The Best $75 000 I Ever Spent.

When I first went to that great institution of booze, blow jobs, and brainwashing, er, higher learning (called University), I moved into a glorified hole optimistically named Residence. Ah, residence, hallowed place where I showered in special shoes, drank Crown Royal for supper, and learned 101 more uses for shaving cream.

I lasted a month.

Which is not to say that residence was too much for me. The truth of the matter was, someone just couldn't live without me. So he threw caution to the wind and "rescued" me from the mysterious stains of Stanton Res and whisked me off to a comparatively luxurious apartment (read: a shoebox that cost as much as a 7-bedroom home, but which we loved anyway).

In some ways, that month spent living communally was one of the craziest I've ever survived. We wore beer steins on lanyards (in those days the University actually provided you with a plastic beer mug to wear around your neck - it meant beer at half price in the Byward Market); we collected pictures of topless Sunshine Boys, scissored out of the local news rag; we saved each other repeatedly from the dusty bowels of the research library and from the nerdy Carleton engineering students who tried to grope above their league. We lived intimately among strangers and became fast friends.

And then, as quickly as we had moved all of my shit up 8 flights of stairs (of course the elevator was out on moving day!), we moved it back down. Jason and I rented a big truck we couldn't drive and made 3 stops in 2 cities, covering several hundred kilometres during which it was often touch-and-go for my goldfish who weathered the move in a margarine container in my lap.

After 13 exhausting hours of hauling furniture in the rain (uphill both ways), we craved only sleep (and maybe some chicken), but instead we were treated to a going away party thrown by the 8th floor. Of course, people from several floors up and several floors down came too. I was hungry enough to eat an ox, but instead I had a very stiff rye&coke (well, whiskey and diet pepsi, actually), you know, the kind that you mix yourself in 40oz cups on my empty stomach, and then another, and then another.

And then a funny thing happened. A rainbow fell out of my mouth. Well, maybe not a real rainbow, but the vomit was so colourful it sure looked pretty. I spent the entirety of my own going away party on the floor of a public washroom. It was a multi-stall facility, but apparently I locked the main door and for the next several hours, as I fell in and out of consciousness, friends would politely knock and inquire as to the state of my rainbows.

Meanwhile, Jason had not quite reached the rainbow stage. However, he had reached the "it seems like a good idea to climb into this shopping cart and let other people race me" stage. He ripped a really expensive pair of pants that night.

When the sun was coming up and very few people remained standing, I bid them all adieu. I somehow managed to leave my toilet-fortress in order to thank my guests for such a fond farewell, but what I did not so adeptly manage was to stand on my own 2 feet. Soon I found myself splayed on the floor, my sexy backless dress failing me in every way imaginable (but please, for the love of god, try not to imagine this).

Long story short, the next day I resolved to start wearing underwear again.

Happy Monday, y'all.