For some reason, whenever I hang out with either Ian or Joe, something out-of-the-ordinary always happens. Last time Ian was home was during New Years and we drove up to NYC for Chris' New Years Party. To make a long story short, Ian and I turned the 5 minute walk from the PATH station to 7 Star Pizzeria into a hour long sojourn through Hoboken, asking 3 or 4 separate groups for directions (getting even more lost), and only finding our way to the pizza joint when a cop informed us that we were only two blocks away (much to our surprise) from our desired destination. All in all it was worth it, as any person that has ever eaten at 7 Star, or "Al-Qaeda Pizza" as it is commonly referred to in Hoboken, at 4 am can attest. Anyway I digress.....
So last night Joe and I headed over to Quagmires, a bar on Shore Road, with a thirst for beer and a desire to meet some hot bitches on vacation that we would never have to see again. Somewhere between our first and second round of drinks, while standing on the outside patio, we noticed a commotion coming from inside the bar and all of a sudden a bouncer and waitress burst through the crowd half-carrying a 30-something woman who looked like she had had a little too much booze (if there is such a thing). They set her on a chair and she started coughing loudly, a precursor to upchucking. Me and Joe made eye contact, rolled our eyes, and plugged our noses in expectation of the nauseating smell that we were bracing for. Instead of puking, however, the woman appeared to lose consciousness and fell to the floor. All of sudden 4 or 5 more bar staff came running out and one of the bartenders began administering CPR. The woman wasn't sick from drinking like we had assumed, but instead was in the midst of a severe asthma attack. For a few minutes, while the ambulance was on the way, there was a palpable air of panic as nobody seemed to know exactly what to do. Thankfully, either through ability or sheer luck, the woman began breathing again, but with great difficulty. By this point a lone policeman had shown up, but he appeared completely out of his element, and his only contribution to the episode was shining his flashlight all over the place for a reason unknown to anyone but himself. There aren't too many buzz-killers that are on the level of almost watching somebody die, so Joe and I finished our drinks and moved on to Sundown to meet up with some of his friends from work. The last I saw, the woman was being tended to by the paramedics and was actually sitting up so I'm pretty sure that she made it through the incident totally freaked out and probably a little embarrassed, but physically unscathed for the most part.
As we walked out of the bar, there was a running, unattended ambulance and police cruiser in the parking lot, and for a moment I envisioned having a Grand Theft Auto San Andreas type experience, driving through Kitty Hawk in the ambulance wreaking havoc by running over prostitutes and capping rival gang bangers who had murdered my family. That thought, however, was quickly pushed aside and replaced by a desire to get naked, pick up some hot bitches, open a case of beer and pretend that I was Tweeter from Varsity Blues, cruising around town in a patol car without a care in my mind. You gotta love pipe dreams that have absolutely no chance of coming true, unless I want to forget my future law career in lieu of spending a lot of time in a 12 x 12 cell. Ah to dream.....
Still having the urge to drink we made our way over to Sundowns and met up with several of Joe's work buddies. Whereas Quagmires was filled with vacationing students and young professionals, Sundowns was filled mostly with townies who enjoy spending their evenings drinking beer and singing karaoke, a concept completely foreign and repulsing to me. I mean who doesn't want to get drunk, go on stage in front of a group of strangers and make a complete ass of yourself?!?! Fortunately the bar had a back room with several pool tables so we were able to escape the madness of the karaoke room and enjoy a few rounds of Miller Lite. Fitting in with the mostly townie-esque crowd was our tattooed waitress that managed to forget more of our orders than she actually brought. After one of the episodes in which she brought 4 beers, but forget to bring a fifth, Joe turned to me and whispered something about how she had had too much coke prior to, or during, her shift. My quick-witted and deft retort was that there was no way that an incompetent waitress could afford coke and was likely on crack instead. All in all it was a good night, but it was not to end yet....
Joe and I had a cold bottle of Skyy awaiting us in his freezer, so when we got home we poured some drinks and sat down on the porch and drank and reminisced until 4 am. We talked about the good old days in Fred Vegas; about the summer between junior and senior year when me, Ian, and Joe lived in Fred Vegas and took classes at Mary Wash. A summer that we agreed, with an air of longing, was the best of our lives. We laughed about all the times that Ian fell asleep while drunk, whether while reading a book (we have pictures), playing X-Box, or on the couch at Charles and Hawk holding a full beer in his hand which he promptly spilled all over himself. We even called Katy, who is moving to Alexandria in February so I have to change my cell phone number (just kidding Katy), in NYC at 3 am so that Joe could try to make some inroads in his attempt to hook up with one of her recently single best friends (who shall remain nameless), and so that I could tell Katy that I was still mad at her for not coming through on a promise to bring me and Ian chips late one night senior year while we were boozing and had no way of getting ourselves to 7-11. The conversation made me think of all the good times we all shared at Mary Wash and how hard it is to get everyone together to make new memories. But it's nights like last night that you remember for years to come and talk about over a drink. In a few years when we're all hanging out, the events of last night will be talked about again, and will say, "Do you remember that time in Duck when that lady passed out and almost died from asthma???"
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