New Year's Eve, in which Echo dents my car.

Okay, so my friend Echo says I need to "post some funny stuff." (Lol, thanks Echo... I thought I was posting funny stuff...)

Anyway, so I have a story relating to Echo today, because I have been leaving her out lately. Plus, I have quite a few single life/drunkenness stories to catch up on.

Here goes:

It was New Year's Eve just last year, and Echo and I had this brilliant plan that we were going to both get marvelously plastered at Eli's Bar. Normally, we take turns being the Sober Driver (See: Babysitter), and so really there has only been one or two times that we were drunk simultaneously.

But this was a dumb idea because:
1. we didn't plan ahead on who would be driving us home at the end of the night,
2. we didn't seem to be remember the level of Stupid-Drunk we could both attain,
and
3. we didn't think about who would be taking care of our drunk asses all night.

We get to Eli's Bar early and all is well until after we have 2-3 pitchers of beer. Yeah, I'm not entirely sure how many we had the entire night. Maybe 4-5 total... I lost track. Toward the end of the night, after the beer had sunk into our brains, we went up to order another before going back out on the dance floor.

At this point, we obviously have had enough:

We drunkenly ask the bartender: "Should we get another pitcher?"

The bartender replies: "You can't take a pitcher on the dance floor." (I'm positive now that he must have been rolling his eyes, and we just didn't notice at the time.)

Me, turning to Echo: "I want to dance."

Echo, to the bartender: "Yeah, we're gonna dance."

Bartender, still playing babysitter: "Do you want Miller Lite or Bud Light in bottles?"

Echo and me, in unison: "F_ck Miller!"

Don't ask where this simultaneous outburst came from, since we'd been drinking Miller Lite all night long by the pitcher, and remarking on how much better it was than Bud Light.

We go back out to the dance floor and after a short while, our Bud Lites are gone and we are completely out of money. Echo is dancing with this random drunk guy who offers her a drink from his mysterious green-bottled beer. (Much later, I did some research and found that the mystery beer had to have been either Heineken or Rolling Rock.) She takes a drink, and then (not asking him or anything!) passes it to me and I take a drink too.

I yell: "That's pretty good!"

Echo says: "What is it?"

I say: "It tastes like water!"

You know you've had too much to drink when you drink a stranger's Green Mystery Beer and it tastes like water. This is the point of no return, people. You've literally drunk your taste buds to death. (Note: This is also the point in which I lose most of my hearing as well. For example, if a stranger talks to me, I assume they are speaking a foreign language. This may or may not lead to me making out with them in order to shut them up.)

Anyway, we drained his beer between the two of us. And then Echo gave him back the empty bottle.

Meanwhile, I am slapping at this guy's hands because he is untying Echo's lace-up top. (Similar style shown here.) It's not that he would untie her and her shirt would be gaping open, it just had the ties hanging down untied. I'm not sure what he was thinking untying her, but I was thinking "Get off my friend, drunk ass" while I slapped at him. And Echo doesn't even notice what's going on, and only realizes her top is unlaced the next morning.

So, at around midnight, we decide that it's time to go outside and call a cab to come and pick us up. I am dialing and dialing, not realizing that the busy signal is not going away. This was my first New Year's without a Designated Driver... the first New Year where I planned on calling a cab to come get us at the end of the night. And the first New Year that I learned that New Year's Eve is the #1 busiest night for the cab companies. In fact, we may very well have called back 100 times and never gotten through.

We go over to stand by my car instead of standing in front of the bar. I am still trying to call the cab company over and over again, even though it's extremely difficult to dial, even though I am just hitting redial (it's ONE key!), because I am so freaking trashed.

I tell Echo: "Dude, dial them on your phone too." She gets her phone and attempts to dial in the phone number as I read it to her. Who the hell knows what number she called, or if she even got 7 numbers dialed at all. So, we are starting to panic just a little, wondering how we will get home, and Echo is literally rolling on the front side-panel of my car, repeating "I don't want to go to jail tonight, Jen."

I say: "Well my house isn't that far, we could always walk there." Except it IS that far! And let's keep in mind, it's winter in Omaha, Nebraska... it's freakin cold outside. But Echo and I, pretty much wasted, are wearing only very light, slighty-slutty, bar-scene clothing and complaining because "It's HOT!!!" Echo is saying this while she continues to roll on my car. I have no idea why she's rolling on my car. (She doesn't know why either.) But the next day I find out that she actually left a dent in that spot she was rolling on at my front side-panel (above the wheel).

Granted, I drive a little practically-made-out-of-an-aluminum-can Kia Rio, but Echo is not a big girl! Can you imagine the sheer force required to leave such a large dent in a car for a little chick like her!? It's like she body-slammed herself into the side of my car. I mean, usually you get dents from, oh say, OTHER CARS. But not me... I get dents from DRUNK ROLLING FRIENDS!

Anyway, so I end up calling a friend of ours to come and get us and drive us home. We were about 10 minutes from either walking home or calling my mom. Seriously, those are equal punishments in our eyes. Apparently walking 15+ blocks in the freezing winter night and dying from pneumonia two days later is equivalent to lowering ourselves to middle school status and calling Mommy to come pick us up.

About a half hour after we get home, the real fun begins.

And in the morning:

Echo: "Jen, did I just walk in the bathroom last night and get sick?"

Me: "Actually dude, you freakin crawled."

Echo: "Oh my god. I kinda remember that now."

Me: "Don't feel bad. I did the exact same thing."