Lethal Long Island

Laura and I decided the bar we went to on New Year's Eve was so much like a Madison bar (very Irish pub) that we just saved ourselves a two hour drive. And most of the people were there to hear the imported from Madison band, too, so everyone was from Madison, anyway. Way to move on with life.

The proprietor of the bar, Lilly (the bar's namesake), wearing fabulous completely-sequined black pants, served Laura and me the strongest long islands we had ever tasted. This is the drink to beat all drinks. For both of us, it was our one drink of the evening, and we just about died. The band was awesome (a friend's band who's actually good, how about that?), Laura got to know my Ogg girls better, and we drunkenly recited lines in Steel Magnolias, which I was surprised to discover I knew. Perhaps I need to start getting drunk before rehearsals.

On the way out, we attempted to sloppily hail a cab for about 30 seconds and then realized there was no point as all the thousands of cabs in Chicago were occupied. When we arrived at the El, the turnstiles were not open, even though they were supposed to be free until 6am. I became outraged and decided to jump the turnstile. I then promptly caught my toe on my way over and plummeted to the concrete floor. I tried to right myself and made it about 2/3 of the way, but had no equilibrium and fell again, laughing maniacally the whole time. On the train, as I had been doing in the bar, I attempted to send text messages to Nate (who sadly had to work), but couldn't quite push those little buttons or read that blurry screen. I may have succeeded to send one with one eye closed, which seemed to balance things out. On the way back to Laura's, I got horribly loud drunk hiccups, which lasted the better part of an hour. Laura, when not focused on not vomiting, instructed me to "breathe deeply."

The next day we dragged ourselves out of bed and went to Marina's for french toast, pancakes, pesto squash, potatoes, and eggs. Major feast, Marina is fabulous. Nothing like syrup to cure a hangover.

Happy 2006!