Surveying the damage

My parents left Sunday afternoon and I had parties Sunday and Monday night.

Sunday night: this party was kind of weak. We (Phil, Tom, Matt, and I) were expecting more people to come but they didn't, claiming job-related reasons. We didn't even open the bottle of absinthe, because nobody wanted to drink it. However, the night was still a success because a good time was had by all.

Monday night: much larger party this time. At its peak, I probably had around 15 people in my apartment. We even had someone throw up. Tom and I tried the absinthe; diluted (which is how you're supposed to drink it); it tastes a lot like black licorice, which I do not favor. However, Tom enjoyed it immensely and noted that it was much better than just drinking Bacardi 151, which will still taste like Satan's piss even if you dilute it. He also said that it was better than taking shots. I was not able to pass an opinion on this because I was already drunk.

The most interesting part was when I woke up in the morning and cleaned up my apartment so that my parents wouldn't be mad at me, I couldn't find one of the chairs. Who the hell would take a chair? I finally found it in my parent’s bathroom, where someone had been using it to throw up into the toilet. Good times.

Absinthe

My dad brought me a bottle of Absinthe from Russia, for which I am eternally grateful. My parents are also leaving today, which means that there will be a party in my apartment tonight. I predict that the Absinthe will, at least in part, get drunk. I started reading about experiences that people have had online. This is my favorite:

I made some Absinthe by simply adding ground wormwood to Pernod. I let it sit for a day before filtering out the mush and bottling the liquid. I had had Absinthe before but I couldn’t stomach it so I thought a friend of mine should give it a try.

We were at another friend’s house when we decided to bust out the juice. I took down two glasses and he managed to get down four. About five minutes later I heard him call from the living room, "Nate, I'm trippin' man." He told me that the carpet had grown like a weed; about 11 inches. He said that everything was swirling together and elongating.

The WOW stories, part 2

The evening started off with me filling out a job application at this place called the Mermaid. No, I'm not going to be a stripper, just a server. Assuming they hire me. Afterwards, I go onto the road which is supposed to take me to Phil's. However, apparently I had gotten on going the wrong way so in a few minutes I end up in Minneapolis. Stupid Minnesota roads.

When I get to Phil's, Matt and Phil are watching TV and trying to call up really awkward chicks that they haven't seen in a while. Problem is, the chicks aren't willing to come hang out. One said, as an excuse, "I'm playing Boggle with my mom." These people don't know how sad they are.

Phil decides that he is hungry and we go to Jimmy Johns. I am not hungry at all, but at Jimmy Johns I learn the following great wisdom from Dave Barry: Never take a sleeping pill and a laxative together. Thanks, Dave Barry.

After Jimmy Johns, we head over to Patrick's, where he and this guy Charlie are playing around with a skateboard. Charlie sees a chick and goes after her on a skateboard. After he passes her, she freaks out and runs off. No one has drank and women are freaking out from the mere sight of us. Amazing. At this point, Tom calls and says that he wants to join us. We tell him to come over where we are. After this, we decide to go back to Phil's house to pick up the alcohol. Apparently, Patrick also left his house so Tom drove to Phil's house, which we had just left, and then drove home, thoroughly mad at us. We try to get him to join us again with cheerful jibes and insults but he did not seem willing.

We decide to head over to Macalester and drink. Our provisions: a handle of vodka, a handle of rum, a bottle of Kahlua, and bottle of Baileys. So I'd say we were prepared for anything. The only person who is really drinking, however, is Matt. Patrick, using his incredible foresight, brought along some doughnuts from Super America which were just phenomenal. At one point, people start walking in to the bush. That's right, they just walked into the bushes next to where we were drinking. I fell down and just laughed, it was so funny.

Some guy pulled up and looked like he called someone about our presence, so we decided to leave. Phil has a great idea: we should go to Perkins. We get to Perkins and they seat us at a corner table. Then we ordered food and MAN. IT WAS SO GOOD. I even ordered another waffle, I liked it so much. The only problem was, we all couldn't stop laughing. Whenever one of us would crack up, the other two would crack up.

All of a sudden I hear, "I'm sorry, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." I freaked out. Were we getting kicked out of Perkins? No, apparently the server was telling another table that they were "out of chili." I'm not sure how I could have misheard what he said, so I think it's safe to say that I was still extremely fucked up.

Afterwards, Matt wants to go home because it's getting a little late. So we drive him home and then head back to Patrick's. On the way back, we're going through an intersection and I see a car coming at us, obviously not slowing down to the red light that it was facing. I emit a sound which can only be described as "primal fear" and Phil pounds on the breaks. Fortunately, his reaction was fast enough to avoid the collision or else I would probably be unable to type this today. I freaked out after that happened. I kept replaying the incident in my head and freaking out about it. We had come to close to an accident; it was surreal.

We go to Patrick's, where he and three other guys are in a car. Phil and I are just standing there talking to them when an ambulance drives by with its lights on but not making any noise. It was really weird. The evening wound down after that; Phil drove home and I lay down in his kitchen, wishing that the tile floor would be softer. I'm not sure how much time passed before I went home; probably around 30 minutes.

Argh

Although my work is enjoyable, I don't get paid for it. The people that I work with are also pretty cool, but I don't get paid for it. And credit cards are evil. I need to have a job this summer or else those nice people who lend me money might get mad...

A short rant

People who are against drug use are at best misguided and at worst blithering idiots. While anyone is free to choose not to use drugs, that does not make them better than someone who uses drugs.

"I'm better than you because I enjoy my life naturally and without chemicals."
No. You can think that you're better than me all you want. However, this does not actually make you "better." That's like saying that Michael Jordan is a better athlete than Lance Armstrong. You can't compare the two. Likewise, you can't compare a life with drug use and a life without. They're simply different.

"If I use drugs, the 'natural highs' I have will no longer be enjoyable."
This isn't true - I know from personal experience. You don't compare life's highs and lows to each other.

"Using drugs is wrong."
Yes, it is illegal. But so is speeding, cheating on your taxes, and underage drinking. Someone's drug use should not influence any decisions about their character or their integrity. If they let their drug use interfere with living their life as a normal, productive human being - then we have a problem. If not, who are you to judge?

I am now employed!

Let's hope that they won't drug test me.

When Tom and I were going drunk gambling at Mystic Lake, the local casino, we got into an argument about meaning on the bus. He argued that human beings have no meaning from an objective point of view. I argued that that argument is only objective from his point of view, which is subjective. I also said that our lives do have meaning, because even if we do create it for ourselves, (i.e., tell ourselves that our lives have meaning) that is meaningful because we live in a subjective reality. Even though I was drunk and Tom was not, he conceded the argument. However, I'm pretty sure he thinks that life has no meaning.

I think that meaning stems from falling in love. As long as there is someone who values you and someone who you value, meaning exists. Selfish people are those who truly lead meaningless lives.

Wow

This story is really long. I’m sorry, a lot of stuff happened. When I came home last night with Tom to watch TV, I decided to make a few notes to myself so that I wouldn't forget anything, because I was ridiculously fucked up. They are below.

The night started off with six guys - Matt, Patrick, Tom, Phil, David, and me. We had a handle of really crappy rum... I think it was Providence. Matt wasn't drinking because he was driving, and I wasn't drinking very much because I was also driving. Between us, we managed to finish off 9/10ths of the handle. I'm sure if Matt and I were seriously drinking, we would have finished it. After a good hour of drinking, we decide to head over to my apartment. This was a good idea because there was cable TV and no parents.

So we get into our respective cars. Patrick, Matt, and David get into one car, and Phil, Tom, and I get into my car. About one block down, we notice that their car had pulled over to the side of the road. We go back for them and I make a U-turn.

Apparently, when they get into their car, Patrick was talking about how he wasn't going to throw up, how he was like a rock, etc. Matt told him that if he needed to throw up, to say so. About three seconds into the drive, Patrick says that he needs to throw up. Matt and David let him out of the car, go piss on some building, and when they turn around Patrick is gone. Completely gone. By this time, we've met up with them, so we make a drunken search party to find Patrick. After about fifteen minutes of no Patrick, we decide to go to his house, which is nearby.

Upon arriving at his house we proceed to come into it (the door was unlocked) and find him lying on the floor of his basement. There are strategically placed piles of vomit around the toilet and inside the toilet. Phil goes to Patrick and offers to stay up all night with him to make sure that he will be okay. Tom suggests leaving Patrick and going to my apartment. Matt comments that Tom is an asshole.

In the end, we decide to go to Phil's house. We were a little slow getting there, but when I finally find Phil's house, Tom is waiting drunkenly in the yard for me. We go upstairs, where Matt is watching, of all things, golf. I tell him to change the channel to Adult Swim, to which he responds, "It's golf, dude." I decide that physically wrestling the remote from him would be impossible. David comments that he really wants to have sex. Did I mention? David is sitting in a chair in his boxers. Unfortunately, there are no women in our party.

We go outside the house, Matt drives home because he's bored, and we go sit in my car and listen to music. David and I are sitting in the backseat, and Phil and Tom are sitting in the front seat. At some point, Tom decides to spit on David because Tom is really drunk. However, in order to do so, he must open David's door, which is very, very hard for Tom to do. Extremely hard. This is because the door is locked. Tom first tries to open the door tugging on the handle, which doesn't work because the door is, well, locked. Then, he tries to unlock the door and pull on the handle. However, this is difficult to coordinate. David is also not very happy that Tom is trying to spit on him.

About this time, Phil stumbles out of the car and goes to lie down in the grass on the other side of the street. We check that he is okay, to which he responds in the affirmative. After Tom successfully opens David's door and spits on him, we head over and join Phil on the grass. Phil is lying on the grass when David gets the idea to teabag him. David proceeds to pull down his pants and attempts to put his balls in Phil's mouth. However, Phil is still slightly conscious, and expresses extreme displeasure in this idea, specifically, "I will rip off your fucking balls off and stuff them down your throat." However, I am relatively sure that he would not be able to pull of the coordination required to do so. Instead, he rolls around on the grass, trying to avoid David's balls. I'm pretty sure David managed to touch every part of Phil with his balls except for actually putting them in his mouth. In any case, the effort exhausted David so he collapsed in the grass with Phil and I.

Tom decides to randomly turn his car around, which he does. This is extremely impressive because he is very drunk. However, after doing so, he wants us to move over to Phil's lawn because it is sketchy to lie on the grass on the side of the street. Although that may be true, the grass is extremely comfortable. After failing to try and pull us over, Tom decides to answer nature's call right next to David's face. David is EXTREMELY disgusted by this, and tries to get away from the pee by rolling away. This works.

At this point, Phil decides that it would be a good idea to go back to his house and get some water. The only problem is, Phil can't walk. He demonstrates this by trying to get up, then falling over as his legs fail him. I walk over to Phil and help him up, after which he takes a step and falls over again. So, I help him up again and support him with an arm. We mange to cross the street and get into Phil's kitchen, where Phil lies down on the floor, Tom sits down, and David and I find things to eat, including: honey chex, ice cream, and chocolate.

The evening is winding down. Phil passes out on the floor. Tom decides to make the situation a little more surreal when he finds a tape measure and stretches it out next to Phil. David drives home and Tom and I drive to my place where Tom watches TV and I stumble over to my computer to write the thing that I posted last night.

"Last night's post"

Before I forget: David teabagging Phil, leaving Phil on the floor in this kitchen, eating ice cream, Phil trying to get up but failing, Patrick getting lost, then found, then left, then left again, searching for bitches, going back home and watching TV. Excellent.

Lasers and robots and stuff

Today's post was supposed to be ridiculously exciting. I remember thinking, "Man, if I put this in my blog, people are never going to believe it." Then I woke up and completely forgot my dream. Sorry.

I then played Frisbee with a few friends and quite a few people that I don't know. Then, we went to Perkins and recounted drunk stories. My favorite: My friend Will gets drunk and blacks out frequently. The University of Minnesota has a two strike system; he had already gotten one strike for smoking pot. So on some day in finals week, he gets really drunk and goes down to the first floor. There were a lot of beer cans there and some residential assistants who asked him to help clean them up, since they aren't allowed to touch them. So he grabs a lot of them and puts them in a bag, and while doing so notices that one is full. He carries the bag of empty beer cans to where the RA's want them to be, after which he drinks the beer and runs away from the RA's, who are screaming at him. Good times, good times.

Car trouble

My Honda is broken. But wait, I took it to the shop and they said that nothing was wrong with it, charging me $110 in the process. Wait, no, it's broken again.

On the bright side, I've found a 420 dealer in St. Paul. I predict more excitement in the future.

Drunken gambling?

No. Tom was brilliant enough to suggest that we put all the vodka in a water bottle, which we did. When we came into Mystic, said water bottle was taken away from us. Fuck da police.

Funny story from my interview today. I was referred to the interview by a guy named Don Kahn, a colleague of my father. He told me to mention his wife's name, Phyllis Kahn, who is apparently quite big in Minnesota politics. Yesterday, Phyllis Kahn called my father and he told her that I was interviewing with Patty Wetterling tomorrow. "No," said Phyllis Kahn, "Amy Klobuchar." "Whatever," thought my father, "I probably just forgot the name since I'm a crazy mathematician." However, there was the following dialogue during the interview today:

Interviewer: So, apparently you were referred here by Phyllis Kahn.
Me: Yes. She's a family friend.
Interviewer: You know that Phyllis Kahn doesn't actually support Patter Wetterling, right?
Me: Yeah, isn't she supporting Amy Klobuchar?
Interviewer: Yeah, we just like to be sure that the people working for us are actually on our side.
Me: I guess she was just looking for a job for me.

I played it as cool as possible but I'm sure he thinks that I'm a spy from the Amy Klobuchar campaign. Goddamn mathematicians.

Lying scum

This post was supposed to be about drunken gambling, but that event got cancelled for today due to laziness. However, I'm sure I will have an opportunity to do so at a later date.

Wells Fargo is lying scum. They said that the branch was open until 7:00, but I should have known that it was too good to be true. Stupid lying bankers. Speaking of which, why do Jews have big noses? Because air is free. :)

I am the unluckiest person in the world

I played in a $12 entry fee, $2100 poker tournament at Canterbury Park this morning. It was quite possibly the most ridiculous thing I've ever had happen to me. Every single time I flopped two pair I got either beaten by three of a kind, a straight, or a flush on the river. My last hand I flopped a full house, only to be beaten by a bigger full house on the river. Everyone at the table was at least 25 years older than me. It was an odd experience.

If you don't understand anything I wrote in the paragraph above, you live a happy, fulfilling life.

I survived

The drive was ridiculously long. However, I've managed to unpack my computer (and only my computer) so I can do all sorts of fun stuff like update my blog.

The first thing I noticed when we left Chicago was that everything was cheaper. Dinner suddenly became $10 instead of $15. Amazing. The second thing I noticed was that Wisconsin police are like fat people - numerous. This made driving through Wisconsin filled with law-abiding behavior. I guess I'll just have to break as many laws as possible in Minnesota to make up for it.

There was one really great part about the drive here. When I was about thirty miles away from St. Paul, my friend called me and said that she wanted to see me tomorrow. It made me feel welcome and at home - gotta love the feeling.

Packing

As I take everything out from their nooks and crannies, I come across some really unusual objects. These include:

- a cultured pearl from Japan (i.e. a dead oyster in a can with a pearl in it)
- a used, yellowing condom (not mine)

I tried Bacardi 151 for the first time on Wednesday. That shit is the devil's piss. It burns in your mouth, it burns on the way down, and it burns in your stomach. I think I'll stick to more fun things next time, like pounding on my fingers with a hammer.

My next post will be from Minnesota - I have a fun filled six hour drive ahead of me, during which my parents will grill me for not getting straight A's. I swear, Russians are ridiculous. I would know.

All done!

We went to Belmont, ate Philly cheese steaks, and bought me a pipe! Truly, truly awesome. I'll post a picture of it sometime.

This came up while we were at Belmont:

A guy walks into a bar, pulls a 12 inch person from his pocket and the little piano and the 12 inch guy starts playing on the piano. The bartender is amazed and asks the guy where he got such a tiny pianist. The guy says, "There's a genie granting wishes out in the alley."

So, the bartender goes out into the alley and sure enough there is a genie there. The bartender walks up to the genie and wishes that he had a million bucks. The genie says, "It will be done!" and disappears. Suddenly, the air around the bartender is full of ducks. Fighting through the ducks, he makes his way back to the guy in the bar, and says, "What kind of rubbish is this? I wanted a million bucks, not a million ducks!" to which the guy responds, "Did you really think I wanted a 12 inch pianist?

My world has turned upside-down

Kerry is a lot smarter than Bush, right? Apparently, that's not true. What next, world? Deep Throat is Mark Felt?

The FDIC called me today and offered to schedule an interview for an internship. Twice. I turned them down because I'm not staying in Chicago over the summer. First time for everything, I guess.

Guessing mood?

You'll never guess what this is. But you can try.

3 down, 1 to go

Finals. I cannot express my hatred due to Adderall-induced fatigue.

So then, a story to amuse you, dear reader. There is a guy who lives on my floor named Justin. Justin is a really big guy - the guy who ate the nine Big Mac sandwiches in 45 minutes for $400, as we fondly call him. That, or Justin. Justin's room has a mouse, which they (Justin and Jared, his roommate) have affectionately named "Lando."

I go into Justin's room in order to discuss our upcoming math final, and see Lando scurry across the floor into their bedroom. Justin gets a weird look in his eyes and runs into the bedroom screaming, "I'm gonna wallop 'im!" Picture the scene: Jared looking really confused after waking up from the light, Justin hitting everything in the room trying to get Lando to come out, and me laughing my head off in the doorway.

Climate

In the times of monkeys swinging through trees, when we were blissfully unaware of anything called "finals" or "homework," Chicago was a tropical rain forest. Today, the jungle still exists, although it's made out of concrete. The monkeys exist too, except instead of swinging through the trees, they're filling out form I-104B, and pretending that their lives have meaning.

One true element of the jungle remains, however. The tropical rains. Take, for example, yesterday:

10-2: really sunny. Not a cloud in the sky
2:30: really really hard rain. Extremely cloudy
3:00 really sunny. No clouds
6:00: rain, again.
6:10: sunny
6:30: rainy and sunny at the same time

Of course, I can't say that Minnesota is any better, since there it's either raining or not raining, and when it rains, it RAINS. But at least there's more consistency.

People from state schools are stupid

So the party wasn't phenomenal. However, I do have a new appreciation of the stupidity of people who go to state schools. Some of them are really stupid.

I had an interview today for a marketing job. The two questions I can never answer:

1) Tell me about yourself in a minute
2) Why [the company name]?

The first one is simply too vague. I can't encompass my persona in a minute. The second one is stupid. I don't really want to work for your company. It's simply a stepping stone to give me experience so that I can go on to work at bigger and better companies. Why lie to you and tell you that I actually give a damn?

How is this person going to get out?

Honestly, I'm not sure. But then again, I'm not the greatest parallel parker in the world.

Finals are going on, so not much is happening. I'm going to a party tonight, maybe it'll be cool. I'll let you know.

Bar Night

Last bar night of the quarter.

Me: Hey, I'm Serge, what's your name?
Girl: Excuse me?
Me: I'm Serge, what's your name?
Girl: I'm Emma... do you go here?

At this point, Bryant (my roommate) enters the conversation and I learn the following three things:

1) She used to be in his French class
2) She's moving to my dorm next year
3) I'm not getting any

As long as we're talking about my failures, I've gotten a B+ on every single hume paper I've written all year. I find it laughable that there is no difference between a paper I write the day it's assigned and take to multiple writing tutors and a paper that I write the night before it's due. But perhaps it's a conspiracy, just like why the textbooks on campus suck (to make us smarter since we'll learn more from correcting their mistakes). Or maybe I'm just stupid.

Decidedly Phallic

This picture is from some place in O'Hare Intl. Airport. Oh, won't someone think of the children?

In other news, I'm writing a paper about various text-music relationships in the music of Britney Spears and Schumann's Dichterliebe. Finally - a legitimate reason to listen to Britney Spears.