jet lagged and hung over, we were ridiculously late for our lunch date with Chrisfed. luckily his office is just around the corner where weβre supposed to meet (43rd and 5th). obviously he already had his lunch so he just came over to say hi, point us where to eat, and arrange to meet up after his office.

we had our really late lunch at a diner. the minute i had my hot soup, i felt better. iβm so happy. i swear to never drink again! i mean, drink so much.so we decided to just hang around 5th avenue lest we were late again.
at 5:15 p.m. sharp, we started walking towards the Ginger Man. itβs a german pub and itβs October fest! thatβs the thing with meeting friends while traveling, they always bring you to drink. i was very surprised to find the pub super full at 5:45 p.m. that we couldnβt find table, not immediately, but we hung around long enough to find one later.
being from manila, itβs truly terrifying to drink in the US. a bottle of beer costs $6 (at least) and $1 dollar tip to the dude who opens your bottle. that is 2 bucket worth of SML (10 bottles) in dencios. but surprisingly in this trip, i wasnβt currency converting too much so for different reason, i held on to 1 bottle of beer the whole night (at the pub).

because they started early, the group was getting bit drunk by 10 p.m. chris then invited all of us to his brotherβs house party. itβs a small gathering of his roommates and us. so itβs actually a pot session. the smoke was so thick in the room that iβm getting high just remembering. lol. there was a rolling competition and we were to be the judge. i decided iβm just going to take a couple of puff and not get doped.
i donβt know if itβs the US air, the jet lag, or maybe the weeds, lol, but on to my 2nd puff, i started feeling stuffy. i stood and went to get a drink of water and very, very curiously i felt the water going down my throat in slow motion.. like 5 minutes and the water still there, rolling down but not getting there. i took another gulp to push it down and again, it wouldnβt. itβs really funny now, but at that time it wasnβt so funny. lol. i was alarmed a bit and sat at the corner of the room near the door, to get a little farther from the smoke.. though itβs really a small room. then i started hallucinating the room expanding and contractingβ¦ hoo-ha! the voices of people were slow and echoing.. and while i was nearer to the crowd in the living room, i heard the voices of chris and greg louder and they were in the other room. itβs freaking crazy! haha
though i donβt smoke weed regularly in manila, itβs definitely not my first time. the effect on me here is different, totally! i called vangieβs attention. i try to act as normal as i can and relay my situation to her. i was aware of my paranoia antics and tried to control it so as not to alarm her.. i didnβt succeed! she looked really worried so i said i just needed some air, normal air. so we went to the toilet and hid there for a few minutes. chris was really sweet and came over to explain that it will go away and that unlike alcohol, it doesnβt cause hang over.
by midnight, we all walked to a diner to eat breakfast food. i was better, the effect was gone, but some of the guys were super stoned and were in dazed and another one talking with no voice and acting like a pantomime.. crazy new york! LOL

uh-oh! hahah! yeah good times yeah? :-)