Yeah, so I haven't written in a few days. So I actually have a social life now. What are you really gonna do about it?

Cat was visiting for the weekend. Friday, we bridged, and last night, we drank. Overall, last night was more amusing. After much wandering around and not drinking, and finding more people, and still not drinking, and going on a mixers run, and still not drinking ("This is insane! Do you realize I've been out of work for three hours, and I'm still not drunk?" "Yeah, I know what you mean. My friends at home do this too. I say, 'C'mon already! I wanna drink!' and then we talk about where we should go for another hour" "Now is the time when we should drink!" "Drink!" "Drink, I tell you!") We ended up at Jay and Alice's. Lexie and Paul were there. Pat the Phi Delt was there. GI George was there. Yahn was there. Finally, Jay mentioned drinks. ("Yaay!" "Yaay!) We started off with half of a box o wine Jay had left from last night. (Jay is funny. He was fired on Friday, and has decided to devote himself wholeheartedly to his new career of Professional Alcoholic. His words. See, his job was so studly that he now stands to gain more on unemployment than most of us mere mortals do from working. I mean, damn, if I were him, I'd probably become an alcoholic too. It pays better than almost everything else. He was drunk Friday. He was very drunk last night. I should go visit him, to see if he's drunk tonight.)

Somehow, we ended up playing Asshole. Yahn and Alice decided to just watch. I asked them to be my entourage. Every time I moved, they moved with me. It amused me. Alice was promoted to High Supreme Chief of my entourage when she and I were the only ones who knew all the words to "Birdhouse in Your Soul"

Pat got really into the game. It was actually a little obnoxious. He knew all sorts of bizarre Phi Delt rules, and insisted we use them. One of these rules was that anyone who was president for three hands in a row got to make a permanent rule. His 1st permanent rule was that the president got to look at the asshole's hand, and pick out the best four cards. This meant that he stayed president for quite some time.This really began to bug me. I vowed to eject him.

I began to cheat. Small stuff at first. I played two cards laying right on top of each other, so it only looked like I had played one. If I was required to trade away my best card, I'd give the second or third best one instead. I told Jay that if he joined my entourage, we'd trade cards freely, so we both ended up with almost all pairs. None of it was working, though. I just couldn't get around Pat's rule. I was moving two or three seats up, but then I'd be dealt a hand I couldn't do a damn thing with, and fall back down, and Pat stayed president throughout it all.

Then, I ended up next to Paul. I struck the same deal I had with Jay. Our hands meshed perfectly. We both got two sets of three and a wild card and a useless card out of the deal. Pat caught us. Now, cheating is of course perfectly acceptable in Asshole. If you're caught, you do what the president says, and prepare to drink heavily. Pat told us to trade back. I was prepared to do so, but Paul handed me only his worthless card. "That's it. I swear." Hardly daring to believe my luck, I gave Paul my worthless card. Pat accepted it, but made us both drink. It seemed fair.

I moved from Vice-asshole to president. Pat was in shock. I think he was drunk enough that he'd forgotten that Paul and I had just been caught cheating. I don't think he had any idea at all how I had pulled it off. During his reign, he had tried to instate a rule that every time a three was played, everyone had to drink and say "All Hail Phi Delts!" The Taus had refused out of principle. We did agree to shout "All Hail Pat the Phi Delt!" instead. Then, after my coup, the cry spontaneously changed to "All Hail Pat the Phi Delt! All Hail Ana the Queen!" It was a psychological thing, really. There we were, a bunch of Taus, and there he was, a Phi Delt, and although personally good people, our sworn enemy, and he just could not be budged from the seat of power. And then I budged him. Hard. It may well have been my proudest moment.

Pat seemed kind of upset, especially when I screwed up two hands later and ended up asshole. (In his rules, if you're caught with a three at the end of the hand, you're automatically the new asshole, threes being the "end card" that nothing beats. While using my presidential privelege of looking at the asshole's hand, I was overcome with how many threes she had, and decided I wanted them all, not realizing that I'd never get a chance to play them all.)

Everyone was quite drunk by this point, so while I was shuffling, I spread all the cards out in my lap, pulled out all the wild cards (twos) and put them on the bottom of the deck. When I dealt, I dealt them all to Pat, as a way to make up for cheating him out of his presidency. The drunken fool did nothing for the rest of the night but talk about this amazing hand, and how he'd never seen anything like it.

Silly Rabbit. That's because he'd never played with the likes of me. I'm telling you, I was in the zone. Kenny used to try and convince me that the whole point of Asshole was to get to be the asshole, because that's who wields all the real power. I never really understood what he meant, until last night.

***

I'm sorry. Looking back over this entry, I can see that it really is of no interest to anyone but me. You've gotta understand today though. I had to be at work by seven. From seven till about noon, my only thought was trying to keep myself together. I drank a lot of water, and moved very slowly. About 11:30, it started to get busy. Then it got really busy. Then it got insane. It wasn't until about two or so that I had both the time and the facilities to think clearly. By four, I had more or less pieced the night together, and arrived at something that amused me. But I couldn't tell anyone. I drove home, for a belated birthday dinner with my parents. I didn't know exactly how to broach the subject. "Hey, Mom, did I mention that I was totally and completely drunk last night, and I scored a moral victory over this guy who was kind of being a jerk by cheating him blind?" I don't think I could have found a way to describe my night that would have gone over well.

Lynne was also at my parents' house, so I gave her a ride back to Cowtown. I tried to tell her about it, but she didn't really seem interested. I can't imagine why. So I decided to inflict the story on you good people instead. What good is an imaginary horde of teeming millions, if not to tell your boring stories to? My point exactly.

Thank you, you guys have been great! Enjoy the buffet, and don't forget to tip your server!

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