And That, Children, Is Why We Should Moderate Our Drinking

So yesterday night was a blast. It was Carmeni's birthday party and the first time a whole bunch of us from college would be seeing each other since finals. The location was this pub called Backyard. It was a pretty cool place.

I arrived at 7:45, which would be 15 minutes late except that this is Malaysia and it was a party so I was actually early. The only other people there were Carmeni, Nicholas, and Kaminie. They had already ordered their food, but I arrived in time for drinks. I had a bottle of Heineken to get started while I tried to work out whether I would have enough money to get through the night. I determined that I did not, so I excused myself for a few moments and went across the block to borrow some money from my dad, who was having dinner with my mum and a friend just nearby. It was very fortunate.

When I got back there was conversation and pictures and then the food arrived. I had some of their fries while I waited for my fish and chips. The food took a long while to get from ordering to the table, so I was glad that I ordered almost as soon as I arrived. When my food finally arrived I shared my fries and ate a lemon. The rind made for good pictures.

Meanwhile, most of the other people who were coming were still either lost or on their way. Arun was driving Elo and Chris over, but he must've had no idea where we were because he was lost for almost two hours. Finally Nick get sick of all the text messages he was getting from Chris which seemed to be begging Nick to get him out of there, so Nick left to go pick them up.

A little after Nick left, Amanda and Davinia arrived. They finished the last two fries on my plate, and then ordered their dinner. I decided to try the mushroom soup, so I asked them to order one of those for me, too. Once that was done we sat around and caught up. Everyone said that it seemed like ages since we'd last been together, but I thought that my break went by ridiculously fast and that the last time we were together had been just like yesterday. Amanda and I talked about the weddings that we had been to in the last month. Hers had fireworks, but mine had an earthquake. She also got chased by a goat, but that was unrelated to the wedding. Anyway, pictures were taken, fun was had, Creep was played from the sound system. I spent the rest of the night anticipating Push, but it never came. Oh well.

Nick got back with Elo, Arun and Chris. More catching up was had, more pictures were taken, it was good times. The food arrived, too, so that was also good. I shared my garlic bread with Amanda and my soup with everyone, because it was exceedingly delicious.

Now that almost everyone was here (We were still waiting for Zach and his friends), we could order the whiskey. Almost all of us pitched in and we got, like, a litre of what I suppose was top-notch whiskey. We also got some soda, water, and free-flowing coke. My first two drinks were mixed with the coke, but after that I got bored and just drank it raw. That was some really smooth whiskey.

The band arrived and took ages to set up. Amanda recognized one of the members as her cousin's ex-boyfriend. I asked if the break-up had been amicable, and she told us how her cousin had gone through his messages and found out he was cheating on her. Apparently she had taken a knife from the kitchen and was ready to stab him when she didn't, for whatever reason. A little after that Nick brought him over and he tried to figure out where he knew Amanda from. He guessed who her dad was and commented on how much she'd grown, so I suppose it could have gone a lot worse.

The whole time there was a lot of good music being played, though not by the band because their set-up time rivalled that of some of the concerts I'd been to. Aside from Creep, the DJ played I Saw Her Standing There, Mustang Sally, Born in the USA, and a bunch of other songs I thought I would remember but I did not. Anyway it made me happy to hear the Beatles. Amanda was dancing in her seat, and I joined in. Dancing while sitting is very simple, you just move your shoulders and make repetitive gestures with your arms. It also doesn't feel as embarrassing as real dancing.

A cake arrived at the table, and it looked delicious. The band finally set up, Nicholas went on stage to sing Happy Birthday to Carmeni, and then we had cake, and it was good. The band started playing a bunch of classics. Some people in front of the bar tried dancing along. One was this heavyset dude who I could sympathize with, since he obviously did not know how to dance and he looked a bit self-conscious, but he was clearly enjoying himself. There were also a couple of women: a bespectacled Chinese lady who thought she was younger than she was, and a British lady who had probably come to watch the election or something with a bunch of other Brits. She got progressively more attractive as the night wore on.

Eventually Zach arrived with his friends. Amanda pulled brought a guy to the table and introduced him to everyone. I thought that he was with Zach, but he just happened to be at the pub at the same time as the rest of us. She told me that he was her ex boyfriend and that she was still totally in love with him or something. That is the point where I realized she probably was drunk. I had started suspecting it when she leaned over and asked if I knew how to dance. I had learned my lesson a long time ago, though, so I just said I had no idea and left her on her own as she got off the chair and danced.

Soon the bottle of whiskey was almost empty. On my last pour I checked to make sure there was still some left, because I thought it would suck to be the guy to finish it. I decided to stop drinking at that point, so I tried to move over to the other side of the table because it had chairs against the wall and allowed an easier viewing of the stage. I stood up, but everything was super wobbly so I sat back down. The last thing I remember with any amount of clarity was leaning over to Elo and telling her that Amanda was very attractive and she deserved her ex before Elo leaned over and told me that Amanda was probably more drunk than any of us.

Anyway, the next thing I remember I sitting in a toilet stall with my pants around my ankles while I puked all over them. At some point I made a call to my brother, Ian, requesting he bring pants and in exchange I would give him a whole bunch of money. I think my exact words were "Minimum fifty, maximum three hundred". Then I woke up again, surveyed the damage, and attempted to transcend spacetime. When that didn't work I just settled for passing out again.

I only woke up again when people started banging on the door. I think Nick might have been one of them. I put on my pants, opened the door, and woke up outside the pub in the grass. Davinia was saying she wasn't going to drive me home any more. I think I mumbled that I totally understood and if I was in her position I would not want to take me home either. I think Arun said he would drive me back, so I mumbled about getting plastic bags. I think I didn't talk about anything else for the rest of my time on the grass. It was just "Do you have any plastic bags" "Can't you get some plastic bags" "I think there's like a 7-Eleven somewhere, they probably have plastic bags there". Actually, I stopped for a moment when one of the guys decided to exploit my current state and ask me who I liked. Thankfully my answer was not anyone at the party. Also, I'm pretty sure I promised Arun "Minimum fifty, maximum one hundred" because he volunteered to drive me home.

I think I was being walked to Arun's car when Ian arrived. He said something to the guys about how dumb I was for trying to be a hero and drinking more than I can handle, and then he got me in the car and drove us home. Our friend, Sarah, was also in the car because Ian was driving her home. Once she was dropped off, Ian told me that Arun told him I didn't have to pay, which was nice. Ian still wanted his three hundred, though. He showed me the pants that he had brought. I asked him why they were shorts and he told me that it would be very difficult to get me into long pants. After he made his point, I said that was very wise. I then told him that since he hadn't actually changed my pants that I would not be giving him the full three hundred. He said that was not fair. I told him to pull over because I was about to throw up.

Ian couldn't pull over because he was on the highway, a fact which he shared with me. He passed me a plastic bag, but I was in no condition to operate it and so I just puked on it instead of in it. After a while he found a place he could pull over. I got out and collapsed on the grass. I think I may have thrown up a bit more, but I can't remember. I do remember feeling better about myself because I recognized where we were (nearby Victoria Station and Jake's Charbroiled Steaks). When we got back in the car I attempted to calculate if I had enough money to cover all the money I had promised to everyone. Ian told me that I should not be doing math. I told him that no, it was cool, I had a limit of seven hundred and I was pretty sure I was under the limit.

I thought that I was well enough to sit up, so I tried. Ian said that was a bad idea, and indeed it was, so I collapsed back onto the back seat. The rest of the ride home was spent trying to find a good song to play. I asked Ian if there was any Ke$ha on the radio, but he said there wasn't, so I asked for Adam Young since I remembered he had an Owl City CD in his car. He told me he didn't have any Owl City any more, which confused me. He switched to his CD player anyway. I said "That's Mercedes" and Ian told me that no, we were not in a Mercedes, we were in his car. I told him I meant Mercedes from Glee, and he said that oh yeah, it was. Apparently he had swapped his Owl City CD for the Glee Soundtrack. We arrived home during Kurt's rendition of "Defying Gravity".

I told Ian to take me upstairs and leave me in the shower, and I would try and take care of the rest. He did, but not before typing "i owe Ian RM300" on my phone. It was a nice try.

I woke up sometime later and managed to clean myself up. The hardest part was getting up off the floor. The shower head looked really, really far away from where I was lying. I pulled it off anyway, but once I was done I didn't have enough strength to drive off, so I just put on a bathrobe and threw a towel on my head and collapsed on the couch.

At six o'clock in the morning I changed into my pyjamas and got into my bed with my cat. My cat was very cautious of me and approached me with apprehension. He sniffed me for a bit and decided to sleep somewhere else. I guess he does not trust drunks.

Anyway I slept for another six hours and woke up at noon. I sent my apologies to Carmeni and my thanks to Arun via Elo, then I cleaned out my wallet and threw it in the wash. Now I am here typing this out. I'm going to say that the first three hours of the night were definitely great, and everything after that was worth it to learn a lesson and get a story to tell.

I'm sticking to beer from now on.