Valuable Lessons

Or, Things I Learned This Weekend:

• Friday night is the unofficial "Get into a minor accident on Route 1 to tie up traffic" night in Boston.
• The Rick and the Sue are some of the best adoptive parents I have.
• Do NOT allow Embree out of the bullpen. Keep him penned. Christ.
• Removing curtains, vacuuming and dusting is good cardio.
• Do NOT buy heinous prom dresses on automatic markdown at Filene's Basement. If you do, make sure there are no zippers to get stuck in the half-zipped position, making a sport for three other people of trying to force the zipper without pinching the delicate fat roll on the side of the stomach while you refrain from breathing for five minutes.
• Purple and green eyeshadow is heinous.
• A good smoky eye is faboo.
• Under no circumstances, do NOT compare your physique with that of your friend's brother's girlfriend's. You will not like the results.
• Pink Chuck Taylors go with all manner of formal wear, especially when dress (pinned closed with safety pins) is yellow and coral in color.
• Do NOT double-fist Corona with pineapple slices marinated in vodka.
• Do NOT tire of bobbing for pineapple slices in a cup of vodka, say, "Eh, fuck it" and grab a spoon and lap it up in two minutes.
• Do NOT try to match a large man named Butch drink for drink. (This lesson has been learned on several different weekends, but usually the lapses in consciousness make it easy to forget.)
• Do sing loudly and off-key when your friend's brother's girlfriend's birthday cake is presented. Pray she will instantly gain a fat roll from sniffing the cake so she too will have difficulty fitting into her dress.
• Do NOT become the backup dancer for the Rick while he is singing "Build me Up, Buttercup." It requires the great physical dexterity and lack of awareness of the pain receptors in the muscles.
• Do NOT allow yourself near the Sue if you're going to make a drunk ass of yourself. If you do, pull the film from the camera before she makes a scrapbook titled "Drunken Debauchery 2005."
• Do NOT accept the beer Butch hands you. Do NOT.
• Do NOT accept the gin and tonic Butch hands you.
• Chaser is of no help to anyone.
  
• Do NOT accept the rum and coke Butch hands you.
• Do NOT attempt the basic swing steps while an old man named Bill is around. He will show your ass up.
• Do attempt the booty bump with Jen and Carolyn's grandma. She's good at it.
• Do NOT get another beer out of the cooler.
• Do take as many posed prom pictures as possible.
• Do sing "Only the Good Die Young" with your former Catholic schoolgirl friends, even though you are a public school heathen.
• Do NOT check your voicemail at 1am, stumbling around the driveway, and try to get any meaning from the messages.
• Do NOT allow yourself to eat Wendy's at 1:30am. Around 4am you will wake up in a world of intestinal pain.
• Have a loud discussion about dating with your friend's parents in the car.
  
• Staring at the television while trying desperately to rouse yourself to a state of awareness that allows you to operate a motor vehicle is fun. Unless it's the NFL draft. Then it sucks.
• Omelets rule.
• As do blueberry muffins and a sea of hazelnut iced coffee.
• Know you may be having some problems when you describe your prior evening to a seven year old and she says "You didn't get any sleep at all. You're crazy."
• Do NOT throw a ball at Big Papi's head.
• Do NOT fuck with Trot Nixon. He will mess you up just by looking at you.
• Do go to bed at 9:30, praying for an uninterrupted night's sleep.
• Wake up on Monday, wondering what in the hell happened to your weekend.