Patrick Schwastey.

As a resident of my favorite local historic district, I felt that it was my civic duty to have the mother of all Halloween parties this year. I wanted the kind of party that people remember (or don't) for years.... the kind that may put future high-paying jobs at risk. The kind where friendships are made and promptly forgotten after you add someone on facebook and swear you'll get together sometime soon.

Dare I say it, I succeeded.

My co-conspirators and I chose to have a house party crawl, culminating in last call at our favorite local watering hole and an after party back at mine, and we started out with a house party at the first locale but naturally, it was on the same night as the final game of the world series, so most of people didn't show up til late, but after the ball got rolling, it was on.

Ok, guys. I'm about to betray my conceit here. This is my single girl blog. It is a place where complicated strings of emotions and joie de vivre come to get down. But, man, I fucked up. I'm in love. I fell the night of my party. HARD.

And like any person in love, I can't stop talking about this shit. I am in that babbly, nauseating phase where I have discovered the UNIVERSE and I feel so bad for you poor guys who haven't that I'm gonna try to show you the light, son. TESTIFY!

But no, seriously, guys. I need to share this with you. I need to shout it from the rooftops and scrawl it on bathroom walls and make it resonate in the chambers of your heart like poetry or the first time you heard that song that now gets you through your day.

Love is out there and its name is Pink Panty Pulldown Punch.

Jolie Kerr has shown me the way.

The description is long and beautiful but I believe it can be summed up in one small excerpt. After consuming this punch, Jolie says, "You will stick your fist in the lasagna." And damn if she ain't right. So many fists were stuck in so many lasagnas and we're still trying to figure out exactly what happened.

The first house had a live show, which was delayed by the Texas Rangers playing someone.... I think maybe the New York Knicks. Those are all hockey teams, right? Weren't they in the Superbowl this year? Yeah, but anyway, all of our friends who love The Sports were latecomers and had already been drowning their sorrows because somebody lost or somebody else won, not sure which. So by the time people got to my house, the second (also the last, for the after party), everyone was toasty.

I actually had to work, so I too was late to the first house. I showed up and wandered around, still slightly panicking, because damnit, my house wasn't decorated yet and IT'S NOT A PARTY WITHOUT STREAMERS, GUYS, IT JUST ISN'T!! So after supporting my buddy's band, I went to mine to bribe a couple friends to decorate my porch and make the punch. I was so scared and skeptical because the punch has fucking beer in it. So I thought it was best if I tried a glass. And oh honey.

If all the references to my favorite watering hole haven't made it clear, I am not an amateur when it comes to the strength of things I imbibe. And let me tell you, within five minutes of chugging this glass, I was mass texting the words: "Darlings. The Punch has landed."

All the sangria and weird sherbet-lime punch having been consumed at the first house, people began to trickle over. I handed out glasses of punch with abandon, assuring everyone that it tasted like magic but they needed to "check yo'self before you wreck yo'self." Yes. It was that good. A couple glasses in, everyone had long since let their hair down and had morphed into the wonders of wit. My roommate's girlfriend judged everyone from our couch, a guy walked around in a costume shaped like a giant bottle of ketchup with the Z crossed off, pointing out that it now spelled out Hein, which is his name, my big brother rang a little bell as he wheeled around in a wheel chair.

 At some point, we had to get to the next house and we literally took the entire five gallon bucket of punch with us in the backseat of the car. And at the last house, that's when it just got ridic. I had to stop people from simply drinking out of the bucket. We danced like madmen & madwomen. Our bar was the next stop and frankly, I didn't even make it that far. I heard from one of my favorite bartenders that at one point, a reveler from our event had fallen down six times and last he saw,  he and all his would-be escorts were laying in a pile on the sidewalk in front of the parking lot laughing.

 I asked this friend about this later and he did not believe he'd been to the bar that night. His last coherent memory took place a couple hours before: I have a very similar set up in my home to the third house, with a dining/entertaining room with a wide doorway into the main living room and he remained convinced that he walked from the third house's front room into my living room at one point.

The hostess at the third house eventually got sick of it all and so I herded everyone back to my house. The group that had chosen to walk instead of ride with the couple sober people that were present showed up just in time to turn around and meander back. All the add-ons from the bar came as well as my across the street neighbors. Two of my female friends decided to play their Stripping Songs, just like always happens at a certain point in the evening. We were dancing and singing and grooving to the music. I'm pretty sure my porch will never recover. The cute bench that I got dumpster diving a few years ago was decimated and I'm still surprised that we didn't get a citation for the amount of beer cans, bottles, red solo cups and cigarette butts that were rolling around on there. My favorite plant was knocked over, but thankfully, Jay-Tree survived. My other plant, Ke$ha was not so lucky and was watered with at least one beer. It's unsure as to whether or not she'll make it.

My dogs and my other plant were squirrelled away in my bedroom, so they were completely unscathed. The dogs were originally supposed to stay the night at a friend's house but due to a lack of communication and the friend's roommate's belief that the scabs from the Ted Meowsby Affair were actually ticks, my bubbas ended up sleeping in my bedroom, where around five thirty, they were joined by two of my friends. Haha. That was fun to come home to...

Because yeah, incidentally... I left my own party. That's how great this punch was, that's how insane the house crawl turned out to be. And while that's an adventure I'll have to share at a later date, just know I definitely stuck my fist in all the lasagna and god bless it, Jolie Kerr, thank you. Just thank you.