Punching games, random conversations, beer, good times...
05 December, 2004 :: 1:45 p.m.
Possibly the last Sparkle and it went well...
It's not really even about Sparkle itself which is just a local festival to kick off the Christmas holiday up in Corning. We spend maybe half an hour to an hour every year actually walking around checking that out...it's about the night and the fact that it is how Pat and I end each fall semester. Sometimes just the two of us, last year with Joel, this year with Chuck...
There's always one or two moments that we look back on and laugh about later on...this year was no different.
For some reason this is the night some random person interjects themselves into one of our conversations or lectures one of us on something such as the evils of smoking. This year it was my turn to be lectured on how to use the bathroom...
We were going to head to the bar, but I needed to get my car so that it was close by when I had to disappear for a bit to take Lacey to work. Since I was parked at Wegman's Chuck and I decided that we'd both take a piss before heading over the bridge to the bar...he went in ahead of me since Pat and I were finishing our cigarettes. I walked in and Chuck was at the only urinal so I headed for the stall only to hear some guy yell behind me, "No! No! Don't go in there." I just turned and glared at him since I really had to piss. The guy looked at me and said, "Nevermind, it looks like you've got to go." I close the door and he continues talking to me, "I hope your sitting 'cause that's what I have to do." I just ignored him. A second later he adds, "Lift the seat if you're just taking a leak," or something like that. Thank you, genious, I'm almost 29, but my parents did a lousy job of raising me and I had no idea that you should do that. The point to taking a piss at Wegman's was to avoid some stupid drunk in the bathroom at the bar, and it ended up being totally pointless.
Pat finally got to see McHale's, the topless bar in Corning. Wooo. Still won't ever understand why you can be 18 and get into an all-nude strip joint, but you have to be 21 to see boobs... I realize it's the alcohol thing, but it's still ridiculous when you think about it. Anyway, I hope the McHale's lived up to the mystique built up over the last 5 years...what with it's 3 dancers, one of whom was actually hot and that had to be balanced by the fact that she danced to Aerosmith. But as Pat said, at least it wasn't Rammstein (the favorite choice of one of the girls at the Last Lap when Pat and I used to go there).
Chuck delighted in the game Pat and I have been playing the last few weeks. Fed up with all of the stupid fucking ribbon cling/magnet/whatever the fuck they are that people are now adorning their cars with, Pat and I made a game. Since yellow ribbons are the most common, they are one punch. The punches increase with rarity: pink are 2 punches; red, white and blue are 3 (these should be reversed now, but there were more pink than r,w&b when we first started), black are 4...the most rare ones (Pat apparently saw an animal rescue one, but I wasn't with him at the time) are 10. Basically whenever we're together, we're on constant alert watching every car that we pass or that passes us and we just wail on each other...I have one hell of a nice black and blue mark on my right arm and I don't bruise easily. But back to Chuck, he didn't join in on the punching, he had a blast pointing out ribbons and watching Pat and I punch the living hell out of each other. Are these ribbons everywhere else in the country too? I realize that they are to show support for troops or worthy causes and all that, but I'm just sick of them...and instead of going away, more and more colors keep popping up...enough already.
The night was capped off with possibly the lamest fight I've ever seen. After the bars closed, Pat, Chuck and I stood outside talking a bit before heading home and suddenly there's all this yelling and we look over to see a group of...6-8 people coming down the street with a few people shouting at each other. Two of the guys started "fighting" in the street which consisted of a really weak punch (Pat and I like each other and we punch harder when we play the ribbon game), a few failed shoves, and one guy falling on his face with no help from the other guy. Then the one who fell on his face and another guy chased off the other "brawler" and the cops came and it was all sad and stupid and still amusing to watch.
The night might not sound that interesting to someone not there--if I described a lot of the nights I hang out with Pat and/or Chuck, they wouldn't sound all that exciting--but that's because it's never really about the things that go on around us or doing things that are "wild and crazy." Like Home Movies, there doesn't need to be an intricate plot...the greatness is in the time spent together and the conversations we have. Random, amusing, offensive, often seemingly about nothing--that's where the genious lies...