Christian Perez's Travel Journal

Working for the Weekend...and a mugging, Mon Jun 13, 2005

Friday was a good time. We went out to dinner at Cinderella's again. I only ate some carrot cake. Mario and I went next door to Tuscani's for $4 ice cream. I know Mario is always up for getting ice cream with me, even when it is ridiculously expensive. It was also delicious: Mocha Chip. I feel like an overweight neglected housewife when I splurge on yummy ice cream.

Next stop: liquor store. It's our first friday night together. So being the eldest, I'm recruited to buy beer for the 20-something kids. I get a Sam Adams for me and some Bud Light for them... Haha, suckers. Evan grabs rum and coke while I'm paying. Apparently he's not shy about using his "borrowed" ID in daylight.

We leave and the group is gone. What crap! They won't even help carry the beer. So Evan and I start walking back toward campus and the grocery store. We pass a couple of harmless bums on a park bench. After a minute, my arm is tired of carrying someone ELSE's beer, so I call Esther to get the group moving. While I'm on the phone, the shirtless bum comes over to us and bugs Evan for a beer. Meanwhile, I'm trying to ignore him and get off the phone with Esther so I can grab my beer before he runs off with it. Of course, that doesn't happen. He grabs my mp3 player from my pocket. A bum with taste!

Evan and I are like "what the hell?" First, I don't even know how he got it out of my pocket...the front pocket of my BKE's, which are a little snug around the hips, so the pockets are tight. So I grab his drunk ass by the other arm and ask for my mp3 player back. Evan says, "Dude, that's not cool. Give it back." I would have preferred something a little more effective (and hilarious), like a flying tackle or kick in the nuts, but I appreciated the moral support. I ask him more firmly and reach for his other hand, but he refuses and mumbles something in bum-speak which translates into "Give it to me so I can trade it for booze and smokes!"

I'm thinking, screw this. Cynthia is a brazilian cock fighter, or cage fighter, something, and I wonder what she would do... Kick his ass, of course. So I grab his arm with both of mine and twist it all the way behind his back so he can scratch the back of his head...the wrong way. He gets the idea and is begging to give the mp3 player back. Booyah! I could be a marine I'm so huge.

I push him back toward the bench and grab my stuff. The group catches up and we make it to the grocery store and back to campus without incident. And then taboo (the game) begins.

After some mild drinking and lots of yelling during taboo, we settle into Anchorman and then finally bed at around 3. The plan for Saturday was to investigate the Science Museum in Boston. I'm freakin' tired, so I sleep through their entire trip, but I'll make it one day. Unfortunately, I don't have the good stories from that day, so I might extend an invitation to one of the others to write an account.

Saturday is Jim(bo)'s 21st birthday. I gather he's not much of a party-er from his typical smart kid quietness on previous occasions. I'm fairly excited to get a couple drinks in him and see what happens. I'm a terrible person, right?

But dinner first. Vinny T's is only a few minutes from Mass Ave Bridge with family-style Italian food. When a restaurant says family-style, they mean the average portion is the size of my head. Each dish is designed to feed at least two people. The place is really similar to Frank and Pauly's in Cleveland (their salads are awesome.) I ordered a double size (called due) of Penne alla Fiorentina with Amit and Miriam and we ate the whole thing. The sauce was light but brought of the flavors of the delicious roasted red peppers. Mario ordered the same with a side of alfredo sauce. I don't know what everyone else got, but I'm sure they'll tell you it was awesome.

The greatest part is that it's relatively cheap to eat there. An uno (for two people) is only $12 to $15. With large parties, you can do huge family-style dinners with 4 courses for $20 per person.

I couldn't skip out on dessert after seeing Jimbo's awesome chocolate cake the waiter comped him for his birthday. Miriam and I split one, and a few others ordered tiramisu or cannoli. All looked delicious.

Dinner's end brought a large exodus back to campus, except for Jimbo's over-21 bar-hopping squad: Jim himself, Nathan "Salami" Etassami, Cynthia (the cage fighter), and me. We started right next door at a packed Irish pub so I could enjoy a Guinness. I had the honor of buying Jim's first legal alcoholic drink: a White Russian. May it go down in history as the finest drink in the land for a budding alcoholic--a deliciously sweet, curiously chocolatey, surprisingly potent nectar of milk, kahlua, and vodka, mixed in perfect proportions. Jim said, "It's okay."

The place was packed and really loud. The had the Tyson fight on, and drunk annoying guys with popped collars (idiots!) were yelling "Punch him!" at the TV's. Yeah, thanks guys, I think Mike knows what to do.

It was incredibly humid that day and the night hadn't cooled enough to become comfortable. We thought we would head someplace a little less crowded and cooler for a more chill vibe. I begged and pleaded with Jimbo to ask this group of attractive ladies for a good local hangout. The one blonde was VERY attractive in my opinion, and I was hoping that one drink was enough to loosen him up so his wiener would n't get stuck in his zipper and he would talk to them. Alas, he refused, and then the inevitable response: "Why don't you do it?"

"Sure." So tap her on the shoulder and explain that I'm new to Boston and it's my friend's birthday and we're looking for someplace with more comfy chairs and less testoster-heads with veins popping out of their necks. Of course, i wast exaggerating, but being girls, they appreciated any degrading humor aimed at men and smiled convincingly. The cute one even offered to take us to The Saint with them when they left, but of course I hadn't changed out of my camo shorts and t-shirt. I wouldn't get in. Couldn't you sneak me in your purse, I asked? No? You think my ass is too big, don't you? Oh well, any place else? King's up the street...Thank you, ladies, next time maybe I'll let you buy me a drink for entertaining you. The End.

See how easy it is, Jimbo? I should talk, though. I only have the balls to talk to good-looking strangers when I have a girlfriend and don't care if they can't tell the difference between me and a circus clown holding a beer with a 3 fingered hand. We walk back towards Mass and hang a left at the Fire Station. Now that would be a fun place to party. We arrive at King's, a pool hall and bowling alley that looks more like a Vegas lounge than a bar. It's even louder here but at least the music is good and the band is live. One could swing or jive to it.

In my life, I've learned to appreciate the small miracles, like $3 Miller Light in the middle of Boston. Salami bought a round of Kamakaze's and Jimbo said, "It's ok." I thought maybe we would settle in here for a while, but I could see that everyone was ready to get back. I didn't mind--more drinks and fun waited back at MacGregor. We tried finding one last bar on the walk back, but didn't see the place we were looking for, so instead decided to sing half-remembered songs while we crossed the bridge.

Once we got back, we started up some more fun: drunken chess, drunken massages, drunken boxing... I don't think we actually did anything in particular. Mario, on the other hand, had a very specific plan to get lost and wake up in a strange place. He succeeded and had a great story to tell the next morning. From what we can piece together, he locked himself out sometime that night and went to sleep on the couch in J-Entry. He woke up and went to get his spare key from the front desk but couldn't get into MacGregor without his card. He did what anyone in his position would do: fell asleep until someone let him in, which happened to be Brian. He finally gets into his room and his relatives start calling him. Haha!

I didn't get to sleep until 5 on Sunday and was up at 8:30 to go sailing. It was a long day... MIT Sailing Pavilion is a 15 minute walk from MacGregor, on the banks of the Charles River. Any MIT ID holder can take the beginning sailing class for free. I've been wanting to learn how to sail since taking the helm of a 19-footer back at Cornell. I fully intend on taking advantage of the proximity and quality of MIT's sailing club. Amit, Minna, Laura, Esther and I learned all the basics of sailing except for the knots, and then they let us out on the water to practice. Eventually, Amit and I were tacking (turning into the wind) while controlling both the tiller (rudder control) and boom (sail control) ourselves. I even did a few jibes (turning out of the wind) for good measure.

I hope to go back on Tuesday for more practice. I'm going to go for my provisional rating by the 4th of july so that I might be able to take a rhodes-19 out. They can hold 6 people. I'm hoping Amit might try for it with me so that we can take everyone out without having to pick favorites. If you get the chance, go sailing. You can't take the class unless you have an MIT ID, but if you know someone who does, they can take you as a guest.