The Condom Poker Story

Photo taken from Brock University's Twitter

A number of years have passed since the events of this story occurred, and I believe that now is the right time to tell the story of how I crashed a major campus event during my first year at university. My university friends filled some of the details in, as I was too drunk to remember the whole story. Regardless, this story will give a sense of what my mindset was at the time, which was quite different from what I am now.

It was a melancholic Thursday afternoon in the winter of 2010. All the university students were back from Christmas break, and classes were starting up again for the winter semester. Despite the rather glum weather, there was also a slight tinge of electricity for me, because I was excited for the Condom Poker event happening later that night. Condom Poker was one event in a series of events hosted by the university student union on the first week of the winter semester called "Frost Week" (not to be confused with "Frosh Week" which is the first week of the fall semester). For the Condom Poker event, the university gym is set up like a budget casino where you can play all the different table games, but instead of playing with casino chips, you play with condoms. You can purchase 20 condoms for about $6 (seems like incredible value, but these condoms are the basic blue Trojan brand, so they were terrible), and you can use them to play the casino games, or to enter the poker tournament that the student union always hosts.

The event came at a great time for me, as I was running out of condoms from the event in the fall semester. I remember how much fun I had from the time I went to the event at the beginning of the fall semester, and for this time, I had the brilliant idea of going to the event while completely hammered. My thought process at the time was that I was going to be the life of the party, be full of life and energy, and enjoy myself more than when I went in the fall. However, little did I know, was that I ended up being so much of the life of the party that it got to the point that it was quite embarrassing for me and my university friends.

Before my Thursday afternoon classes, I bought an orange juice from the dorm cafeteria, drank a quarter of the bottle, and topped up the bottle with Captain Morgan spiced rum. From the looks of the bottle, it looked like it was still full of orange juice, but if you actually smelled the bottle; you got the whiff of hard liquor. My classes ended right when the event started, so I wanted to get a head start on the night by drinking during class. Terrible, I know.

I went to class with a friend of mine, and I told her my master plan for the night. I asked her to take a whiff of my orange juice bottle, and when she smelled that bottle, she rightly told me how foul I was. Undeterred by her protests, I kept drinking that orange juice bottle while paying attention in class. As I was drinking from the bottle while in class, I felt the world around me becoming a wavy haze. At the end of my afternoon classes, I was quite inebriated. I got a quick slice of pizza and went back to the dorm rooms where all my friends were having a drink of their own in preparation for the Condom Poker event. Yeah, my friends had a drink, but they were in no way as smashed as I was. It was time to leave to go to the event, and I thought I could handle myself. I was so excited.

We got to the event, and at this point, I knew that I was not going to function as a coherent human being. I was stumbling everywhere, as I could not walk straight. My voice was slurred and unintelligible. My brain could not process a basic sentence, nor could it form a basic sentence for my mouth to say. I was the life of the party for all the wrong reasons. I somehow managed to purchase my condoms, and on the casino floor, I was knocking into tables and people, because I simply could not function as a human. Some of my friends were laughing at my self-inflicted misfortune. Other friends were legitimately upset and thought I was making a mockery by crashing the event. Other friends were trying to get me out of there so I do not cause further damage to the furnishings around me. I was a big problem to the event organizers, and they sent staff to try to give me food and water, but I was brushing them away and still stumbling around like an idiot. I was surprised that the event organizers did not try to kick me out of the event, until I heard the reason why they could not do it. They told my friend that they could not legally kick me out of the event because they thought I was a special needs student. When you get so drunk that people would think of you as special needs, then that is a new level of mortification.

After an undetermined amount of time (because how could I possibly tell time in the state I was in), my friends dragged my ass out of the event. On the way back to the dorm rooms, I remember falling flat on my face a couple of times because I still could not walk properly. We got back to the dorm rooms and a friend put me to bed, but as soon as I heard my friends leave the dorm halls, I went back to the event by myself in my drunken stupor. I think at that point, some of the drunkenness wore off, and I was at least able to play some blackjack in order to win more condoms. After some time, I went back to my dorm room, and my friend from class caught me outside my room. She grabbed me and threw me on my bed while I was still fully clothed. I think I remember asking her to get my pants off and she left my room in disgust. I did not mean it in a sexual manner; I just wanted my pants off so I can sleep more comfortably. Nevertheless, I passed out for the night.

I was an absolute wreck in the morning. My head was pounding like a jackhammer, and my mouth was dull with stained rum. Moreover, my breath was rank with stale alcohol. Even with all these things plaguing me, I was still determined to go to my morning history seminar so I could check out a cute blonde girl that I knew would be there (you can see where my priorities were at the time). I went with another friend of mine to the seminar, and everyone in the seminar could see in my face how hungover I was. That same seminar, I embarrassingly asked the teaching assistant if I could go to the bathroom, when I could have just up and left the room without telling anyone. Smooth moves, Randy, especially in front of the cute girl that you wanted her phone number.

In hindsight, it was a shameful night in my university life, but I fully own up to it. Hell, I would probably do it all again if I had the chance. You have to own up to your embarrassing moments in order to move on with your life, and this was one of those moments where I can just look back and laugh at how foolish and reckless I was at university.

At least I was not running in the dorm halls butt naked. Oh, wait...