Oh sweet, sweet Tigerfest. It’s been so long since we’ve spoken. I’ve missed you.

Do you remember the last time we saw each other? We spent the whole day together, frolicking in the afternoon sun like a couple of love-struck kids.

There was wiffleball on the hillside, there was swaying and holding up lighters as Dashboard Confessional played romantic ballads. Remember how people threw things at them so they cut their set short? I still remember seeing dozens of girls being carried away from the front of the stage in tears. I’m not sure if they were being pounded in the mosh pit or if they were just incredibly moved by Dashboard’s performance. It was a beautiful spring afternoon. I got so carried away with you that I forgot to eat anything all day. You do that to me.

Sure, we got a little crazy. You and I, we started drinking so early it was laughable. We were doing Jager bombs by noon. Oh you, you were so drunk, but not as drunk as I was. I know I may have had a few too many drinks even though you kept telling me to slow down. I know I promised we’d spend the night together but instead I stumbled home early and fell asleep.

You called me nine times while my phone was on full volume and I slept through all of them. Believe me, I felt awful about that when I woke up at four in the morning to eat Lucky Charms because I was starving, and I felt even worse the next day, but I swear I’ll make it up to you this time.

Things are complicated between us now, I know that. It feels like we’re one mistake away from never being able to see each other again. There are those that would keep us apart forever because they don’t like our raucous public displays of affection.

Some people can’t handle the whirlwind of passion we leave in our wake when we’re together, or the beer cans.

If you ask me, they’re just jealous. They’re jealous of our youth and our love and our alcohol tolerance. They’re jealous that we’re out having fun while they’re at work.

Look, I’m not an idiot. I know what you’re thinking. We don’t have a future together, right? I know that. You don’t think I know that? I’m a junior now. We’re lucky if we have two more years, but chances are I won’t be able to see you again after next spring even. Maybe I can have a friend sneak me in after I graduate, but we can’t count on that. Maybe the community will finally cancel you for good.

Even so, you’ll eventually move on and start seeing younger, drunker college kids, and I’ll start hanging out with older, more mature concerts, but I don’t see why that has to change anything between us for right now. Let’s cast aside our fears for one more day and relive the good times that we used to have.

I have big plans for us this Saturday, Tigerfest. I’ll stay awake past 8 p.m. this time, I promise.

I just turned 21 last month, and despite what people say, it’s just a number…. a number that will turn you into an alcoholic.

My older brother took me out at midnight on my birthday with some of his friends, because none of mine are old enough yet. We went to Federal Hill and I had my initiation at a bar called Ropewalk. The group hooked me up all night. It was awesome. I must have tried a “slut” of every hair color imaginable. Also I had a lot of drinks.

Compared to the stories I’ve heard of other 21st birthday celebrations, mine was pretty tame. No one got into a fight, no one got arrested and everyone made it to a bed or couch before passing out. I got about as drunk as I can get without getting sick, and that was enough for me. There was no rush. I knew there would be plenty of debauchery in the coming months.

It’s been roughly three weeks since, and I have been drinking any chance I can get. Obviously there are the weekends and the parties, but things are getting ridiculous fast. The freedom is addicting. Every liquor store becomes fair game, and swinging by one on the way home is impossible to resist. A lot of the time I’m not even drinking to get drunk anymore; I’m just drinking because “Nip/Tuck” is on, it didn’t rain, or I’m making Tuna Helper. Those are all acceptable reasons now.

Take Monday night as an example. I got a text message from a friend I haven’t seen in a while asking what I was up to. After a little back and forth, I suggested we meet up for a beer later at Rec Room. It still tickles me that I can “meet up for a beer” anytime I want. I felt like a real grown up for the first time in my life. A few hours later we were sitting at the bar with a couple of brews, catching up on old times. We played foosball, we ate wings, we laughed, we cried. It was really mellow and relaxing.

It wasn’t long, though, until our freshly-turned-21-college-kid-side came out. I sort of forgot to take into account beforehand that my friend is an aggressive drinker and that I am easily goaded into drinking more than I want to. Pretty soon “a beer” turned into three beers, which turned into a lot of crazy shots, which turned into me running up a $30 bar tab on a Monday night.

That type of thing probably wouldn’t happen just sitting around the house, but with the power to go to bars comes the responsibility of not drinking yourself into oblivion, or bankruptcy, every night. I’m willing to tiptoe that line. My only real goal is to not end up on “True Life: I’m An Alcoholic,” “Intervention” or “Cops.”

I can honestly say that my 21st birthday was really the only birthday that changed my daily life. When I turned 18 I didn’t start buying tons of porn and cigarettes. Well, at least not the cigarettes. I guess 16 was pretty good because I was able to drive, but somehow I see being able to buy beer as more monumental.

As a side note, I have considered the fact that now I have no birthdays to really look forward to and perhaps my life will become a slow downward spiral towards senility, but those thoughts are easily drowned in legally obtained vodka.

Here’s a quick little something before everyone goes home for the holiday. Be safe, and stay away from the turducken.
 
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Every holiday has its own culture. Halloween is costumes, candy, and scary movies. Christmas is presents, commercial capitalism, and cheesy Christmas films. Thanksgiving is turkey and football. Where are all the Thanksgiving movies?
 
Is Thanksgiving just not a compelling enough holiday? Is there no story there? That’s ridiculous. If any holiday has a universal meaning it’s Thanksgiving. Halloween is basically a giant party, as is the Fourth of July, and Christmas really only means something to people who are religious. Being thankful for the positive things in our life, though, that’s something everyone can get on board with.
 
I know that Thanksgiving makes a small cameo in a lot of films; the cooking of Thanksgiving dinner turns into a comedy of errors and someone burns the bird. Yeah, it’s been done. I want to see a movie that uses Thanksgiving as the focal point, the way Halloween is at the heart of the Halloween series, or the way that Jennifer Lopez’s ass is at the heart of any movie she has ever been in.
 
It can’t be that hard, and I’ll prove it. Below I have taken a few holiday classics and shifted the focus to Thanksgiving. Enjoy.
 
The Nightmare Before Thanksgiving - Jack is whisked away to a world where every day is Thanksgiving. Everyone is obese, constantly subdued by tryptophan, and forced to watch endless Detroit Lions games. Jack learns that Thanksgiving land is lame and comes to be thankful for his old life.
 
A Thanksgiving Carol - The prequel to the popular “A Christmas Carol.” Ralphie is unhappy with the traditional celebration and wants to hunt his own wild turkey. His parents object, afraid he may “shoot his eye out.” A bitter Ralphie attempts to sabotage Thanksgiving dinner. Hilarity ensues.
 
Turkey Day (Groundhog Day) - Bill Murray finds himself reliving Thanksgiving over and over again. Frustrated at first, he eventually uses the phenomenon to figure out how to bang some chick, and learns to appreciate how clever he is.
 
The Hot Turkey - Rob Schneider switches bodies with a turkey.
 
I could go on, but unlike Hollywood directors, I’m not getting paid for this. I’m not just going to give away all my best ideas for free. Then again, if the Writer’s Guild strike doesn’t end soon, Hollywood might be looking for scabs. They know where to find me.

I just received an invitation via Facebook to National Sex Day, which begins at 12:00am December 21st, and ends at 12am December 22nd. They even have a link to a resource for getting free condoms. For some reason I am endlessly fascinated by this and my brain has been on overdrive. Some thoughts:
 

 
Alright, the novelty has passed. That was fun while it lasted.

When I first stepped foot outside yesterday, I heard loud booming voices coming from what felt like all sides. After briefly considering the possibility that the United States had been converted into a V-for-Vendetta-like dictatorship, I concluded that the sounds I heard must have been music from a festival not far from my house. Not long after, I began to detect the distinct “festival food” aroma; a combination of fried dough, chicken fingers, and barbeque. I had to investigate.
 
At about 2:30pm, I headed down Pennsylvania Avenue to check things out. The first thing I saw was a big white stage occupied by a Bob Marleyish jam-band. Directly next to the stage was a Go Army tent. The young guy running the booth immediately tried to recruit me, but the whole time the guy was talking to me all I could think about was how shitty their tent location was. I seriously heard about twenty percent of what he said. Something about the Army Reserve, and that my being a student would make me “undeployable.” The band was rocking out too hard. I felt kind of bad, but not really. I took his card, went on my way, and promptly disposed of it.
 
I set out to discover what the festival was about. Having just randomly wandered over, I had no idea. Let me just say that I went to school in Baltimore City, so being the only white person in a large crowd is pretty much business as usual. I didn’t even notice that that was the case for a good fifteen minutes.
 
Not long after having this realization, I stopped to look at the work of a local artist. I asked her a little about her art, and then asked her if she could tell me what festival I was at.
 
“It’s the African American Arts Festival. We have it ever year.”
 
I told her that I heard music, smelled food, and just started walking towards the source. She got a laugh out of that, and at that point I told her it was good meeting her and I went on my way.
 
I walked around the rest of the festival, and it was pretty cool. I mean, it was identical in almost every way to the last festival that was held here (Towson Festival, I think?), but still pretty enjoyable. There was a photographer walking around and I was really hoping that he would take my picture, just so that he would print a caption like “The African-American Arts Festival draws visitors of all ethnicities.” And it would just be a picture of me looking lost and confused.
 
It might still be going on today, and it might be worth a look if you’re free. It’s good to be reminded that not everything about Towson sucks. There is a softer side.

I remember watching the last Ravens-Bengals matchup, near the end of the 2006 season, while I was still in Arizona. Going to an out of state school (ASU in particular) was infuriating during the fall because, instead of watching the Ravens clobber people, I was forced to choke down yet another abysmal season of Cardinals’ football. To be fair, the Cardinals do hold a soft spot in my heart now (they’ve got spunk, if nothing else). But that’s besides the point.
 
My roommate and I went out to this sports bar for the game (which was primetime), and as we devoured our burgers or wings or whatever it is we got that night, we watched the Ravens lose slowly and painfully. It was like a game of Monopoly; it had been over for a while, but there were still 2 maddening hours left of formalities. We ended up losing by 6 points, which is roughly a third of the number of convicted criminals on the Bengals’ roster.
 
I wanted to start throwing food at the T.V. Not my food, but someone else’s. I needed mine to comfort myself and ease the pain via massive calorie intake.
 
That game perfectly foreshadowed our playoff loss to the Colts later that season. They were both slow and painfully drawn out, leaving behind only a bitter emptiness within Baltimore fans everywhere. The Colts game, however, gets extra points for ruining my 20th birthday.
 
I ‘ll be watching tonight, looking for redemption. And also a glimpse of the cheerleaders.

Tonight, the Towson Tigers took on the Central Connecticut State Blue Devils (or something stupid like that) in a game that captivated the eight people who were sober enough to stay past half-time. The nailbiter ended with Towson on top 20-10.
 
Next game: Away @ The Little Giants.

When I first came to Towson, I heard whisperings about a mystical event known simply as Tigerfest. People talk about it like it’s Woodstock. There were supposedly rivers of alcohol flowing through the streets and girls throwing themselves around as if it were a Backstreet Boys concert . After all the buildup, the day had finally arrived.
 
I talked to Will the night before and he told me we were going to the big pre-game party at 9:45am. I thought that sounded a little ridiculous, but I was willing to roll with it because… shit… it’s Tigerfest.
 
I had really been looking forward to this day of debauchery. ASU didn’t have anything like this, which I think is weird. The entire time I was there, we never had any cool festivals or good bands. The coolest thing that happened in my time there was Bill Clinton giving a speech. Funny thing is, there were more people at that one speech than there were at Tigerfest.
 
I woke up at 9am and got ready to head over to campus. In a way I was dreading that first beer, because it was so freaking early. I’ve only gotten drunk in the daytime once or twice in my whole life, and I was about to step into the major leagues of sun-up drinking. Thankfully there had been a misunderstanding about what time Tigerfest actually started, so we ended up holding off on the boozing until about noon.
 
As I suspected, the first one went down a little rough. It just felt weird. I’m not even usually awake at noon, let alone being productive, let alone drinking beer. After beer number one… then beer number two… then a Jager-bomb… and then beerpong…. I was starting to hit my stride.
 
We partied at Valley View Apartments, and it was insane. It felt like Mardi Gras, or armageddon. Hundreds of people were walking around in broad daylight, drinking, dancing, and being merry. Parties were merging, people were playing whiffleball on the hill (I accidentally the hit the ball at a crippled kid. Woops.) Cops drove by and people just laughed. Everyone was tanked by 2pm.
 
Tigerfest itself wasn’t all that exciting. I can’t imagine what we would have done if we actually went there on time. All I saw was a big empty field and a stage. I heard rumors that there was food there but I never saw it.
 
Today I heard everyone complaining about the lines and such. Me, Will, and Jessica must have waited 2 minutes to get in, TOPS. I had people tell me they waited 20+. I guess being VIP comes in handy.
 
Dashboard Confessional played a good set, although it was pretty short. I later found out that’s because people threw things at them. The best part of Tigerfest was the free popcorn. At first we were just eating it, then we starting tossing it into eachothers’ mouths (I tried to do this with some random chick and she gave me the finger), and then I started a full on popcorn war by dumping my bag on Jessica’s head. As Will pointed out to me later, there was like a ten foot buffer on all sides of us. We were “the drunk ones” at Tigerfest; go figure.
 
After Dashboard finished up, I had to go home. It was probably about 8pm at that point, and the day was seriously catching up with me. My plan was to take a “one hour nap” and then be ready for round 2 either at my place or at Valley View again. That didn’t even come CLOSE to happening. My phone was on full volume, and I slept through 9 calls in the span of 3 hours (I guess I wasn’t the only one who wanted to after-party at my place). I was fucking comatose. At midnight I woke up and saw the barrage of messages on my phone, but I decided to just go back to sleep.
 
That night I realized how much havoc Tigerfest really wreaked on my body. I slept in like 3 hour intervals; I kept having to get up to deal with some sort of crisis. The first time I just had a massive headache, and I got up to chug a million cups of water. The second time I realized I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, so I walked downstairs and made myself Lucky Charms at 4:30 in the morning. The third time I felt like I had to puke, but it was a false alarm.
 
Today, I was hungry and exhausted all day. I slept for like 14 hours and it wasn’t enough to wear off that day. Thank God Tigerfest is only once a year.
 
You win, Tigerfest. You beat me.