The First Annual ZSN Speedbowl and Pink Sock Awards

The year Two Thousand and Six is coming to an end. In a brand new, mega long post, Tom and HP are recalling the best and the worst moments from 2006 in the 1st Annual ZSN Speedbowl and Pink Sock Awards.

The Speedbowl Award is named after our future faux-religion and current life philosophy, speedbowling. Invented over the summer by Danny and HP as a method of bowling as fast a possible, it quickly became a way of living. Don’t think, just go, and what ever happens is good. This goes to the best moment of our year.

The Pink Sock Award goes to something that utterly sucks. Named after the horrid results of a night of rough anal sex, this is a truly despicable award to receive.

In 2006 HP liked:

• West coast HP
  • The trip that saved my life. As a present for graduation I got to go out to Seattle to see my cousins, Anne and Phil. Every night was a party, I sat in a hot tub for entire evenings, I received the best back rub of my life, I saw Shaimus play, and my cousins turned my summer from shit to shine, in one week.
• Prestigious HP
  • I worked on a farm all summer. When I left the farm, I moved a week later. I didn’t have a job for months. Now I work for the Harvard Business School. High class, bitch.
• 80’s HP
  • Three words. Trent’s. 80’s. Party. I tricked my hair out in a flock of seagulls manner, got a bright green jacket, hung out with mohawk Chad, biker Ethan, and big clock n gloc Travis and partied like it was 1989.
• Cruisin’ HP
  • Tom, Ethan, Tom’s ex, my ex, and I went on a cruise for our last spring break. It was fun. Mexico rocked.
• Cornin’ HP
  • I picked 2,000lbs of corn one day. By myself. It. was. Awesome.
• Social HP
  • Any of the numerous evenings spent at Mike and Danny’s have been great. From car fights to Gears of War to passing out on their couch, we did it all for CornShoe!
• Undead HP
  • Two amazing nights this summer: Zombie Apocalypse Night and Failed Zombie Night. Failed Zombie Night was supposed to be an evening of zombie movies and booze, but it turned into a night of “keep Tom’s sister’s hair out of the toilet.” Still rocked though.
• Wifflin’ HP
  • My last fond memories of CSC, playing wiffle ball with everyone I miss.
• English HP
  • London House, the home of Ethan, Travis, and Chad during their senior year. They had a 100 inch projector screen, a media center computer, free couches, and good people. That place is what I modeled my apartment after. Also, I saved their asses when I face planted through that beirut table just in time for Security to miss it.
• BFA HP
  • I received my Bachelors of Fine Arts on May 13th, 2006. Twenty years of school led up to that moment.

HP’s Speedbowl Award goes to:

Socio-HP
The Sociodome, located in scenic Chelsea, MA. Tom and my first real life apartment. Granted, I have had an apartment before, but it was next door to the ex’s mom in Dickshit, VT, so I don’t count that. This is the first step to a real life.

In 2006 HP disliked:

• Graduation
  • I like the fact that I graduated, but the day itself sucked. It rained 6 inches, it poured all through the ceremony, the speakers spoke far too much, I could see my breath, and it meant leaving where I called ‘home’ for the last 4 years.
• Pre-Graduation
  • My girlfriend of four years got a hotel room with my freshmen neighbor on the last night of school. I had no idea where she was. Ouch.
• Puking
  • I’d like to apologize for all those places that I let loose alcohol upon: The entire London House bathroom, Danny’s kitchen floor, the bathroom at The Sloop, the port-a-potty at Boesch Farm, aaand several other toilets at home.
• Chicken Nuggets
  • History of Graphic Design was a joke. I love Prof. Debbie, even though she uses words like “mysterical” and didn’t know how to teach a lecture class, but that card game we invented, ‘Chicken Nuggets’ (named so because Travis was hungry), was a painful experience.
    
• Advertising
  • How can I learn how to manipulate the public into looking at my ad for .34 seconds longer than the next? Not only did this class kick my ass, it also made me question my moral fibers. And what was the professor thinking, making me the group leader for our huge ass, two week long advertising campaign?
• Locations
  • Locations are dumb. Some places remind me of things I never want to think about again, others are just far enough away so that I can’t see the friends on a regular basis. I hate time and space. Physics too.
• Student Loans
  • $300 a month. At least. For the next ten years.

HP’s Pink Sock Award goes to:

The Break Up
I don’t usually get too personal on ZSN, but this was a huge event for me, so here it goes: I dated her for about 4 years, all through college. She was my main focus during school, more so than my school work. Things went sour a few weeks before we graduated, ruining future plans of moving in together (though most agree, I dodged a major bullet here). Each day is tainted with memories of her. It’s something I struggle with everyday, because I didn’t just lose a girlfriend, I lost my best friend and four years of my life. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad she’s gone; she was never stable, required ungodly amount of patience to be around most of the time, and had a habit of “accidentally” attracting other guys. I just wish it didn’t end so very, very poorly.

In 2006 Tom liked:

• The Perfect Woman post
  • This was a special moment for ZSN. Our digital balls finally dropped, and the future finally made sense. Also, we freaked out Chris’s mom.
• Sociodome
  • Happiest place on Earth. Well, maybe 3rd or 4th happiest, but damnit, it’s up there. From creepy neighbors to the tilted porch, it is everything right in my world these days.
• Joining ZSN
  • Self explanatory. It’s awesome, bloggified.

• The Socio-Tree
  • It’s a Christmas tree of dreams. Immune to life, covered in lights, and awkwardly decorated with ornaments. My first Christmas season away from the house, and I feel right at home.
• Free Roaming Chickens
  • Last March, I went on a cruise with Chris, his friend Ethan, and our respective future ex’s. Mexico was fantastic, but the highlight was, clearly: the chickens that roamed free, all over Key West. They were like the Fowl Mafia of the Caribbean.
• Irish Whiskey
  • Greatest. Drink. Ever. EVER.
• Graduation!
  • Finally, after four years of torture, pain, and accounting, I got my ticket to leave. The ceremony was unnecessarily long (as expected), but the food was okay. Also, the gown was black. That makes it okay.
• My birthday
  • A smashing success! Cooking out, bowling, and a host of friends over three days. For a weekend, life was close to perfect.
• Zombies
  • Zombie Night was…painful. However, when Chris and I got to see Cars, we had a near-zombie apocalypse in his town. It was awesome, and resulted in our sitting around, drinking Zombie, and playing Dead Rising. There is everything right about that.
• Megan’s Arrival
  • It’s nice to have a third roommate. It’s nicer when said roommate requests to cook dinner and help decorate. Thumbs up for Meg.
• Jobs for all
  • At first, I had a job, Chris didn’t. Then Megan moved in, and Chris got a job. For a while, Meg had no job, and now…she does. This is good, because although it’s nice to have a resident housewife, I prefer having bills payed on time. Huzzah for income!

Tom’s Speedbowl Award goes to:

Norm, my car
Over 150,000 miles and 20 years couldn’t kill him. He was running strong when I left him for Boston, and a tear even comes to my eye while I write this. When things got tough, when life got me down, I’d just grab my music, grab my keys, and take to the roads in my trusty old ’87 Toyota Camry station wagon. No matter the traffic jams, no matter the apocalypse, driving my car was a Zen moment for me. Thanks for the memories, Norm.

In 2006 Tom disliked:

• The break-up
  • These always suck. I don’t quite have the tale Chris does, but mine did eventually result in a…whittling down of my social circle.
• Target
  • I still work there! Ye gods, it’s been over a year, and I’m still stuck in retail. Their uniform is red. Oh, so are the demons that constitute the Army of the Prince of Darkness. How convenient.
• Meditech
  • Fuckers led me on for 3 interviews, and then didn’t even have the balls to call me and tell me no.
• Post-Graduation
  • Basically, it sucked. Job hunting was a futile effort, girls avoid me, and I ended up praying to the porcelain gods at Danny’s once. Ironically, because of Irish Whiskey.
• Bills
  • Goddamnit, there’s so many!
• Lack of Focus
  • Yeah, see, I want to be a writer, but it’s tough, because I sit down, and, oh look it’s a cute little bunny. Damnit!
• Jack Daniel’s
  • Smells like hobo, tastes like used car parts, and I’m pretty sure I lost a few years of my life to it.
• Airports
  • I spent far, faaar, too long in them coming to and from the cruise. Something like 8 hours in Logan, and another 10 or so in MIA. My brain…it melted.
• Gas
  • For years, this is where the bulk of my measly, minimum-wage paycheck went.

Tom’s Pink Sock Award goes to:

The Real World
It’s the main problem of this year for me. No, not the show – we’re talking the actual, cold, unfeeling, bus-full-of-criminals real world. Mind you, I’m not complaining about the world, just the entering into it. Jobs have been either non-existent or crappy, women appear to want to have nothing to do with me, and every month or so there are new bills coming due. Life doesn’t suck (it’s going quite well at the moment, in fact). It’s just too much life at once.

Predictions for the 2007 ZSN Speedbowl and Pink Sock Awards:

• Speedbowls
  • Liquor-Induced City Adventures
  • Flying Cars (we’d have a tricked-out flying bus, respectively)
  • Weekly supermodel orgies
  • ZSN’s Book & Movie contracts
  • Rock stardom
  • Getting a rug
• Pink Socks
  • Liquor-Induced City Misadventures
  • We get too much money
  • The women all want a piece of us
  • Tom gets a pink sock. (ha.)
  • Overexposure to cosmic radiation (but that gives us super powers)

And thusly, this conclude the longest post ever. Be sure to leave some comments, tell us the best and worst of your 2006. Preferably the worst, as they tend to be more amusing. Happy New Year. Good luck in 2007!

-ZSN-