It’s late on Tuesday or Thursday or Friday or Saturday or Monday or Wednesday and you are feeling yourself at the bars. As you stumble out, your peripheral vision is so blurry that you feel like you must be in a movie with the camera focusing on you. You are the star of the movie actually. As the crowd around you mingles and flirts and waits in line for the bathroom to vomit from subtle alcohol poisoning, you feel alive. Yet, you leave. Why do you leave?

 

Kicked out (Paragraph A)

Hungry and want food (Paragraph B)

Plan to go to another bar (Paragraph C)

 

A: You were kicked out. That bouncer was watching you all night. You thought it was because he or she thought you were working it, but you realize after trying to run back in that it was probably to make sure you didn’t get out of hand. You were definitely not drunk, though, so it’s a good thing you screamed that at them. There’s only one thing that will soothe your current ego-wound and future hangover: a calzone. With all of the other champions of the pregame, you stumble your way down to Calios.

 

B: You left because you were hungry. What a great choice. Late-night options are slim pickings, which is unfortunate because none of them are pickings that will help you get slim — especially after drinking two pitchers of beer. It’s cool, though, because in your inebriated state you can’t help but contemplate the hypocrisies of body logic. Who cares about skinny? Is this not just cultural hegemony demanding one more — oh, shoot. Calios smells good. You go in.

 

C: You plan to go to another bar. What a party animal. Good for you — even though you are probably underage and will definitely regret it in the morning. In your pilgrimage from one watering hole to another, you run into someone you think you might know — at least, you talk to them like you know them. You are struggling to place where you know them from, but you definitely know them. That’s why you ran up to them and went “Itzchu!” Translation: “It’s you.” “WehavtagotaCalios!” Translation: “Let us go together as comrades of the night to Calios.”

 

Calios: The scene at Calios is a bit like Salvador Dalí meets “Animal House.” There is something uniquely beautiful and surreal about the experience, as people who met 30 minutes ago tightly embrace on the bench of the booth. We are all humans, and we are all just looking to get by in this weird, overwhelming world. And what do we do to cope with inadequacies we feel when life throws layers and layers of issues to comprehend at us? We invest in other humans — and alcohol — and — “Excuse me, can I take your order?”

Chicken, bacon, ranch calzone (Paragraph D)

Buffalo chicken calzone (Paragraph E)

Garden calzone (Paragraph F)

D: You went for a unique blend of carbohydrates and regret it in the morning.

E: You went with a classic and you regret it in the morning.

F: You tried to be healthy and you regret it in the morning.

 

Patty Terhune is a senior policy studies and television, radio and film dual major. She usually does a make-your-own calzone with everything she is in the mood for individually baked together in one calzone. It usually leaves her bedridden for the rest of the night. Follow her on Twitter @pattyterhune or reach her at paterhun@syr.edu.

Published on February 15, 2017 at 7:38 pm