And Then What Happened: Boston Part 2

If you missed part 1 of the Boston story, here's where to find it. Really, this photo does more to explain the weekend than anything I could say. It was taken on Sunday afternoon, on our way back from watching football downtown with Katie, Lindsey and my cousin Justine. It took MAYBE 30 seconds for us both to fall asleep.

Anyway. I'm sure I've talked about this before, but I've never in my life had a hangover. I've never gotten sick from drinking too much. I've definitely had enough to warrant those situations, but for whatever reason, it hasn't ever happened. My working theory is that I'm a superhero of some kind with the lamest super powers ever. But I digress.

Now I'm not sure exactly what a hangover feels like. I've woken up and not felt great -- a little bit of a sour stomach sometimes, maybe a slight headache. But it's never been anything I couldn't just wake up and power through.

Well, I woke up on Saturday morning with the biggest headache I'd ever had after drinking. I blame the scorpion bowls. I had some water and took a shower, and I was good after I had some food. I don't know if that counts as a hangover or not, but it's definitely the closest I've ever come. I still say no.

Langdon and I were up around 7:45 or 8 a.m. to head to the airport to pick up J. Mike. Let me take a second to plug J. Mike's blog, where he posted his own story about Boston. Very cool. When J. Mike got in the car, we started recounting some of our old Technician road trip stories. J. Mike and I talked about our infamous trip to cover the Miami game in 2007 where we realized we did not have our press passes two and a half hours in the trip and turned around. "BG, turn around, man. I don't have the press passes." Oy haha.

Then Langdon and J. Mike told a story about a road trip to Winston-Salem to cover a Wake Forest game. The game was long over, and the interviews were done. Langdon and J. Mike exited the field house with the new writer they'd taken along with them, only to be semi-accosted by a homeless man who screamed, for no apparent reason, "And then what happened!" As Langdon told the story, he broke into a dead run as soon as the man yelled. J. Mike followed along quickly enough, leaving the young writer alone. Like you do. Naturally, they tried to spin it into a life lesson for the poor kid in the car.

So there you go. I did what I do, and I ran the saying into the ground all weekend. And then what happened.

We'd made plans to meet Carnell, Katie and Lindsey at this bar near BC's football stadium. There's not a whole lot of room to tailgate for games there, so people often go to bars. This particular bar -- City Bar, I believe it was called -- is where the N.C. State Boston alumni chapter meets before games. Carnell was nowhere to be found until the second quarter of the football game. The girls were very slow to arrive at the bar as a result of Friday night.

Langdon, J. Mike and I had a few drinks and some food and met up with a bunch more of the DC folks who made the trip. We made our way to the stadium, and the game was terrible from the start haha. We were down 7-0 before we even found our seats. What can you do. We laid an egg in the game and lost 14-10. Obviously, we now know how the regular season ends, so it's all good.

That game was the first time I'd really heard the song "Shipping Up to Boston." I documented my thoughts on that last week. I was getting fired up, and they weren't even playing it for me.

So there's not a whole lot to say about the game. After the game, however, Langdon, J. Mike and I hopped on the T to get back downtown to meet Langdon's roommate and his girlfriend for some drinks. We sat down, and I could already tell I was only minutes from sleep. But Langdon saw this guy in a Boston Transit uniform, drinking something out of a Gatorade bottle. Langdon, being Langdon, asked him what kind of Gatorade it was. "My own special blend," he said. (I'm sure it is, I add parenthetically.)

The man, whose name I cannot recall nor do I know if we ever knew, came and sat down near us to share his life story. All I remember is he "fackin' hates loyahz," and he and his ex-wife have a standing appointment in court seemingly daily.

I passed out not long after, but Langdon kept up a conversation the entire ride downtown. And then what happened. Indeed.

The combination of Friday night and a long day on Saturday left all of us pretty drained. We headed back to Langdon's apartment after a few drinks at an Irish pub downtown. When we got back, his roommate and roommate's girlfriend cooked homemade enchiladas for us all. LEGIT. So very good. The roommate made us some kick-ass drinks, too, but of course I don't remember what they were. If Langdon reads this, maybe he can chime in on that. I'd love to know what that drink was. Some kind of ginger beer mixture. For the win.

I tried incredibly unsuccessfully to make plans with Katie and Lindsey. They were, understandably, exhausted and not sure they were going to make it out. Well we were having none of that. So we hit the T and headed downtown. We ended up a bar called Hurricane O'Reillys. Carnell found us while we waited outside, and we headed in. It was pretty much redonk. J. Mike was so excited to be out with us, he joyfully bought all our drinks that night (THANKS BUDDY). Naturally, we drank, I think, four High Life tallboys each. Like you do. Keepin' it classy.

Well, you know how I roll. I got a couple of drinks in me, and it was time to dance. Listen. My arms get involved when I dance. Out to my sides. Above my head. I'm just grooving, man. I can't help myself. The problem was this: I've never seen a more crowded dance floor in my life. My arms were stuck to my sides because I simply couldn't move them.

Carnell peaced out to meet up with some other people he was in town with, so we worked our way over to a side bar and kind of made our own dance floor for a bit. J. Mike got really excited and bought us shots of straight Jager. I don't often take shots of straight liquor. The occasional shot of Jameson this summer, I suppose, but it's not common.

Here's how you know I had a good time. I was checking my Twitter feed after the weekend, and I found the following tweet, timestamped at 1:34 a.m. while we were out Saturday night: "Aww sookie sookie now."

Clearly, I was feeling it.

Langdon and I were finally able to get up with Katie and Lindsey, who DID make it out Saturday night. Katie sent us a picture of the wallpaper where they were and told us to find them and have fun with the scavenger hunt. Of course. As we were getting ready to leave, this guy walked by Langdon, J. Mike and I and LITERALLY showed his teeth to Langdon. What in the world. It was one of the strangest things I've ever seen.

I'm sure Katie and Lindsey have figured this out by now, but there's no chance we could have found them if Katie hadn't checked in at the restaurant/bar on Facebook. I saw the check-in, googled the name and we were on our way.

I left my sister a drunk voicemail. Langdon and J. Mike left Nick and drunk voicemail that went straight to his voicemail hall of fame. Like you do.

So we were walking down to street toward the restaurant where Katie and Lindsey were with some other friends of theirs when these two girls jumped out of an alley, grabbed me by the arms, pulled me into the alley and threw me against the wall.

In my head, I'm thinking, "YEEAAH BUDDY. Best night of my life! Pre-emptively!" I've seen this movie; I know how it ends. One girl was so drunk, all she could do was lean against me. The other girl said to me, in a reasonably thick Boston accent (which is surprisingly endearing on young, cute girls and not middle-aged drunk men), "Please help us. This guy has been following us for, like, five blocks now, and he's really scaring us. You look like you're really cool, so can you pretend to be our friend so maybe he'll leave us alone?"

I'm thinking, well you're the ones that have me pinned against a wall in an alley. Do I need some help? But I said, sure why not. Apparently I look much more intimidating than I feel because that was the second time in a couple of months I was asked to scare someone off.

What the hell do you do in that situation? I looked over at the guy as menacingly as I can (read: not very), and the girls started talking really loudly, "Oh my god, Chris, thank GOD we found you! We've been looking for you for so long!" I continued looking at the guy menacingly, and he seemed to get the point and wandered off.

The girls kissed me and ran off down the street, thanking me profusely. So. That happened haha.

Langdon and J. Mike watched the whole situation unfold and were totally engrossed in what I told them about it. It was so bizarre. I'll tell you what, though. Shit like that DOES NOT happen to fat dudes. It just don't! So once again, hooray losing more than 40 pounds! haha

We finally found the restaurant after some googling and wandering. Katie and Lindsey were extremely surprised we found them. Langdon and I just looked at each other, and we were like, c'mon. Of course we did. Lulz. J. Mike was barely coherent at this point, which was awesome because he began to tweet complete and total gibberish the entire time we were there.

Unfortunately for the world, he went back and deleted it the next morning. I wish I had some examples.

Around 2 or 2:30 a.m., we decided it was time to head back. Now, remember the cab situation I faced the night before? Yeah. Again. Not only was it hard to get the cab drivers even to stop, but when they DID stop and heard where we were going, they often drove off immediately.

So the three of us fanned out to try to get a cab. Langdon and I were on opposite sides of this main street, trying to flag them down. J. Mike, however. Oh lord.

J. Mike took to standing ON the center line in the street, punching cabs as they drove by. It didn't seem like a sustainable situation, but wow do I wish I'd taken a picture of it.

Eventually, we came up with a new strategy. Langdon flagged down the cabs and distracted the driver while I jumped in the backseat and refused to move. Once I got in the backseat, they hopped in too, and we were just like, dude. We've got cash. We're not moving. Drive us home, you know? Shit.

I fell asleep in the cab immediately. Like you do. Like I do, anyway. We got back, paid the cab and headed upstairs. I crashed on the couch so fast I didn't even have time to change clothes.

Sunday morning was a bit rough for J. Mike haha. We finally got him out of bed around noon so we could head downtown to watch football with Lindsey and Katie. And my cousin Justine! Justine lives in Boston, and we tried unsuccessfully to coordinate hanging out Friday and Saturday, but Sunday there was no excuse.

I hadn't seen her since the wedding back in September 2009 that I've talked about so much. Her brother is the one who got married. But she came and hung out with us, and she exhibited what appears to be a BG-family personality trademark: infectious enthusiasm and energy. Good times.

She definitely helped rally us because we were dragging from two solid days of nonsense and staying out until 4 a.m.

Alas, my flight was that night, so we had to head back. The photo up top is from this point in the story. We fell asleep on the T in no time. J. Mike was too nervous to fall asleep, but you could tell Langdon and I are seasoned subway travelers. We fell asleep and would wake up at each of the stations as we approached the station we needed -- which is exactly how I roll on the DC metro.

Made it to the airport and headed back to DC. As we were exiting the plane at National, Katie gave us the most appropriate quote for the entire week: "It's kind of weird being sober."

Indeed it was.

Final verdict: Boston was infinitely more awesome than I expected to be, and I would love to go back very, very soon so I can do actual nerdy touristy things.

Boston, well done!

As always, thank you so, so much for reading and for telling me you enjoy the stories. I get such a huge kick out of knowing people actually like reading my BS.

It should be another insane weekend, again, starting tonight with a party with some work friends, continuing on Saturday night with a holiday-themed bar crawl downtown and then finishing up on Sunday with a date! Doin' the bull dance. Feelin' the flow. Let's GO. Hopefully there will be some blog-appropriate stories! Have a great weekend, kids.

Later!

-BG

And Then What Happened: Boston Part 1

Oh boy is this post long overdue. For a few reasons, actually.

First, I went to Boston a month ago. Ha. Second, I've been trying to write this since Sunday night, but I keep falling asleep while trying to write. Like, falling asleep on the couch with the computer in my lap. But all night. Like you do. It is now Tuesday night, and I will do anything to finish this tonight (Ed. Note: I did, and then forgot to post it before I left work. I am clearly still adjusting to writing at night.)

Anyway.

Back in August during the CAN softball tournament, one of my teammates suggested we all head up to Boston for the N.C. State/BC football game. She lives in New Hampshire, and she said it'd be fun if we all came up. What a great idea! I'd never been to Boston, but I also never thought I'd want to go. In case you don't know, I'm a Yankees fan, and I'm kind of irrational about how much I hate Boston. I just never wanted to go.

Well. The city of Boston is pretty awesome. I'm totally glad I went, and I'd actually like to go back sometime when I won't be spending an entire day at a football game. I'd like to do some touristy stuff, you know? You do.

So here we go!

Lucky for me, the game fell on Veterans Day weekend. Since I'd just started this job a few weeks earlier, I didn't have much time off accrued. But Veterans Day was a floating holiday! We get three floating holidays a year, and since I was working the last third of the year, I'd get to use one. So I was able to get off work on Friday to fly to Boston. I managed to get on the same flight as Lindsey and one of the Katies (the only one of the three who made the trip, so she'll just be Katie from here on out haha).

As I was walking onto the plane, I heard the gate attendant say the following to another passenger: "You better buckle up! It's pretty windy, so you're probably going to have a rough flight!"

Do what now.

I would not say I'm scared to fly. I really do rather enjoy flying places. It's just that I have a sort of heights...thing. I don't care for them. So yeah. Definitely not afraid to fly, but you know. Nerves. That's all. And hearing Flo the Gate Attendant cheerfully tell another passenger we were in for a rough flight -- c'mon now. Thankfully, the flight did not live up to her warning. It was totally fine.

So we landed and my old Technician buddy Langdon came to pick us up. He gets out of the car, and he said, "BG what is UP, my dude?" Katie and Lindsey were amused someone else from an entirely different group also called me BG.

Brief tangent: I'm not entirely sure how BG came to be my nickname. Well, OK. Obviously I do because it's my initials, but it stuck with my Raleigh friends, and then my DC friends began calling me BG, too, and I'm reasonably certain I never told either of them to call me that. It just naturally came up and stuck. I like it, so it's all good. Just kinda funny.

We dropped the girls at their hotel downtown, and Langdon and I headed for his apartment outside the city. Awesome, awesome apartment, and a pretty cool up-and-coming neighborhood. We grabbed some drinks with his roommate and his roommate's girlfriend at this really cool bar up the street. They don't sell food at the bar, so they allow two things: you can bring your own food in, and you can bring dogs in. Awesome.

Lindsey, Katie and I wanted a unique Boston experience for dinner. Langdon and his roommate recommended this place called Pizzeria Regina, near Boston's Little Italy. Well, I don't know if you've met me, but you don't have to convince me very hard to eat some pizza. And everyone we asked raved about Pizzeria Regina, calling it the best pizza in Boston.

After a couple of drinks with Langdon, he pointed me in the direction of the subway, and I worked my way downtown to meet the girls. The restaurant was going to be, like, a 15-minute walk from their hotel, so we decided to cab it. Pizzeria Regina looked legit from the outside. It's a pretty small place, so waiting outside is almost guaranteed. But they do it right, with heat lamps and benches outside. Very nice. We were a small party, so we didn't have to wait long.

Naturally, we ordered a couple of bottles of wine to get the night started right, as you can see in the photo. You know how we roll. We end up deciding on a margherita pizza with green peppers added. See the photo. It was redonk. Lindsey asked the waitress for some ranch for the pizza. In what I imagine to be true Boston style, the waitress looked right at her and said, "Oh we don't do ranch here. I'll bring you what we do have. It's better anyway."

Well then.

It was some kind of oil and garlic mixture. It was, of course, quite good. The pizza was amazing -- I can't say "best pizza in Boston" because it's the only pizza I had in Boston. But I will say I don't believe the claim to be ridiculous. At all. The walls were lined with pictures of famous people who'd eaten there and left their autographs, including a photo of our waitress with Danny DeVito. Lindsey and Katie took a picture of an autographed Leonardo DiCaprio photo on the wall, uploaded it to Facebook and tagged all three of us in it. Like you do.

So obviously with two bottles of wine, we'd built up a solid buzz already. We finished with dinner around 9ish and cabbed back to the girls' hotel. We had, like, half a bottle of wine we needed to polish off before we headed out for the night.

A few frantic phone calls between Langdon, my cousin Justine (who also lives in Boston), Carnell (who also made the trip to Boston) and one of the three of us eventually led to us settling on going to this place called Hong Kong. We were told it was a grimy place with fun drink specials where you can really dance.

I mean. Sign me up.

So we went to Hong Kong, and it was exactly as described (read: awesome). Check out the drink special. It's called a scorpion bowl. I'd never heard of these things before, but it's basically fruit juice, sugar and the cheapest brandy and liquor you can imagine. In a giant bowl. With four straws. Aaaand we drank two of them between the four of us (Katie, Lindsey, Carnell and me). And then the dancing started. And it was, predictably, incredible. Gah we had such a good time.

So the four of us were dancing in a circle when this girl came up behind me, grabbed me around the waist and started dancing with me. I mean. I'll allow it. She seemed...interested (to say the least haha). After a while, she looked at me and said, "You do not move. I'm not done with you. I have to go get a drink." Well OK. What's your name? Let's just say she shared a name with a recent ex-girlfriend of mine. Because of course she did. Lulz. No matter. She never reappeared after leaving.

The dancing and drinking continued, and we decided to leave around 2 a.m. The girls' hotel was close enough to walk to from Hong Kong. Langdon's apartment was decidedly not haha. Here's my least favorite thing about the city of Boston: their subway closes at midnight! What in the world!

It has to be collusion between the city and cab drivers, who are all assholes because they can be super selective. They know we all have to get a cab, so it's insanely competitive. I've never seen anything like it.

Obviously, I am not a cute girl, nor was I wearing revealing clothing, so it took me a solid HOUR to get a cab. An hour! I finally made it back to Langdon's around 3:30 a.m. He offered me a glass of wine, which I'm pretty sure I aggressively declined. Look, we needed to go to sleep. We had to wake up the next morning at 8 a.m. to pick up J. Mike from the airport!

And so we did.

Come back for part 2, which may or may not be the conclusion, depending on how much I write haha. Anyway, it will include such exciting details as the explanation for the title of these posts ("And then what happened?!"), our encounter with a (probably drunk) Boston transportation employee on the T and J. Mike attempting to fight cabs in the middle of the street, like you do.

Later!

-BG

Hey. Thanks.

Yeah. I know I'm a couple weeks late on this, but Thanksgiving happened while I was on my blog vacation. Naturally, I have some thoughts.

It's no secret 2011 hasn't been my best year -- although it did rally something serious starting at the end of October. Well, when you go through rough times, you learn a lot about yourself and your friends and the people who care about you.

I've definitely got that. I learned more this year than I ever have before -- about humility, about perseverance, about trusting my instincts, about not being afraid of accepting help, about the importance of a positive attitude, and so on and so on.

Finally, I feel like I've made it through the storm. I feel so good, and there are innumerable things for which I'm incredibly thankful. Since I didn't write anything on Thanksgiving, I figured why not now?

Fair warning, though. It's about to get real up in this piece. So in the spirit of Thanksgiving (two weeks ago), I couldn't have made it through this year without the following things (some very obvious, some maybe not so much), albeit it an incomplete list:

My Family -- My dad slipped me a $20 bill every time he saw me. My mom sent me home with food every time I saw her. My grandfather was so upset when he heard about my job back in January, he sent me a card with a check for $50 in it. Seriously. That happened. Is it getting dusty in here? I mean. There aren't enough words.

My Friends -- You guys. For reals. You're all ridiculous, and I don't know what I would have done without our weekly (or more often) debaucheries this summer and fall. You were there with a kind and encouraging word when I needed it and with a disparaging word when it was necessary haha. And you continue to be awesome.

Fridays at the Bottom Line -- The best happy hour in DC. It's tough to beat the $1 beer specials. We can go in there and all get drinks for like $25 total, which would cover like three drinks anywhere else in the District. Many a ridiculous night has originated at the Bottom Line, and I hope for more to come VERY shortly. Like this week, I hope.

Running -- Reluctantly crouched at the starting line. Engines pumping and thumping in time. The green light flashes. The flags go up. Churning and burning, they yearn for the cup. You're fired up right now, aren't you? The first few lines to "The Distance," by Cake. It's the first song on my running playlist every time I run. Since April, when I started watching what I eat and exercising intensely, there have been times where I was simply overwhelmed. And nothing cleared my head, got the blood pumping or burned the energy better than a solid four-mile run. Whenever I go a few days or weeks without running, that first run back is a rush of excitement, and I always remember how much I love it now. It's so funny because I hated running until I forced myself into a half-marathon two years ago. Since then, I've run two 5Ks, and I registered for a second half-marathon here in DC in March. CAN'T WAIT.

Losing Weight/Being Healthier -- You may have heard, but I've lost more than 40 pounds since April. You know what never gets old? I wore pants yesterday I couldn't even pull up to my waist just a few months ago. Never mind buttoning them, I couldn't even get them up to my waist. And I wore them comfortably yesterday. Incredible. I was wearing XL shirts just eight months ago. Now, I wear mostly mediums. I have a size medium coat. What in the world. This time last year? I was almost 230 pounds. I weighed in Monday night after my run at 186, which is even more of an accomplishment given how I spent the months of October and November up and down the East coast. More on that next week.

Dancing -- Dude. I never knew how much I loved it until this past summer. But, man, what an unbelievably freeing and exhilarating time. Play a little Jackson 5 ("I Want You Back," especially) or, really, any 60s music, I'm totally in. Oh who are we kidding...I'm good with anything. Lulz.

My Job -- First and foremost, I straight-up love my co-workers. You guys are brilliant and hilarious, and I could not be more excited about this opportunity. It challenges me in new and exciting ways every day, and I'm learning something new seemingly by the minute. What more can you ask for?

My Best Friends -- Jon, you are like a brother to me. We've been friends for, what, 17, almost 18 years now? Incredible. You have a way of cutting right to the point in exactly the way I need to hear it exactly WHEN I need to hear it. I often, unwisely, do not heed your advice (just as we both know I probably won't this time...LULZ), but, rest assured, I know I probably should haha. And it is always most appreciated. Sometimes I just need to go down magnificently in flames, consequences be damned, you know? C'est la vie. And Mike. There may be no stranger "bromance." Despite the fact that we have only hung out in person maybe four times total, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say I have talked to you more than anyone else this year. Disturbingly parallel. Whatever happens with one of us, I can know without question the other has either already done it or will be doing it shortly. Lulz, indeed.

Last and, most certainly, not least, the past five weeks -- I mean. What can I say? Simply amazing. Thanks, "Lola." Always.

-BG

Mailing it In

Look, I'm not saying I'm going to mail in this post, but I'm not NOT saying it either. So you know. There it is.

Here's the deal: I get sick like once a year. It's a cold that lasts for a little while and then it goes away. And I sort of feel it coming on right now. You know that cloudy-head feeling and sort of sore throat deal? Yeah. Fail.

Is this related to my insane weekend in Raleigh? It could be. I went harder in Raleigh than I have probably since my trip to Savannah back in June. Who knows.

So prepare for a little random, stream of consciousness today!

This weekend feels like a couch weekend. After last weekend and last night, I wouldn't mind a little relaxing and recovery. Tonight is a rest night, for sure. Gotta head this potential sickness off at the pass.

And it's raining again. We're supposed to play flag football on Sunday. This is the CAN league, so it's the N.C. State flag football team (like my N.C. State softball team from this summer).

The team was really good last year. Ended up ranked no. 8 out of like 60-65 teams, I think. We won our first game last weekend 34-0 over South Carolina. Obviously, I was in Raleigh, so I didn't participate. This weekend, we're supposed to play No. 2 Michigan though. I hope the rain stops long enough so we can play.

And then don't rain anymore! I don't want any more softball games to be rained out! We're supposed to play Tuesday night. *sigh. We'll see.

So last night, we hit up Front Page for happy hour before going downstairs to Buffalo Billiards to watch the State game. Let me tell you why happy hour specials are awesome: four beers, $11 bill, including tip. That's tough to beat, friends.

I don't want to talk about the State game. Except to say this: ATTENTION DEFENSE AND OFFENSIVE LINE -- THE SEASON STARTED FOUR WEEKS AGO. SHOW UP.

I sort of blame myself for the two losses so far this season. I've worn my two-time national champions shirt for two games this year. Yup. The Wake Forest and Cincinnati games. Might be time to retire this shirt for game purposes. I was going to wear the kick-ass long-sleeve shirt I bought in Raleigh (that I wore to the South Alabama win), but it was just too warm for long sleeves last night, no matter how thin and comfortable the shirt may be. Next week, I'm not risking it. I'm wearing that shirt regardless.

We had a great group to watch the game though. Probably had 50 State people show up. So that was good anyway. Really though, the only way to watch a State game is at a bar. Watching the team just makes you want to drink to forget most of the time, so it helps to cut out the traveling and just start at the bar.

Matty's playing rugby tomorrow against Georgetown, but if it's raining, I probably won't make the trek down to watch that. Not as much fun to stand and watch in the rain as it is to run or play in the rain.

Tomorrow night, however, we're going to go see Moneyball! I never read the book, but I know about it, obviously, and the sabermetrics teams use to evaluate players. I fully support sabermetrics. I think stats like RBIs and pitcher wins are ridiculous measures of a player's worth because they are completely dependent on OTHER players and not the individual you're trying to examine.

Plus, Aaron Sorkin wrote the screenplay for the movie. I will see anything Sorkin has a hand in writing. If it came out that he was writing the screenplay for the next Sex and the City movie, I'd be there on opening night. He's responsible for two of my favorite shows of all time -- The West Wing and Sports Night. I'm pretty excited to see this.

I'll be surprised if we don't end up at a bar after the movie, but there's no chance I'm going like I did in Raleigh. A couple drinks, and then home. Because if we DO have a flag football game, it's 11 a.m. on Sunday, and it's a little bit of a drive from my apartment.

Otherwise, Matty and I will head to McFadden's for the Panthers game at 1 p.m. I gotta say, I'm incredibly surprised there are enough Panthers fans in the DC area to designate a bar as a "Panthers bar." But there it is. McFadden's is a Panthers bar. Who knew. I'm not a diehard Panthers fan like he is. I'm mostly indifferent on the NFL. I love watching football, but I don't have ONE team I live and die with by any means. I loosely follow the Jets and the Panthers.

Brief health update: After three days in Charlotte and three insane days in Raleigh, I gained a couple pounds back. Nothing crazy and nothing unforeseen, and undoubtedly worth it. But back to the grind this week and next, big time. Feel great, folks. Feeling really great.

Have you seen the previews for the movie 50/50 with Seth Rogen and Joseph Gordon-Levitt? I may have talked about this before. I don't recall. Whatevs. Anyway, JGL's character gets cancer. Rogen plays his friend, and it appears to be about how they deal with it.

Every time I see a preview for this movie, it looks better and better. I really want to see it. It comes out next weekend. But I mean. There's no chance JGL's character lives, right? He has to die at the end of the movie, doesn't he? I just don't know. One of the reasons I want to see it is because some of the conversations the two guys had in the previews were strikingly similar to conversations and interactions I had with Erik. I got the chills when I first saw the previews.

I'm afraid of this movie hitting too close to home, essentially. But I don't know. It looks so good. I think we can all agree this would be a poor decision for a date movie, though, right? Haha of course.

I foresee myself seeing this movie and bringing plenty of tissues. You know, for the emotions.

You know, I really love the phrases "xxxx is the worst" and "the game is afoot." I think the first one comes from The Office. Michael was always very fond of saying how Toby is the worst. And the way he said it with such disdain and disgust really cracks me up. Plus, it's so definitive. That's the worst. Love it.

The game is afoot. Whenever I hear this it reminds me of those awesome SNL Celebrity Jeopardy sketches with "Sean Connery." It's just really great. It's definitely NOT the worst. I believe I said it a few times this past weekend. Very appropriately, too. And I think we should all try hard to work it into our daily speech as often as possible. There's just no downside to that.

Anyway, I'm pretty excited for a relaxing, low-key weekend after the past couple of weeks. It's been beyond awesome, but even I need a break every once in a while -- ridiculous energy levels notwithstanding. Seriously though, the past few months is the most fun I've had since college. Which is pretty much what I knew would happen. Lulz.

Once again, thanks to everybody who, for some reason, reads whatever it is I feel like writing. Thanks for the comments and messages. It means the world to me.

Back on Monday!

-BG

That Just Happened Part 2

Did you somehow miss the exciting first part of the story of my weekend in Raleigh? Check it out here before reading on.

So! When we left off with the story, we were turning in around 5 a.m. We'd all had quite a bit to drink, although I quickly learned Nick and Mike are extreme lightweights. Mike had four beers and was nearly unconscious. Nick didn't have much more and was worried about feeling awful Saturday morning.

What in the world guys!

Anyway, 9 a.m. rolled around on Saturday and I was UP and ready to go. I walked Allie and got ready, and then I waited to get up with Nick so we could gameplan for the rest of the day. Predictably, it took a while. Weaksauce.

We finally rendezvoused at lunchtime. The game was at 6 p.m., so we had plenty of time to grab some food and tailgate for quite a while.

This seems like a good place for the story of acquiring tickets. Obviously, I'm no longer a student. But for a while, I still had my student ID, so I could just find a student to get me a ticket, and flash my student ID to get in. Well, first of all, I no longer am up to speed on the whereabouts of my student ID. Second, I know fewer and fewer students every year.

When I told Nick I was coming back, I asked him to please get me a ticket with everyone who'd be going (and we had a fairly substantial group). He said it wouldn't be a problem. That was last weekend.

Monday rolls around. Tuesday rolls around. Nothing. Hey Nick, ticket update? "We're totally fine." Nick, I need some reassurance about this. I'm driving an awfully long way to get to this game. "I have the best reassurance ever for you: SOUTH ALABAMA (meaning it shouldn't be hard to find tickets to this game because of the team we were playing)." Nicholas, that does not help me.

He kept telling me it would be fine and not to worry. So I stopped asking. Asking wasn't going to get me anywhere anyway. We didn't have the tickets in our hand until 2 p.m. on SATURDAY -- the day of the game. In retrospect, I'm glad I stopped asking about it haha. Truthfully, if I still lived in Raleigh, I wouldn't have cared about getting the tickets on that timetable. But all the driving made me nervous.

Anyway, we met up and headed to Wendy's for lunch, where I got a grilled chicken sandwich (because I'm watching what I eat...lulz), fries and SWEET TEA, which I can gleefully report was readily available everywhere. We recounted the stories from Friday night and filled in the newest member of the team, Chad, who replaced John in the car with Nick, Mike and me.

Chad was instantly a fan of everything that happened and couldn't wait to come out with us Saturday night.

As we got closer to the stadium, we realized we had neither tickets nor beer for tailgating. Nick and Mike went to meet the guy who was selling us the tickets. Chad and I hopped out of the car at the intersection of Hillsborough and Blue Ridge. There's a gas station across the street there, so we went and bought beer. It was kind of like a game of Frogger with us trying to cross the street.

Well, Mike and his four beers from the night before made it impossible for him to finish more than ONE beer at the tailgate. Nick did a little better, but he was also not feeling well from the night before.

We met up with Justin and a few of Chad's friends. And one of Mike's friends, Eileen, who was out with us the night before, came to tailgate even though she had no ticket for the game, nor did she plan on acquiring a ticket to the game. Also, she walked three miles just to tailgate with us for a few hours. Hardcore. Major props. Then again, tailgating at N.C. State is kind of a way of life. Nothing comes close.

Tailgated for a few hours. It was relatively chilly and light rain fell almost the entire time. My long-sleeved State shirt proved to be a brilliant decision. Justin was totally clutch, too. He brought a small HD TV with a box that connects to the cigarette lighter in the car, so we got to watch football while we tailgated without a ridiculous generator situation.

No point in talking about the game. Check out the ESPN game recap for that if you want. It was raining and sloppy, and we won by more than 20. A GOOD TIME WAS HAD BY ALL. Here's a photo I took from where we were standing. I really love our stadium. Man.

We didn't bother going to our seats. Another friend of ours, Dennis (D-Burt) has season tickets and NEVER sits in his seats. He and his buddy Doug just stand in the concourse near the big scoreboard. It's actually a pretty solid view, so why not? This way, it doesn't matter where your tickets are. You end up with the people you want to be with anyway. Oh! and I took a video of the team entrance with my blackberry, so pardon me if it sucks, but here it is anyway.



While at the game, I ran into J. Mike, another Tech sports alum who we hadn't seen in a long time. We agreed it was necessary for him to come out with us that night.

Got back after the game, showered and got ready. I didn't want to wait for Nick to go back to Durham to do the same and then come back, so I cabbed downtown to meet Laura, and I actually got to see Danielle and Adam for the first time in like two years. I think the last time I saw them was the very first Bark for Life event we did the day before my half-marathon. So Oct. 2009. Crazy. They lived in Spain for like nine months. Kick ass.

So we met at Mecca, which I'm told is the oldest restaurant in Raleigh. Awesome! Seriously, any place that has a framed portrait of FDR over the bar is A-OK by me. Had a drink there and then went to meet Laura and her friends again at Busy Bee. I've heard a lot about Busy Bee from friends in Raleigh, and it was pretty awesome. Tough to beat $2 cans of High Life. Also, I had a swedish fish shot for the first time ever. It really does taste like swedish fish. That could get dangerous.

Nick, Chad and their friends arrived, and we just kinda sat around at Busy Bee for a while. I feel like we probably wasted too much time there, but it was fine. Around 1 a.m., Nick and I looked at each other and pretty much said, "I just wanna dance," at exactly the same time. It was getting late. We needed to get moving. Literally.

Laura, who is pretty much a hipster haha, said we had two options. There's a place where the people would look like Nick and me (The Hive, where we were Friday night), but there's a huge line to get in; or a place where the people would look like Laura (Neptunes), but there probably wouldn't be a line to get in.

We chose the latter, and got in after not too long. Laura was right haha. J. Mike was waiting for us there, and I'm not sure it was possible for us to visually stick out more than we did. But the music, man. The music. It was kind of a 60s/Motown/funk kind of thing, and it was just unbelievable. It was exactly the kind of vibe I was looking for that night. Seriously amazing.

Laura described it best when she said it was like a scene out of Dirty Dancing. You couldn't really dance fast to it. You just had to groove (and yes, I know how white I sound right now. Suck it.). God I just loved every second of that. We didn't have much time to dance there, but I really made the most of it, I think.

J. Mike had the incredible foresight to take a picture of it. It's a little blurry because, well, I was dancing and it was dark. But it's too good not to share.

It was around this time when Justin, Nick and J. Mike began to wonder how many energy drinks I must have had given how hard we went the night before, how late it currently was and how much energy I was displaying on the dance floor haha. They couldn't accept that I just had that much energy pretty much all the time. But I did, and I do. Apparently, they all feel like I should spend time being in energy drink commercials. I'll take it!

Anyway. Excellent night. Lots of drinks, friends I hadn't seen in a long time -- great success. Must be done again soon. Saturday night was mild compared to Friday night. I was asleep by 3:30 or so.

Woke up the next day, feeling good as always. I took Allie to a dog park downtown, where she promptly sat down next to me or under a table. Allie is one of the smartest dogs I've ever encountered, but I really think she fundamentally does not understand the purpose of the dog park. Or maybe she just uses it for mental stimulation. Or maybe she just doesn't like dogs who are strangers. I don't know.

She had two beagle friends when she was younger, Ella and Lady, and she always loved running around and playing with them. She loved playing with our family dog, Spunky, too. Who knows. After the dog park, I went to Laura's house and hung out and had a few drinks with her and her roommate. Allie and Laura's dog Rainer got to run around their yard some more before we hopped in the car for the 4-5 hour drive back.

I made the brilliant decision to call ahead to Lilly's and pick up a pizza on my way out of town. Great success on that one. Thankfully, there was no traffic, and we made it back in a decent time. SO great. Thanks to everyone, seriously. Amazing weekend.

And that's all she wrote for my weekend in Raleigh. I'm sure I've left out some things I did not intend to leave out, so feel free to let me know via messages or comments or whatever. All in all, it was a perfect weekend.

I couldn't have asked for a better time seeing all my friends, and I absolutely must get back soon to do it again.

Also, standing invite to everyone to come to D.C. whenever you can, and we'll make sure we go just as hard here as we did in Raleigh. Man. Just awesome. LET US GO.

-BG

That Just Happened: A Raleigh Recap

I spent the later half of last week in North Carolina, visiting family and friends -- Wednesday through Friday morning in Charlotte and the remainder of the weekend in Raleigh.

Charlotte was excellent, of course. I got to see my parents and some of my oldest friends. I got to rock out on my drums a good bit. It was, generally, solid.

There really are not a whole lot of exciting details to say about that though haha. It was an excellent few days, and I'm excited to go back next month for Kirk's wedding.

Raleigh, on the other hand. Whew. As my texts, blogs, Facebook status updates and Tweets said, I was expecting a ridiculous weekend. I never could have imagined just how ridiculous it would be. I'll talk about many things here, but suffice it to say there is also quite a bit I will never mention in a public forum. Ever. That just happened.

This may require two parts. We'll see. Here we go!

So when I left my apartment on Wednesday, it was 85 degrees. Relatively hot. Humid. You know. The usual summer weather. When I woke up in Charlotte on Friday, I discovered Fall had arrived overnight.

That's fine and all. I like Fall. Well, I love Fall. But I was not wardrobily prepared. And also, I don't know if you're aware or anything, but I've lost a shit-ton of weight over the past few months -- 42 pounds to be exact. I haven't worn jeans since I was a fat-ass. They no longer fit! WAY too big for me. They'd fall down after taking barely a few steps, and the belt caused such ridiculous bunching-up it was just time for new jeans.

When I got to Raleigh on Friday, my first stop was the Go Pack store to buy a long-sleeved State shirt for the game on Saturday, which was supposed to be cold and rainy (it was, more on that later), and my second stop was the mall to buy jeans.

I bought jeans with a 34-inch waist. Let's. Go. I haven't been able to wear jeans that size in six or seven years.

Anyway, so I got situated and I was ready to go. I heard from Nick, and we made our plans. We planned to hit this bar called Foundation because our friend Laura works there. The group started as Nick, his roommate John, Mike and me. Mike, as I've mentioned, has become a close friend of mine through talking on Gchat every day, but this was the first time we ever got to hang out in person. Lulz.

We got our hugs and greetings out of the way and hopped into the car to go downtown. It was drizzling a little bit, and it was not really warm at all. We got downtown and found parking, and I called Laura to find out where Foundation is because none of us had ever been there.

I don't want to cause trouble, so I'll just say Laura was unavailable to hang out on Friday night haha :-). Mike helped us find Foundation anyway with his iPhone, and we decided we'd order a round or two of drinks before heading to the next stop.

I had a Manhattan (great success!), and we all took these shots called Carolina Sunsets. I couldn't tell you what's in them to save my life, so there you go. Some of Mike's friends from work showed up, and we had a pretty solid party going now.

It was then we agreed it was time to dance.

A brief aside about dancing: I had NO IDEA how much I loved dancing until very recently. I mean, from my stories from my cousin's wedding a couple years ago and various random nights out, obviously I knew I enjoyed it, but this was another level.

We made our way to The Hive around 11 or so. It was still pretty early, so it wasn't very full. We immediately went over to the dance floor and commanded the area until almost 2 a.m. It was beyond insane. Lots of drinks -- beers, whiskey, shots, let's go -- lots of fun.

Friday night really helped me realize how insane my energy level is now. Some of my friends have been commenting lately on how I seem to have a ridiculous amount of happy/fun/positive energy. I mean, is there any doubt it's completely tied to losing 42 pounds and working out six days a week?

I mean, we didn't stop dancing for three solid hours. I danced in the middle of a circle on the dance floor. What in the world? WHO AM I? So incredibly awesome. I really have to say, Nick, John, Mike and I know how to break it down. It was nuts.

A theme of the weekend seemed to be various people marveling at my energy level haha. And how they couldn't believe I was able to keep it up for as long as I did and at such high levels (THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID). But seriously, I was completely fired up all night, and I couldn't get enough dancing.

So John and Mike disappeared around 1:30 to find some other friends who were out. Nick and I stayed to continue dancing and drinking with some girls Nick had started chatting up who were in the aforementioned circle with us on the dance floor. We were under the impression Mike and John were going to bring the friends back to The Hive to continue dancing until it closed.

When it became apparent that wasn't going to happen, Nick and I wandered outside into the rain to find wherever Mike and John were. I think they were at Raleigh Times. Anyway, obviously neither Nick nor I knew where that was. So we asked this random guy named Wayne where to go, and he totally pointed us in the exact opposite direction.

Thanks a lot, Wayne.

As we were walking, we encountered a bachelorette party full of girls from Wilson. They were looking for their stretch Hummer limo. We ran across the street to ask them if they knew were Raleigh Times was (obviously not, since they were from Wilson, though we didn't know that when we decided to ask them). Instead, a few of them ran up to me, grabbed me and asked me to tell this creepy guy to leave them alone because he was following them despite repeated requests for him to stop.

Oh lord.

I don't particularly remember saying anything to the guy, but he left them alone. It must be because Nick and I are such a strikingly intimidating pair. Ha. Anyway, the girls then insisted on Nick and I following them to the Hummer to go to Wilson with them. Like you do.

For reasons completely passing understanding, we did not get in the Hummer. Instead, we got chili dogs. Again, like you do.

We eventually found Mike and John after nearly 30 minutes of walking around in the rain downtown. We were able to take shelter inside, but it was well after 2 a.m., and the bar was closed. Fail.

We left and found the car and ended up having another beer and hanging out at a friend's house for an hour or so after that. The fog of "you better believe I'm not disclosing these details on a public forum on the Internet" prevents me discussing this night further.

But oh boy. That just happened.

We made it back around 4:45 or 5 a.m. and hit the sack so we could do it again on Saturday. We had to tailgate and check out some State football before going out again Saturday night. It was going to be a long day!

That'll do it for part 1. Part 2 later!

God. This weekend was just so, so unbelievably awesome haha. Let's GO.

-BG

Weekend Outlook!

Warning: rambling ahead.

Ladies and gentlemen, the sun! For the first time in FOUR days.

Let me tell you about this rain. This week, I was supposed to have my first game in our new softball league on Tuesday night. Canceled because of rain. Then, all the rain we've had over the past 36-48 hours has caused the National Park Service to cancel all park activities for the whole weekend, which means N.C. State's first two flag football games against Johns Hopkins and Iowa are washed out.

Oh well. I got a lot of rain running in this week. And I mean, that's nice and all, but I'm tired of the rain!

So! Running recap for the week: I ran 13 miles this week -- four on Monday, five on Wednesday and four more today. Today's run, whew. When the weather says 100 percent humidity, go back inside and sit down. Seriously. On the brightside, I lost enough water weight to hit 185 on the scale today. That's not official or anything, but it sure is fun to see. :-)

Well, it's Friday, so that means tonight will be spent downtown with many of the usual suspects. A bartender a couple of my friends know pretty well at our favorite bar -- the Bottom Line -- is working her last shift tonight because she's moving to Key West. Couple that with their usual Friday happy hour specials of $1- and $2-beers, and there's really no way we can avoid it.

Although I may make a pit stop at another place first with my buddy Evan because, as I told him, he makes compelling arguments and I wish to subscribe to his newsletter. Lulz.

Tomorrow! The first official alumni group game-watch of the season for N.C. State football! We're going to get together at a bar in Arlington to watch the Wake Forest game. CAN'T WAIT. I know I've said this before, but it is so great to be surrounded by N.C. State people.

Sunday! NFL Sundays start again! I'm going to see if a few of my friends are watching games anywhere. My brother and I had a pretty sweet bar near Foggy Bottom where we watched games last year, but it's kind of small. And you might get stuck on a tiny, non-HD television for your game (I know, #firstworldproblems). So if we can find another good place, that wouldn't be the worst.

Looking back over the weekend's plans, it's a good thing I ran the 5K on Saturday and 13 more miles over the past week. Because that's going to be a lot of drinking. Hey oh! I'll take it. We have a really ridiculously good time.

In other words, awesome weekend coming up. Really can't wait.

Job front: I ended up not getting that job I was talking about over the past few weeks. But I applied to, like, 25 more jobs this week, and a few of them are really, really solid leads. So I remain optimistic and hopeful as ever! Life is good, my friends. Life is good.

Some posts I'm thinking about writing over the next week or two: a story about my wisdom teeth surgery in honor of my friend Big Jon, who's having his out pretty soon; a reflection on being single, how I've never really ever been single before (lulz) and how it's actually been really awesome for my mental and physical health haha.

Also, I have definitely decided to go to Raleigh next weekend. So, friends, mark your calendars! My only real requirement: I must go to Lilly's Pizza at some point. Like, I need it, OK?

See you soon, kids!

-BG

Updates!

I wrote entirely too much last week. I wouldn't be surprised if most people didn't even bother to read it all. So let's just update a few ongoing things, shall we? We shall.

Ribs Update

Shit hurts, man. It's improving daily, but you know. I'm over it. I sneezed twice this weekend (BREAKING NEWS!), and the good news there is they didn't make me almost pass out. It's the little things, folks.

I definitely can't run. I tried. Bad decision. I'm hoping another week of rest, ice packs and painkillers will make it so I can get back to the gym next week. It's kind of driving me crazy that I can't work out.

For now, I'm limited to walking Allie four miles a day. In the meantime, there will be a lot of couch time with an ice pack planted on my ribs. Stretching it out seems to help, so there you go.

So interesting, I know.

Weight-Loss Update

For, like, a month there, it seemed like we were playing softball at least twice a week. You may be thinking, "oh hey! Lots of exercise! Nice!" And yes, that's true. But it also meant more beer and bar food than I'm usually accustomed to consuming. Aaaand it sort of led to a little more cheat meals than I'd like. But it's OK.

It was exactly as awesome as it sounds.

Thankfully, I'm holding steady at 194-195 pounds for now, which is a loss of 32-33 pounds since mid-April. I'll take it, man. I'll take it.

Today is all about rededicating to cutting out the nonsense food again, and as soon as I can get back in the gym, you better believe I'll be hitting it hard six days a week. For now, I'll just have to be satisfied with walking Allie four miles a day. It doesn't seem smart to try to work out with any kind of intensity with this rib stuff going on. Oh well. Soon!

The excellent news is I'm still on track to reach my goal of 180 pounds in the timetable I originally set back in April. The first couple of months went so well, so quickly, there was room for a bit of a plateau, even if it was more than a little self-induced. Just keep on, keepin' on, man. I'll get there. I know it.

Weekend Update

So I knew I liked Bottom Line, a bar downtown near Farragut Square. We'd gone there a few times during softball season, and it was my kind of place. I liked it immediately, in fact.

On Friday night, I met a bunch of friends there and discovered Bottom Line's ridiculous happy hour specials.

From 4 p.m. to 7 p.m., they have $1 Miller Light bottles. The price goes up to $2 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., and to $2.50 from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. Pretty sure they go back to $1 at 11 p.m., too. That's incredible!

Got there a little before 6, so we got to take full advantage of the special price. It's just such a great place to waste some time. And, in case you missed it, $1 beers! From there, we headed to a place called Local 16, which is actually pretty close to my old Columbia Heights stomping grounds. Local 16 was all right and all, but two drinks there cost twice as much as the five I had at Bottom Line.

I know they were regularly priced for bars downtown, but I did not appreciate the juxtaposition haha. But there was a LOT more dancing at Local 16, and we all know how I feel about dancing. We left that place around 2 or so. By the time I got to sleep, it was nearing 5 a.m. Hey oh.

I went to sleep on Saturday morning the same time I woke up the Saturday morning before.

All of that goes to say most of Saturday was spent asleep. I walked the dog, ran a few errands and fell asleep. And it was magnificent. All in all, Friday was well worth it. Let's go.

Job Update

Still waiting to hear. As far as I know, I'm a finalist for the position I mentioned briefly over the past few weeks. I feel good, and I'm optimistic.

I think I may be hearing something in the next few days. C'moooon good news. I'm ready.

Football Update

Yes. So college football season is almost upon us, and a bunch of friends are planning a road trip to Boston for the N.C. State-Boston College game on Nov. 12. We first started discussing it during the ridiculous CAN softball tournament, and it seemed like such a great idea, so why not?

I've never been to Boston. Truthfully, I never imagined I'd ever go, nor did I particularly want to go, really. But whatevs. I've heard good things. I have a friend and a cousin who live there, and I have no doubt it will be awesome. I'm looking forward to it.

Plus, N.C. STATE FOOTBALL! Man, let's go.

Well that's still a pretty long post, but it's reasonable for me, I suppose. Until next time!

-BG

Not Illegal, but Frowned Upon Part 3

Welcome to what I intend to be the exciting conclusion of the CAN Softball Tournament Saga. Did you miss parts 1 and 2? Check 'em out!

Part 1
Part 2

So my ribs. It is now Friday afternoon, and they have progressed from agonizingly painful to only sort of painful. Great success! Still hurts, but it doesn't make me want to lay down and go to sleep anymore.

Except for an incident Wednesday night. I'd discovered if I lay on the couch on my right side with my left arm extended over/resting on my head, I could breathe mostly pain-free. I was feeling better, and I got a little cocky. I felt a sneeze coming on, and instead of holding it in as I had been since Sunday, I let it come out.

Oh. My. God. It was so painful I actually got dizzy from it and had to lie down to keep from passing out. Incredible. So that happened. I'd never experienced the whole "seeing stars" phenomenon before. Yikes. Still improving though. We're getting there.

So we lost to Cornell, eliminating us from the tournament. Howevah! My goal going into the tournament was to win at least one game since there were going to be PLENTY of teams who couldn't say they won a game. I thought that would be a solid accomplishment, and we did it. Great success.

Our game was done by 1:30, and there were a ton of games still going on, so we moved our tent back from the dugout to the chairs we'd set up and commenced the drinking-and-relaxing portion of the tournament.

We saw some pretty exciting games that day, but really the best part was our tent was squarely in the shade with a clear view of the field. So we didn't need to move at all to watch games. It was fantastic. The beer was flowing, and the weather was excellent at the moment. Our tent was close to Central Florida's tent, and they had a cornhole set.

Lindsey had the brilliant idea to ask them if we could play. Cornhole for the WIN. It started off with Lindsey and Carnell against Brent and me.

Here's the thing about Lindsey and cornhole: she's a machine. She lands three bags on the board every round. It was incredible.

She was clearly the best player of the four of us who were playing at any give time.

I'm a much streakier player. I'll get one or two on the board each round. I very rarely miss the board entirely. But then I'll throw three cornholes in a row in the same round and make up for my streaky play. I just wish I could harness that power more often. Alas, I probably won't.

I did that in two separate games Sunday. Let's go. The first picture in this post seems to be my "IT'S IN THE HOLE" celebration. If you notice, Lindsey appears to be looking for something with which to hit me. Please, just not in the ribs.

But that could be in retaliation because Brent did throw a beanbag at her. And he missed and struck some kind Indiana folks under the tent behind us. Our bad! We brought them beer to make it up to them.

Lindsey and Carnell won the first game, and I mixed and matched partners for the rest of the afternoon. I believe it ended up with a 2-2 split between them and me and whoever was my partner at the time.

I love this picture because you can see my toss in mid-air. Excellent timing by Amy with the camera. This is probably very soon after Brent tried to peg Lindsey with the beanbag. Hey oh.

Sunday was just a really good day. I was feeling much more like myself (aside from the whole rib thing).

Hard to go wrong with the beer truck, hot dog/hamburger buffet, great softball games and cornhole. We were FAR from the only cornhole group going. There was a whole section of grass that sort of became the cornhole playing field (pictured below).

So! While we were playing cornhole, discussion turned to next season. We want to get jerseys for next season -- or at least T-shirts with some kind of printing on it. They don't have to be legit baseball/softball jerseys. That might get too hot anyway. We want numbers and nicknames on the back.

Lindsey and Brent started coming up with nicknames for people based on things from the season. Previously, I only wanted "BG" on my jersey because that's what most of my friends call me anyway, and I rather like it.

Then, Lindsey (maybe Brent? I don't know. Fuzzy memory) said she could see my nickname being "Late Night." Well that's a pretty kick ass nickname. It has to do with a few things -- two things specifically, I believe.

First, one night during the season at the Exchange, I lost track of time playing flip-cup and ended up missing the last red line train. It ended up costing me $60 to take a cab to my car from downtown. Second, obviously, going to sleep on Friday night at 2:30 a.m. with the 4:30 a.m. wake-up call the next day. I like it.

Other team nicknames and their reasons if I can remember them:

• Evan: The Ripper because he totally clotheslined a girl while tagging her out at home on Sunday.
  
• Brent: Right Eye because he needed stitches after getting hit in the face with a ground ball. Yikes.
• Marty: Mimosa Marty because he promised to bring mimosas for us on Sunday and then did not. Fail, Marty. Fail.
• Sean: Iceman. This one I'm not sure about. Thoughts?
• Matt: Ghostface Killah because he is Irish haha.
• Lindsey: Hoover because she is pretty damn solid at second base. But you know. There was drinking, and this one turned quickly. Yeah. Lindsey, if I'm in charge of the jerseys, we can probably work on a different name for you if you want haha.
• Carnell: No-Show! Haha because he overslept on Saturday (though truthfully, I thought for sure it would be me oversleeping) and because he showed up for the last inning of our game on Sunday. Better late than never!

I think that's all the nicknames I heard. There may have been others, but I don't recall. Let me know though!

That's pretty much how it all went down. Carnell, Dale, Caitlin, Lindsey and I were the last ones remaining. We decided to go watch the intense Michigan/Penn State game going on. We played and lost to both of these teams this season. They were both really good teams, so this figured to be an awesome game. We actually sort of became friends with Penn State after we played them.

They have a girl on their team named Missy, and every time Missy saw us, she'd run up, make the wolfie hand sign and say how much she loved N.C. State. So we went down to support Penn State. Then the sky opened up. Thankfully, Georgia Tech was set up at the field with a tent, and we were able to get some shelter there.

It was a crazy rain storm, and it ended up leading to the cancellation of games for the weekend. They moved the rest of the game to this coming weekend. We don't need to go back out there though.

So, as you know, I was a huge nerd and kept track of my stats all season. Here's my final tally: 26-for-42 for a .619 batting average, 10 RBI, 7 runs scored and a slugging percentage of .857 and OBP of .613 for an OPS of 1.470. And I ended the season on a 10-game hitting streak, although there were only two of the 15 games I played in where I didn't get a hit. I'll take it!

Now I was just going on memory from each game, and in the time between the game and when I got home to record the stats, there was often heavy drinking. Those numbers represent my best recollection though. I promise.

We'll hopefully have plenty of opportunities to practice since many of the people on the team are looking into playing Fall softball in DC. That would be awesome. Don't get me wrong: I enjoy flag football very much, and I'm sure we'll all have a great time playing, but softball is my jam. I don't want to have to wait eight months or however long before the next season starts.

Now that the softball season is over, I'll be back next week with weight-loss updates. Briefly, all the softball that happened over the past few weeks led to more drinking and junk food than usual. I haven't gained any weight at all, which is awesome. But I'm still treading water at 194-195. And I'm hoping this rib thing will go away soon so I can get back in the gym and crank that up again. I might need to give it another week just to be sure though. We'll have to see how it goes.

Anyway, I'm out. Thanks so, so much, as always, for reading! Heading downtown to the Bottom Line tonight! LET'S GO!

-BG

Not Illegal, but Frowned Upon Part 2

Miss part 1 of the CAN Softball Tournament Extravaganza? Read all about it right here!

I feel like I should explain why the title of these posts is "Not Illegal but Frowned Upon." This is a story that will probably only be funny to the 12 or 13 of us who were there this weekend, but when has limited appeal ever stopped me before? That's right; it hasn't.

So Dale (the coach) emailed the team to say that bringing our own alcohol to the tournament was at least discouraged if not forbidden. That turned into Evan saying, "I didn't know bringing our own alcohol was FROWNED UPON IN THIS ESTABLISHMENT."

So I was standing with Evan, Sean, Marty, Lindsey and Keith watching a game, and the pitcher threw an illegal pitch (meaning it was either too high or too low, etc.). The ump yelled out, "Illegal pitch!"

Someone in our group then quipped, "Well that's not really illegal, it's just frowned upon. Thanks a lot, bin Laden." Which you might recognize from this scene in The Hangover.

And I proceeded to giggle like a little girl for the rest of the day at the thought of the scene. And anytime anything happened, I proceeded to say "Thanks a lot, bin Laden," at every turn. I usually like to take jokes and run them into the ground as quickly as possible. I think the team will agree when I say: mission accomplished.

Also, I giggled like a little girl just writing out the story. Easily entertained? Easily entertained.

So there you go. Thanks a lot, bin Laden.

Now, the Michigan game! Yes, we lost. Michigan went 13-1 this season. Only 14-0 James Madison had a better year, so we knew it was going to be a tough game.

As I mentioned on Monday, we really did hold our own, including drawing four or five walks in a row in one inning, causing the only pitching change to take place in the middle of an inning I saw all season in any game. I think their pitcher walked in two runs, and the coach jumped out there quick and yanked him.

The rest of day 1 was spent lounging under our tent (as seen in the picture at the left, which was actually taken on day 2) and watching other games going on around the grounds.

With 69 teams in the tournament and only five fields, there was always another game to watch, which was fantastic. Not to mention the beer truck! Five taps on the side of a keg-filled truck. See the photo below. Pretty awesome.

The whole scene was just incredible -- like a giant multi-college tailgate where everyone was having a great time.

It was ridiculous, and the team already has a list of things we need to do for next year now that we've seen how things go.

Among the things we need: inflatable couch, baby pool, slip-n-slides, pitchers for beer so we don't have to keep getting up, some kind of stereo to play ridiculous music, our own cornhole boards, etc.

I have to confess: due to my staying out too late on Friday night and only have that brief two-hour nap before the 4:30 a.m. wake-up on Saturday, I was, shall we say, "out of it" for most of Saturday. I had three drinks MAX all day. I just couldn't.

Quite a few teammates commented how they've never seen me so subdued. I almost fell asleep several times Saturday. Some people were even talking about going out Saturday night. I couldn't imagine. It's astonishing I didn't fall asleep on the drive home Saturday.

I got home, took the dog out, showered and hit the couch. I was passed out by 9:30 p.m. Thankfully, I set my alarm before I passed out. I woke up at 6:30 a.m. right on the couch. I felt pretty damn good on Sunday morning, especially comparatively.

Sunday was a different story. Because of some rain Saturday evening, game times were pushed back. We were originally scheduled to play Cornell at 9:30 a.m., but it was pushed back to 12:30 p.m. Since we were there and ready for an early start, we just started drinking.

Dale planned ahead and brought a cooler of beer since the beer truck (shown on the left) didn't open until 10 a.m. At around 11:30 we got word from tournament officials that our game was finally scheduled to start soon.

I was already four drinks in, so I ran up and ate a quick hot dog and hamburger combo, and then Matt came through for me in the clutch with some Gatorade. We were ready for the game.

We'd already played and lost to Cornell once earlier in the season, but we felt like we could hang with them. Honestly, we played some decent defense during this game; it was our offense that stunk it up. We didn't get our bats going until the third or fourth inning, and by then, Cornell already had a lead on us. It was too little, too late.

Before the game, Sean, Evan, Keith, Marty, Lindsey and I were watching Villanova play and giving their second baseman props because she was diving all over the place for balls (that's what she said). We talked about how it's been so long since any of us had done it, and we're not sure we'd really like to lay out for a ball anymore.

Well.

It's the second-to-last inning. I'm playing right field, Dale is playing left-center and Jen is playing right-center. Normally, since most balls are not hit to right field, we liked to play the right-center fielder shallow to cut off some of the balls hit up the middle. That meant the right fielder (me in this case) had to cover a bit more ground. No problem. I was an outfielder growing up. I know how to get around and judge fly balls out there. I rather enjoy it a lot, actually.

Sure enough. Jen was playing shallow, and a ball is hit over her head. I saw it, and I thought I could get to it. So I took off. I was tracking it, and I could tell it was not going to be easy to get there.

The ball was coming down, and I knew I had to dive for it. I was running from right field back and toward center field, so as I dive for the ball, I'm kind of jumping into the air backward with my left arm extended. I felt the ball hit the tip of my glove and bounce away, and I landed hard on my left side.

I hopped up to make sure someone was getting the ball (Dale did), but I quickly doubled over because it occurred to me I couldn't breathe. And there was a ridiculous amount of pain coming from the ribs on my left side. Thankfully, there were no other balls hit my way during that inning, and I didn't need to take the field in the bottom of the seventh because Cornell won.

I won't say I've lost a step or two in my increasing age because that implies I had the steps to lose in the first place. Speed was never my game. But if I'd been even one step closer to where the ball landed when I started running, I believe I would have caught it. I might not have held onto it when I landed, but it would have been in my glove in the air haha.

I spent much of the rest of Sunday icing my ribs and in moderate-to-relatively-severe pain.

It is now Wednesday afternoon, and this is the most pain I've ever experienced. But! It only hurts when I move, speak, cough, laugh or breathe. So as long as I don't do any of those things, it isn't so bad. I recognize now how exceptionally lucky I've been. I've never broken a bone, never gotten stitches, never needed to go to the doctor for an injury, which is remarkable considering how active I was and how many sports I played growing up.

This is ridiculous though. There aren't enough painkillers in the world right now. If this isn't a cracked rib, I don't even want to think about how much that hurts. It's not necessarily excruciating, but this is still pretty terrible, which leads me to believe it's probably a really bad bruise (best-case scenario) or a possible cracked rib (worst-case scenario).

So, yeah. Great haha. Second-to-last inning of the last game of the season, and that's when I hurt myself. Figures. Almost made it the whole season. *sigh.

Anyway, this got a bit longer than I intended. I know; I wrote something and got a little verbose. Who knew?!

I'll pick it up with the conclusion in part 3 on Friday, which will cover our cornhole adventures and our team nicknames! As well as any other randomness that comes to mind while I'm writing, which always happens.

LET'S GO!

-BG

Not Illegal, but Frowned Upon Part 1

Thanks a lot, bin Laden.

CAN Softball Tournament Part 1

So this past weekend was the Capital Alumni Network league-wide softball tournament. It was, basically, ridiculous.

I may have talked about it briefly last week, but this weekend was the most fun I've had in a long, long time. Bruised/cracked rib, notwithstanding (more on that later).

It all started Friday night with Katie's birthday at Public Bar on 18th St. downtown. I met one of the other Katies (yes, there are many -- three we regularly interact with, in fact) at Farragut North, and we walked over to Public around 6 p.m. Now, going into the night, we learned our first softball game in the tournament was scheduled to start at 7 a.m. Taking into account checking in with tournament officials and warming up, that meant we needed to meet by 6 a.m. at the field.

The tournament is held at the Goddard Softball Complex, near NASA. It's at least a 45-minute drive from my apartment. So I woke up at 4:30 on Saturday morning. Shoot me in the face.

So what did I do? I naturally stayed out until past midnight on Friday, and I didn't get to sleep until 2:30 a.m.

Katie's party was great fun, as always, and I'd never been to Public before. It's pretty awesome. It has a great roof-top patio, which was luckily quite pleasant on Friday despite it being August in a swamp environment. Evan made the wise decision to check out by 9 p.m., given the ridiculous wake-up call just a few hours away.

Major props to Lindsey and Carnell for not even showing up until after 10 p.m., knowing full well they had to wake up just more than six hours later. Although one of them was more successful than the other. More on that later haha.

Once midnight rolled around, I knew it was time for me to begin my trek home. I got to the Dupont station, and the escalators were out. Now. If you're unaware, the street escalators at Dupont are some of the longest escalators I've ever seen -- the kind where you get vertigo when you have to walk down because of how high up you are.

Multiply that by several drinks, and I'm just glad I arrived at the bottom of my own volition and not due to gravity.

I got on my train and tried not to fall asleep. The train arrived at the Bethesda station, where a station operator got on and announced, "if you stay on this train, you will be going back downtown."

Ah, shit. That's no good. Apparently all red line stations between Bethesda and Rockville were closed and out of service. I made my way upstairs to the street to find a fleet of shuttle buses waiting for the passengers. Except there are no signs on them, and they're not all going to the same stations. I got on one bus, and someone got on and announced, "if you're not going to Grosvenor or White Flint (I wasn't) you shouldn't be on this shuttle."

Mother of God.

Signs. Invest in them. Let us know where to go before we get on the damn buses.

I finally found the correct bus, and ended up at the Rockville station. I asked the driver, "aren't you going to go to Shady Grove, too?" He said, "No, you need to go wait on a train to get there."

It was 1:30 in the morning at that point. Train service isn't exactly prompt or frequent at that time of night. I could not envision myself waiting on a train to ride one stop. So I just hopped in a cab and got to my car.

I finally got in bed by 2:30, and set my alarm for my brief two-hour nap. The poor dog was so confused. She normally greets me all happy and waggly when my alarm starts going off. Saturday morning, at 4:30, she was still on the couch, looking at me with half-closed, sleep-filled eyes, as if to say, "you have got to be outside your damn mind."

Hard to argue with that.

After I took her outside, I got in the shower. Upon getting out of the shower, I see a missed call and a frantic text from Lindsey. Apparently Carnell is not quite as cut out for the rock-and-roll lifestyle as some of us haha. He was not answering her repeated calls or texts. Well, nothing to do but get to the field and keep calling. He did eventually make it!

It was still dark the whole drive there, and the sun only started to poke its head out when we met up to carpool to the field. We set up our tent to claim our spot and started warming up.

Because of our stellar regular-season record, we were playing in a preliminary round game against a team with a similarly stellar regular-season record. So 1-13 N.C. State took on 2-12 Delaware for the right to face No. 2 Michigan (13-1) in the winner's bracket.

Here's my thing: it was a double-elimination tournament, and we had as good a chance as any at winning a game in the tournament, which is something a lot of teams weren't going to be able to say. Let's take care of business and play up to our potential. We WILL win if we can do that.

It was actually pretty intense. It went back and forth the whole game. We jumped out to a 3-0 lead early. Delaware battled back and took a 5-3 lead. We fought back again and retook the lead at 7-5. Delaware tied it at 7, then took a 9-7 lead. We scored four runs in the top of the sixth to take an 11-9 lead.

Normally, we play seven-inning games, but because there were so many games that needed to be played, the ump said we'd call it after six innings if one team was ahead. So we went into the bottom of the sixth up 11-9 with Delaware needing three runs to win outright. Naturally, they scored two runs immediately to tie the score at 11. Then they loaded the bases with no outs.

Now, in slow-pitch softball, there's a mat behind home plate. If the pitch hits the mat, it's a strike. It's hard to consistently hit the mat. All they needed was a walk to win the game. The first batter swung early, and popped it up to shortstop. The second batter lightly tapped it back to the pitcher. Evan threw home for the force out. Bases still loaded, two outs.

The next hitter popped it up right to the left fielder. It was one of our best defensive inning of the season, and it couldn't have come at a better time. We faced bases loaded with no outs, and if a run scored, we would have lost the game.

Instead, we held them and proceeded to score four runs in the "one-pitch" rules in the top of the seventh. Basically, every pitch is either a walk, a hit or an out. If the pitch is a ball, you walk. If it's a strike or a foul, you're out. Intense.

Four runs and three Delaware outs later, we'd won our first game in the tournament. Man, LET'S GO. It was spectacular.

We won as many games in the tournament as we did all season, and it was so incredibly satisfying, especially after one of the Delaware players was being an asshole to our first baseman after a questionable call where she should have been called out. Whatevs. Victory.

After the game, we questioned the wisdom of swinging the bat at ALL during the bases-loaded, no-outs scenario. Chances are, Evan is going to walk ONE of the three hitters that were coming up. Just playing the odds, it's damn hard to hit the mat every time. And you had THREE chances to walk ONE batter and win the game! Take your chances on the strikeout and force Evan to hit the mat every time. As Sean said after the game, "Don't even bother bringing a bat to the plate. Force him to make the pitches." Alas, they did not do that. We won, 15-11, after scoring eight runs in the top of the sixth and seventh innings combined. LET'S GO!

After an hour break, we played No. 2 Michigan, and, predictably, lost. But we put a scare into them.

They were routinely destroying teams in the regular season, and they were probably expecting to roll us, too. But we led 2-0 after the first inning, and we were tied 4-4 after the third inning. They took a lead, but they were only up by four after the fifth inning. We put a little scare into them when the game probably should never have been that close in the first place.

Michigan eventually scored a bunch of runs, and won in the end. But we held our own pretty well considering how good a team Michigan was.

That'll do it for part 1 of the CAN Tournament Extravaganza. Coming later, the exciting conclusion, including my cornhole prowess, my possibly cracked rib and giving the team nicknames for our jerseys next season.

Good times.

-BG

Weekend Update!

I know I missed a post on Friday. That's my bad. I was actually in the process of writing a post that I planned on putting up just before I left to go downtown for my softball game.

It stormed something serious Friday afternoon though. I was planning on leaving to go to the game around 4:30ish, so I was writing feverishly to get it posted before I left.

The problem with writing quickly is the autosave doesn't catch as much as if I take my time and add a little here and there. I'm usually pretty good about stopping to save pretty frequently while I'm writing, but I was just trying to finish so I could leave.

Then the power went out.

It came back a few minutes later, but when I logged back in to Blogger, most of my post had not saved. I got so disgusted that I just closed the window and left for the game. I'm sure you know what that's like. You write so much, and then something happens and you lose it. You just get frustrated and don't even want to finish.

Well that's what happened on Friday.

Anyway, since I wrote you a novel on Wednesday when I described how watching (500) Days of Summer, like, 15 times can help put some perspective on a break-up (which I went through not too long ago), I figured I would keep it short and sweet today.

So here's a brief, general life update.

The past week has been pretty busy with working out and job interviews. Excellent news there, that's for sure.

I'm now going through the process with three more places, which I will not name here for fear of Google's revenge. Two are PR firms downtown and the third is a place not too far from my apartment. I feel good about all three initial interviews, and they all are still interested, so we'll see how it goes.

On the health and fitness front, I still ran and lifted last week, but I backed off the intensity a little bit on account of a ridiculously sore muscle in my back. That seems to have paid off since I'm no longer feeling any discomfort. Today, I went right back to it. I upped my distance to 3.5 miles today in an effort to work up to running four miles a day on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, starting next week.

HOWEVAH. If you've been keeping up with my progress, you know I've lost 25 pounds over the past few months. And now, the really super excellent news is after running and walking Allie today, I stepped on the scale and saw 199.5!! Now, I know that was some water weight, but I haven't seen under 200 on the scale in two years. Feels good, man. Feels good.

Won't be too much longer before I'm back under 200 for good. Let's go.

In other news, the softball game I was so excited about on Friday ended up being rained out anyway. Fail. We haven't had a game in a month! And the cruel thing is the long lay-off came after our first win of the season, which has no doubt killed off the momentum we managed to collect in our 20-4 ass-beating of South Carolina.

In true N.C. State fashion, we can't even win right. *sigh.

Oh well. We still met up at our bar to hang out. After games, the bar has $10 pitchers, but for rainouts, they do $8 pitchers. So that was great. I easily killed about a pitcher and a half of beer. And then, I have to say. Evan, you sir are a dangerous man with your affinity for shots of Jameson.

That didn't stop me from having two of them, but my God. I swear I could still taste the Jameson on Sunday night. The metro ride home Friday night is by far the closest I've ever come to breaking my streak.

I was pretty convinced I was going to need to get off the train at one point. And then I had to cab home from the metro station at like 1:30 a.m., and then cab back the next day to get my car. Good lord.

Sunday was pretty great. I went to the Nats/Rockies game with a friend from the softball team. The Nats lost, which is the first time in six years that the team I was rooting for lost a baseball game I've attended. But the Rockies pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez was absolutely dealing. He had a perfect game heading into the fifth inning!

I was actually kind of disappointed when the Nats broke it up in the bottom of the fifth because I would have loved to see history like that. Anyway, the Nats ended up losing 2-1, and we headed out to a bar for the rest of the night.

I was most decidedly taking it easy after Friday night because oh my God no thank you. But it was a good time. It's always good to get out of the apartment, you know?

Sunday was all about some rest. And the U.S. women's soccer team. Because holy shit. What a win, man. And also, Hope Solo. Yes, ma'am. Marry me immediately. She's pretty kick ass.

Anyway, brief update and all, so I'm out. Softball game on Thursday at 6 p.m. at 14th St. and Constitution! Come watch us hopefully kick some ass!

-BG