March 1996

Somewhere out there, hiding in some dimly lit building, perhaps next to the parsley or beside the fries, is the ultimate manly food - the sacred perfect rack of ribs. It is waiting to be discovered (and subsequently devoured in a grotesquely messy display of testosterone), and we knew it was our job to do it. Since this quest unfortunately involves a large amount of time and money, it is at this point incomplete. I can, however, share with you what we have discovered thus far: Red Hot and Blue is pretty good. Some people say their dry ribs are even better, but dry ribs just don't count. (Not messy enough) I'd tell you more, but I missed out on that one, so I can't. Our next target was Houston's in Georgetown. Five of us - Warren Menzer, Duncan Crosby, Dave Sylvester, who goes to Langley, Joel Hartel, who goes to Gonzaga, and myself all piled into Warren's studly mini-van and headed off. Not too much happened on the way there. (Warren doesn't drive fast enough to give rise to hair-raising stories) There was an hour wait for seating, so we bided our time by strolling around Georgetown. They thought I was stupid for wearing my TJ jacket, but since I didn't get beaten up despite almost walking through a drug deal, I guess it was ok. Anyway, finding the ultimate rack of ribs wasn't our only goal; the other great quest was to establish which of us could consume the vastest (sure it's a word) vast quantity of food. Duncan, Dave and Joel decided to get a head start and split a cheese steak at some fast food joint. Warren and I figured if we were going to pay for more food than we could eat anyway we might as well starve ourselves until then. When the hour was finally up, we piled in to Houston's for some serious eating. The ribs were really good - at least, the first two thirds of them were. After that they became sort of tasteless. Duncan and Joel came out at the leaders in number of pounds consumed at this point, because they snatched two of my ribs. My excuse is that I had a double order of fries to deal with and was hence otherwise occupied. Besides, as far as volume goes, those fries were way up there. That's about all you get to know about the dinner. I'd tell you about the conversation, but, well, it was guy talk. You know. Dinner didn't come cheap - in fact, I only had one measly dollar bill left by the end. However, since we hadn't thrown up yet and could still walk out the door, we knew we hadn't eaten enough yet. The call of the wild cow seized us and we raided a nearby Ben and Jerry's. Here's where the fun begins. The obvious choice was the biggest thing available : The Vermonster. Vermonster's are quite nifty. Let me tell you what they consist of:

Since none of us had a camera and all the customers and employees seemed to be huddling at the other side of the store trying to avert their eyes, I can't show you any pictures or sketches. However, I'm sure if you try and visualize five guys huddled around a bucket of ice cream trying to stuff it down their throats as fast as possible to get the most out of their share of the money (heck, I went into debt for this thing) while at the same time trying to keep the food already swallowed in its place, you'll have a pretty good idea of what it looked like. Well, there you go. If you've ever wondered what guys do when left to their own devices on a night without a football game going on, now you know. Burp.