Party, Pain, Party, Pain, Agony, Party, Pain

In summary, that's been my vacation so far.

I arrived in California ahead of schedule, which naturally would never have happened at a time when I could arrange a slightly earlier pickup. My 400 pound bag and I enjoyed a nice evening stroll around the airport while waiting for my friend to pick us up.

Eventually we made our way to a club, which we entered for free since we "knew a guy." The atmosphere was like a petri dish of swarming humanity which would normally have sent me straight into panic-attack hell but was okay this particular time, mainly because I was tipsy. I was dancing and having a great time, and at one point I was dancing with a boy. So far, no cause for alarm (unless one is Amish, which I am not). This boy decided he wanted to show off how manly and strong he was, so he lifted me over his head and started to bounce me up and down.

I'm not morbidly obese or anything, but I'm no pixie either, so I was a little bit concerned that maybe I would falldowngoboom at some point during the proceedings. However, my fears seemed to be unfounded. The boy had me hovering over the swarm for well over a minute, everyone was cheering him on, I was the center of attention, etc. All was well.

Then he started to lower me to the (cement) floor of the club, which was covered by a blue carpet about the same thickness as a Wheat Thin. This was when bad things started to happen. His hand slipped, I fell, and landed knee-first on the club floor, ending the pain-free portion of the evening.

At first, the noise of the club and the adrenaline in my system prevented the pain from reaching my central nervous system. The boy helped me up, and I was actually starting to dance again when it hit me like an express train and I crumbled like a Jenga tower. (Don't mix these metaphors at home.)

My friends helped me over to a couch, where my knee rapidly swelled to the size of a softball. We left soon after, agreeing that it was not our night, in the sense that it had involved injuries. I normally have a pretty high pain tolerance (comes from years and years of being a clumsy oaf) but this one was particularly difficult (and by difficult I mean "whine-worthy"), inasmuch as the pressure of a blanket or a blue jean leg was enough to make me shriek in agony.

I also managed to get myself badly sunburnt (in a really cute patchwork pattern) and bash the knee again, this time with no one but myself to blame. We were at something like the fourteenth party since arrival, I hadn't been sober since I stepped off the plane, and I decided it would be a good idea to do a handstand against a wall. In a skirt. In a (futile) effort to regain my dignity, I immediately pulled out of the handstand. Only, I was sort of drunk, and I didn't do it right. I fell sideways and in the process, bashed my bad knee into an outdoor air conditioning vent. The screaming that ensued was more in keeping with the spirit of a knifepoint mugging at 3 am.

So my left knee, which wasn't in great shape to begin with and hasn't been for years, owing to an old gymnastics injury, is currently a particularly egregious mixture of black, brown, red, purple, and yellow. At this point my leg thinks it did something to anger me and is tiptoeing around in an effort to not upset me further. Another little tap and I'm pretty sure it will shatter like an Easter egg.