Bowling

So now that I'm allowing myself to drink in moderation again, I decided to do a little experiment at the bowling alley last night. I bowled 2 games with no beer, and then 2 more after drinking a 22 ounce Sam Adams.

Before Sam
90, 80

After Sam
130, 133

Sure, I changed my technique after everyone pointed out that the ball was falling out of my hand after game 2. Sure, I had 2 games of practice before games 3 and 4. Coincidence. Pure coincidence.

I'm tellin' you, they should really test professional bowlers for alcohol...it's like Popeye's spinach to the bowler.

Well...

My month long odyssey is over. I'll wax philosophical about it some other time...right now, it's time for a beer! Guess we'll see if I learned anything and can find my off switch.

Before I taste the deliciousness, let's have one last weigh-in after a disappointing week last week.

Not too shabby! Lost 2.5 pounds from last week, bringing the total for my sober month to 6.5 pounds. Pretty good, but not great. I figured out this morning that I've been treating myself to large amounts of food on Saturdays to compensate for my sobriety. A brotha's gotta get his fix somewhere, and if I can't have beer, you best believe I'm going for that big-ass burrito and some bread pudding.

Okay, off to crack a bottle of Sam's White Ale and get that old, glorious feeling. It's been to long, beer! Daddy's home.

1998

Well, it's been a few years since we left High School Panek. Clearly, he's put on a little weight!

I was pretty anxious to get out on my own, and once I realized that I didn't HAVE to go to class, could eat whatever and whenever I wanted, smoke cigarettes to my heart's content, and could just waltz into any party in town as long as I had a few bucks for the keg (I didn't even need to be on the "invite list!"), the world was my buffet.

I was a fairly mixed-up young man when I first arrived on campus- still smarting from the end of my first real relationship (she was a Brazilian exchange student, yet I thought it would somehow work out...I wasn't necessarily very bright back then). I was all set to play for the lacrosse team- I'd met with the coach during an earlier campus visit, and even made the "freshman players to watch" section of the team's program- but made a spur of the moment decision to play rugby instead. After all, rugby didn't have mandatory study hall, and one of the coaches was a co-owner of a bar downtown at which the team was occasionally treated to free beer, and that was all I needed to hear. Giddy up!

I ended up having a great time playing rugby freshman year, but ultimately got injured, had back surgery, and hung up my cleats for good. It was just as well, though, since I probably packed in a lifetime's worth of male nudity into that one year (once you've seen one "zulu warrior" or "butt chug", you don't really need to see one ever again). Besides, with no sports or physical activity of any kind holding me back, I was able to focus all of my efforts on the art of college drinking.

I met my group of good college friends- who are still my good friends to this day- toward the end of freshman year. I think we became friends so easily because, for the most part, we all looked at college the same way-the one time in life where we could party constantly with little to no consequences. We weren't really interested in doing much else- I mean, what was the point? We were all smart enough to pass our courses (with the occasional slip-up), and nothing else ever really seemed like as good of an idea as getting together, going to a party or gathering in somebody's dorm, and drinking until the sun came up.

When we got together, our drinking took on something of a mob mentality, and was usually quite legendary. As former moderately successful high school athletes, we tended to fill the void left by sports by getting REALLY competitive with drinking games, sometimes with hysterical or violent results. I met my friend Whitey when we stumbled out of different rooms at a dorm party and he yelled "I bet I can bong a beer faster than you, you pussy!" Our excessive, awesome partying- which occasionally featured crowd surfing and screaming Bon Jovi songs rewritten to feature the word "beer" 57 times- ultimately drove our head RA to resign from her post, which was something in which we took extreme pride.

By the time I moved off campus, the moderately svelte High School Panek was no more, replaced by the 260+ pounds of chewed bubble gum you see at the top of the page. I smoked about a pack of cigarettes a day, made sure the delivery guys at JD's Subs and Pizza had plenty of walking around money, and drank a solid 3-4 nights a week. Looks pretty bad out there in print, but hey- I was young, and I gotta tell you, getting that big was really fun (a lot more fun than losing the weight, that's for damn sure).

Our place was something of an "animal house"; the floors were slanted, the backyard was unkempt,and the back porch seemed to be held together with duct tape and chicken wire. This was before any of us set foot on the property. Ultimately, we ended up with a hole in the wall that was filled with meat (long story).

Regardless of our home's deplorable condition, we ended up with a pretty great party house, which was definitely helpful for me, being a chunky young lad, in my pursuit of the ladies (the fact that we served lots of alcohol helped too). The first week of school, we had a party that made the front page of the local paper, got about 20 of us cited for underage drinking, and took 7 police cars to disperse roughly 200 people. The local police weren't terribly fond of us, so we eventually took turns answering the door, with those of us who were most recently cited filing out with the crowd.

Our drinking prowess only grew as the years went on. We probably hit our absolute peak junior year, when we would each indulge in a "pre-game fifth" of Jim Beam BEFORE going out for the night. A local mini-mart sold 64 ounce bottles of Olde English and Private Stock (since discontinued), which we sometimes drank in place of the "pre-game fifth". Again, writing that out make it seem even more absurd, but it's what we actually did.

Looking back on my 4 years of college, I don't really have any regrets. Could I have been slimmer? Sure. Could I have given up smoking? I guess. But the fact that I was able to make friends with some of the greatest people on the planet by living that lifestyle made it worth every unsightly pound I ultimately had to shed and the cold sweats I ultimately had to endure by quitting smoking.

Plus, I wouldn't have seen (or heard second hand through my roomates) some of the ridiculous things I'm about to share with you:

-My buddy Zack, a gentleman who turned into the Incredible Hulk when drinking, once ripped a toilet out of the dorm bathroom after the Giants and Redskins tied 7-7, dragged it to the room where everyone was drinking, peed in it, and was arrested about 15 minutes later.

-Someone who may or may not be me, while being arrested by a large female police officer for being intoxicated in public, informed said officer that she couldn't catch me unless I had a doughnut taped to my back, and that she was "Go' have to take me!"

-Watched my roommate Seth get hogtied and tossed into a police car...on his birthday

-Zack, handcuffed to a keg, broke free from the cuffs to pimp slap Master Mike for pouring beer on him

-Jason's room in our senior year house, which had heating vents made from Chips Ahoy boxes (in retrospect, not necesssarily the safest choice), had a wall made of a large wooden plank. We learned that we could, with a running start, jump through it into his bedroom. We each did it at least once, much to Jason's dismay, including some of our girlfriends. We wanted to convince his parents to do it at our graduation...but got too drunk.

-After being caught by the head RA on the porch of Jefferson Hall, drinking 40's of OE (shirtless) on a couch we dragged outside, Whitey and I proceeded to spend 30 minutes in his office trying to convince him that we weren't doing anything wrong and that he should "just look the other way". Whitey still has a copy of the incident report (if you read this, send me a scanned copy!)

There are a lot more, some of which I recall and some which I do not. If you went to school with me, feel free to share!

Do I Feel Funny?

So Michelle emailed me today and asked if I wanted to go out to dinner tonight. It sounded like an excellent idea, so we decided to go to Carlyle in Shirlington.

I happened to glance at my desktop calendar, and noticed that it was April 21st. I tried to think back to the exact date when I had my last alcoholic beverage, and- lo and behold- it was March 21st!

Now, I planned to wait until this Saturday to tickle my liver with the sweet, sweet nectar of the gods, but hey- I think I proved my point. It's been exactly one month, so I think it's about time to treat myself. In a way, I think it's a good thing that I didn't even notice that my month had come and gone. Yeah, that's my story and I'm sticking to it...

SO, I rocked 2 glasses of wine with dinner. They were awesome. Don't you judge me!

The wine was delicious, thank you very much, and on the way home I realized I felt a little tipsy. Looks like my tolerance went bye-bye. Ordinarily, after having wine with dinner, I'd come home and polish off a couple beers- I am happy to report that I was able to cut myself off.*

*I purposely kept the beer in the pantry to prepare for this possibility. I know myself pretty well!

Anyway, I feel like the fact that I only had 2 glasses of wine, still got to experience a silly little buzz, and didn't come home and indulge my drunk tooth shows that I may be on the right track.

PS- I still feel funny! How the hell did I go this long?!

Leveling Off

So I didn't lose any weight this week, which frustrates me like a summamabitch.

After all, I've temporarily embraced the sober lifestyle, so where's the instant gratification? I worked out 5 days this week, ate reasonably well and resisted temptation, and yet I was greeted by a big, fat 236.0 yesterday morning.

What makes this all the more frustrating is the fact that the last time I lost a significant amount of weight, I drank pretty much the entire time. I cut out the heavy stuff like Belgian beers and strong microbrews and skipped a lot of Friday happy hours, but you best believe I filled my cup with some potent vodka cocktails every Saturday.

Could it be possible that drinking helped me lose weight last year? Should I make a beeline for the ABC Sto' and get my Goose on? While that would be the most practical solution, I suppose I'll borrow a page from Obama's playbook and go "line by line" through my food budget and workout program and pledge to cut out some delicious, fatty pork. I guess I could also go and get my bike fixed, seeing that cycling helped me drop tonnage more than anything I did last year. Behold, my amazing powers of deduction!

So after the scale dropped that bombshell on me, Michelle and I went to Charlottesville for the day to walk around downtown, check out Monticello- or as I call it "home of the original baby daddy", and have dinner with her friend Elizabeth. We ducked into a bar when we first got to town to watch game 2 of the Rangers/Capitals series, which turned out to be a bad decision. The Capitals, despite the strong goaltending effort put forth by 20 year old rookie phenom Simeon "The Iron Curtain" Varlamov, lost to the Rags 1-0, putting them in a 2-0 hole in the series heading to New York for game 3. Not looking good, gentlemen. Not looking good at all. Just what is "Let's Go Goats" supposed to do all summer? Just what the heck is he supposed to do???

To make matters worse, I was tempted to order a beer more than any point during my challenge. I'm not sure if it was the 70 degree weather, the frustration of watching shot after shot richochet off of "King Henrik" Lundqvist's gargantuan pads, the stress of my epic "fail on the scale", the sight of Michelle enjoying her Sam Adams Summer Ale, or the fact that there was a little blue Chimay bottle amongst the choices atop the bar whispering "drink me". It was probably a combination of all 3. Whatever the reason, it was the urge I thought I would experience a lot more this month, telling me to give in.

Luckily, as quickly as it came, my urge to wet the whistle sailed away through the open door as I sipped my ginger ale.

The rest of the trip was great- we got to see TJ's freeky-deeky jungle fever love den (his bed was pretty small- he must have been flexible), had some delicious pork tacos with some insanely hot hot sauce, and made it home by midnight. Gonna have to do some serious work in the gym this week, because...brace yourselves...I only have 1 week left! Guess we'll find out if I learned anything.

PS- "College Panek" bio coming the next couple days. Got a bit tied up on my day off on Friday being all productive and shit.

Let's Go Goats!

So I went to the first game of the Caps/Rangers playoff series last night, and I'm beginning to think that fate wants me to drink.

After all, I was the only one at dinner last weekend who got a shitty meal and receive an incorrect bill, and the Caps, who took 7 out of a possible 8 points in the regular season series, decided to throw up a stinker to kick off the series, thanks to Jose "Three-Or-More" allowing some fairly questionable goals (see below) with my sober ass in attendance.

Eh, whatever- I'm sure it's just a coincidence. After all, judging by the wait staff, I probably wasn't the only person who got a jacked up bill. Plus, there were about 20,000 other people who saw the same game as I did last night- and many of them were definitely NOT abstaining from alcohol.

Now, I usually behave myself at Caps games, with a few exceptions where I may have been a beligerant drunken lunatic. Generally speaking, though, I'll enjoy 3-5 beers, "rock the red", cheer for Ovie and the boys, and head home, so being sober at the game last night wasn't really that much of a stretch. However, the combination of my sobriety and the fact that last night's game was the beginning of the playoffs, which definitely takes the intensity (and inebriation) at the Verizon Center up a notch, certainly made the drunken antics around me stand out a good bit more than usual.

I've probably been to about 6-7 Caps games this year, and never saw anyone ejected from the arena. Last night, I saw a group of screaming, ornery Rags fans bounced after 1 period. During the second intermission, I saw a 50-something gentleman in an Ovechkin jersey, waiting in line for the bathroom, execute a perfect "hip check" on a passing Ranger fan- probably in his mid 20's. Nearly knocked the him off his feet! The Rags fan and his buddy- from the look of them a couple of hardscrabble Ney Yawkas- were not amused. I thought for sure that a fight was gonna break out, but the 2 Youts decided it wasn't worth it (I think the one guy said "You're lucky you're old as fuck!).

In other words, playoff hockey + beer = fun!

So Tommy has a pair of season tickets, so I've gone with him to enough games where I'm pretty familiar with the section regulars. There's "Asian Sam Kinison", a chubby 20-something dude who sits a row behind us who, until the first time I turned around, I thought from the sound of his voice was going to be a red-faced 50 year old man. There's a fairly normal couple- the chick's got a bit of a Lisa Loeb vibe goin' on, and the dude always wears a green hat.

Then there's "Let's Go Goats"...

The guy who sits a couple seats down from us is a giant grizzly bear of a man. From his appearance, he's probably in his 40's, with a goatee, beady eyes and a red Caps jersey with no name. No matter what day of the week the Caps play, this guy is double-fisting beers. He polishes them off, 2 at a time, and before we even realize it, he's back with 2 more. At 7 bucks a beer, 41 home games, and probably about 6-8 beers a game- you can imagine how much this wildebeast spends on beers during a typical Caps season. A few more seasons of this guy and Ted Leonsis can buy the Nats!

So about halfway through the game, this guy starts going ballistic. It generally doesn't really matter if the Caps are winning- he's going ape shit about some percieved slight against the Caps. His rallying cry of "LET'S GO CAAAAAPS!" becomes so garbled that Tom pointed out that it sounds like "LET'S GO GGGOAAAATS!!!" I just marvel at how consistent he is- the guy does the EXACT same thing at prety much every game I've attended.

Last night, however, he managed to top himself. We thought it was strange that he rolled in with a large cola...until we noticed that he was drunker than usual. There was definitely some bourbon in that bad boy. As soon as the Coke was gone, the usual double fisting and "LET'S GO GOATS!!!" chants started up. By the time the game was over, Goats wasn't even speaking English. Once it became apparent the Caps were going to drop game 1, he kept turning to the people behind him and speaking jibberish- something to the effect of "Theze peeeeple, I hate 'em...just gotta be like me....I gotta hate em..."

The funny thing is, I bet Let's Go Goats is some kind of important executive who opts to sit in cheaper seats and spend the difference on thousands of beers.

Before I go, here's Alex Ovechkin attempting to sing the "Eastern Motors" jingle.

Without A Net

When contemplating my weekend, I came to the conculsion that going to a bar sober is, in a way, like walking a tightrope without a net.

 

What's that you say?  Take my fruity metaphors and stick them where?  Well, fuck you!

 

I'm not sure about anyone else, but when I get banged up, I am capable of doing some crazy shit.  Not bat-shit crazy, retardedly violent crazy, or creepy crazy- just crazy in the sense that, if done sober, my actions may raise a few eyebrows.  Some examples include dancing on tables, doing "the worm" at wedding receptions (well, I've done that sober ,so maybe that's a bad example), leading the bar in some sort of chant or sing-a-long, or doing an impromptu jam session with the band at my 5 year high school reunion.  Basically anything that makes me the center of attention- occasionally having fun at other people's expense- but probably wouldn't get me arrested (the upcoming "College Panek" section will address the rare exception). 

Being at the bar sober on Saturday, I didn't have a strong urge to draw much attention to myself.  I was content to relax in the corner seat of our booth and watch the drunken comedy unfold before me.  However, as the night rolled on, I thought to myself "If I were to start dancing on a table right now, or tried to get everyone singing along to "Shipping Up To Boston", everyone I came with would think I'm actually a crazy person."  Would that be so bad?  Well, no- not really.  I've never really been that concerned about what other people think of me (sometimes to Michelle's dismay), so why not draw a little attention to myself?  I busted out some dance moves on Saturday, which was just as fun as drunken dancing (although my drunk moves were probably a little better), so next time I go out without the drank stripping away my inhibitions, I think I'm going to act up a little more and see what it's like.  One of the points of this little exercise (which I keep adding as I go...it's my perrogative!) was to prove to myself that I could still have fun and go out with my friends when not under the influence.

 

Even though I had a good time, It was a little unsettling that I didn't have the excuse "I was drunk" to fall back on in case I managed to piss someone off.   

 

However insignificant it might seem, it was always in the very back of my mind- after all, I've been at the same routine for 10 years now.  While I think it's a legitimate excuse to explain away silly behavior such as accidentally spilling beer on somebody's shirt, telling a story really loudly over and over again (guilty as charged!), or making a comment without thinking that someone takes the wrong way, I don't believe that being drunk allows one to write a blank check for mayhem.  After all, the reason I (and most people I know) drink is to make myself feel funny, become a bit less coordinated, and reduce my inibitions to the point where I want to cause a mild scene- not become a menace to society.   A little spillage and the occasional loud or off-color remark come with the territory.   Still, after taking a step back, I guess I should probably either use that excuse a little less when I return to the realm of boozy pleasures, or try not to be quite as much of a buffoon.

 

Granted, being sober probably eliminates 99 percent of the silly crap I do at bars that might unintentionally annoy my friends, but it's still hard to get used to not having that one multi-purpose excuse to explain away any and all transgressions- walking that tightrope without a net.   After all, old habits die hard.  I guess I'll just have to take more responsibility for my actions like a sucker!

 

 

 

 

Herdin' Cats

So, last night was aight. I managed to have a good time without drinking...at a bar; something I wouldn't have thought possible before I began this sobering spiritual odyssey. My patience was tried on a few occasions, for sure, but I'm happy to report that I was able to look past the legion of annoying drunkards and layer of cigarette smoke and have a good time with my friends.

Started the day at Carpool, which I figured would be a good bar to ease me into my sober barhopping adventure, since playing pool and shooting at cyber-deer with a fake plastic shotgun would help fill the void left by barley and hops. I met up with Jimmy, John, Natasha and her friend whose name eludes me at the moment...I know it starts with an L (apparently I'm forgettful when sober too) to celebrate Jimmy's birthday. Since we decided to meet up at 3 pm because Jimmy had to be up early in the morning, the bar was pretty empty, and the lack of a drunken horde bumping into me was much appreciated.

The afternoon went pretty well, since I pretty much played pool and "Big Buck Hunter" constantly, but the first thing I noticed was that sober bar time moves about twice as slowly as drunken bar time. I'd get through a few games of pool, talk to the group, and when I checked my watch only 20 minutes had gone by since the last time I checked. Weird.

Another thing that really weirded me out happened after about 2 hours at Carpool. Michelle, Becky and Stan showed up, and Stan and I started a game of pool. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a fairly creepy looking old man standing about 5 feet away from our table...staring at us. I tried to ignore him and carry on with the game, but every 5 minutes or so I'd look up and he'd still be there. He must have stood in the same spot, for a solid 30 minutes, just staring at our pool table. I'm not really sure why he was staring, since we aren't terribly good or bad at pool, but it was really bizarre.

I'm sure I would have been just as weirded out by the wacky, elderly pool afficianad had I been intoxicated. The only difference, as far as I can tell, is that Drunk Panek may have asked him if he wanted to play a game and asked him some probing questions to determine the source of his weirdness. Chalk one up for Sober Panek, since by the look of him, he'd have probably said some really weird shit.

Oh, and for the record, being sober didn't really affect my pool game at all. In fact, I was consistently better than when I played drunk- maybe a little worse than the height of my "drunk zone", but overall much better sober. Guess it's back to the drawing board on that one.

So we left the gang at Carpool and headed to dinner at 7, and met the rest of our dinner party at Caribbean Breeze, the cheezy looking-yet surprisingly good restaurant/cheezy night club. Nobody was drunk at this point, but the drinks were definitely flowing. I was tempted to snag Michelle's mojito, take it to the head, and suck the remaining goodness out of the sugarcane stick...but resisted once my delicious pomegranate iced tea showed up.

I'm not sure what the good Lord was trying to tell me at dinner, but for some reason I was the only one who had a bad experience. My food came out cold, didn't taste a hell of a lot better once it came out of the microwave, I got charged for an alcoholic beverage which I didn't consume, and my stomach started doing backflips shortly after we left. Everyone with delicious margaritas, mojitos, cervezas, and capirinhas got delicious entrees, and their checks were added correctly. I'm going to assume that my particularly outstanding pomegranate iced tea was meant to show me that my trials, albeit difficult at times will ultimately have positive results.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

So, we hopped in the car and headed over to Whitlow's to see "Back To Zero", the band that played at Stan and Becky's wedding that was really awesome. Too bad Stan's German relatives couldn't join them for an impromptu accordion session like they did at the wedding! EINS, ZWEI, STUFFE!!!!!

I paid my and Michelle's cover and we walked in, meeting up with everyone and getting a spot at the bar, which was pretty crowded at this point. One of the aspects of the bar scene that I find especially annoying is constantly being bumped by people who are unaware of their surroundings, so it came to no surprise that within 5 minutes of walking in some big galoot bumped into me, lurching forward to bump into Michelle- never breaking stride when telling his buddies some story that was evidentally the most hilarious story ever told. From one galloot to another, I must say that was poor galloot ettiquite.

Much like the pomegranate iced tea saved dinner, a booth opened up and saved my Whitlow's experience. Despite the fact that the bouncers told us that the booths were reserved for the "dinner crowd" for another 45 minutes, I wasn't going to be denied. I sat at that booth for the rest of the night, while people came and went, and watched the night unfold before my eyes. I could see the drinks working their magic with my "enhanced" powers of sober perception, all the while taking notes on my cellphone notepad (probably looked like a tool, but almost everyone else was drunk, so they probably didn't even notice!)

Without further ado, my notes-

-Jimmy slapped my ass about 10 times at Carpool, yelling "GOOD GAME!"
-I checked my watch about twice as many times than I would sober
-I shot at the wrong ball in a pool game, something I do a lot drunk. Apparently I can be fairly absent minded without the help of alcohol.
-A young lady tried to stand up, fell back down, her shirt fell down (luckily for her she was wearing a bra), and she was then carried out of the bar by a chivalrous (hopefully) young gentleman
-Was educated about a sexual position known as the "Eiffel Tower"
-Another young lady walked up to a guy and yelled "That's not your beer!", switched beers with him, and walked away. From the look of it, the dude had never seen her before in his life. I wonder if she thought he roofie'd her drink?
-I got charged 3.00 for a coke! Way to promote designated driving, Whitlow's!
-A guy outside karate kicked a tree about 10 times! That tree must have wronged him in some terrible way. I can't really talk, seeing that I've taken my drunken anger out on inanimate objects before; they're easy targets.
-Being a big galloot, I stumbled into a group of people...totally sober. I apologized and went on my way.
-I made a point to get my dance on to see if it was still awesome without beer. It was.

11:51- Everybody's drunk! Everybody's talking really loudly!!!
11:53- Stanley purchases first round of Jager shots
12:02- Stan, Becky and "the other Michelle" are in a big group hug. The group hug is moving from the bar to the table!
12:10- Stan tries to give "the other Michelle's" boyfriend 2 dollars to buy 4 shots of Jager
12:11- Rejected, Stan went to the bar and harrassed the gentleman sitting next to him with a plastic M&M., which the guy eventually bitchslapped across the bar. I stood between them so Stan could buy the 4 shots on his credit card
12:12- Everyone else had gone home, so Stan had to do 2 of the 4 shots. I decided it was time to go
12:30- Finally managed to corral everyone and get them to the car. Wasn't easy!

All and all, I had a really good time, despite having to do a little "cat herding" at the end of the night (our vases nearly met their untimely end!). I noticed a lot of strange and hilarious things that I wouldn't normally notice under the influence, and was pleased to find out that I could actually have a good, sober time at a bar. Drunk people are a hilarious, emotional, and occasionally surly bunch, and I look forward to rejoining their ranks...just on a slightly less regular basis. At least now I know that being on the other side sometimes isn't so bad.

I'll have to find out how the rest of Jimmy's night (and this morning) went, snce his car was still at Carpool when we left for Whitlow's. Hopefully someone was there to take notes!

Saturday

Getting ready to head out for lunch and then my marathon of non-drinking barhopping. Hopefully I won't go too crazy, come back with some good stories and funny observations, and none of my friends turn into blithering idiots! At some point I really need to invest in a blackberry so I can do some live blogging...maybe I'll grab one with some of my bar tab savings.

Had my weekly weigh-in-

Wasn't terrible, wasn't great,
but it's less than last week, so I don't really give a heck.

Dreams

One benefit of my drinking hiatus that I'm really starting to enjoy is having a normal sleep cycle.  I figured this would be one of the perks when I placed myself on leave from the weekend wars, but I had no idea that I would experience such a dramatic difference so quickly. 

 

I'm not sure when it started, but at some point my weeks began to fall into a distinct pattern; drink a little on Friday, drink a lot on Saturday, recover all day Sunday, toss, turn, sweat (occasionally have nightmares) while getting maybe 4-5 hours of actual sleep on Sunday night, sleepwalk through Monday, feel moderately normal and occasionally struggle to fall asleep on Tuesday, and spend Wednesday through Friday afternoon feeling 100 percent.

 

Lather, rinse, repeat...

 

 

Since I somehow allowed that routine to became such a part of my life, I was never really able to step back and realize how absurd it was to constantly put myself through the ringer like that.  What really hit home was how easy it's been for me to sleep now that I've been walking the straight and narrow path of the Shirley Temple. 

 

Not only have I been regularly having nights of uninterrupted sleep, starting roughly a week into my challenge, but I've also been having really vivid, mostly awesome dreams.  I even had a dream last night in which I was drunk!  How weird is that shit?!  I was riding the metro home with my buddy Will at about 2am, and, as I've done so many times, decided to serenade my fellow passengers with a song and dance routine.  I broke into a classic from "Rob and Big" by Rob's alter ego, the one-hit wonder R&B sensation "Bobby Light", called "Dirty Girl", and had the train clapping along to the beat.  Suddenly, 2 large black gentlemen with big bushy beards approached me.  They rolled right up on me, which was a little intimidating since they were both easily 350 pounds.  They removed their beards to reveal they were none other than Christopher "Big Black" Boykin and his buddy Bam Bam.  I wasn't sure how they'd react to my rendition of "Dirty Girl", since they co-wrote the song and rap on the track, but they immediately joined in and finished the song in style, dancing and booty-shakin' up and down the aisle. 

 

Freakin' sweet!

 

I was thinking about my recent run of good dreams, and the only thing I can come up with is that they're my body's way of thanking me for giving it a break!  I buy that explanation just as much as any physiological evidence.

 

I'm going to be nicer to my body from now on...it may be funny looking, a little too hairy, and rather pasty, but it's the only one I've got.  I may run a few pints through it from time to time after this is over, but I'm only going to be a "Weekend National Guard Reservist" after a 13 year tour as a weekend warrior*

 

*with the occasional call-up for "active duty"

 

 

-Sent from my Gmail account

Field Work

Well, the alcoholic challenge is progressing well; the weight's starting to come off, I haven't had any "Leaving Las Vegas" moments where I woke up shaking on the kitchen floor with only a bottle of vodka in the refrigerator (not that I've ever had one, but this is the first time I've deprived myself of alcohol for this long, so we're kind of in uncharted territory), and I've had a generally positive experience in my temporarily sober state.

To that end, I'll be embarking on my latest mission to test my mettle this weekend; sober barhopping.

Sounds ridiculous, I know, and I'd be lying if I wasn't a tad apprehensive about the prospect of going to several different bars, packed with drunk people who want to stumble into me and enough alcohol to take down John Daly, beckoning to me to break my vow of beer celibacy. Plus, we'll be entertaining some houseguests this weekend, including Stan- who just so happens to be ridiculously fun to drink with and has a penchant for ordering rounds of Jager shots before anybody has a chance to object.

If you'd have asked me to consider sober barhopping under these conditions 3 weeks ago, I'd have almost certainly given you the gasface. After going a few weeks without drinking, though, I really doubt it will be that bad. I am actually really looking forward to it, despite the fact that I'll be playing the role typically reserved for my friends' pregnant wives- the desingated driver (whaaaat?)

My first real extended sober foray into the bar scene will definitely be interesting. I'm looking at it as something like an expedition- "field work", if you will. I'll do my best to provide an account of how my evening progresses- the good times, the annoying times, the cravings, whether sobriety adversely affects my pool game as badly as it affected my bowling...anything and everything the the night has in store for me (with names falsified to protect the intoxicated).

I hope to return to you with my alcoho-abstinence vow (and my sanity) in tact!

Classic

This clip from the film Beerfest, in my humble opinion, epitomizes the dichotomy of what goes on in a drunk person's head versus what's actually going on like none other.

Enjoy.

Noise

So I hit up Clyde's to meet some of my former co-workers last night...at happy hour. I stared temptation smack in the face, and I'm proud to say that my chastity belt remained in tact. I was actually more tempted by a really fruity looking key lime martini looking thing one of the ladies was drinking than the beer; I seem to be learning more about myself in my alcohol deprived state than I care to find out...

Anyway, I had a good time, but was definitely more aware of some of the more annoying aspects of the bar scene. I definitely noticed the smoke in the air more without drinking (good work on getting that taken care of in 2010, VA legislature), and I definitely noticed the noise a LOT more.

I've never really been able to hear myself think at a vast majority of bars, but it never really mattered, since I have selective hearing when I'm under the influence, and I tend to talk about 5 times louder than I normally would. Last night, though, I couldn't block out the noise, which was annoying because I actually wanted to hear what everybody was saying.

Weird.

Ok, so it's time to see if this madness is having any beneficial effects on my body. And the scale says...

Okay- that's better! Dropped 3 pounds in the first week. Not bad- I felt like my belly was jiggling a bit less this week.

1994-95

The 90’s-

The glorious Clinton years were in full swing, Toby Bailey, Ed O’Bannon and the UCLA Bruins cut down the nets, Steve Young finally got that monkey off his back and won the Super Bowl, Ace Of Base was taking America by storm with their techno-infused Swedish beats (I admit it, I had the album)….

And, in the heart of Westminster, Maryland, an 17 year-old Panek got drunk for the first time.

To the casual observer, it wasn’t terribly noteworthy; I went to a party, drank 4 Keystone Lights, threw up on my shoes, smoked 3 Swisher Sweet cigarillos, and woke up on a pile of blankets on the living room floor.

It was also the greatest night of my 17 year old life.

I spent the early part of high school basically picking up where I left off in middle school; pissing my teachers off with my grating yet witty sense of humor, telling dick jokes with my friends, and wondering just how the hell I was ever going to ever get invited to a party or touch my first boob.

Junior year was another matter, though, and I finally got invited to one of these huge parties I had heard so much about. Years of painstakingly making friends with people who knew people had finally paid off! So, I abandoned my closest friends who didn’t get the invite (I later found out that they almost called the police and had the party busted, but decided to spare me at the last minute…if they did, I’d have totally deserved it!) and riding out to the party with some of my lacrosse teammates.

I don’t really remember much from that night, on account of the fact that I was drunk back then and am currently old as fuck. I know they actually had an “invite list”- as if a gathering of drunken high school kids in Carroll County was Studio Fucking 54- and that I was somehow on it. “Friends in Low Places” and “The Thunder Rolls” by Garth Brooks were on a constant loop all night, I’m pretty sure I remember some dick from the football team wanting to beat me up for bumping into him, and, as I mentioned before, I painted my shoes with Keystone.

A funny thing happened that night, though. After cleaning my shoes and composing myself, I realized that being drunk is fucking awesome.

I cracked jokes and smoked cigars with people that would normally never give me the time of day, grabbed girls and danced with them in the living room (during the rare times when somebody put on something other than Garth Brooks), and felt pretty invincible until I passed out in the living room. I decided then and there that I was going to go to a party every weekend for the rest of my high school career. *
*Didn’t go to another party for 3 months

One thing I can say with certainty is that going to that party definitely changed my life.
I made several friends that night with whom I still keep in touch, finally got to touch a boob (it was awesome), and realized that all of my years of being a class clown made me an absolute hit at parties. For the rest of high school (and to some degree, to this very day), I took pride in being the center of attention at every party I attended. If I wasn’t phoning local businesses impersonating different “Jerky Boy” voices, I was breaking out some crazy dance moves or trying to break the world beer bong speed record…and loving every minute of it.

And thus, being the life of the party became young Panek’s way of life...

Random facts about high school Panek:
-Smoked Marlboro Lights, as did about 90 percent of teenage boys in Westminster
-Owned CDs by Hootie and the Blowfish, Seven Mary Three, and Silverchair (I really thought they'd be around forever!)
-Once was tricked into smoking catnip from a corncob pipe by my friends, who told me it was marijuana. They told me the truth only after I started to act stoned.
-Had 2 earrings in my left ear (one on the top)
-Once stood up in the middle of 11th grade American History and yelled “I’LL ROCK YOUR WORLD” at the girl with the best grades in the class after correctly answering a question she didn’t know

Well, hope you enjoyed part 1 in the series.

Coming soon….
College Panek!

1980

How it all began...