Jim and Kryzsia's big fat Polish wedding, Part 3

(This one's a little gross, if only implicitly.) 5-6 hours into the reception and things are starting to get fuzzy. The old guys seem to have taken an interest in David and I, maybe to test the Americans to see how they can handle their vodka. More likely, they're just being friendly. At any rate, I regularly find myself over at the pickle/snack table with a shot in my increasingly unsteady hand, with someone trying to tell me something very interesting in Polish. I'm having a lot of fun; I find that the more I drink, the easier it is to communicate with them-perhaps it's that I avoid abstract concepts altogether and go right to the vulgar. There's more dancing and other traditions that I see but unfortunately don't fully register (appreciate some help filling in the details here...), I remember someone drinking vodka out of a shoe, a sort of can-can line dance that seemed more Greek than Polish, and more singing.

We sit down for the 2 am course, I think it was stroganoff. Anyway, I'm 3 bites into it and my bowels start to rebel, a result of the excessive travel, pork, potatoes and various forms of cabbage over the last 3 days catching up to me. I excuse myself and shuffle off to the bathroom. As I'm sitting there, it becomes apparent that my alcohol consumption had reached the point of violent returns. Now, I haven't finished my initial project, yet this new one had been dropped into the inbox with "urgent" stamped on it, a head-scratching dilemma if ever there was one. Given my drunken state, the choice was pretty simple: I multitasked (kinda reminds me of this [ warning: funny but gross] story though the results weren't nearly as catastrophic). Miraculously, I managed to keep my suit free of flying chunks, so I cleaned up as best I could, washed up and exited the bathroom, thinking I was home free.

I needed some air, and I had two choices: back through the reception hall to the outdoor terrace or the main entrance and street downstairs. I chose street, wanting to keep a low profile with a mild embarrassment starting to set in. I picked my way down the steps slowly, mustering up the full capacity of every neuron not yet saturated with vodka. I made it down to the second to last step, proud of my pending accomplishment-suddenly I'm on my ass, looking into the shocked faces of the group gathered in the lobby, including Jim, Krzysia, and, to my horror, Monika. Goddamn these dress shoes and tiled floors! I mumbled something halfway intelligible about being fine and nearly ran out the front door, my head feeling like it was the size of a baseball.