It's about the journey... right?

Actually, this post has nothing… NOTHING… to do with Jesus. Or anything Holy, for that matter.

Sunday included what was probably the strangest, most thought provoking date I’ve had in quite some time.

Here’s how it went down. Read at your own risk.

• Met my date, who shall henceforth be known as Crazy McMuscles (or just McMuscles), at Sneakers for a little football and beer action.
• Crazy McMuscles shows up looking, well, muscley. And nervous. I like that. Makes me feel like I have an edge.
• Drinks are consumed. Round one.
• McMuscles starts rambling on about his glory days, academic and athletic achievements, and fondness for injecting himself with questionable substances on a daily basis “just to see what happens”. I’m actually quite amused, because this guy is obviously bright, if somewhat lacking in the common sense/good judgment department. My brand of fun.
• Food is consumed. McMuscles, who is borderline fanatical about diet and fitness, eats a Cesar salad. Now, at this point I would usually begin my snarky commentary about how I’d rather take a belt sander to my own nipples than listen to some asshat preach about carbs and lean protein… but my injured tooth was really hurting so I just focused on football and let it slide. Plus, I was drinking beer (NOT light beer, either), giving the game the majority of my attention, and eating the most EVIL calorie-and trans-fat soaked item on the menu. Macaroni and cheese cake. Basically, I did the best I could to balance out his nonsensical ideas about “a healthy diet and lifestyle” with all the typical American “fuck my liver and arteries if they can’t take a joke!” rebellion I could conjure up. McMuscles takes said rebellion in stride, and demonstrates his keen observation skills by choosing not to lecture me about my very delicious, albeit unhealthy, selections. Good call, McMuscles. Good call.
• More drinks are consumed. Round two. And by round two, I mean I am on my second 22oz Yuengling, and McMuscles is chugging his 3rd double vodka and diet with a Patron chaser in the same manner that my 2 year-old nephew throws down Capri Suns after a hard summer afternoon climbing on the jungle gym. McMuscles and I are drinking at a 4:1 ratio.
• McMuscles continues his rambling and drinking. He’s really found his groove.
• I continue to watch football.
• I finish my second beer. McMuscles is still rambling, something about a swan and how much money his family has. I was pretty focused on the Titans/Texans game, but am pretty sure he spent a while lamenting on how he will never be good enough for his Dad. Awesome. Deep seated paternal approval issues? Yeah, this guy really knows how to turn on the charm. Somewhere in there he also explained what, exactly, his profession was. From what I gather, he is some kind of motivational speaker/welder/masochist/drug dealer.
• McMuscles admits that he doesn’t really like football. States that because he is a professional athlete in one particular sport, that it is hard to be a fan of a different one. After that announcement, I’m ready to write off this obviously irreparably damaged and unstable young man and head home, but then I noticed that he was stumbling/bobbing/weaving/ricocheting against other Sneakers patrons on his way 4th trip to the bathroom.
• Quick decision time, Mixon. Do you cash out in record time and run like hell, or do you offer McMuscles a ride and in the process potentially save the lives of random drivers and pedestrians from this very large, very strange, very DRUNK young man who has no business operating a motor vehicle?
• Stupid fucking bartender apparently does not notice me hanging over the bar, waving my arms, and screaming “For the love of Jesus and all that is Holy, take my money so that I can get the hell out of here before he comes back, you useless twat!”.
• I default to option two.
• Luckily, McMuscles lives all of 45 seconds away from my apartment, so it wasn’t a huge burden to drive him home… UNLESS you consider a 200-some-odd lb, 5’11” man draping himself across your lap whilst DEMANDING that you “pet” him and drive at the same time to be a burden.
• McMuscles decides to see if my fist fits in his mouth, for the sake of science. It does. I’m over being annoyed and laughing my ass off at his off the wall drunken antics.
• Not surprisingly, considering his menu choice at Sneakers, McMuscles comes to the abrupt conclusion that he is hungry and must be fed. Immediately. Grabs the wheel of my car and announces at the top of his lungs, approximately three inches from my right ear, “GIVE ME PANERA OR GIVE ME DEATH.”
• I somehow kept my car from running over an elderly couple on the sidewalk we were now driving on, and also narrowly avoided a head-on collision as I crossed traffic back into the lane we were, by law, supposed to be traveling in. I then decided that the best plan of action was to point my car in the general direction of the nearest Panera and drive until I could assimilate the chain of events that had just occurred.
• McMuscles takes a 2 minute and 43 second power nap.
• We arrive at Panera. McMuscles becomes fully conscious and looks around, obviously bewildered. Then he sees the Panera sign and recalls his mission. Next thing I know, this dude does some kind of crazy hip-toss sweeper thing, throws me across his back, and carries me full speed across the parking lot (said parking lot is full of people, most of which are Ma and Pa types stopping before/after church for a peaceful family meal), sets me down gently… and opens the door, allowing me to enter the establishment first.
• McMuscles pulls off a transformation that would leave Optimus Prime in awe. Manages to wait in line at Panera without incident, order yet another salad, and even though I was in some kind of shock not hungry in the slightest, tells the cashier “…and the lady will have some soup and a Diet Coke.”
• At this point, I have given up completely on trying to understand how I got there or predict what is going to happen next, and am just rolling with it.
• I manage to get McMuscles home without incident, as he is in some type of food-induced coma and isn’t particularly responsive.
• Even though I really wanted to enforce the tuck-and-roll method of ejecting McMuscles from my car, I had to pee. Badly. McMuscles invites me in to use his facilities, but warns me that he has to “straighten up” some before I can go.
• McMuscles vanishes into the bathroom with a kitchen sized garbage bag. Comes out about 45 seconds later with a half full bag and these words of warning: “Look, if needles and stuff freak you out, i’m sorry, but I wasn’t really expecting company.”
• I enter the bathroom, and witnessed a scene straight out of… well, I don’t actually have a basis for comparison. It was just… unheard of. McMuscles had done his best to clear a pathway from the door to the toilet, but along the way I beheld what I estimate to be about 1,341 syringes, hypodermic needles, empty vials, a half-used boxes of Epsom salts, and a waterlogged copy of “The Diary of a Serial Killer” among various other mind boggling atrocities piled up on either side of the newly created pathway.
• Against my better judgement, I pee. And maybe prayed, a little.
• I check on McMuscles before leaving. He is stretched out on his bed, looking, for all intensive purposes, like an average 20-something dude. However, my never to be forgotten adventure on the drive home, combined the with the  nerfariousness that I descryed in the bathroom just moments earlier, have shattered any illusion that this guy is ANYTHING but a complete lunatic.
• I attempt to leave, but McMuscles executed another one of his crazy wrestling maneuvers, knocks me down on the the bed, and gives me… a hug? I was fooled for a very brief moment, when suddenly, out of no where, comes the worst kind of violation I have ever experienced.
• He. Put. His. Finger. In. My. NOSE. It was full on nostril rape. McMuscles, being the giant goofball that he is, decided to lighten the mood by exploring my nasal passages for buried treasure. I am not making this up.

After that last encounter I realized how late it was and headed home. Upon refection I have decided that this is getting filed away as one of my top 10 BEST dates of all time in the history of Chrissy Mixon. Why? Because I wasn’t BORED. Not for one second of the hours and hours McMuscles and I hung out. And that, friends, is rare.

P.S: To make up for the absolutely ridiculous behavior that I have just described to you in detail, McMuscles chose to redeem himself by using his aforementioned keen powers of observation. For our second date, he bought me a book (Our Dumb World), prepared home-made mashed potatoes and gravy, and we watched the newest episode of one of my all time favorite shows ever: Intervention.