So, out to Davis we went. Things started turning bad when the Wild Turkey was brought out within moments of our arrival. The girls had a fairly large container of it, as I recall, and Jen was downing the stuff like a madwoman. I suggested that she slow down, but she would have none of it (in fact, this may have been the same evening that the infamous "grabass" event may have happened. Maybe not.) I insisted that if she were to continue drinking against my advice, it would be on her own. Were the same to happen today, I'd probably be a bit more assertive.

It was at this party that I learned the simple truth that while drinking antics are fun while you are drinking, they are absolutely no fun if you are sober.

The evening winds up with poor Jen retching her guts out in Geoff's john. During this time, our good friend Cheryl has hooked up with an ex-boyfriend from High School who she had run into, and is making eyes at him. Henry manages to keep out of most of this, and simply drinks. We all head out to our cars. Geoff loads the mostly incoherent Jen into one of the cars, which heads out first. I load up my passengers; Cheryl, the ex-boyfriend and Hank; and I start out. Before I leave, however, Geoff says to me: "I'd consider taking her to the hospital if she's not better when you get back. I think she's got alcohol poisoning." Second only to aspiration of one's own bodily fluids, there is no greater fear of the binge drinker than of alcohol poisoning.

Visions of long hours in the hospital while Jen's stomach were pumped filled my head. Or worse, her drunken companions ignorant of her problem and her sober driver too tired to notice, they put her to bed where she is found dead the next morning. Horrors! All this while her mostly spooky boyfriend (later to be the friendly Roy) was out in Alaska, honing the skills required to eviscerate us upon his return.

Time being of the essence, I speed to the ex-boyfriends place, hoping to throw him out. Henry, at this point, decides he is ill, and spends time staring down over his shoes and wheezing. Cheryl takes this opportunity to lock lips with the ex. At this point, I feel like the man spinning plates on stage. Every time I get close to convincing Henry that he's not going to be sick, Cheryl once again is sporting this growth from her lips. When I remove the growth, Henry decides that he is about to be sick. After much angst, I finally get the two in the car, and get back on the road.

Hank is hanging his head out the window as we pass by one of Davis' finest. This does little for my general mood as the car slows to watch us, and then drives into the distance. Finally, on HWY 113, I start to open the car up a little bit. As I make the turn from 113 onto I-80, I feel a drop of moisture on my cheek. Odd, since I'm on an overpass, it's been a dry day, and since it's my right cheek. At this point, Cheryl screams "Ohmigod! He's PUKING". I lay rubber coming to a stop and expel Henry from the car in a torrent of profanity. Getting out, I see that he has completely decorated the side of my car--I have a new bile-colored flame job.

Getting back in the car, I instruct him to bang on the dashboard if he feels like he is going to be ill again. Now, feeling like I have lost valuable time, I put the aging Celica to its very limits. The speedometer pegs out at 90 as we continue to accelerate. I do not fear being stopped at this point, as the officer would walk to the passenger side of the car, see the vomit, and escort me back to Sacramento. As I hit campus, the turns get too much for Henry, who begins to again vomit on the side of my car. I yell at him that "you were supposed to hit the dash if you were going to fucking puke", to which he responds by hitting the dash.

Henry gets out and recycles some more alcohol. So close to the dorms, only to be hamstrung at this point! I load Hank back into the car and speed towards the dorm. When I hit the dorm, I don't bother to park, but pull up on the sidewalk mere feet from the door. A Community Safety Officer steps out and begins to explain that I can't park there. She is silenced by a stern "Look, I've got this guy puking all over the side of my car, and I may need to take someone to the hospital. Let me find out what is going on and I'll move the car in a minute."

We all pile out. I go to investigate Lil' Jen, who turns out to be sleeping without incident. I park the car and make sure everyone gets to bed all right, and then hit some schnapps I had socked away. What an evening. The irony in all this, is that the next morning, despite being completely out of touch with reality for a period and spending hours vomiting, Lil' Jen is completely fine. Henry got his however, as I took him to the car wash the next morning to watch him clean my car. Cheryl never did see her ex again, and I never was the designated driver again either.