New Year's Eve Memories, Part One

1998 --- Gathered at a friend's house, we end playing a game of Trivial Pursuit. OMG WHAT A PARTY. I end up finishing second due to mispronouncing 'Tiananmen,' and since we were playing under stickler rules, I didn't get the point. What garbage. This was also back when I still stuttered, so it's quite possible I said something like Twpetgogjsghogjfgjgfjmen. Actually, I think the Twpetgogjsghogjfgjgfjmen are also Thailand's top super-hero team.

2003 --- On our way home from a party, we walk through the drive-thru at the Wharncliffe-Oxford McDonald's. I think it was due to us that they issued a cars-only policy, but anyway, we made our food order then went back to another friend's house to eat and call the cabs. My usually non-gluttonous pal Trevor ordered 20 McNuggets, and in the time it took us to pick up the receiver, call U-Need-A-Cab and hang up (a span of maybe 45 to 60 seconds) he had somehow eaten them all. It was amazing. This was in the era when a group of us would order a massive three-figure amount of Nuggets and plow through them --- our record was 280 McNuggets split among 17 people. It basically turned into a scene from Caligula, except with eating McDonald's instead of the gross sex stuff --- one guy was lying on the ground with his back arched, with his girlfriend holding a McNugget aloft and dripping honey sauce into his mouth. Trevor's contributions to these binges were no more than 10 Nuggets tops, so to jump to 20 was a major achievement. But the time! My God the time! In a single minute! Trev was pretty drunk, so perhaps it was a situation like Jackie Chan in the Legend of Drunken Master. Perhaps alcohol is what fuels Ted Kennedy's senatorial powers too.

2002 --- It was another example of gluttony, if somewhat more low-key. We settled in for a quiet evening at Trevor's girlfriend's place (not me and Trevor's girlfriend by ourselves, that would be pretty backstabby) and watched TV. The always-entertaining Tommy Boy was on --- it's hard to believe that it has been 10 years since Chris Farley died. It was hard to believe that it had been five years since his death back in 2002. Anyway, the gluttony came in when Trevor's girlfriend's well-prepared snack platter ended up being plowed over like snow on a main road. My friend Dave ended up passed out on the living room floor due to drinking, I ended up eating so many vegetables that I felt oddly ill, and Trev and his girlfriend sat awkwardly on the couch as if waiting for me to pass out as well so they could start making out. In fact, wait a second, perhaps that was the cause of my stomach ache. Those cucumbers were laced with roofies. That's what knocked Dave cold (well, that and his comically low tolerance for alcohol). I only stayed awake because I have a cast-iron gastrointestinal system. I have the Wolverine of stomaches. And this is like that X-Men comic when Wolverine tagged along on Colossus and Kitty Pryde's date to keep them from getting their swerve on. You know what, I said that as a joke, but there's a good chance there actually has been an X-Men comic where Wolvy was all overprotective towards Kitty and thus cock-blocked Colossus. That poor Russian.