When Irish Eyes are Smiling
22 March 2006
My favorite holiday has come and gone without anyone dying, going to jail, or doing the creative sidewalk landscaping I engaged in last year on this holiest of holies. (holys?) I left a message for my girl Eryn, who spent SPD 03 and 05 taking care of my sorry ass, saying that I made it to the other side of March 18th without so much as falling down or trying to pick a fight with a chick a foot shorter than me, and she suggested that perhaps this wasn’t due to my growing capability to handle my liquor, but rather my growing inability to throw down as much as I did back in college, when I was carrying around those extra 15 pounds of beer weight. Is this true? Am I grown up now? Let’s do a small retrospective (NB: Am eliminating St Patricks Day 04 because, even though marie cites it as the day I realized I could handle living in New York and that is most likely very true, I spent the actual holiday at weird bars downtown with a strange girl from Texas, her exboyfriend, and someone who dropped half her social circle in salmon-colored writing, so we’re going to go ahead and wipe that one from the books).
The Previous Day
’03: Um, would have been a tuesday, I think? No idea, but I’m going to go with drinking an entire bottle of champagne and watching MTV with allison as she drank an entire bottle of Arbor Mist.
’05: Spent a week stressing and having nightmares re: telling my boss I was quitting before finally dropping the bomb the morning of the high holiday.
’06: Took Kyle on his whirlwind tour of manhattan, which involved walking from Wall Street to W 71st and hearing him exclaim things like “Holy donkey!” at the sight of the crowds in herald square (herald? look, I’m not googling it. That’s not what they pay me to do at this job, okay?). Went out at night to introduce him to his NYC doppleganger, the Kev, so that they could hold hands and talk about feelings. Landed at Trinity and listened to owen sing the chorus of Irish songs off the jukebox. Crashed into bed at some indeterminate time.
Target of My Rage
’03: The front steps of my sorority house, of which there are a scant four, which proved way, way, way too difficult to climb when I returned home. I remember thinking clearly “well, I’m going to have to sleep outside.” Oh, and one of my housemates was sitting in our study (yes, there was a study, what, you think it’s easy having the highest house GPA on sorority court? No, you have to WORK for that shit! Study also doubled as “the room where we held the north/ south case race”) watching and laughing at me. Who’s laughing now, bitch? Who’s. Laughing. Now. Yeah, you know who you are.
’05: Jordan. This was an interesting choice on my part, considering when that much Jameson is in my system I’m vastly more likely to physically attach myself to jordan and growl at anyone else who comes near him (okay, so I only did that once. But hey, every weekend brings a new chance!). But this year, while caught up in Jordan’s Oh What A Tangled Web We Weave When We Have Way Too Many Hot Girls In Love With Us lifestyle, I went with the yelling. “This is MY DAY!” I screamed, over and over. We get it, cristin. Must be hard to have decades of potato famine agnst coursing through your veins at such high speed. 
’06: No one. Or, rather, UConn basketball, which looked like it was going to drop it like it was hot to Albany for awhile. Let it be said that I don’t care at all about college basketball, aside from the fact that Ali’s photo montages make me very happy (more, please!) and there is a tall blonde boy in my life who has his soul crushed a little every time Duke loses. This is on top of the extra soul crushing I gave him when he had to watch me fill out my online NCAA brackets: “I can’t pick gonzaga because I hate that name. I mean, it’s a joke, right?” “Doesn’t it make sense to just pick all the teams that are ranked higher? I mean, isn’t that WHY they’re ranked higher? Because they’re better?” “I have to take BC because my cousins went there. And Seton Hall because it’s in new jersey.” “I only like teams that have showtunes to go along with them. Kansas she said is the name of the staaaaar!” I feel like Bill Simmons might have been secretly recording us from the closet or something.
Venue Choice
’03: Yeah, “choice” is a strong word here. It was Williamsburg, we were 21, and our options came down to (a) our dorm rooms (b) Ye Old colonial blacksmith’s tavern or whatever and (c) the leafe. Who cares that we go there 5 nights a week! They certainly haven’t seen enough of my money! No sir!
’05: Oh, Dorrians. Dorrians, Dorrians, Dorrians. Plastic cups of bud light, constant U2 rotations, guys in kilts. I don’t know what to say about this one other than: I’m sorry, guys. I was young, and foolish.
’06: The intrepid Anna picks Slainte for us, and after a headed email debate over the pronunciation of the name (“which doesn’t really matter, as long as you can pronounce “coors light!” you’re going to be fine). Bar turns out to kick so much ass I immediately put it into the running for Birthday ’06. They avoid the U2 cliches, and instead make a point to go in the 
opposite direction with… the Smiths? Uh, alright. They also show rugby, to the amusement of former rugby plays Kyle and Kyle’s intended. Downside: No french fries. Anna is also denied her attempt at bringing a pizza into the bar (I dare you to spend 3 hours with Anna wherein she does not mention/ consume something half her body weight in bar food). They do, however, have a special St Pats menu, so even though you can’t get french fries you can get, say, leg of lamb, or stew. That’s always fun to split around a table!
The Morning After
’03: Took a Criminology midterm. Examined the facts: I was taking the class pass/fail, the professor was about 13 years old and eager to be liked, and I had another exam and a paper later in the semester through which I could make up some lost ground. Ground that was lost when I played 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon throughout the essay section (Professor EagerPants called me “brilliant,” fyi) and handed the exam in half an hour before anyone else did (I haven’t confirmed this, only heard it through various reports, as I was fully passed out in bed by the time the class concluded), ultimately earning myself a 58 on said exam.
’05: Came into work. Squinted at computer briefly before leaving to get a protein shake. Did some more squinting before leaving in search of hash browns. Examined the facts: I was leaving this damn job anyway. Mentally composed apology emails to the DPW team in charge of the 2nd Ave/ 84th street section of manhattan.
’06: Having fallen asleep before 11pm, woke up bright and chipper. Went outside to see if anyone had puked in front of my apartment. Wouldn’t have been the first time, but, they hadn’t.
Unsung Heroes
’03: Eryn coaxes me up the front steps of our house and puts me to bed… on the floor of the living room.
’05: The Kev is in charge of getting our wayward group back to my apartment and mistakenly walks us to his old apartment ten blocks away before packing us all into a cab.
’06: Kyle, upon seeing that Marie has no intention of even attempting her irish car bomb (aside from dropping the shot into the beer, which is the “fun” part anyway) reflexively grabs and downs it in under three seconds, drinking two in the time it takes me to have half of mine before giving up and saying “this makes my stomach angry at me.”
So… jury’s still out. Am I getting better with age, or worse? See you next year!
2 Responses to “When Irish Eyes are Smiling”
March 22nd, 2006 at 1:39 pm
quite possibly the most entertaining underwear i’ve seen in a while!
March 22nd, 2006 at 2:58 pm
SPD ’03 was a Monday. Which I spent drinking Killian’s and car bombs in a freshman dorm room. Klassy.