Many recent graduates are not just leaving college; they're also leaving town. They're starting new jobs in new towns where they don't know anyone. Moving like that is scary.
I'm here to give everyone in that boat a little bit of advice:
Don't get drunk until you've met everyone in town.
One of the best ways to meet new people when you move to a new town is through community-type internet sites, like Friendster or MySpace. Do a zip code search, and then throw yourself on the mercy of a few select locals. Try not to pick the stalky ones. If you have pizza delivered and then receive an email the next day from the delivery boy, you've found one of the stalky ones.
Eventually, one of these locals (let's call them Local A) will invite you out to his going-away party, for example. You can meet other locals there.
Don't get drunk until you've met everyone in town.
If you get drunk at this event before you've met everyone in town, you will stop paying attention to the new people that you meet. These people may get offended when you "meet" them at a later date.
You may, in fact, wind up on a date with one of them a year later, set up by their xgirlfriend.
He will probably not find the whole "being set up by an x" thing nearly as funny as you do.
He may also refer to the going away party as the occasion when Local A dumped you on a friend of his. Because you didn't heed my advice, you will be too mortified by how goddam drunk you were on that one night over a year ago to bring up any of the following points:
- Two roads diverge in a wood.* One has a cute boy who is leaving for a city you hate. The other has a cute boy who is not leaving for any city, hated by you or otherwise. Who are you going to talk to?
- After a few successfully fun dates, this friend of your current date's "let's be friends"-ed you via a MySpace message.
- And is now kind of a huge joke amongst you and your friends.
- Additionally, at one's goodbye party, one normally works the crowd, saying goodbye to them.
- Is it just you, or does your date hold some kind of animosity towards Local A?
- Why are you still bothered by this several months later, anyway?
And then he won't walk you to your car, despite it being after dark and your car being down a side street.
You'll go see a movie with this guy and reach unknown levels of jackassery yourself, when you realize you'd rather talk and talk about how you like to be quiet after enjoying a movie than witness a repeat of when your xboyfriend ruined The Village for you with a ScoobyDoo crack.
And then he'll drop you off and not wait to make sure you get inside your apartment before speeding off. (Side bit of advice: creepy single-girl-who-lives-alone-attackers can wait next to poorly lit doorways. Side bit of advice 2: don't ever forget your keys on a date, just in case you're out with a drop off and drive off type.)
Two months later, you'll be out with a friend enjoying some half-price pizza. You try to back away from her and her would-be gentleman caller towards a table of your friends. Said table includes your former date. You make eye contact, smile, and begin to say hello. He picks up his beer and hides behind a pillar. This forces you to go and join your friend and her gentleman caller, who then tries to get rid of you by offering to buy you a beer if you can find out his friends' middle names, which he already knows.
And this, my friends, is why you don't get drunk until you've met everyone in town.
Also, don't ever give a mouse a cookie. I hear it starts off a bad chain of events.
*This is a graduation speech, after all. I gotta quote Frost.
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