The Argument October 10, 2005
Yesterday was my Aunt Cubbie's 65th birthday. We all went to Drexelbrook to hold a surprise party for this wonderful lady who is always whereever you would least expect her to be, like at your sporting events growing up, or every party you've ever had, who never forgets your birthday, who helps raise your kids if you're lucky enough to have any, and a number of other comments from everyone else in the room who had a story or a thank you for her and got the microphone from my Uncle Dave.
There was a DJ, and he played decent music, and some Sinatra, which I never object to. He also sang. He was pretty good. He played Mony Mony, and I found out that you can do the E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES!!! chant to it during the chords played after such lines as "Here she comes now saying Mony Mony". It fits perfectly. I started it, Steve noticed, then everyone at our table, the lucky number three, joined in during the next two verses. It was awesome.
We all walked out at the same time, me and my five brothers, when everyone else was in a circle on the dance floor, thirty to forty people, holding hands, dancing to "That's what friends are for." We figured it was time to go. It was almost 4 o'clock, the Eagles start at 4:15. We are studs. We all practically ran to our cars. We all would meet at The Beast's house, a shrine to the Eagles. Everywhere you look, there's a picture of an Eagles' player, or a football, or a PlayStation2 controller, lots of Eagles stuff.
The argument started after the Cowgirls' second touchdown. He dove out of bounds and reached across the goal line out of bounds, the ball seemingly never crossing the plane of the endzone, marked by the pylon, in bounds. It was ruled a touchdown. It was a big argument! It was fun though. I was watching for cops because I had about 5 Yuengling bottles, a Heineken bottle, and 2 Yuengling cans all day, I was feeling pretty good, yet somehow I manage to come up with some help for the argument. It was Steve, me, and the Dallas fan (Kel) vs. everyone else. It wasn't anti-Eagles or pro-Dallas, it was just football. My evidence came in this form... If you are running down the sideline, holding the ball over the out of bounds, you are not considered out of bounds. If your feet leave the field, then, all it takes for you to be out of bounds is your feet or the ball touching the ground out of bounds. Therefore, diving out of bounds, crossing the plane of the endzone is a touchdown. Steve argued that the pylon either marks the endzone straight up to infinity or the endzone goes all the way around the world. He knew the rules, and knew that it goes all the way around the world, and brought up a website on Beast's computer, owned and maintained by a former NFL Referee, that proved his point.
The others felt more like yelling. I have to admit, yelling is fun when you're drunk, especially doing the EAGLES chant during Mony Mony and on the way out of a party with all five of your brothers. Steve was willing to take back the bets. He had bet $20 with Pat and also with The Beast. He was saying "Are you sure you want to bet me? I'll let you take it back now, if you want, before it's proven and you'll owe me." I don't know if he was showing uncertainty or just being nice. Actually, I do know, he was being nice.
It was pretty funny. Steve soon became known as Pylon and some variants like Pylon boy. If there's one thing that my family is really good at, it's giving people nicknames. Not me though, although I do have some notoriety in the field. My brother Pat is named "Patter" because of me not being able to say his full name, Patrick, when my Mom introduced him to me when they brought him home from the hospital. I was 2, give me a break. Also, my brother Jeff lost one of his teeth when he was 11, playing hockey. So he's had a replacement ever since. He loses it sometimes, and the last time, very recently, he was going to have a temporary replacement until the real tooth came in. It was made out of porcelain! I came up with "Toilet Tooth" :) It never stuck though. Scott is the master nicknamer. The Beast is The Beast because of Scott. There are plenty others, like Stork, who was watching with us yesterday.
It was a great time. I woke up at around noon, and by 1:30 I was feeling pretty good. The dedication to my Aunt was great, she deserves it, and a whole lot more.