Let’s talk about Mondays. Everyone is bound by law to hate Monday because it’s the first day of class and work, and even though we are taught by people wiser than us that we should embrace learning and work passionately, we hate doing both.
But I don’t hate Mondays. During school I rarely have any morning classes on Mondays and out of school I’m a bar waitress, so work is all but finished come Monday. But a true cynic has a pet peeve for every day of the week, and mine is that I must endure 24 hours of my peers excitedly telling me (or someone around me) how drunk they were last weekend.
Here’s a motto: A drunken memory is a good one if you don’t have to put it into words to enjoy it.
If you stole a jungle cat from a champion boxer like guys in The Hangover, go ahead and tell that one. I will probably laugh and then possibly try to exploit your antics for monetary gain.
But that isn’t the kind of story people usually tell.
For children, poking Grandpa in the stomach is funny. If you’re old, making wildly inappropriate jokes about minorities is funny. When you’re in college, performing mundane activities while intoxicated is funny.
“Man, I was so wasted on Saturday that I ordered a pizza, and then we all like, ate the pizza. Then my buddy, he ate the last piece, because he was so wasted.”
“Then I fell asleep with all my clothes on because alcohol is a depressant and it was late at night, because I was so wasted.”
“Did I mention I did all this while I was wasted?”
On the first day of class last week, a guy stated three times that this would be a whole lot easier to grasp if he wasn’t so drunk right now. It was 1 p.m.
He then proceeded to do that motion where you jerk your head around looking for someone to laugh like that one person who always takes the religion jokes too far at the dinner table.
He received nothing but eye rolls.
The point I’m trying to make is that — wait for it–– no one actually cares that you got drunk.
You know who else drank last weekend? The majority of the college campus and a large chunk of the entire demographic of 17 to 40-somethings drank last weekend.
Do prostitutes gather at a 24-hour diner drinking coffee with a side of shame and excitedly reveal to the others, “Guys, big news, I slept with a stranger last night”?
Don’t shake your head, that was a fabulous analogy, and that is exactly what everyone does in class after the weekend.
The sad part of all of this is most who are guilty continuously reiterate their drunken memories to all that can hear, as though expecting everyone to reward their antics by naming a building after them.
And why shouldn’t they? After all, nothing says “shoo-in for a job” quite like publicly announcing your diminishing supply of brain cells.
But to all my peers out there who choose to spend Monday rehashing a weekend that is about as unique as a wealthy white man in the Senate, I must commend you.
The economy is tough and it is becoming increasingly harder to make yourself look like a better choice than the rest of your peers, and you are only making it easier. For that, I thank you.
Jackie Runion is a junior studying journalism at Ohio University and a columnist for The Post. Tell her your drunk weekend stories at jr178409@ohiou.edu.
