Sophomore Stories Part XVI "Astros"
It's been quite a lengthy time off between stories, so I feel the need to share a really good story here, and this one is that, and very, very humiliating.
I'm not even sure why we ended up there, but the out of the way, strip-mall billiards establishment known as Astros was the destination. In my car was Paul and Dave Tran who somehow overheard what was going on and decided to come with us. The other car contained Jim and Chris and Shelly, who I think were a couple at this point.
Important pre-story facts: NONE of us are 21. I think Jim may have been 20 but the rest of us were 19. I had never had more than a sip of beer at any point up until now. I weighed maybe 120.
So we stroll on into Astros like we know what we're doing and claim a table in the back corner. We play a game or two and suddenly Jim comes back with a pitcher of beer. Interesting I thought, and since everyone except Dave was grabbing a cup, I decided that peer pressure wouldn't hurt, just this once, and started sipping beer. Well, as the night wore on, I had consumed one glass of beer. I'm feeling the effects of the alcohol to be sure, but I'm not totally gone...yet.
For some reason, we ordered another pitcher of beer and the idiots behind the counter have no problem not carding whoever was buying. I had another glass of beer. Well that's all it took, and by now the only person who's sober is Dave Tran. So the way I made it home from Astros was to put Dave Tran behind the wheel of my Maxima and hope that he could navigate safely back to Ellsworth Hall.
My head is spinning now. I'm bordering that line between extremely tipsy and legal toxication when we stumble up to the 5th floor. Here's where things get sketchy for me. What I remember is creating a lot of ruckus with different folks who hadn't joined us at Astros until my RA got so fed up with me he shoved me in my room and shut the door. I climbed into my lofty sleeping perch and enjoyed the swimming feeling in my brain when my eyes closed and eventually passed out.
***Normally, the story would end with me waking up the next morning with a massive headache. Not so...***
The next thing I remember, the door to my dorm room is open and James and Eric are pulling me down off the bed. As I'm struggling to understand why, I hear it...the Fire Alarm. It's 2:30am and some dope pulled the Fire Alarm. Still not altogether with it, I stumble into my closet where I promptly fall down into my pile of dirty clothes and I find myself suddenly, and strangely, comfortable. At this point I tell my noble kidnappers to just leave me here, the RAs don't check the closets anyway.
My rescuers persist that I dress myself and join them outside in the freezing cold. So I throw on clothes and they guide me down the stairs and into the parking lot where we waited for the RAs to check all the rooms before we could go back inside.
Having gone through this Fire Alarm ritual several times before, I knew that you could usually count on a 15 minute wait or so until the dorm personnel could confirm that it was a false alarm and the fire engine could turn back to the station. This process involved each floor being checked for residents who didn't abide by the alarm, room by room, opening each door, turning on the light and peeking inside. You could watch the building as lights would flicker on and off across each floor.
Well this night in particular, we waited a long time. Probably close to 30 minutes, maybe even longer as firemen walked in and out of the dorm. About half-way through our time, Jim threw a pebble at me. Not very hard, but it did hit me in the neck. I acted as though I didn't notice, hoping he would stop. Well, he kept at it for the rest of our time out there. I think he thought I was too drunk to notice, but I wasn't! HA!
Finally, the building was cleared and we were allowed back inside. I quickly fell into bed and slept in.
The next morning, we were talking with our RA about the false alarm and asking why it took so much longer than usual.
His reply: "We went around checking rooms and while we did, someone called the front desk to tell us that they pulled the alarm and that they were hiding in their closet. So we had to go back and check every closet which we never do, but we did last night. And we didn't find anyone."
All the blood rushed to my feet as I realized that, had I stayed in the closet half buried in laundry, as I had requested, that it would have been me that they had found and charged and fined and maybe kicked out of the dorm.
James. Eric. Thanks.
Public service announcement!
I wish I could say that this episode was where it began and ended for me in the 'consuming too much alcohol makes you do dumb things' category, but it isn't. I have learned that getting drunk=puke=smelly mess=nobody likes you. So, it's not something I do anymore or have done in many years. So, readers, enjoy a beer or two, or a single cocktail, but please don't overindulge.
posted by Dale @ 9:47 PM
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