Who do I still think I am??

This one's about the butt of the joke.

30DBC PROMPT: "Have you ever been embarrassed in public (and had people laugh at you)? And/or have you ever laughed at someone who had been publicly embarrassed? Tell us the story."

Hey folks! What's good out there? Feels nice to have a day where I'm not chasin' after something for a change, and I won't even complain about how bored I've been all afternoon...there's no excuse for it anyway.

So this prompt...you're asking someone who was perpetually embarrassing throughout the early nineties. Couldn't avoid it, no matter how hard I tried...which is probably the biggest sin upon itself. Life feels like a series of repressed memories...bad haircuts, dubious friends, Cross Colors hoodies from the local flea market, etc. In a time where individualization still meant fitting in with a crowd, I was more notorious than popular (and not in the Biggie kinda way http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glEiPXAYE-U). Then again, how many of you out there can claim high school was easy?

I think it became a purpose once I graduated...to be determined not to be laughed at or embarrassed, while maintaining some sort of individualism and credibility. There comes a time when a boy needs to know when to cut his losses and start over. You don't get many opportunities in life to do that, and you can't always do it when you feel like it...which makes it all the more gratifying when you take advantage of it at the right time.

That's why it's also hard to recall moments of public humiliation...you get yourself to a point where you've moved past the dumb shit you've subjected yourself to, so much so that your indiscretions almost fade with age.

I will, for the sake of this entry however, allow myself one trip down memory lane. I was in my very early twenties, living on my own and trying to establish my place in the world. I was on a bowling team with some buddies I'd worked with...we weren't the best team, or the most appropriate in matters regarding proper etiquette, but we definitely had more fun than anyone else in our league.

After a match, DMFM and I went back to my apartment to chill and watch MTV2. It was still kinda early, so we decided to head over to a bar to meet up with a couple of girls he knew. To this day I don't remember their names, but I can picture the blonde and my lord, she was adorable.

Drinks and shots...drinks and shots. Sitting at the bar, watchin' a Sabres game, makin' idle conversation. And suddenly it all hit me. I remember wobbling in my seat a little, covering my mouth, and throwing up all over the bar. Pro tip #1: when you're puking, don't try to cover your mouth...it just forces your vomit everywhere, in a fan-like propulsion.

My boy helped me into the bathroom, where I spent at least twenty minutes trying to clean myself up. I ditched the sweatshirt I had on, and made my way back to the ladies. I greeted the bartender and did the most logical thing one does to attempt to mask his very public bout of intoxication: I ordered another beer.

Dude looked at me like I had three heads, which was kinda what I was seeing in the mirror behind him anyway. Although he'd spent the time I was in the bathroom making the area I just destroyed with my liquidy insides look like it never happened, he incredulously asked me, "Did you make this mess?" Sensing his displeasure and continuing with my streak of wise decisions, I lied and said I had not. That led to my party being asked, in a not-so-nice fashion, to vacate the premises. Which was fine...there was another bar across the street, and hey! They serve beer here too!

Awkward situation at best...the girls kinda went along with everything, even going as far as saying "It's ok, we've all been there before." And somehow, word got around that "some asshole got drunk across the street and threw up everywhere", with a description matching our group...yet we managed to avoid total scrutiny. After all, we were well-behaved, paying customers...who were motherfucking "that guy" whenever the topic came up. Pro tip #2: always act like you're not only not guilty, but can't stand the thought that someone would actually commit the social faux pas you just did.

The rest of the night happened fast...I don't think we stayed there very long, and like I said, I don't remember the girls. I ran into one of them maybe a year later, and she remembered me, but I had to remind her of that night (because that's what stupid people like me do in random situations)..."Yeah, I puked on the bar that night at [the place is closed and no longer merits the consideration of promotion]!" Go me.

Sometimes the ways of the world are best learned the hard way. I can't say I've never been drunk in public since then, but I've learned how to manage my intake and keep my wits (and my dinner) about myself.

BCF PROMPT: "Are sequels better or worse than the original?"

Nothing's ever as good as the original, is it? Usually our unrealistic expectations aimed at the recapturing of feelings sets us up for the fall...or another person is trying to capitalize on those same feelings, but never quite does right by what we came to know and love.

Yet we can't imagine life without sequels, if for no other reason than to have something we can say "sucks" by comparison. I guess it sorta balances out the order of human selection, or something.

And why does it seem like movies are the only artistic medium to wear the billing of "sequel" in advertising? Albums by musicians are rarely noted as such; same with books (even by authors writing a series of novels). TV shows aren't listed as sequels; if anything they're "preludes" or "origins" or "spin-offs". Why are movies so sucktasticularly special for this designation? I don't get it.

Play along with me for a minute...what if other arenas in life had sequels? McDonalds Part 2: The Bigger Mac. "Honey, I have an appointment this afternoon to see "My Gynecologist 2: The Return Of The Baby-Making Ladyparts." Oil Change...the sequel to last year's blockbuster, New Used-Car Buy. Now showing: Paper Plates, a memoir of life after divorce.

But with all due respect, some of the intangible stuff needs a second act. Perhaps a redemption of sorts. It's a two-way street, "Circle Of Life" kinda thing. There can't be a two without a one; how do we wish to improve? Maybe there's the covering up of prior embarrassments, or the promise of actually getting whatever it was that made the mess in the first place right for a change. Learn and grow, ya know? Supply/demand, minus oversaturation and plus the good stuff, or something like that.

I don't contend to know everything...there are answers to questions I'll never think to ask. For every "Rocky" there's a "Rocky III" and a "Rocky Balboa"; there's "Star Trek" and then there's "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine". As long as you're not pullin' a Cosby and droppin' "Leonard Part VI" without the warning of a parts I-V, you're probably doin' alright.

MUSICAL BREAK!!

Perhaps. Maybe. Maybe not.

Cover songs aren't sequels, y'all.

THE DAILY BOX SCORE:

I really wanted to say I had no public interactions today (0) but that'd be a lie. I went to the post office to mail out my tax forms, and now that the internet is sorta steady again, I should be getting my TAP/PELL stuff in order soon as well so I can get the ball rollin' on going back to school in the fall...but (and there's always a but) I'll need something to do in April while I'm laid up and nursing a hydrocodone buzz. No time like the ever-present future, I guess. Still need to figure out what it is I wanna be when I grow up go back, and what part of "computer things" I want to get into...programming, security, graphic design, I don't know. So confused, and I haven't even looked at TC3's website yet (and I'm linking it now in hopes that I'll come across it eventually, knowing that I don't reread my blog entries once they've been posted and I've knocked out the grammatical errors I've seen). http://www.tc3.edu/

Best movie sequel I've ever seen? "Clerks II" (which also happens to be the last movie I saw in a theater http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0424345/). Thinking about it makes me want to watch the original again...almost like reliving my puking experience in a public place makes me nauseous all over. I've been there and done that, working in a retail environment and specifically a gas station overnights as a second job. I threw around a basketball in the parking lot. I skated around on entire shifts with rollerblades. Drank in the back room with friends and took a nap early on Sunday mornings before the newspapers came. I will please and thank you to never have to work in retail again.

Ok, well, at this point I'm mentally masturbating, so I should probably shut up and eat something. Peace, which started the whole world laughing, and GOODNIGHT NOW!!

Please never let there be a sequel to this movie...it's perfect.