I am Alex Rodriguez

Bill Lumbergh: Heyyyy Matty, whats happening???? Yeahhhh were gonna need you to come in on Saturday, MMMMMMKay?

Matty: Ugh, okay.

From these humble beginings so began one of the best Saturday I have had in a very long time. This Friday my little company moved from our 141 5th Avenue address to 757 3rd Avenue. Because of this move all 20 of us in our companies employees were required to come in and help set up our new digs. Although somewhat tough to actually comprehend "working" on a Saturday, little work was actually accomplished, and it was more of a chance for me to become more social with my coworkers, as we ordered food and hung out for a lot longer than we were required to. I also spent about a good 2 hours playing around with the CEO/President/Founder's little girl who is 3. Needless to say it built me up an enormous amount of goodwill, and as all of you know I am about 6 years old at heart, so it wasn't a burden on me at all. At around 3 I decided it was time to get out of there and start gearing up the big game.....

'Nova Vs. Oklahoma.

I left my apartment around 4:15 to get to the Manhattan Villanova Alumni Gamewatch. In true Villanova fashion, this was held at a bar called "The Park Avenue Country Club" on 27th and 3rd. Now going into this Saturday I decided that my goal of the day was to be independent and confidant, and I had totally planned on going to the gamewatch solo, and end up meeting new people/mingling at the gamewatch. Right before I was about to walk out the door I gave the token "Hey do you want to come along with me to go______" that is a pretty common and act of simple courtesy to bestow upon ones roommate(s). No as ya'll know about 87% of the time the normal answer is "No thanks, but thanks for asking, I am doing _______." Well when I asked my roommate Thomas to accompany me to the Gamewatch, he decided to go against the grain and tag along with me. I would go into more detail about my Gemologist roommate from Chicago, but I will go into thourough detail and analysis of my roommates later this week.

The Gamewatch

The Gamewatch was something that was very fun, but will be exponentially more fun once the college and pro football season commence. While about 95% of the bar area was there for the Villanova game, Wildcat fans only encompassed about 25% of the entire restaurant, as there was a USC football Gamewatch there too, so while cheering for 'Nova I had the good fortune of hearing corny cheers from my least favorite fan base in all of sports. Good times. The Gamewatch was fun, but it seemed like an event geared more towards the 25-28 year old crowd. Thanks to Thomas though, I was introduced to a girl who ran other alumni events, such as happy hours, and I gave her my email address to contact me. Yeay networking! Anyways I was very happy that I went, and it was wonderful to cheer on our squad in an impressive victory among partisan fans. After the 85-74 win, I left the bar around 7:30 to go eat dinner with Mike before going to the "Christmas in the Little City" party, hosted by Katie "Steel Reserve" DiPerna and Gina "St. Pauli Girl" Pitera.

In classic fashion Mike and I had a miscommunication, and ended up in different areas of lower Manhattan, and I made the decision to skip dinner and go straight to Hoboken. Now this was a good and bad decision.

Good-I got to spend much more time at the party by skipping dinner, mingling with a ton of people

Bad-I had no food almost all day, and was about to drink heavily after having 4 casual beers at the Gamewatch.....a recipe for a drunken disaster.

Night in Hoboland

After a Nova win I entered the party in a great move. The party was set to start at 8 PM, and I rolled in there very noisily at around 9:30, expecting to catch the party in the upside of its lifecycle. So I walk in and ....crickets. I was the 2nd guest there. So to review I went there an hour and a half late and it was ME who tapped the keg.

(Side note: there was a fine young chap there before me, and Gina and Katie claimed that he couldn't tap the keg!!! What 23 year old male cannot tap a keg?!?! This is deplorable to me. It is similar to one not knowing how to tie a tie at this age.....ooops I only learned that 2 weeks ago. Now back to your scheduled program....)

As I entered the party I had a ton of energy built up from a huge 'Nova win, and I entertained Gina and Katie with my antics for a good 15 minutes. For once Gina wasn't repulsed by me and all seemed to be in good spirits as people tricked into the party. The lack of attendees early in the party made it very easy for me to move around the Hoboken apartment and consume beers at an alarming rate....another sign of things to come....

Now around 10 or so the guests began to come in more steadily, and all were in awe of the decor and the detail of preparation of the girls for this party. Now it is no secret that Katie is one of my top 10 favorite, non family member people in life. This being said I was nervous beforehand about her party planning skills. Now in retrospect these worries were plain silly as even Rosanna Billias couldn't have put together a party so well from decour, to alcohol selection, and in layout.to aside. I give the party a 15.5 out of 10.

The party layout

So the feel of the party, was very much like a 6th grade social, Katie's coworkers conversing with one another, and Gina's doing the same. Now at this time I had consumed a plethora of beers so I was feeling quite social and ready to mingle, so I decided to introduce myself to all the random people at this party that I didn't know. I finally started to act like the person I want to be, carefree and confident. Nearly halfway through the party, while doing this I came across two good looking girls, one of which who was almost out of my league. Now being that this evening I didn't harbor my normal insecurities I decided to just lay it out there and totally flirt with these two. I decided even if I ended up looking like a fool, oh well, I need to put myself out there more and stop being such a prude.

To my astonishment these two enjoyed the "Matty being Matty" personality that many of you have seen from me, and I ended up holding at least an hour conversation with these Staten Islanders. These SUNY grads also were doing all the telltale nonverbal signs that I have picked up of the years to tell they were interested, which was very fun Now before I get anyone's hopes up about a raunchy hookup story or anything, nothing at all happened as I pulled out my standard "Dammit I got too drunk card". I have mentioned this in earlier entries, but it really is the equivalent to A-rod Striking out with the bases loaded in the playoffs. He plays a great season and sets himself up for greatness, and then kills himself in the clutch. I hate ARod but I totally understand his anguish. To be honest in retrospect I am sure the alcohol gave me an enhanced confidence about the situation that wasn't even there, but it's okay, becuase I enjoyed the situation more than anything else.

So as the night wrapped up Mike, (who rolled in the party around 11:30) the hosts, and myself, decided to hit the Hoboken bar scene around 1:45 or so. We were poised to enter a bar a few blocks from the girl's apartment, but unfortunetly some of us (me included) did not meet the dress code as we were wearing sneakers. I wasnt too upset about the denial of entry, but while drunk Gina was verbally harassing a bouncer (which is not a fun position to be in, as I have had much firsthand experience) my Connecticut drivers license proved not to be durable as I thought, and i broke it in my hand. Dammit.

The remainder of the night was a standard bar hopping/drunken eating/game playing event that was very typical college, and while a good time we all know how this works ,and it needs no more explanation. The next morning I woke up, and bullshitted around Katie and Gina's apartment and left around 1. Ialso drank dome of the wonderfully tasty alcholic cider, which tasted great, even in the morning. Yeay 12 step program, here I come. Shit I am so freaking tired right now I think I'll just post this and add more later.

Grades of Katie (and Gina's) Party

Decor/Drink Selection= A+
Environment/Vibe =A
Guests=A-
Preparedness=A+
Enjoyment of my hour commute home=F-
Enjoyment of the hosts=C+
Just kidding......A

Yes I can give good grades, and credit where it is due, who knew????