Friday
Trekked all the way to the upper west side (my lazy arse doesn’t go above 23rd street) to see a performance of Ologunde, an Afro-Brazilian music and dance troupe, with my friend Niki. We decided to meet for drinks before the show and I arrived at the restaurant a little early and was ravenous so I inhaled an entire bread basket, a goat cheese tart, and half a plate of fries before she arrived.

The show was awesome. I think any dance performance that involves drums and acrobatics is amazing. By the end of the show the entire audience was out of their seats, dancing and clapping to the music.

Saturday
Woke up early and went to a 90 minute vinyasa yoga class. It is so much easier to do things like yoga or even waking up when you are not insanely hungover. I think I should get extra points for this when the time comes and the judges panel of this game called Life asks for my score card. He’d ask, “So what did you do with your life?” and I’d answer, “I woke up early and went to yoga!”

That evening my friend Vidya came into the city. We wanted to have dinner at my favorite Italian place Supper but the wait was on hour and forty minutes. Who do they think they are, Buddakan? We decided to go to Li’l Frankies instead (same owner and menu as Supper). We were so ravenous that we would’ve eaten the menus if they were accompanied by olive oil. But we are civilized so we just waited patiently and drooled every time a waiter passed by with bowls of pasta.

If it weren’t for the fact that we were starving I’d say that dinner was a little disappointing. Our bruschetta was basically chopped tomatoes on top of thick Italian bread. I may not be Mario Batali but I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be served on thinly sliced, toasted bread. Vidya’s rigatoni tasted like Chef Boyardee. Actually, despite my culinary pretenses I’m a big fan of Chef Boyardee and their cans of beefaroni tasted better than this. I had the spaghetti limone which is just spaghetti with butter, olive oil, and a squeeze of lemon. They must have given me the child’s portion or something because after slurping 10 noodles my bowl was empty. I wanted to ask our waiter for an extra side of noodles but like I said I am civilized so I didn’t. Instead I just dunked bread in the sauce and polished the bowl.

Despite our criticisms we still had room for dessert so while Vidya went to use the restroom I was in charge of ordering the dessert. Our waiter started describing the dessert items and my mind started to wander because I was getting a little drunk and when he finished talking I asked:

“So do you have any warm chocolate cake?”
“That would be the warm chocolate cake I was just talking about.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. I’m just really…tired.”

After dinner we went to Midway for a girl’s Mexican themed birthday party (hence the sombrero pics earlier). Vidya and I were prudent at first, ordering whiskey with ginger ale. We deemed the drinks too sweet so our next round was whiskey with a splash of gingerale. By the end of evening we were just drinking straight whiskey.

Which brings me to Sunday.

Sunday
Woke up with the worst hangover ever. Not your pedestrian, run of the mill, take two advils and you’re fine hangover. No. It was the kind of hangover that makes you feel like you’re being rotated in a centrifuge and even the mere act of opening your eyes or sitting up straight requires the strength of an Olympic athlete.

Me: I don’t remember the rest of last night.
Vidya: That’s because you turn into a mute when you’re drunk. You just danced with a pole all night. You express yourself through dancing. And a pole.

On a different but not totally unrelated note, she told me this story about her friend Edward*. I’ve met Edward a number of times and he looks like one of those staid, quiet banker types. Not the kind of guy you’d see doing jaeger shots and/or puking on sidewalks. Well, on the night of an office party in Manhattan (this is an important detail), Edward got so drunk that he puked on the sidewalk and then fell asleep on the sidewalk. At one point he even rolled onto his own pool of vomit. Noticing a gentleman passed out on the sidewalk, a police officer decided to stop and ask Edward if he was okay.

Cop: Sir, where do you live?
Ed: I live over there.
Cop: Where’s over there?
Ed: Greenpoint, Brooklyn

See, I may get so drunk that I don’t remember my evenings but I always manage to find my way back home. Like a dog.

*Name changed to protect the guilty. Why do you think I use a pseudonym?