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December 30, 2004

Last New Year's Eve

Last year for New Year's eve I called up a friend, "Do you want to go to Times Square?"
"Ok."

So we went to the liquor store and stocked up on beer, liquor and sparkling wine or sparkling malt beverage or whatever then drove over to a train station in New Jersey. There we drank beers and liquor in the parking lot before getting on the train. We drank on the train hiding our beers inside gloves to avoid the wrath of the ticket takers that were becoming increasingly hostile to our disregard for the no-drinking-on-the-train rule.
By the time we got to Manhattan Times Square was already full of people, but we tried to get in anyway. At every access to the square the police told us to go a couple blocks farther. "This entrance is closed. Go down to the next one." We ended up walking all the way down to Central Park.
In the park, under some trees, we ran into a bunch of thugs drinking forties. We joked for a bit and traded sips of delicious malt liquor for the Canadian liquor I brought. "Thanks for the drinks, guys, but we've got to run to go find Dick Clark."
"You ain't getting to that mothafucka. That shit's all packed."
And it was packed. All I saw was heads. Thousands by my count. Actually estimation is a better word for it, I was in no shape to count by 10pm.
As the night progressed we were packed tighter and tighter. More and more people wanted to get in to see Dick Clark. (What the hell does he do besides the New Year's special?) I got the idea to kick my feet out from under me to see if the friction betweenmy neighbors and I would hold me up. It did. What a sucker, using my feet all this time, I thought. I stayed holding my feet in the air until I forgot I was doing it and eventually stood up on my own again.
I'm not positive what it was that made me forget I was intentionally not using my feet, but I have an idea: a painful desire to urinate.
I had been drinking for hours and had no place to pee. Not only that, but if I did have someplace to go I couldn't reach it. Here I was, a sardine among hundreds of thousands of sardines packed into the streets of Manhattan unable to move in any direction. We were packed so tightly together not even my friend standing next to me could see that I had lifted my feet when I lifted them up. He couldn't see my feet.
I unzipped my fly and peed on 7th Avenue without anyone noticing.

I'm not sure when the ball dropped, if it even did, but eventually the place started thinning out.
I ran into a bunch of Japanese tourists. I gave piggy back rides to the girls while their boyfriends took pictures while they chanted, "I love America!"
I found myself in a Puerto Rican bar. I promptly left.
I ran into a Marine that wanted to kick my ass, but I talked him into buying me a beer.

Then I got into a fight with a cashier at one of Manhattan's many porno stores.
while my friend bought stacks and stacks of porno DVDs and grab-bag magazine packs I decided I was going to buy a gift for a girl I was dating. "Can I see how this thing works?"
"You turn it on."
"I know you turn it on. It's a vibrator. I got that part, but I've never seen a pen vibrator before I want to see how well it works. Does it even vibrate?"
"You buy it and see."
"It's thirty bucks. Let me see how it worksand then I'll decide."
"No. It has batteries. You buy it first."
"You want me to buy it to see if I want to buy it?"
"It has batteries."
"I know it has batteries."
"So you buy it and see how it works."
"No. I don't want it." Why the hell would I buy a pen vibrator anyway? It had become obvious to me it was just a stupid idea conceived because I was drunk in a porn store. After all that is why we crowded into the peep booth in the last store - it was there and we were drunk and curious ast to how they worked. I'm normally afraid to even look inside them, even though they smell like hospital disinfectant.
I walked over to the grab-bag magazine section and saw my friend with an armload of porn dropping things as he picked others off the shelf.

"You, sir. You wanted to see." The cashier called out to me. I turned to see he had opened the package and had the pen in one hand and the battery in the other.
"Yeah. OK"
"This is it." He held the two pieces, one in each hand.
"Ok, let's see."
"I just showed you."
"I saw that already. I wanted to see how well it worked. If it's crappy I don't want to waste my money."
"No. No."
"Yes. If it's crappy I don't want it. Let's see."
"No. you buy first."

He never showed me how it worked. Even though he had the package open and the battery out.

"Let's go."
"Just wait. I've got to buy a couple things."

The grab-bag magazines were rather bad, or he already had copies of them, we gave them away to the homeless on our way back to the train station.

The train back to Princeton was full. I stored myself in the overhead luggage compartment and took a nap.

Posted by calculatoronfire at December 30, 2004 12:57 PM

Comments

Just thought I'd drop by to say, "Happy New Year!" For the past few months I've dropped by your site. I've enjoyed reading the literary accounts of your life. I find your light hearted imaginative posts very entertaining. I have no doubt that one day you'll be a big time fiction writer. Keep up the good writing!! Here's Wishing You a Safe and Prosperous New Year!! Peace!!

Posted by: Gail at December 31, 2004 08:46 PM

Gail -
So you read something one day and then decided to come back to read more?

Is that what they call masochistic?
Or is it sadistic because I end up hurt, embarrassed or naked? (boy I've got some good ones from this long weekend)

Either way, I will try to have a safe and prosperous new year (within reason, of course!), but only if you promise to do the same.

Thanks for the compliment (I think the big-time fiction writer thing was a compliment, unless you were implying that I am a soulless sell-out), but I don't know if it will work out as I don't really proof read anything. Of course, if you stop by again and see some typos you are invited to point them out. As long as you use an emoticon at the end of your message.

Oh, and Happy New Year

From Brian.

Posted by: brian at January 4, 2005 12:51 PM