Old school Red Bull night

In my first somewhat caffeine related post, Saturday night was pretty entertaining. It was a true, old fashioned xBox and poker night like we used to do, fuelled by none other than my old friend, Red Bull.

It was a little creepy cramming seven people into Brodie's garage and even creepier being one of the three men squeezed onto the leather couch. No amount of "I'm comfortable with my heterosexuality, so this is OK" makes me feel more comfortable. The xBox part didn't really work for seven people simultaneously, plus Brodie's xBox agonisingly fails to read discs mid-game with moderate frequency. We broke out Ricky Ponting Cricket. Matt began reading the instruction booklet to work out how to play and ten minutes elapsed.

That was our cue to start the Red Bull (if it wasn't earlier). Not all of us can drink and drive home, so this was our nice, social and cheaper alternative. Only $6 for a 4-pack is an all-time special if you ask me. Short of the on-the-way-to-work-after-a-late-one-and-I-feel-like-crap Red Bull or drinking them at gigs I've driven to (on P plates), giving me a virtually equal platform to fraternise with people on, I haven't had it for a while. And the buzz is still a bit of fun.

I swept the first poker game, flaunting my big stack when I got up. As usual, and duly noted by Brodie, I win the unimportant games where there's no money involved. But of course, it always becomes a practice or warm-up game for some of us if you're losing, and a deadly serious battle to defend your ancestors' honour if you're in front. The second game wasn't so great for me, but having one the first one I felt no pressure and accepted a game of Madden when my "ambitious" all in on a pair of pocket 8s fell over.

Having just achieved my goal of winning the Superbowl on All-Madden, Dean favoured me to win but I know that playing people is totally different than the AI. Things got bad as I picked the wrong defensive scheme and got my ass kicked early. I had a few big runs and eventually got in front 21-14 before Dean's Seattle Seahawks had a 5 minute long TD drive, virtually all running. He topped it off with a 2-point conversion run that I would've challenged if it wasn't in the last two minutes and I had 42 seconds to reply. A 13-yard run out of bounds by Atlanta's Michael Vick was a good start. Next, Dean guessed my play right (I think), jammed the receiver and picked off my pass. That was it, 22-21.

I had a post-Red Bull buzz low after that, not helped by the Madden defeat. That meant it was time to break out another Red Bull. I see the recommended daily dosage as a challenge, and an easy one at that. I laughed when I heard Craig had erratic heartbeats the last time he did that. The man can conciously drink for 24 hours straight but can't do caffeine. Next drinking challenge against him I might have to bring out my old partners in crime from high school: Finlandia and Red Bull. I've had a lot of great nights and chunders with those two.

After that I went home just after 2 and couldn't sleep until after 5:30. I ended up watching all of Zoolander. I'm surprised I functioned at all yesterday after I was woken by the whipper snipper at 11am. Jerkwads.