The Apocalypse

I have had my New Years plans set in stone since the summer, ever since my friend Katie Appel announced she was going to host a party. And with such advance, a great assortment of personalities gradually made DC this year’s New Years Mecca. With a converging of characters to rival Knights of the Round Table, I was expecting nothing short of an epic week (although not anticipating many heroic deeds).

And the week lived up to it’s expectations. The entire week blurred together as I caught up with friends from foreign lands and become good friends with former acquaintances; a mosaic of merrymaking and snapshots (and shots sans snap). With this assembly, I was all but certain that the Apocalypse would occur the moment the clocks chimed midnight.

A few superlatives:

Biggest blunder: Our good friend Chelsey Jones, whom I dearly adore, is really good at (a) opening her mouth and (b) talking to strangers. So it made complete sense when she befriended Alex Plank on the metro en route to our New Years Eve jamboree and invited him along. So when he agreed to come, the evening was spent in addled trepidation, everyone making certain to look both left and right before moving across the dance floor (which can be pretty challenging while dancing the Cupid Shuffle). By midmorning, and one Facebook friendship confirmation later, we came to find that Alex Plank runs WrongPlanet.net, a popular community for individuals with Asperger’s Syndrome and Autism…You can only imagine the self-reproach and compunction that filled the apartment after some of the comments made. Woof.

Biggest prank: My funny friends think they are full of wit and always know how to pull a fast one on me. Over the course of the week, I found myself swindled on many occasions, from the larger task of saran wrapping my apartment while I was at the grocery store paying for their sustenance, to more minor infractions, like changing the time on my clocks, to taking liberties in redecorating the Christmas tree. Alas, the ultimate winner goes to mother nature. A mere hours after the stragglers filtered out, I opened the front door to find a fervent river flowing down the hall in our direction. I immediately retreated, panicked, near hysterics, as I senselessly started stacking my precious personal property (valued at circa not much and what property?). As it turns out, due to the devesatingly low temperatures and wind chill, the pipe burst in our neighbors apartment, and within a matter of minutes, we were rocking our rain boots, trekking through our uninhabitable swampland. Mother nature, you thought you had me, but thankfully I asked for new galoshes for Christmas!

In the end (or apparently not, since I’m still here and the Apocalypse has yet to bring a tragic end to this romance), I’ve decided to retroactively enact a New Years Resolution: Buy Renter’s Insurance.