Waterlogged

Cousin Pat and I had a water drinking contest, one summer
We were in his kitchen
He lived on the corner with
Cousin Jo Anne, Uncle Al, and Aunt Jo
And Mr. Frank, his grandfather

Mr. Frank was in his eighties, and smoked wine dipped crooked Parodi cigars
Very pleasant demeanor, with a slow walk
He was very dapper and neat in appearance, and customarily walked a half a block to The Green Lantern Tavern, or more commonly called “ the beer joint”, or Roosh’s, the Italian derivation of red ( russo )
The elderly proprietor had white hair, but was apparently a red head in his younger days
The Green Lantern Tavern was on the corner of Rudyard and Kipling
The other corner intersection was Rudyard and Mandalay

The city planners also named other streets in the neighborhood, Evangaline, Stevenson, Nathaniel, Ivanhoe, Plato, Euclid Avenue, and London Road

After games at the baseball field, Pat, I and some other kids would often greet him as we were headed for the beer joint to drink ice cold Pepsis, on the stoop
His tag line upon being greeted “ Oh boy oh boy “

Back in the kitchen, we started out our contest, filling 2 ounce shot glasses with water
We counted to keep track, as we continued our competition
We transferred 4 smaller glasses to a larger glass, to speed up the match
Each of us drank glass after glass until the winner was declared
Sadly I can’t remember who won

All I remember was feeling sick, on my way home, and hearing & feeling sloshing, in my distended belly, and vowing never to do that again