Have You Met My Friend Gin?

I have a confession to make. In my ripe old age of 23, I've more or less lost the ability to party hearty. When it comes to my choice of alcohol, I'm more inclined to nurse a bloody mary at home, wrapped in a leopard-print Snuggy watching reruns of Wings than I am to do jello shots in a dive bar somewhere. But when Saturday night rolls around and my friends call me to hang out, I have to begrudgingly oblige, lest I become a complete recluse. The Boo Radley of Northwest Portland, if you will.

For the most part, I've learned my limit and can walk the fine line between being merrily drunk and utterly schwasted. I can normally take care of myself, but problems arise when people start to buy me drinks. Truth be told, I'm not quite attractive enough to rely on strangers purchasing me drinks on a regular basis, nor do I have the charisma to work free drinks out of people very often, but if there's a drag queen in the joint, it's all over.

I'm not sure what it is about the drag queens. They always seem to find me and attempt to liquor me up with appletinis. I'm beginning to think I have some sort of drag queen tracking device embedded in my neck, or maybe I emit some sort of drag queen pheromone, I don't know.

And that's when everything goes downhill. What ensues is something akin to an 80's movie montage, and for the next several hours I'm lost in a fog of free cocktails and Aqua Net Super Hold. Later, after the bars close, I can always tell how much trouble I'm in by gauging one of two things: the first is how insatiable my craving for Denny's breakfast is, and the second is how many times I freak out from imaginary squirrel attacks. The latter is far more distressing, as there's no telling how many times I'll see vicious, fictional creatures leaping from tree branches into my face.

The Denny's thing is probably more upsetting long-term, however. In my waking life, I pride myself on eating as healthy as possible. For example, I might only have three donuts for breakfast instead of four, or I'll eat Taco Bell for dinner instead of McDonald's for a sixth night in a row–because being an adult means making adult decisions. Boozy Adam isn't as inclined to make such judicious choices, though. Many a Saturday night I've found myself hunched over a sticky Denny's table somewhere, struggling to make sense of the menu, wishing the tiny words would stop moving around like caterpillars, before finally giving up and making my decision based on the photos alone, pointing clumsily for the waitress at whichever entree has the most melted cheese and the highest content of animal fat.

Last time this happened, I ended up ordering something called the Hooburrito. If you aren't familiar with this abomination (and I pray to Vishnu you aren't), allow me a moment to enlighten you. The Hooburrito is a burrito stuffed with crispy chicken strips, onion rings, pepper jack cheese, barbecue sauce, and some sort of nondescript melty cheese sauce–basically a heart attack wrapped in a tortilla. To make matters worse, it's actually named after and endorsed by Hoobastank.

Yes, you heard me. Hoobastank. Hoobastank. Denny's has a dish designed by FUCKING HOOBASTANK. Apparently Denny's has a whole bunch of shitty items endorsed by terrible bands, but the Hooburrito takes the cake. It's the most disgusting thing I've ever seen in a restaurant, hands down.

And you know what? It was amazing. Like, top 10 meals of my life amazing. I'm sure it was the alcohol talking, but that damn burrito was so delicious I cried. I took one bite, and literally teared up. It was like seeing the smiling face of God.

And, as is always the case, I woke up the next morning in complete misery.

Now, I don't know what it's like to be pregnant–and thankfully I'll never have to experience the glorious miracle/disgusting agony of childbirth–but I imagine it's like being bloated on gin n' tonics and Hooburritos. Of course, I also used to think that girls peed out their butts, so I obviously I have a loose grasp on the female experience at best.

Clearly my body is begging for me to treat it better, and I suppose sooner or later I'm going to have to start listening and stop filling it with garbage, but my brief love affair with the Hooburrito will remain a sparkling high point in my life. A delicious, painful experience I'll never forget. I'm getting choked up just thinking about it.

Wait, nope, that's more Hooburrito. Excuse me while I vomit.