One of my favorite things ever, seriously....

Ok, you know I love kids, and dancing, and blah blah blah.

But what the world really needs is more little guys like Seth. Seriously.

Click on his name, watch the video, and prepare for your mind to be blown.

Oh, and the temptation will likely be strong to watch the "Party in my Tummy" related video on the side. Buddha gave in to such temptation, then told me to watch it. It is scary. Be careful, and view it at your own risk.

I do not think that my children will watch much Yo Gabba Gabba.

Ok, they might. It's kinda weird, and I love weird. Plus, I don't think that anything that I raise really has a chance of turning out normal. Anyone met Refugio? Puh-lease!

Hope everyone had a great Christmas. I'll be blogging about that, soon.... And finishing up that one I started on 12/7. Tomorrow (well, technically today), I am going to Madison, and my mom is coming to Milwaukee on Thursday, so there will be a chance for new material coming soon as well!

Sneaky Vulture Tricks, Volume III

I'd like to start this blog out with one of my new favorite quotes.... It's from the Raccoon Whisperer, about me.

"The notion that someone could keep you in line is absurd. They'll find bigfoot first."

Love it. I think I need a t-shirt that says that.

Anyway.

Apparently, I have no blogged in awhile. The other morning, I got an email from my mom that said "Good morning. November 24th, Really? Love, Mom."

The next day, I got a gchat message from the Prince that said "I know I've been slacking on emailing, but I also noticed that you've been slacking on blogging."

Bru-tal. If the prince and my mom are demanding blogging, I suppose I had better get to it!

That said, it has been a long time since I've touched upon the topic of vultures.

Firstly, I'd like to share that there is a new species in town. Not exactly in the bird fam, but a parasite nonetheless.

I'm talking about cockroaches.

Cockroaches are individuals that scurry about in odd and frenetic manners. Of course, this was written with a certain individual in mind, but since his status as a cockroach was discovered, we've noticed cockroach-like tendencies in other individuals.

If you haven't already, you really need to read Sneaky Vulture Tricks Volume I and Sneaky Vulture Tricks Volume II.

The worst type of vulture, the velociraptor, or king of the vultures, is even worse if he has cockroach blood in him. That makes him much more likely to partake in the first vulture trick on the list.

Anyway, there is something that will soon be in my repertoire, and I can almost not wait for it to flourish. That is the VV or vulture violation. Vultures will be given citations for using the sneaky tricks. It's still in development. I am looking forward to handing the first one out, and I think I know who will get it!

Swoop swoop.

I also want to remind my readership that when a good-intentioned man does these things (well, before most of volume 3.... volume 3 is pretty much pure heinosity), it's glorious. But when a vulture does them, it is straight shitttttaaaay!

Without further ado....

22. Being cute, nice, or friendly to our friends. "Oh, I am in love with your friend, make sure you take care of her." Shut up. You are not. You are a fricking vulture. Don't use my friends to get me to fall helplessly prey to your damn charms? Get out of my father's Lexus (my father does not have a Lexus, but one time whilst shopping, LL heard an interesting man say "get out of my father's Lexus" to another guy in a story about failing his driver's test. Hi-larious. Had to steal it.).

Numbers 23-25 are all in a separate sub-category I like to call "secret women."

23. Having a girlfriend. What in hell? If you have a girlfriend, why are you talking to me? Are you so amazing and so much to handle that you have to have more than one woman? I doubt it. If you want me, get rid of her first. I shouldn't have people giving me shirts that say "I'm his mistress" because of the way that I've been attracting boys with girlfriends almost exclusively for over a year. What in hell, I say again, what in hell?

***Note added 5-7-09****

This has been SO prevalent, that I have been given TWO shirts to commemorate this - one that says "I'm his Mistress" and another that says "Tell Your Boyfriend to Stop Texting Me." Lawd.

Ok, back to the old blog!

*************************

24. Having a wife. This one isn't anything I can speak of from personal experience, but I have friends who can. See #23, but someone should also slap you, douchebag.

25. Having secret children... Having children is fine, but why not be proud? That's cute. Unless you are just pretending, and doing that whole sneaky vulture trick from volume one, like with being good with kids or animals. I should not know you for several months and then find out you have a litter somewhere, that I still know just about nothing about. Fiff. I suppose things could be worse. This isn't that bad, just bizarre. I wanted a round number, which isn't very normal for the girl who sets her alarm and microwave clocks for times like 6:41 or 2:32 and so on. I hate round numbers! Ah well.

So that's that. Been a little sick lately, but am getting over it, I think.

Was in a couple fashion shows a couple weeks ago.... You can see pictures on www.myspace.com/milwaukeestreet in the slideshow for "Fred/Red Heel Fashion Show." There are also pictures from the one I was in the next night, which you can see on www.themilwaukeescene.com, if you go to Gallery and then to "NEWD one-year Anniversary/MOCT" or something like that. Good times. I was hammmmmmmered. Part of the payment for the show was a free bar tab. Dangerous! I ended up trying to steal a male model's shirt from off of his body, in front of his parents. I then ran into him a week later at Nad's birthday party, and didn't recognize him, and was a little surprised when he proposed, told me he loved me and was infatuated with me, and then invited me both to Christmas with his family, as well as on a roadtrip to Florida. Hmmm.... Brut brut!

P.S. He was smart. He asked if I was married, and if I had children. Why don't my friends and I do that??

Well, I think I am going to go back to watching Coming to America now. Had to get into the Randy Watson spirit, since tomorrow is Thursday!

Still trying to think of where we wanna go on NYE. I want a kiss at midnight! Fiff. Any vultures free? Ah-ah-ah-ah.

I'll try to blog again soon.... I started one on Ousmane's birthday (Dec. 7th) but have yet to finish it.

NYC, LA, LV, KC. Wait, WHAAAAT?!?

This blog was started on December 7th, and not finished....

First of all, I want to take a moment to wish a Happy Birthday to two basketball greats of our time: Larry Bird, who is 51 today, and Ousmane Barro, who will not likely be celebrating his 23rd birthday, which is also today. It's ok, Ous, I will celebrate for you!

Anyway, this blog is LONG overdue. Lately, I haven't experienced much that has been blog worthy, so I thought I would go back to some things in the past that I didn't blog before but should have.

Last year, we were having meetings at school to talk about how to increase the language proficiency of students in our school. Apparently at a meeting that I did not attend, the principal decided that it would be a good idea to send Lers and I to a conference on the topic.

Whaaaaaaat???

We wondered, has she met us? Does she know what we're about? This is an absurdity.

Lers and I, the dynamic duo of drunkeness, were to travel to Kansas City to attend a conference, and our airfare and hotel would be paid for by none other than our lovely school district. Holla!

I don't think it's even possible to describe how excited we were for such and adventurous voyage!

We were to spend three nights and four days in good ol' KC.

AC volunteered to drive us to the airport, and as usual, Lers was runnin' late, which caused AC some serious stress. It ended up working out perfectly, though, and we just didn't have to wait as long.

We got to the airport, checked our bags, and enjoyed our flight.

We arrived in KC, which my grandpa had informed me was the City of Fountains. There was not a fountain in sight.

There were, however, signs that said such things as "NYC, LA, LV, KC." As though Kansas City is on par with New York City, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas. Come on now....

To our dismay, we found that there were many other teachers flying in from all over the central states for this conference.

In case you didn't know, I think teaching is the least fashion-savvy profession. Almost every time I see a group of teachers together, it makes me want to call the boys from Queer Eye, or Stacy and Clinton from What Not To Wear, or someone who has the ability to take away my eyesight.

You can spot these women a mile away.

The regular teachers are pretty bad.... Our school doesn't seem like THAT big of a struggle to me, but that could be because I'm used to it. I went to a district Math meeting last week, and that made my eyes bleed. There was a teacher with a medallion that was the symbol that used to represent Prince's name during his time as "The Artist Formerly Known As 'Prince'." No, I am not kidding.

But let me just tell you, foreign language teachers are the worst dressed people in the United States. Someone should call Mr. Blackwell right now and just let him know to look no further than a foreign language conference.

By the end of that week (which we kept calling a weekend, because that is what it felt like!), I was ready to swear that if I saw another woman wearing Eiffel Tower earrings, or carrying an Eiffel Tower totebag, or wearing socks of the same design, and so on, that I was going to stab myself repeatedly in the eye with an Eiffel Tower pencil topper (which I am sure were available in the room with all of the vendors).

Anyway, we spotted thesse 50-something's a mile away, and tried to avoid them as much as possible.

We got to our hotel, which was the Hyatt Regency Crown Centre. Big pimpin', for us teachers!

____that was where I stopped on the 7th.... Continuing now! _____________

So we check in and get our keys and such. We decide to ask about where the best places to go are for food and drinks and so on in KC so that we would have good recommendations. So I asked the guy at the desk, and he gives me a map of the city, which he marks with about 1500 different x's and circles. It was beyond overwhelming. And we were quite hungry.

What made the hotel we stayed in more than just a regular hotel was the fact that it was attached to this giant building that was a mall with a lot of restaurants and such.

Lers and I decided to check it out....

This gigantic mall was attached to the hotel via a skywalk thing that was entitled, "THE LINK."

This would become immensely important to our lives during our stay in KC.

We went to a place that made subs and pizzas. Since we were starving, we each decided to get a slice of cheese, and another slice. Lers went with pepperoni for her second slice. I was less decisive, and then ended up with a slice called "Da Bronx," which was also the name of the restaurant.

Wow.

Da Bronx was a slice of pizza that was about three inches tall. It had sausage, pepperoni, canadian bacon, hamburger, onions, peppers, mushrooms... I feel like I am even forgetting something. Black olives? It was a lot.

We decided that a picture was necessary. Unfortunately, we decided this after I had eaten a lot of it and smashed it down. I had wondered why the people in the restaurant were shocked by my order, and making comments about how I must be hungry... Until I saw my twenty pound pizza. Here it is.

After our very large meal, we decided to check this mall out. There were lots of cool stores, like the crayola store, where we drew pictures on easels, and the chocolate factory store, where they make fudge and all kinds of delicious treats.

We also went to a dog store. So far on this pattern, you may think that they sell dogs, but you'd definitely be wrong. However, they did sell merchandise that celebrated every dog breed imaginable. I deeply offended the clerk when I suggested that Lers buy AC Gilman a pair of Bichon Frisé socks, and he more or less asked us to leave. It was hilarious.

And don't worry. Cat lovers, don't fret. There was a cat store as well.

Freaks!

Anyway, the time of the trip, as I may have mentioned (I started this blog over a month ago, and don't feel like re-reading it all now), was during the Big East Tournament. So we knew we'd have to watch that, since Ous and MU were in it.

But where? The possibilities were completely overwhelming. And of course, we were going to want to drink.

SO, we decided to ask the wise woman at the cat place where we could get some alcohol. We had come to the conclusion, as poor teachers, that we should watch in our hotel room, and relax. After all, the flight had taken quite a bit out of us.

The wise (freaky) woman at the cat place told us that what he needed to do was go to The Apothecary, which was a drug/convenience store in the basement of the mall. Jackpot! We bought some cat cards from the kind crazy cat lady for us to play some games in our room whilst enjoying the game. And since we were so tired, we ordered room service to watch the game.

We thought we should take a picture of our array of tools.

You can see clockwise from top left... The captain, of course, courtesy of the Apothecary. Next, the bucket of ice we'd use to put in our drinks. Then there's the program for our conference, and a bottle of diet coke. Next is my glass, which is proping up my nametag and lanyard. Then is the coupon book, which included my coupons for the shops in the mall, including what we used on the cat cards, and at the Apothecary. This coupon book is, of course, leaning up against a lime green cat-shaped case for the $7 cat cards... Then Lers' nametag on her lanyard, and Ler's glass. Looks like a good time to me, no?

Well, to make a long story short, Lers and I would get quite reliant on "THE LINK." In fact, we would never even leave the complex, until on our final day.

You may be wondering, "Why does she keep putting 'THE LINK' in the weird quotes and all capital letters?

That would be because of the signage and labeling.

Check it out.

Yeah, it's blurry. I took it on the last night of our trip. I was hammered.

I know, I went straight from the first night of the trip to the last night.

It was almost a year ago. Also, honestly, we really didn't leave the hotel at all. We watched basketball and SVU every night in our room, and ate at restaurants that we could get to through the link. We honestly did go to the conferences we were supposed to go to. And let me promise you, we spent a great deal of time laughing hysterically, and making fun of our colleagues. We also hid our lanyards all over the complex, as there was a pharmeceutical sales convention going on at the same time, and all those people seemed normal and dressed all kinds of fly. We didn't want to be associated with the whack job foreign language teachers!

On the last night, we still had a fair amount of the Captain left, and a decent amount diet left. So, we decided we'd have to finish off the alcohol, as we'd certainly not let it go to waste.

I asked Lers to make me a drink whilst I sent Ous the obligatory "good luck" text.

Here's a picture of it prior to the addition of the diet coke....

Note to all reading: If you desire to maintain sobriety, do not ask Lers to make you a drink.

Chi hua hua.

Another thing you might've been wondering is what this link situation looks like.

Here's "THE LINK" in all its glory, as seen from our hotel room.

That snakey lookin' thang is "THE LINK."

So Lers and I got hammered, and watched the MU game.

We were alarmed when we saw that they pictured a hispanic man in the starting lineups for Ous. This was actually the second night we were there, but I had set the games to DVR at home in case we wouldn't be able to see them in KC. I took a picture of the absurdity on our tv at home.

Here it is!

That is definitely not Ous!

Anyway, so I texted Ous that night and asked him when he turned into a Latino man. He called me after that game quite confused! I explained, and we thought it was hilarious.

When we were contemplating what to do that last night, over drinks, we had decided that we were going to stay in again, at first. Seeing the way that Lers mixes drinks, we determined that we needed more alcohol. So we bought a couple bottles of wine from the Apothecary, and a corkscrew.

Then, we had a change of heart. Decided to go out. And decided that we'd go to one of the nicer places on the other side of the link. But, we were hammered, as I mentioned in the explanation of the picture of the labeling.

Fortunately for us, we ran into one of Lers' professors en route, and spent time with her in the elevator, hammered. Bru-tality.

Then we got to the restaurant. Hammered. Ordered a bottle of wine to share.... Just what we needed! That'd make three, in addition to the remnants of the captain we had just downed.

The waiter was something else. I guess we were, too.

He asked us if we were high!

We drank more.

Ate lots of bread, which came in round loafs. We wanted another. We asked the waiter for a shenanigan of bread.

Yes, a unit of bread is also known as a shenanigan.

We were reminiscing about all kinds of things. We called Meams. She was afraid for KC with us on the loose, since she had known that we had been asked to leave the dog store, and other interesting parts of our trip.

We wanted to text Zak Attack and ask him if he had a small map of this place, in the style of "Staff" from the camping trip (yeah, I know, I keep saying I am going to blog that). Since at that time, I didn't have his number, I instead texted a completely different Zac, and asked him instead. He was very confused, whilst Lers and I were very amused.

We ended up immensely enjoying our meal, going home, and going to bed. We got up and went to our conferences, and came home, mostly without incidence.

One thing, though, that we noticed both during the trip, as well as waiting in the airport to leave, was that KC has completely brutal news! It's obscene! There were babies kidnapped, elderly people beaten in an atm vestibule (yes, I thought of the Friends episode with Jill Goodacre), weird stores catching on fire.... All types of heinosity!

I was pretty sure that armegeddon was taking place, but clearly we're safe. Phew!

All in all, amazing trip. We even brought back chocolately treats, cat cards, wine (yeah, we didn't drink three bottles in one night) and I got my three rings that I usually wear on my right hand. Great trip!

Mom, this blog was for you and Clarence. Thought you could use a laugh. Love you!

Ten Historic Drunks, A wet cat, and letting your soul glo!

It's official. I am one of those crazy cat ladies. I decided to take some time off from going out. Decided to stay home last night and watch movies and such....

One of the things I have been meaning to do awhile is give Refugio a bath.

So here he is. My little man. Look how angry he looks! He's so soft and fluffy now though!




Also, the other night, the night before thanksgiving, I went to Decibel for the Thanksgiving Eve Throwdown, which was a lot of fun, and before that, I went to Tangerine for Fred and Favio's party, which was a good time.

The Lakers were there, but I left before I had the chance to talk to any of them (which was sad, as I would've enjoyed a reunion with my main squeeze, Derek Fisher, but oh well, haha).

I did, however, get to meet Eriq La Salle. You probably recognize him from ER, which he is apparently on.

Not me, though. I recognised him from Coming to America. You know, he was Darryl Jenks, the Prince of Soul Glo!

Here we are....



And there he is in his younger days!




I'd say the years have been pretty kind, wouldn't you?

Anyway, I'm going to close out this absurd blog with an excerpt from a book that I got for my birthday present from one of my best friends of all time, Al.

Here it is....

"Ten Historic Drunks"

1. Noah. According to the Old Testament, Noah was the first person ever to get drunk.

2. King Scorpion I of Egypt. The Pharoahs loved their wine. In 3500 BC, his royal highness's cadaver was entombed with seven hundred bottles of resin-infused hooch to help ease his journey into the afterlife.

(Wow, must be nice!)

3. Socrates (469-399 BC) The great philosopher had a legendary ability to hold his liquor and would continue to philosophize when everyone else at the symposium had long since passed out or gone home.

(I've known some people to do this!)

4. Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) The Macedonian king who ruled an empire stretching from Greece to India was in his lifetime as famous for his marathon drinking sessions as for his military conquests. During one of Alexander's drinking contests thirty-five men died; during another he killed one of his best friends with a spear. His close friend Hephaestion expired after drinking half a gallon of wine for breakfast; Alexander dropped dead after drinking contest at the age of thirty-two.

(Makes me feel a little better now about just simply falling and scraping up my knee!)

5. Pope Benedict XII (C. 1334-42) The pontiff was such a hardened boozer that the expression "Drunk as a pope" became popular in his lifetime.

(I have never heard of this expression, but I'll be damned if I don't start using it!

6. Selim II, Sultan of the Ottomans (R. 1566-74) Also known as "Selim the Sot," he could drink a bottle of Cyprus wine without drawing a breath. When he ran out of his favorite drink, someone suggested he capture Cyprus to replenish his stocks. Selim agreed and massacred 30,000 Cypriot Christians in the process.

(Wow. Seems a little extreme.)

7. Empress Catherine I, Czarina of Russia (R. 1725-27) Whiloe shuffling through her two-year reign in a drunken haze, she once survived an assassination attempt, too drunk to realize that anything had happened. She was reviewing a Guards regiment when a bullet flew past her and struck an innocent bystander dead. The Empress moved on without flinching.

(I don't even know why that was in the book. Who hasn't that happened to?)

8. Ludwig Van Beethoven (1770-1827) The composer died of hepatic cirrhosis of the liver as a result of alcoholism at the age of fifty seven. Before he expired, he cheerily announced, "Wine is both necessary and good for me."

(At least he was cheery!)

9. President Andrew Johnson (President from 1865-69) He was apparently drunk at his swearing-in as vice President to Lincoln, and his acceptance speech was rambling and largely incoherent; he claimed later that he ahd been taking alcoholic medicine prescribed for a cold. He didn't make his own inaugural address. When the U.S. Chief Justice was sent to tell him that Lincoln was dead and that he was now president, they found him trying to shake off a terrible hangover. Johnson took the oath of office as required, but then fell asleep and had to be dressed and carried to the White House.

(Wow. Just wow.)

10. Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965) Britain's great wartime leader began each day with a glass of Riesling with his breakfast, then kept himself topped up with whiskey until the early hours of the following day. A doctor attending him after he was knocked down by a cara in New York in 1931 actually issued a medical note that his convalescence "necessitates the use of alcoholic spirits, especially at mealtimes," speficying 250cc per day as the minimum. Although it wrecked his health, he liked to brag, "I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me."

(My doctor specified that, too. Oh wait....)

Have a great rest of the weekend!

New (Old) Blog

So I finished a blog that I started in July. It is pretty much the longest blog in the United States.

Your highness, if you print it, it will be 24 pages.

Everyone else, if you are reading it and it's cold out, make sure you grab a blanket so your rheumatism doesn't act up. And be sure to stretch out every so often, because this is a long one, and and you wouldn't want to suffer from crippling lameness as a result of hip dysplasia!

Anyway, without further ado, here it is!

Thriller!

Check out this video of Broseph and his brother performing the Thriller dance! Remember him from my Halloween blog?

Aloha & Manastacia: Reunited & it Feels so Good! (And the History of the Armanian Empire!)

This past Saturday, I had a pleasant blast from the past.


My Junior and Senior years of college, I lived with two girls, Laura and Amie. I knew Laura from highschool, and Amie I met through Laura. I am going to take this moment to mention the fact that both Amie and Laura are married now, and that makes me feel weird, because I still feel like I am 19 years old with a fake ID.


Anyway, this past Saturday, Amie came up to visit. I hadn't seen her in almost a year, and we hadn't necessarily done an amazing time keeping in touch.

We were absurd in college. We'd go out a few nights a week, and once went about a month without spending more than two dollars the whole month on the drinks we'd imbibe. Holla.

We liked props. We'd bring out a tape recorder, and interview people. Or perhaps a microphone, and pretend Amie was an on-location reporter. "Back to the studio, Stacy!"

We also liked aliases. I know that Amie had been Leslie a few times, and many people were calling me "Mandelicious" even then. But our best aliases came about from the purhcases of some really tacky initial necklaces. When we wore the necklaces, she became "Aloha," and I "Manastascia." Yes, I am aware that my alias sounds like the stage name of a drag queen stripper. Deal with it. You'd be surprised at how many people believed that shit!


After she arrived, we discussed the plan. We were to go out to eat, go to the Marquette game, then go out to a few bars.... This presented outfit challeges. Amie likened what she was to be doing to superman changing. I called it awards show changing. Either way, we were going to have to change our outfits a few times. I wish we would've taken more pictures! We should've captured all of our outfits. Oh well!


So we put on our dinner outfits. We met Danielle outside of Murphy's, where I left my car. Danielle then drove us to the restaurant.


Let me just tell you that the freaking waitress had to have thought we were crackheads. This cute little girl had to come back at least four times before we could even decide what crazy drinks we'd like to enjoy over dinner. I had to tell Amie the Vegas story and the story of my interactions with the terrorists (which Danielle helped me to tell). Plus, the drink menu was written in a fairly humorous manner, so we were enjoying that too much to focus on what the actual drinks were, and what we wanted. Poor girl!


We ate our meals and drank our drinks. Amie drinks like a damn fish. I have never seen someone inhale a beverage in such a way. She drinks sooooo fast! It's absurd. She finished her first drink within five minutes. It was an impressive feat. Unbelievable, really.



After dinner, the cute little waitress returned to tell us that our desserts were being paid for by one of the owners, and that the special was "vulture cake with swoop swoop sauce." I felt so bad for this girl for having to come and say that to us! I almost died laughing. My face hurt by the time we left the restaurant because I had been laughing so hard I was crying the whole meal. I barely even ate because I was cracking up the whole time. Made for good leftovers!



Next event was the Marquette game, so we changed clothes in the car, and Danielle dropped us off at the game. Time to sober up a little! Our seats were great (Thanks, Ousmane!).... Section 200, Row D, seats 9 & 10. That's half court. Amie was hilarious. She mentioned that she had seen video clips of Tom Crean yelling on tv, and now she could hear him!



Game was entertaining, as usual. I was quite disappointed, however, that Ousmane didn't start.... I love hearing "At 6'10" from Dakar, Senegal.... Oooooooooousmane Barrrro!" Maybe next time. He's in Maui now. I am jealous.



Anyway, after the game, we took the bus back to the Annex, and walked across the street to Murphy's, where my car was parked. I knew that Buddha was supposed to be working, so we thought we'd pop in.



To our surprise, Parker from Decibel and his friend Matt were standing at the end of the bar. Fancy that! And Joe, the manager, was working as well. It was practically a Tuesday night at Decibel, except.... Well, it wasn't really like that at all. Haha.



Anyway, Parker informed us that we had been on the jumbotron at the Marquette game. Awesome. I hope that I wasn't doing anything stupid. I really have to be cognizant of the possibility of jumbotron action when I am sitting in the family section!



We had a couple drinks and did a couple shots, then Buddha showed up, and we had some more. Buddha was Buddha, and it was hilarious. Amie showed again her striking abilities of being able to pound drinks. Joe even remarked - "damn, girl, you thirsty?" Hilarious.

After Murphy's, it was awards show/superman time again. We went home and spiced things up, spruced up, if you will (and I know you will!).

Next stop was Cush, which was a good time. That place is starting to grow on me, I think. It was here that we were informed that we drink high-maintenance drinks, because they stop the flow of drink-making because they are bizarre and out of reach of the bartender.

44 North and Sprite and Malibu and Coke? Really? Bizarre. When you see me coming, move the bottle into the flow! Haha.

Anyway, after our drink at Cush, we of course moved on to Decibel.

By the way, I am having an almost impossible time focusing on the task at hand, which is blog-writing. I'm pretty sure it's the third day I've come back to it. Fiff. I need to lock it up.

Decibel was a glove as usual. We said his, and I made about a billion introductions. We met up with the Prince.... There will be more about him and such later.

We did some drinking, obviously, and did some shot-taking.... You know the deal.

At one point, in VIP, we were talking to Hen (see the blog about the wifebeater bar crawl) when suddenly Amie pulled out her recorder. Yes, that's right, her recorder. And no, I don't know why this whole thing is a link. I only wanted it to be the part that is in the parentheses. This is pretty damn intense.

So yeah. Woohoo! No more link! I never claimed to be a computer genius.

Yeah, so Amie pulled out this recorder and just starts playing right in the club. Hilarious. Hen was agog. Just loved it.

Back by the Prince.... Picture time!

Here's Amie and I....





When I introduced her to Dustin, he said that he could tell that we caused a lot of trouble in college. I have no idea what he is talking about. Look at us! We practically have halos! Just beeming with innocence (ignore the fact that I look hammered).

Next it was time to take a pic with the Prince...




Wow. That is a... really nice picture. Umm... Notice the green star on his left shoulder? I had decided that since I am a teacher, I was going to bring out foil stars and give them to deserving individuals. Amie kicked it up a notch and more or less covered some people, like Scooter, with them.

Whilst the camera was out, Amie suggested that we take a picture of the fine fellow with the nice abs. I think the point was actually to capture the abs themselves.... So back to Arinze we went....




For the love of people with functional eyes, Arinze, would it kill you to do a crunch or sit-up now and then? I mean, come on. That is just shameful. Haha.

I think poor Arinze is blushing here.

Moving on.... When I came back from taking the picture of Arinze, the Prince told me that Shawn had refused to pour us the royal shot. He was quite disappointed, so I went to go see what's up.

When I walked to the bar, before I could say anything to him at all, Shawn said, "Mandie, I am not pouring six shots of triple sec."

Shawn, I do not blame you. Also, I must say that it is entirely too funny to me that every time I try to type your name, I accidentally type "Shaqn" because I am so used to typing about Shaq, apparently. I need to pull my life together.

Anyway, I really don't know what self-respecting bartender would just pour a bunch of shots of triple sec. Especially without a good explanation, which is what Shawn asked for.

By the way, I am considering just leaving the name wrong here. Haha.

I promised Shawn that I would explain the story to him. Obviously it wouldn't have been easy to do in Decibel on a Saturday night, so I figured I'd put it in a blog and send him the link.

There wasn't a whole lot to the rest of the night. We met up with LL after the bar was closed and went to Ma's where I threw a lil fit because I couldn't enjoy any Cream of Chicken and Rice soup.

So here's the story. The history of the Armanian Empire, and how Triple Sec became our royal shot.

My sophomore year of college, I began dating Mike. He was a bit of a bullshitter. Totally made up absurd things. For example, I recall a scenario in which he convinced a friend that he was allegic to ice cubes. This went down whilst he stood in a swimming pool. What?

Anyway, the summer before junior year, he moved from the dorms into a shithole. I mean, into a house. He had 6 other roommates. I knew most of them, either from having gone to high school with Danielle and Mike (I met Mike through Danielle, so I knew a lot of these people for awhile), or from hanging out with them when I visited Mike in Milwaukee in the dorms.

There was, however, one roommate that I did not know at all. That was Matt.

Matt's grandpa lived in the Philippines, and apparently was a big deal. I'm told he is like a Hilton over there, and that when Matt visits, he is treated like a Prince.... They iron his socks and underwear and such.

Anyway, I still swear to this day that Mike told me that Matt WAS the prince of some foreign land. I take full credit for having perhaps forgotten which land he mentioned, and just deciding at some later point that it was Armenia.

So life moved on, and I just was kinda scared of Matt. I was a little more shy at this point than I am now. I just observed.

The types of things I observed were that Matt rarely went to class, wore expensive clothes, did not seem to have a job, did a lot of poker playing with serious amounts of money (to my poor ass, haha) both online and in casinos, and that he spent money like it was his job - buying shots and rounds of drinks like crazy, buying me food at Michael's and Omega in the middle of the night, etc.

Anyway, a year and a half goes by, and I barely talk to Matt. The entire time, I think he's the prince of Armenia. Absurd, yes, I know.

I just figured it was like... Coming to America. My favorite movie! Matt just wanted to live in a rat-infested (no, that is not an exaggeration) shithole for a couple years while he did the college thing and checked out America before he went back to Armenia to rule on his throne.

Oy. I'm sounding like a moron here, aren't I?

So I'm talking to Mike, like a year and a half into these guys living together, and I confess that I thought that Matt was the prince of Armenia. He just started cracking up, and he told me that this was not the case, and he denied that he had ever made such a claim. I'd like to say for the record that his claim that he didn't make the claim is an erroneous fabrication. Wait, what?

A couple nights later, I am down from Madison visiting, and I drunkenly start confessing to Matt, who I am practically talking to for the first time, that I'd been thinking that he was the prince of Armenia for almost two years.

Hilarious.

So the night rolls on, and when we're driving from the bars to Omega, Matt is yelling out of Steve's (who would later be known as Oha, just like the guy from Coming to America. And yes, we do tell him to do stuff and say Oha and then clap twice) sunroof to his people. Saying "Helloooo!" in a regal way to passersby on the sidewalk. Absurd.

Later that night, Matt and I would bond by me sitting on his lap in Eric's room and me seeing my first few seconds of porn, the Paris Hilton video, whilst sitting on his lap. Yeah. Kinda weird, but whatever. Also notable is that at Omega, we bet Eric that he couldn't eat everyone's (there were like 8 of us) garnishes in under three minutes. He did it in like thirty seconds, but was fooled into believing that he was just a little too slow and that he'd have to buy lunch for everyone. He was so sad and disappointed! Hilarious.

Anyway, that's about all there is to the story of that night.

Months lated, a bunch of us went to Florida after we all graduated. One of Mike's roommates, Frank, had a timeshare in his family, and for graduation, he got it for a week for us.



There's a group picture of everyone that made the trip, minus the goat (Winston) that was purchased and returned after it made horrible noises all night. The prince is the second from the left, Eric (we'll get to him in a second) is front and center with the red hat, and I am all the way to the right, with my ex, Mike. I was pretty much accustomed to being the only girl (or in this case, one of the only girls) in a group of a billion guys. I guess I just get along well with boys. Don't know why. Because I love basketball and hate drama? I dunno.

The trip was an absurdity. We were quite focused on one thing.

And that thing was drinking.

Here's what the refrigerator looked like when I arrived.



As you see, the only food in it is a can of parmesan cheese. Don't get me wrong, we definitely ate, but that was not the focus. Funny how I don't remember where the food was kept, though, ha. Also, keep in mind that things such as Tequila were in the freezer, and that several trips were made to the liquor and grocery stores on St. George Island that week.

It was just before one such trip that a big change was made. We were all sitting around, when I hear Matt say something. He said some sort of name at the beginning of the sentence that was not mine, so I didn't really pay attention. It was at that point that Mike said, "I really don't think you should ignore the Prince when he is talking to you."

Whaaaaaaaat?

Matt repeated himself, and said "I asked if you needed anything from the liquor store, Princess."

Princess?

I am not really a girly girl, so I am pretty sure that I had never been called princess before, by anyone except for my grandpa. Matt said that since he was the Prince, I'd be the Princess. Works for me, I guess!

Anyway, over the course of the week, we developed a royal family. We decided that Eric would be our jester, because he is hilarious. He re-named himself the Butt Jester, because one of his nicknames is Buttram, because of his last name.

The three of us became pretty close, as though we weren't already. We just were kinda all on the same page. The Butt Jester and I had a weird relationship that involved a lot of cuddling. Yes, I cuddled frequently with my ex's roommate, and my ex didn't care. Like I said, it was weird. He was a good cuddler, though.

Anyway, when the last night of the trip rolled around, many people were tired. Their need to party had been met. They did not have the insatiable desire to party that Matt, Eric, and I shared. So the last night, when everyone was trying to sleep, we were trying to make sure that no alcohol was left behind. Isn't that some kind of legislature that Bush has been trying to get goin'? Oh, no, that's No Child Left Behind. And, for the record, it's stupid. But I digress.

We had been going through the alcohol, and finally, we were almost done. Our game of "Drinking Dredle" (Which is AWESOME, and really needs to be played again) had done a serious number on the supply of alcohol, as did the casual drinking of the week. Guess what was left?

Triple Sec.

I was really into Margaritas at this point (yes, it is supposed to be capitalized), and we had nothing left but triple sec. During our poker playing, the Butt Jester made us special cups (giant styrofoam ones) that said "Prince," "Princess," and "Butt Jester" on them. Awesome.

And, as the night went on, he kept pouring giant "shots" of triple sec into them. We were the only three people doing it.

We then decided that that would be the royal shot. There were three of us, hence the triple. And, well, we didn't have a choice.

So there it is. The story of how the Armanian (we changed the spelling) Empire was formed. The story of how I became the Princess (and yes, it still catches people off guard when they see on Matt's phone that I've sent a text and find out that it's not his girlfriend, Cari, who is one of my best friends, but rather me who is called "Princess" in his phone). And the story of how Triple Sec became our royal shot, and a little justification as to why I got so many bottles of triple sec for my graduation party (and why my mom bought a couple bottles of it for us to drink at said party). There's still a bottle on the party cart!

No, it does not taste good. No, it does not really have much alcohol in it (less than wine, haha). But yes, it has sentimental value. And yes, it almost always illicits a hilarious reaction from the bartenders we ask when the whole group of us needs to do the shot. Usually, people don't even know what to charge us, then they get the managers and ask them, and we usually get it free because it's so weird.

"I'm gonna need eight shots of triple sec please...."