Geneseo is supposed to be the "smart" school in the SUNY system.

Supposed to be.

In actuality, Geneseo seems to be a place where not only do the residents drink for 18 hours a day, but also the center for some wormhole or Twilight Zone portal, because some really strange and absurd things happened in my less than 24 hour trip there.

First off, a trip that should've been no more than three and a half hours ended up taking almost six hours. Not only did the remnants of Hurricane Ivan decide to drift into the area the day I need to drive for hours at 80 MPH, but we also got stuck in five miles of traffic.

When we eventually arrived, the partying had begun with some beers over a game of Hot Shots Golf. A quick trip was made to Wegman's (the country bumpkin supermarket) for more alcohol. Hung out for a little bit, and then went to Jackobel's frat house.

Alpha Chi Rho's little soiree left much to be desired, being that the basement was partly flooded and the keg got kicked about an hour after we got there. But on the plus side, me and Chris were giving the drunk idiots names (we saw both the Hamburglar and Darius Rucker at the same party), and also did a little Comm. Studies research by watching how people reacted to the music being played. As expected, everyone tried to rap when 'Juicy' came on, and all the drunk sluts did that "WHOOOOO!!" thing they always do when they played 'Freek-a-Leek'.

The tempo of the party changed a bit and 80s music began. Now, these songs being 15+ years old, most people know at least the chorus. And, being the designated 'party' songs, people love to get into big drunk groups and sing them off-key. Girls would also scream when it came on, start shaking their hips, and the obligatory hands would go up in the air. This was our hypothesis. Sure enough, as soon as 'Pour Some Sugar on Me' came on, the screams came, the signing started and only one person starting clumsily gyrating with their hands in the air.

The fact that it was Chris' girlfriend made it that much sweeter.

Afterward, the party kind of got stale and generic with your typical games of beer pong and flip cup, so we hoofed back to Chris' house. Only it was still pouring out, but when you're drunk, that kind of thing doesn't seem to matter, so we walked about a mile in a monsoon.

Kristin got hungry, so we had to order food from Jackobel's new place of employment, a pizzeria. The pizza sucked. Weird sauce.

Yet it led me to a soul mate I've been looking for for twenty-one years now. Jackobel's housemate Justin is literally the only other person I've ever met that takes the cheese off their pizza. We actually hugged. It was beautiful.

We threw in a Family Guy DVD and all passed out.

Next day we walked down to the Geneseo Family Restaurant to indulge in their famous #1--two eggs, homefries, and toast: $1.95

I'm surprised more college towns don't do this. Cheap hungover students love a bargain, especially one on food they don't have to make or clean up afterwards. The place was packed with sandals, hooded sweatshirts, and hemp necklaces. And at 10:30 AM, no less. This is pretty impressive if you know what it takes a student to get up on the weekend. Campuses across the nation are deserted until at least one in the afternoon on most weekends.

Then we took a trip to the Marketplace Mall outside Rochester. Kathleen and Kristin went their way to try on overpriced shirts and all that girlie crap, while me, Chris, and Justin went to look at videogames. I also got to visit my first Best Buy in over a month. I bought PCU on DVD. If you go into a Best Buy and nobody in your group of friends buys something, you've committed sacrilege in my book.

Then I bought a fake beard. I wore it the rest of the day. The girls were embarrassed and pretended I wasn't with them. I didn't care.

We started to talk about old videogames: Punch-Out, the Nintendo Power Pad, etc. We got the bright idea to track down a used game dealer and buy an old NES. During this, it turns out Chris and I both owned a copy of 'Yo Noid!', an awful game featuring the old Domino's Pizza mascot, therefore making the game great. The only two people in America to own the game.

Eventually, after 40 minutes and some bad directions, we find this place in Rochester. They had a Nintendo for sale, and a decent selection of old games.

What do we see sitting there?

Yo Noid. I'm sure reading this doesn't nearly capture the joy and excitement felt by Mr. Jackobel and myself.

Needless to say, we walked out of there sixty dollars poorer with Yo Noid!, the original Metal Gear for NES, and all three Super Mario titles. No Punch-Out. It cost $10. They refused to buy a used 16 year old game for $10 on principle.

It was funny. Driving back home, me wearing a fake beard, Justin holding a Nintendo Entertainment System, and Chris telling us Craig Mack lives across the street from his grandmother, all with Amazing Grace on bagpipes playing from the stereo, it hit all of us at once: What the fuck are we doing with our lives?

Anyway, after we got home, we got to revive the old tradition of trying to get the Nintendo to work: hitting the reset button a million times, blowing in the cartridges, pressing the game up and down in the machine at thirty miles an hour. Memories.

By that time it was 4, so of course they all started drinking again. It was time for me to go. But not before buying $14 of Taco Bell to bring back to Oneonta, the land of no T-Bell for 30 miles.

Already planning another trip in October with Joe D. and Joe Gibbs.

If you'd like to come, send a letter to:

Chris Jackobel
7 Ward Place
Geneseo, NY 14454

Seriously, someone send him a letter.

With just "YO NOID!!!" written in it.

That would be one of the funniest things ever.