So, how was the weekend?

I went with Bobby Massage and his household to a party Friday night. It was a good one. Most of the people there assembled were dressed either as medical professionals, or people who were in some way injured. One of my cocktail serving friends was there: she was dressed as an ambulance-chasing lawyer. Brilliant. I didn't even recognize her, so far gone in her part was she.
As I stepped into the smoker's haven on the back porch, I heard a woman's voice ask, "Is your name Rich?"
Yup, I said. "Do you remember when you had that horrible stye in your eye, and I squirted my breast milk into it, and cured it?" she asked.
I looked at her a minute, and said, "Amelia!"
After this, we sat and talked a bit. She had a bandage on her head, which fit with the motif of the party, but it turns out that she actually needed it. She had slid in her own vomit the evening before, and had hit that arch that surrounds one's eye (name?) on a doorknob. Eeesh.
And the people they were very nice; attractive, too, lots of them. And what was the only thing I kept on thinking? "(sigh) I wanna go home and watch a movie or something..."
Yup, I'm getting boring. The social imperative is receding in me, and I've even declared a moratorium on being around certain people, if they are drunk, lately. The Me of A Few Years Ago never would have done that. These days, it's all about small groups of well-picked people that I already like. Boring? Hardly.
Maybe I'm just recognizing that I've already done enough partying and engaged in enough bad behavior on the high seas for two of me, at least. I've been lucky, and often very happy.
And I found this item in my notebook, circa late Nineties, titled "So How Was The Weekend?":
It started Thursday afternoon. I don't generally go on benders, but this was the beginning of one. Gretch and I started in on the Elijah Craig, and from there, it was all over. Hazel came home, and we continued drinking. Then we went to the Horsey Ass with Short for some beer and fish n' chips.
The next evening, Hazel and I sat on the fire escape, drinking whiskey and McMinimum's brews, until we both fell asleep, early.
The next morning, beer with breakfast. Then I helped Short pull his weeds. At some point, he said, "I'd like a nice, cold beer." I pointed out that we had that, and so the rest of the afternoon consisted of more fire escape action. He came back later with more beer.
We watched the mechanics of a guy who was too drunk to stand up, trying to use the pay phone. He couldn't reach the receiver from the ground, but couldn't clamber up to the point where he could both manipulate it and dial at the same time. This went on for quite some time, until our laughter, three floors above him, became audible. At that point, he looked up at us and made a grand, inclusive gesture with his arm. He asked, "Are we...To act as friends?"
This led to general laughter, and he just went back to laying on the ground, intermittently dozing.
Short left, and we went to the Handy Slut to meet Boom Boom. Tequila tonics were consumed. By this time, my reasoning was going out on me. I know I offended at least one of the Cacophony Society guys (who aren't easily offended), then we left.
Upon our arrival at the apartment building, we were forced to note that the crackhead guy on the second floor had, yet again, barricaded himself in his apartment and was screaming about how he had a gun, and a knife.
He was pounding on his door, yelling "OFFICERRR!", thinking there were cops all around his door. There was only his girlfriend, who kept pounding back, saying, "CRAIIIIG! Lemme in! I gotta peeee!" I kept hearing the crackhead say to whoever was with him in there, "Dude, you with me?"
I took my machete, so strong was my need to shut his ass up, and crawled up the fire escape. I went across the roof, came down on the third floor landing opposite my own.
There was a guy watching TV. I saw him turn around and look at me, shocked, naturally. I just held up my index finger, put it to my lips, and crawled back to my apartment. Boom Boom and Hazel had no idea I'd even been gone.
There was something in how he looked at me-standing behind him with a machete-that allowed me to see how I looked through his eyes, and therefore what a stupid action I was undertaking.
Went back in, and there was my poor fucking manager, looking like hell in his undershorts. He shook his head at the apartment ("OFFICERRR!") and said, "I can't go in there. That'd be breaking and entering. A felony! They'd put me in prison for a year!"
I don't know where he got the sentencing guidelines, or what he thought a felony was, but this whole thing was exacerbated for him by the fact that the crackhead was married to his granddaughter. I still looked at my manager and said, "Naw! Go ahead and do it!" I still just wanted some quiet.
We passed out hard that night, and woke up the next morning feeling like pure shit. When the crackhead was later escorted away by real police officers, he remarked to one of them; "I don't remember you from last time..."
Though the above is not the only story involving me drunk, wielding a machete, in general I pride myself on being the one in the crowd who isn't a liability. I can be seeing at four of you, and still maintain a coherent conversation. I still know when to remove myself from a situation. Nonetheless, it would be nice to be someone else for a little while, and as is often the case, the change comes naturally, on its own.
Besides, to study with one of the great social lions of all time, Dean Martin, it is worthy to note that it really isn't a contest, and if that's really just apple juice in a rocks glass you're drinking, it's not a shameful thing. Most people will assume that you're as drunk as they are anyway. The only barrier comes in not denying myself the honest feeling that most people are a pain in the ass when drunk (including me), and I don't like them very much. So the entertainment factor disappears past a certain point.
It's even more fun to be the only guy at the party on hallucinogens.