#73. Fishbowl Friday (Friday, May 12, 2017)

What was your best day…of just hanging out with people who were a lot younger/older than you?

It all came together pretty quickly. My brother was back in town from McGill, volunteering at a medical research center for the summer. His nineteenth birthday was coming up this week, so we decided – why not have a real birthday party with his friends. And by Wednesday, it was all organized: Lac-Leamy Casino¹ on Friday it is.

That Friday right after work, I met them at the mall. It was a group of seven of us going. Me, my brother, my brother’s long-time childhood friend Tim (#108), my brother’s best friend Alex, his other best friend (and gaming buddy) Rishi, Taylor (a weekly regular at Lac-Leamy), and Justin. I was kind of the old guy there, but my brother’s friends were all really interested in talking to me (based on all the crazy things my brother had told them…).

So, after an Uber ride where the driver kindly let all seven of us squeeze into one car, we had dinner at the casino restaurant² then went down to gamble…for about an hour. (Apparently, nineteen-year-olds don’t tend to last long in blackjack when there’s a $10 minimum bet.) Tim in particular, lost all his money in about five minutes of slots and tweeted that he would never go gambling again.

So we took off.

The problem was that, upon leaving the casino, we didn’t really have a plan. I think the initial idea was to go to the supermarket across the street, buy a bunch of alcohol, and Uber back to our house and drink it. But we ended up just standing in the store for over forty-five minutes picking out drinks and deciding what to do…until I said screw it, let’s go to a bar/club and get wild. At which point Taylor offered the Rue de Portage in Gatineau which had a dance club and a few bars, including a surprisingly active-at-night Boston Pizza – where today was Fishbowl Friday³!

As you may have guessed, we ended up going to Boston Pizza. Where none of us actually ended up getting any fishbowls, but we did get rounds and rounds of shots (tequila, Jaegerbombs, the like) with a couple of large pizzas on the side. This went on for quite some time; far longer than you would ever expect at a Boston Pizza.⁴

After several hours of this drinking, eating, and joking around, the seven of us take separate Ubers back to our house.

And once we get there, right away we set up the beer pong table in the basement. We don’t really have much alcohol stored, so we end up mixing POM juice with this old, nasty-tasting vodka that was given to us during our holiday cruise. We’re deep into the beer pong match, when we hear a ring at the doorbell. Who could it be at this hour?

It’s Tim’s mom. She tells us that it’s getting late and it’s time for little Timmy to go home. So we call him over. But no one responds. So we call again. Nothing. Then we look around, then realize it’s just the six of us. Where’s Tim? We do a scan of the house, including the closets, under tables, everything, but can’t find him. What the hell? TIM JUST FUCKING DISAPPEARED!

At this point, seeing as it’s now an hour past midnight, we’re all getting a little worried. We had seen him come back with us, put his coat and stuff down; but then we had gotten into our beer pong, didn’t hear anything from the guy…and that’s the last we saw of him. We give his house a call…no answer. We give his cell phone a call…no answer.

We see his boots and coat are gone, so presuming that he just wasn’t feeling it and left⁵, Alex and Rishi put on their stuff and run outside, scouring the nearby streets to try and find him. Meanwhile, we keep searching every part of the house in case he’s hiding or something. All this time, his mom is pretty calm; she thinks he just went home (about a 30 minute walk away) and hasn’t gotten there yet.

Well, Alex and Rishi come back…nothing. Some more time passes. Must be at least forty-five minutes since we arrived home, and we’re really starting to panic now…but then Tim’s mom receives a call.

He just got home. (Thanks for telling us before you left, Tim!)

This big, fancy casino in Gatineau (i.e. the Quebec side) with mostly old people playing slots and blackjack, and intense Poker players who are way-to-quick to accuse people of slow-rolling.
With a bottle of actual “Illuminati” brand table wine.
$7.50 for a literal fishbowl filled with a mixed drink of your choice.
A word on Boston Pizza. It has nothing to do with Boston: it’s a Canadian chain that actually takes to changing its name temporarily whenever a Canadian NHL team plays the Boston Bruins in the playoffs. Also, it’s usually a pretty tame casual dining spot, so the fact that there were several groups there getting shots late into the night was quite unexpected.
He wasn’t really into things back at Boston Pizza either, and just not really into things in general.