The past week has been a week long reason to drink. Perhaps thanks in part to it being a five payday month I have kept my word of a previous post and have not felt guilty about the amount of money that I've spent over the long weekend. My monthly total is now approaching October's current high, but with good reason after all the fun I had these past several days.
That said, it was also a sort of farewell celebration of sorts to that free spending out at the bars as well as in my daily habits in general. With my plans to quit my job impending, I am going to have to watch my spending a bit more scrupulously once again. $3 dollar beers and shots have once again increasingly grown annoying and I'm going to be looking to instead go out to bars with some sort of bargain (ie, Essex St. Pub). As well, I haven't been as focused on posting here and have even grown sloppy in some of my daily habits--sleeping (too much), reading (too little), cleanliness in my apartment--that could use a second wind as far as attention paid goes.
It's nice to think that the cold weather alone would keep me in more on the weekends and cut back on the spending, but a colder house is also hard to stay in. Either way, beginning today I've begun to take the necessary steps to be a bit more prepared to be focused once again.
Then again, it is only one day and the bars are open everyday.
Showing posts with label alcohol. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alcohol. Show all posts
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Monday, October 8, 2007
Weekend Roundup
Well, I was working on this while watching the Bills game. Then it got interesting. Before it got devastating. Nevertheless, no point in wasting a post...
My Mondays usually have three steps:
1. Reluctantly wake-up, at least mildly depressed from another weekend of more boozing than constructive work accomplished, if not also from having to wake up to work.
2. Slowly pull myself together and not make more out of my partying than needs be made.
3. Ultimately get over it and go about enjoying my day.
Only today, my first two steps were far shorter than they normally were. The reasons, to me, were obvious. There was no way I would have guessed, especially after a Sabres loss on Friday, that I would have had my longest consistent laugh in recent memory.
But had I known that my friends and I would consider it a good idea to talk with stereotypical southern accents for over an hour (with Drew and Poose stealing the show), Chief would "round up" some sort of wagon with an extension cord, my friend Nick would be smooth enough to provide a consistent supply of stolen beers, Nick and Chief would slow Allen St down into only one lane with only two orange cones and their traffic directing abilities, and that we would collectively taunt (still in said southern accents) the girl working for Molson Canadian dressed up as a Mounty that was giving us free beers via some promotion they were running when she asked if she could borrow a cell phone, then yes, I would have definitely guessed it would have been a good night.
Once Saturday capped it off with a marathon bid pitch session, Pat riding Jay's bike inside of Merlin's (with Queen's "Bicycle" in the background of course) and a "long distance darts" session despite the constant buzzing of the "insert a quarter" sound, yeah, it was a good weeekend.
So even as I slept my Sunday away I couldn't help but not care. If a good time meant sleeping a whole day just to catch up, then sign me up ever time.
My Mondays usually have three steps:
1. Reluctantly wake-up, at least mildly depressed from another weekend of more boozing than constructive work accomplished, if not also from having to wake up to work.
2. Slowly pull myself together and not make more out of my partying than needs be made.
3. Ultimately get over it and go about enjoying my day.
Only today, my first two steps were far shorter than they normally were. The reasons, to me, were obvious. There was no way I would have guessed, especially after a Sabres loss on Friday, that I would have had my longest consistent laugh in recent memory.
But had I known that my friends and I would consider it a good idea to talk with stereotypical southern accents for over an hour (with Drew and Poose stealing the show), Chief would "round up" some sort of wagon with an extension cord, my friend Nick would be smooth enough to provide a consistent supply of stolen beers, Nick and Chief would slow Allen St down into only one lane with only two orange cones and their traffic directing abilities, and that we would collectively taunt (still in said southern accents) the girl working for Molson Canadian dressed up as a Mounty that was giving us free beers via some promotion they were running when she asked if she could borrow a cell phone, then yes, I would have definitely guessed it would have been a good night.
Once Saturday capped it off with a marathon bid pitch session, Pat riding Jay's bike inside of Merlin's (with Queen's "Bicycle" in the background of course) and a "long distance darts" session despite the constant buzzing of the "insert a quarter" sound, yeah, it was a good weeekend.
So even as I slept my Sunday away I couldn't help but not care. If a good time meant sleeping a whole day just to catch up, then sign me up ever time.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Shat Mat (The Nothing that We Do)
After another weekend of excessive drinking left me too hung over to even drink during the Bills game—and the Bills leaving me too sick to even watch the entire game—last night I was able to reap the benefits of all the people that were over the game by plundering the leftover beers they left behind.
And while doing so my roommate and I decided to play some chess.
Chess is like so many things that I really enjoy doing—drawing, playing music, playing sports, doing chicks, doing nothing—in that I just don’t do enough of it. And it always takes only a brief moment to remember how much I like these things as soon as I get to doing them again.
The thing that fascinates me so much about games is just how representative they can be of human intelligence and ingenuity. Chess alone, from what I’ve read, has more possible moves than there are believed to be atoms in the entire universe. One has to consider that games are mostly the result of people who were sitting around with nothing better to do and simply decided to create something out of doing nothing. (If you’ve never been a part of a creating a game that was maybe played for even only a day, then by all means your life is truly representational of doing nothing.)
And while ultimately, unless the feelings of competitiveness and enjoyment actually do count for something, they contribute nothing in what would be described as a meaningful way, especially in the arenas of making money or pointing your life in that all import direction, that is the very point of them: a natural expression of what we are capable when the burden of meaning or having to do something is lifted from us.
In my mind they are just as pointless as making money, only much more memorable and far more fun. And if that isn’t the purpose of our lives, it has at least be the purpose of our games.
If the two are in fact separate entities.
Check mate.
And while doing so my roommate and I decided to play some chess.
Chess is like so many things that I really enjoy doing—drawing, playing music, playing sports, doing chicks, doing nothing—in that I just don’t do enough of it. And it always takes only a brief moment to remember how much I like these things as soon as I get to doing them again.
The thing that fascinates me so much about games is just how representative they can be of human intelligence and ingenuity. Chess alone, from what I’ve read, has more possible moves than there are believed to be atoms in the entire universe. One has to consider that games are mostly the result of people who were sitting around with nothing better to do and simply decided to create something out of doing nothing. (If you’ve never been a part of a creating a game that was maybe played for even only a day, then by all means your life is truly representational of doing nothing.)
And while ultimately, unless the feelings of competitiveness and enjoyment actually do count for something, they contribute nothing in what would be described as a meaningful way, especially in the arenas of making money or pointing your life in that all import direction, that is the very point of them: a natural expression of what we are capable when the burden of meaning or having to do something is lifted from us.
In my mind they are just as pointless as making money, only much more memorable and far more fun. And if that isn’t the purpose of our lives, it has at least be the purpose of our games.
If the two are in fact separate entities.
Check mate.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
I'd Rather Have a Bottle in Front of Me...
If food and bills will be my biggest expenses, then alcohol will fill out the top three. If there’s any honest reason why I have no desire to completely remove myself from society and “go live in the woods” it would have to be because where there are people there is alcohol (and where there is alcohol there are people) and, certainly, where there aren’t, there isn’t (and where there isn’t, there often aren’t; at least not the type of people I enjoy being around). And both foolishly I know, but I like them both. I just can't help myself.
Not that I couldn’t make my own (booze) I suppose. Hell, I’m already back on the Steel Reserve diet—at least until someone back West, probably a bum, sends me some damn Camos—and no matter how bad homemade booze is it really couldn’t be that much worse could—Yes, actually, yes it could. Because Steel Reserves aren’t really that bad. Honestly. And I’m not just saying that as a person on a budget who stubbornly believes that a “young at heart” mindset is worth keeping always. Really.
So far this month, due in large part to a bachelor’s party that I had to attend—holidays, birthdays, etc will surely come up again and be dealt with in more detail—and last Thursday In the Square’s Sam Roberts show and the resulting night of going from the square to some of Buffalo’s finest bars like Mohawk Place, The Golden Swan, Founding Father’s Pub, Gabriel’s Gate and then The Pink, I’ve spent more on alcohol so far this month, $67.74, than I have on food, $54.71. Sparing one the exuberant list of quotations in support of alcohol ranging from Benjamin Franklin, to Tom Waits, to Homer Simpson, I will simply but firmly state that I have no intentions of changing this habit any time soon, if at all or ever, and feel no further need to justify myself.
(I’d be willing to bet, even if unwilling to do the research myself to support the claim, that far more people—even respectable people!—do the same than the general public would initially guess or maybe even like to think.)
In going out one will almost always find himself, when amongst good company (and I’ve always managed to find myself lucky enough to be around some of the best), on the beneficiary end of a free drink or shot. When discussing this project to spend as little as possible with my friend Pat, we discussed the grey area free meals, drinks and the likes create and how one in my position should include the benefits of hospitality.
We both agreed that I should at the very least keep as accurate a count as possible—and anyone who has drank in Buffalo knows exactly how inaccurate that count will immediately be—of the free drinks given to me. The argument going that I could go without those drinks being bought for me so they will not count against my spending; I did not ask nor beg for them, they were given to me. At the same time, since I am receiving something for nothing, it would be nice to at least note that someone, having previously done some work themselves, did something for me while I was attempting to do nothing myself. Quite obvious really.
The current count of free drinks that I have been given, not counting the abundant amount at the wedding, is 16, which, at this point, is working out to more than one a day.
But, for example, in the instances of my friend Fuzz’ wedding last week or my cousin Jake’s grad party the next day, it is a social agreement that, in showing up, one will eat and drink on someone else’s bill. Still, in bringing the all but expected gift—or in the case of the wedding, using the custom to have a year to present a present, much to my present disadvantage’s advantage—an exchange is nevertheless made that would otherwise not have been made. Therefore, those drinks or meals will not count against my spending, but what I spend on the gifts will. Just as well, any rounds of drinks that I would buy for my friends I will count towards my own spending.
Though, as one might imagine, such spending is currently at $0.00. And since none of the good company I am surrounded by has ostracized me for this fact, I’d have to say I’ve at the very least proved myself no liar in previously saying that I have always been lucky enough to always be surrounded by some of the best company.
Still no surprise to me as to why it was I came back to Buffalo really.
Not that I couldn’t make my own (booze) I suppose. Hell, I’m already back on the Steel Reserve diet—at least until someone back West, probably a bum, sends me some damn Camos—and no matter how bad homemade booze is it really couldn’t be that much worse could—Yes, actually, yes it could. Because Steel Reserves aren’t really that bad. Honestly. And I’m not just saying that as a person on a budget who stubbornly believes that a “young at heart” mindset is worth keeping always. Really.
So far this month, due in large part to a bachelor’s party that I had to attend—holidays, birthdays, etc will surely come up again and be dealt with in more detail—and last Thursday In the Square’s Sam Roberts show and the resulting night of going from the square to some of Buffalo’s finest bars like Mohawk Place, The Golden Swan, Founding Father’s Pub, Gabriel’s Gate and then The Pink, I’ve spent more on alcohol so far this month, $67.74, than I have on food, $54.71. Sparing one the exuberant list of quotations in support of alcohol ranging from Benjamin Franklin, to Tom Waits, to Homer Simpson, I will simply but firmly state that I have no intentions of changing this habit any time soon, if at all or ever, and feel no further need to justify myself.
(I’d be willing to bet, even if unwilling to do the research myself to support the claim, that far more people—even respectable people!—do the same than the general public would initially guess or maybe even like to think.)
In going out one will almost always find himself, when amongst good company (and I’ve always managed to find myself lucky enough to be around some of the best), on the beneficiary end of a free drink or shot. When discussing this project to spend as little as possible with my friend Pat, we discussed the grey area free meals, drinks and the likes create and how one in my position should include the benefits of hospitality.
We both agreed that I should at the very least keep as accurate a count as possible—and anyone who has drank in Buffalo knows exactly how inaccurate that count will immediately be—of the free drinks given to me. The argument going that I could go without those drinks being bought for me so they will not count against my spending; I did not ask nor beg for them, they were given to me. At the same time, since I am receiving something for nothing, it would be nice to at least note that someone, having previously done some work themselves, did something for me while I was attempting to do nothing myself. Quite obvious really.
The current count of free drinks that I have been given, not counting the abundant amount at the wedding, is 16, which, at this point, is working out to more than one a day.
But, for example, in the instances of my friend Fuzz’ wedding last week or my cousin Jake’s grad party the next day, it is a social agreement that, in showing up, one will eat and drink on someone else’s bill. Still, in bringing the all but expected gift—or in the case of the wedding, using the custom to have a year to present a present, much to my present disadvantage’s advantage—an exchange is nevertheless made that would otherwise not have been made. Therefore, those drinks or meals will not count against my spending, but what I spend on the gifts will. Just as well, any rounds of drinks that I would buy for my friends I will count towards my own spending.
Though, as one might imagine, such spending is currently at $0.00. And since none of the good company I am surrounded by has ostracized me for this fact, I’d have to say I’ve at the very least proved myself no liar in previously saying that I have always been lucky enough to always be surrounded by some of the best company.
Still no surprise to me as to why it was I came back to Buffalo really.
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