rolled around with much of my stuff from their house. Unfortunately, I didn't notice them for another hour.

Early that morning, during one of my vomiting fits, I realized I had lost my cell phone. In which case, it was damn good thing that I came back to Queens instead of going to a friends house as otherwise, I would have had no way of knowing when my parents were at the apartment. Even though I strategically positioned myself at a window, I failed to notice my parents for sometime until I finally found my mother in a hysterical state of mind.

She's always hysterical, whether its because I break a bone or a stub a toe, so I still didn't think anything was amiss. However, as soon as I greeted my father, he screamed, "Where the fuck have you been? [His words, note mine] Do you know how much of my time you have wasted? Why did you shut off your cell phone?"

Working all the language neurons I could manage despite a terrible headache, I uttered, "Uh, I think I lost my cell phone."

"You lost it because you drank too much didn't you!" My father retorted. Now, up until this very moment in my life, my parents have not known about a single sip of alcohol that has ever passed my lips. Especially not those gulps I took in high school, when I was still living with them, and much less the great big chugs I take now. Indeed, I have done quite a good job covering up after myself, even after the large parties I hosted in their house while they were away. Hence, he could not have arrived to this conclusion from my track record. The evidence must have been obvious. I must have reeked of alcohol. Given the situation, there was no point in hiding it anymore. After a brief pause, I confessed, "Yeah..."

My parents displayed their usual disapproval of everything I do, like talking to people instead of studying, staying fit instead of studying, and expressing my opinions instead of obeying their every word and studying. When a roommate joined me at our apartment an hour later, he confirmed my suspicion that I reeked of alcohol. Heck, I even had to stop for another vomiting fit while my parents were helping me move. The veil of mystery had clearly been lifted.

Every day for the following three weeks, my mother proceeded to spend several hours a day sending me newspaper articles about scientific studies linking alcohol to brain damage. She confirmed something I always suspected, but never completely knew, she knew nothing about me, my personality, my social life, and my life at school.

Just to note, I eventually recovered that lost cell phone... ...a month later. After I had already purchased a newer but crappier phone. A kind stranger from Roosevelt Island found it on the street in Midtown Manhattan and made several unsuccessful calls on it (I disconnected the service after two days) before he finally called someone from my phone book and returned it to me. Well, I'm just glad I got it back.

[Note: The title of this post is taken from a completely unrelated song by Cynthia Lin, professional in the software industry turned folk musician.]