chase the devil when he misbehaves. 12.31.04

this is the pre-new year's post that i wrote yesterday. the new year's recap will come after i eat and go meet gully and crew.

the year is about to turn and as such dave from paradise hotel hosts his new year's eve eve party. a chance to countdown to the good times of new year's eve and get one's drinking started early (so it won't hurt so much on new year's eve). the tradition was continued last night at the park slope apartment, with many of the hs guys (c-lo, steve e, sambuka, ashok, danny m, kev, dave rhee passed out on the coats) and girls, (gracious and zo-co) and friends who i had met before and invariable forget the names of, but not the faces... of (that is no way to end a sentence).

i brought matt c from school, a fine even-tempered fellow you will likely all meet. i arrived on a mission and even though the drinks were outside, i drank them them with abandon. even when i couldn't find anything to mix with the whiskey. that was a lot of whiskey.

gully arrived off of his train to grab a drink and then left to meet jess and debbie at the park slope place they are renting for the weekend.

i took advantage of the mistletoe, talked of plans to go trail biking with noah, made new friends, phuong and shana, watched danny m to the worm as kev karaoke'd to eminem's "without me," rocked out to karaoke versions of "pour some sugar on me" and "born to be my baby," and left late and drunk.

problem: i live far away. i didn't get back in contact with gully's posse and so i took the train. i got that half-lidded, incomprehensible look on the f train in queens. and missed my stop, from which i would have walked to the LIRR.

i woke at 169th. let off an expletive. got off at the last stop (179th). didn't understand my surroundings enough to race for the train going the other way. let off louder expletives. asked the woman spraying the platform when the next train was leaving-- 20-25 minutes.

i took my problems street side. it was empty, 3 AM, one straggler by a phone booth in the residential neighborhood. still drunk. no idea when my train was supposed to come, but thinking i had about 20 minutes to make 30 blocks, in shoes that are comfortable but not conducive to distance running.

started walking. found a bus to take me 8 blocks. jogged. saw the spot where i'd been mugged 15 years ago. jogged some more. cursed. thought about just giving up and looking for a gypsy cab-- they are expensive and i don't trust rolling with some dude in his unaffiliated with a car service plymouth acclaim-- but i had to know if i had missed my train or not.

but when i got there, i was early. caught my train. made it home. drooled in front of my email. my little brother came home. at 5 am. i was drunk and not-conversational, unable to eat.

the upshot of all of this is that i was trying to sleep in, rest up for tonight. trying to think about eating eggs and drinking water. trying to keep my grumbling stomach chill so i could enjoy my block of sleep. and just when i nodded off for real...

i had an undergraduate moment. i went to the bathroom and i reversed the curse. i enjoyed the bulimic's diet. i prayed to the porcelain god and i must tell you, it's as unpleasant as ever.

my day is a winner; i don't have applesauce nor ginger ale, as anna-lu suggests, but i am going to start with ginger tea and an apple, and i will be ready for tonight, to see rini and gurney and gully and all the rest, on pixel's isle.