Most of you have known me for 1/3rd of my life. I started posting on AC in 1998 as a college student whose most important decision of the day was where we'd go get drunk that night.
Obviously, life has changed dramatically over the years. Graduated, moved, started a business, got married, had a kid, sold the business, went to grad school, moved, got a professional job, got a professional designation, started a business, moved, bought and sold personal residences, started another business, moved.
Somewhere along the way, Alkie became nothing more than a cartoon character I play on this website. I don't even drink on weekdays anymore and I'm usually in bed, asleep, by 11pm.
Then........last night.
We shipped our kid off to El Paso for a week to spend some quality time with grama and granpa; something we almost never do. I can count on one penis the number of times we'd done that before now. So last night we find ourselves sitting at home, as usual, at 10pm watching Friday Night Fights, baseball, and enjoying a nice imported beer. Three texts from one of my few local friends later and I instruct my wife to get her ass up, put some clothes on, that we're "goin' out for a fucking change." I hadn't left to go out drinking at 11pm in at least seven years.
We met up with friends at Dive Bar, sold on the beer selection. Unlike the last time I left my house to get drunk seven years ago, I was fortunate to have the luxury of financial resources this time. "A bottle of your best shit. For each of us." turned into "A bottle of your 8 best things. For each of us. And one for you."
At 3am, we wandered out of the bar to go see Mike's new apartment, his first nice residence (he has been in grad school for the last 10 years). Woke up his entire family. That went well.
Then the fun began. Did I throw up? Does the pope shit a funny hat on a tree? I puked. And puked. First the Black Ops Ale. Then the Eku. Then the Engine Oil. Then I threw up some of my own blood. Spoke to a doctor friend of mine this morning and he assured me that it was nothing to worry about; I would eventually die anyway and this was just speeding up that process.
I passed out face down on my couch.
When I came to at 5:28a, alone, cold, and very dizzy, I threw up again.
Got in bed, slept till 10a (I seriously can't even remember the last time I did that), and woke up with a mindbending, soulcrushing hangover.
Anyway, it's not a fun story or a funny story, I was just sitting here realizing how fucking old I am. And also how glad I am to not be 22 anymore.
