Sorry, sorry. I know I’m a day late and a dollar short with this one. Unless you’re my bookie, in which case I’m about $700 short! (Haha seriously help me they’re gonna break my fucking legs).

The abrupt end to my gambling hot streak aside, I wanted to show some gratitude for the weekend that was and one of the best things in my life: the fellas.

I am blessed in my life to have a wonderful, tight-knit group of friends from both high school and college that I still regularly interact with to this day. And while I love my female friends to death, any guy will tell you that chopping it up with the fellas just hits different.

For those who don’t fully understand what I’m talking about, observe this video of some dudes chopping it up:

It transcends cultures, languages, and all boundaries. When the fellas get together for a sporting event, pregame, or just a night on the town, you never know what’s going to happen. You could tear a door off its hinges in celebration like my Saudi friend there. Or draw a dick on your boy’s stomach using his belly button as one of the balls. Or drunkenly debate if you can do pushups with one of the homies on your back. Spoiler alert: you can.

So this past weekend, when I had back to back nights hanging with the fellas, you can imagine my excitement. The first night was a Christmas party at a female friend’s apartment. Her apartment is beautifully decorated, very classy, and very adulty. So it’s curious why she would invite me and the other immature scumbags I associate with.

I rolled in wearing a Barstool Tom Brady sweater and was greeted at the door with a game.

You write your name down on a slip of paper and put it in a stocking.

Every 10 minutes, the hosts would pick a name out of the stocking.

If your name was picked, you go up to the front of the room where there are two more stockings labeled naughty and nice. Gotta think the stocking budget in this house was about the same as the rent.

You pick from one of the stockings and consume whatever you find in there. As far as I can tell both stockings were filled with nips, so the difference between the two was pretty arbitrary. A very fun game nonetheless.

Within a few turns, my name was called. One of my douchier friends offered me $1,000 on the spot if I butt-chugged the nip in front of everyone. A tempting offer, but I couldn’t in good conscience traumatize an entire room of people like that. Also, I can’t imagine Fireball tastes any better in the back end than it does in the front.

I go up to the nice stocking because I’m a nice boy per my mom. But before I can reach in, I’m redirected by a girl at the party to the naughty stocking. Now that I think about it, that may have been subtle flirting I didn’t pick up on. Damn it. Whatever, back to the tale.

I move to the naughty stocking and reach in expecting to feel a nip. But what I find instead is a very light, rectangular piece of cardboard. Ever curious, I knew I had to select this mystery item. A sly smile creeps across my face as I pull my hand out and gaze upon my treasure.

It’s half a pack of Marlboro Reds.

I display the pack to the crowd of onlookers as if I’m Rafiki holding a new born lion cub over the edge of a cliff like a psycho, and let out a guttural “Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhh!” The crowd explodes. The fellas roar in approval, the ladies clap it up and hoot and don’t comment on my weight. The only people in stunned silence are the two girls hosting the party. Quickly I realized, the cigs weren’t part of the game. Someone had planted them in there for this very moment.

Well, never one to let a good prank go unnoticed, I jokingly began a raucous “Cigs Inside!” chant. The hosts didn’t like that. Quietly, I grabbed a McGillicuddy’s nip from one of the stockings before accidentally yanking the stocking down with my superior hand strength.

The nip wasn’t met with the same acclaim, but it didn’t matter. I had a pack of cigs, and the fellas were gonna smoke ‘em. It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t a discussion. We just unanimously agreed to go smoke some porch cigs. That’s just fellas instinct.

And we did. The fellas (and our friend Grace) got together, went outside, and ripped a few darts in the cold winter air. Grace called her shot in this video. It was indeed blog material.

There it was revealed that one of the other guys at the party had brought the cigs and snuck them into the stocking to create some chaos. It was then later revealed that the idea was prompted by our friend Hannah (shoutout Hannah) who thought (correctly) that it would be funny. Ladies are welcome amongst the fellas anytime. But as a result of this little prank, we got a funny story, a great porch smoke and conversation, and a fairly pointless blog. Anything can happen when you hang with the fellas (and the ladies, shoutout all the dope ass ladies too).

PS. Should this go on my Hinge? Sound off in the comments.

PPS. I didn’t feel like my lungs got enough work on Saturday night, so we hit the cigar bar on Sunday. Also we were celebrating my guy Fieldsy for getting into HBS. Congrats Fieldsy — love when the fellas support the fellas. We spent 3 hours in a smoky basement smoking gars, drinking scotch, and talking sports. Think I teared up at one point discussing how good the Bruins are. What a night. No real surprise that I’m having a slow start to the week. Worth it for the fellas.