well hi!

tuesday night was ryan cole's twenty-first birthday.

boy did he celebrate.

that's ryan over there on the left, with the dazed look on his face. i'm pretty sure that was between shot 17 and 18, or 18 and 19, or somewhere around there. he mustered up that smile after a bit of effort. ryan is a dear.

you know, i had heard that people did 21 shots on their twenty-first birthday. call me naive, but i never actually believed it until my experiences at the U of O. i always assumed it was some over-hyped thing that was often bragged about but seldom happened. i saw the stories on our local news of waifish little blondes who ended up hooked to tubes and monitors somewhere between shot 17 and 18, or 7 and 8, but i never really bought it. the oklahoma news is most notable for it's ability to create news out of nothing. after all, except for football season, life is fairly mundane out here.

anyway.

much to the shock of my college sophomore eyes, the myth is no myth, and last night, ryan cole conquered the big 21.

and then some.

we didn't last at the mont very long. fairly accustomed to 21 celebrations as one of two bars literally down the street from campus, they've learned to expect the expected, and they cut ryan off at shot number 12.

so we migrated to o'connell's, and there he finished his night of glory.

i had a lovely time with my roommate jennie (center) and our friend whitney from down the hall (right). apparently jennie had a bit less fun, as her man ryan spent the rest of the night sick beyond belief, culminating with a graceful dive through his bedroom window.

if this isn't a commercial not to drink, i don't know what is.

oh.

yes mom, i had a diet coke.

really. look.