Meeting and exceeding expectations, Vol. 2

We left off here. And now we continue on Saturday night, as we pregamed at the apartment before the big night out.

5. Snellfinger – Ahhhhhh, the Snellfinger. First introduced to me when Shorty came to New York in 2005, the game is ridiculously easy to learn and play but impossible to explain. So I won't. All you have to know is that it involves everyone's index finger, a little bit of luck and an awful concoction, which in our case turned out to be two parts rum, two parts vodka and one part Coke. Last man remaining has to drink said concoction. Fortunately, I finished around the middle of the pack with eight points and was never too close to having to drink that ghastly drink. (The guy who did? He didn't make it past 10pm that night.)

6. Scull – They call it sculling, Americans call it chugging. Easy enough, right? We went around the room, everyone had their shot against the clock and then we were all ranked. Fastest time was somewhere in the four second range. Slowest time? That would be yours truly, somewhere in the forty second range. Going in, I knew this would be my weakest event and it absolutely was by a long shot. Not that I actually took forty seconds to actually consume the beer, mind you. For at about the 20 second mark, when it was painfully apparent that I was going to take longer to scull this beer than your average Super Bowl commercial runs, Shorty and Maz took it upon themselves to do all they could to make me laugh. Without their influence? I could have easily gotten into the 30 second range... and still finished in dead last. Good times.

7. BAC & Yack – The event I'd been waiting 25 months to participate in. Literally. First concocted 12,045 miles away in Montreal on an impromptu weekend trip with Dave, Robert and Regan, we found (what was to us) this novelty of a breathalyzer earlier in the day and determined that we would come back to it later to see who was the drunkest. But after a night of trying to incite Quebecois separatist fervor, going to the worst strip club ever in a town renowned for its strip clubs and choking down some sort of an excuse for pizza, we forgot all about it. And I've regretted it ever since, often lamenting with Robert. Fortunately, in the lead up to the Decathlon, Robert reminded me of the contest and I happily submitted the idea to Maz and Shorty (the three of us formed the Decathlon Executive Committee), who loved it and quickly adopted the event.

Cut to later Saturday night. We get to the place where we'll be spending the rest of the night, pay a $10 cover and then... no breathalyzer!!! We were crushed until, well, there was a breathalyzer. So we excitedly gathered everyone (not an easy feat when 14 guys are scattered in a two-story bar) and we all blew. The lowest BAC? 0.072. (Still under the legal limit to drive!) The highest? 0.253. And I blew a 0.140, which I was very disappointed in at the time* but was still somehow good for seven points.

*What have I come to that I'm disappointed with not being drunk enough? Is this my life??!? Ah, whatever... it was a contest. Plus it wasn't even midnight yet! I probably got into the 20s by the end of the night.

8. Picking up – This was a weekend-long event. And the goal was a simple and universal one: pick up. No need to translate any wacky Aussie lingo here. Originally, the idea was to rank everyone based on a mix of success and good stories, but by the time Sunday rolled around and we had to actually rank 14 guys on a very loose and undefined set of criteria, Maz, Shorty and myself -- all just a tad on the hungover side -- gave up and simply awarded five points per hook up. Which resulted in almost the entire group accumulating five points -- including yours truly -- but leaving Shorty on top with ten. No surprises here; this is what Shorty does best. I submit the accompanying picture as photographic evidence of this.

On the way home, I was conned into walking fifteen minutes in the wrong direction all in the name of going to Harry's. My fury and bewilderment quickly turned into pleasure as I scarfed down pie number two on the weekend. And then as we walked another 20 minutes back to the apartment, the rage came back in full force. Unfortunately, there were no pissed off women screaming at us from a hotel window to berate this time.

As I slept away my rage, Sunday morning dawned. And not only would it bring the end of the Decathlon and the crowning of a champion, but also one of the stranger and funnier things I've ever witnessed. We'll wrap this up by this weekend at the latest. I promise.