Back in Illinois now, thank God. One more day in the Big Apple probably would have fried my brain but good. All it took was about twenty minutes of Midwestern air circulating in my lungs to dope me up and bring me off that natural high of city living, steady alcohol and sensory excess. Better than a healthy shot of Valium, as far as I'm concerned.

It was funny to watch the old high school/college patterns develop (though in all honesty, a weekend full of them probably took ten years off my life). We would wake up eleven, twelve, one in the afternoon, and Matt would hang over the edge of his bed, staring at me lying on an inflatable mattress on the floor. "God, you look like shit" was his standard morning greeting, to which I would mumble something vaguely comprehensible. After showering (and how in hell he does it in a bathroom no bigger than my hall closet is beyond me) and dragging a razor over my face, it was over to the corner restaurant, where I had the best lox and eggs I've ever had.

"No more alcohol for a while," one of us would promise the other. "My liver is ready to jump out of my stomach and start kicking me in the ass." There would be no fuss over that particular point; we would arrange for something cultural (a museum, city tour or whatever)...and then by three o'clock we were back in the bar drinking. Hell, isn't that what they invented Bloody Marys for? When Wiggo hooked up with us (and believe me, an alcohol-amateur he is not), his amazement registered through every layer of my booze-soaked brain. Would that I could put such an accomplishment on my curriculum vita.

So I get home and find that I still have no food in the fridge, my bills still aren't paid and I still don't have all the paperwork in for that camp trip for the kiddies in July. So I had to put in about thirty minutes at the office today, after which it was straight to this month's Premiere magazine (the Top Ten Best Sex Scenes of All Time), a couple hours of NYPD Blue (in the city pan-and-scans I can now pick out three buildings besides the Empire State and Chrystler buildings that I can recognize) and a DVD (Tell Me Something--kickass review to be published). My brother's bachelor party is coming up in a few weeks; Wiggo will be back in town in two weeks. I should be thinking about curriculum and what not right now, but I figured I'd take a good week off of anything like that before straining my brain cells. Besides, after a weekend like this one, I'd probably get in more trouble trying to put lessons together than not.

Anyway, I'm thinking of looking into NYU and what it has in the way of a rhetoric program. It probably won't happen (I have no idea what their requirements are, but I know damn well how much their TAs make, and while you can live like a king on such a salary in DeKalb, similar ambitions in the City That Never Sleeps, Stops Drinking or Throwing Lustrious Entertainment Your Way fall significantly short of reality), but I can't help thinking that if other people can make it work, maybe I could qualify.

Qualify as "other people," that is. Ever notice how everything that ever looked the best or the worst to you always happens to someone else? There's my answer.