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My brother arrived from Tokyo on Wednesday evening. When we returned from the airport around midnight, we arrived home to find a house full of drunken merriment -- a dozen or so friends sitting in the living room relaxing. It was a scene that began the previous night and never entirely disappeared until the following Monday, with a large cast of players rotating through the parts. The rest of my family came in Thursday, which marked the beginning of four consecutive nights of me eating very, very well. No complaints there.

Friday night after dinner, I went out with a large number of classmates to the frat-tastic bar in Georgetown where we had marked the end of our first semester finals two and a half years ago. A steady flow of beer and bourbon, with the occassional random drink,* had me in extraordinarily rare form. We have this friend... he's the sort of guy who incites. He's the catalyst. He has a knack for getting other people to cross the line while staying just a hair's breadth on the safe side of it himself. I made the mistake of telling him, shortly after my roommate and I arrived at the bar, that I was fairly sober, having just arrived. He bought me a double-shot of bourbon, and the night took shape from there.** By the time they turned the lights on and threw us all out, I was a disaster. Thankfully, as I think (hope) my friends will agree, I'm generally a fun drunk, if a bit loud. I don't fight, I don't mope. I get very loud and kind of giggly. When my roommate and I got home, I walked in, proclaimed my intoxication to all present, and proceeded to pass out.

Saturday morning was family brunch at the house. You can see how that was poor planning on my part. I woke up, called my parents to tell them we were pushing brunch back an hour, prayed to the porcelain god, went to pick up fresh bagels, came home, and passed back out. I woke up to a house full of people -- probably 25 people at its peak, as my family, my roommates' families, and various friends were getting to know each other. A bit embarrassed -- though not nearly as embarrassed as my mother would have liked me to be, I think -- I came downstairs, ate, and slowly recovered.

That night, we skipped the school's black-tie Graduation Gala. My family doesn't really do black-tie. We opted instead for Chinese dinner for 35 with the friends who I went on spring break with and their families. That was a good call. If you want Chinese in D.C., you have a whole slew of options in the greasy, hole-in-the-wall category. But for a nice dinner, there's no competition for Meiwah. Simply fantastic. We took it easy Saturday night, in part because we were still tired from the previous night, but also because we had to clean up the brunch and get the house ready for hosting a post-Commencement BBQ.

To be continued (because this is already a long post and because I need to study). Stay tuned.

* I looked over my receipt the following morning, and even more shocking than the three-digit total at the bottom was the fact that I had apparently purchased four "red headed sluts". I like Georgetown undergrads as much as the next guy, but I didn't think you could get get them for $8-9 apiece, and I didn't think it was that sort of establishment. I think I'm quite glad the details became hazy. It's a drink, you say? Whew. That is almost certainly for the best.
** Exaclty what shape it took, I'm not precisely sure.