Game Day

 

I wanted to eat barbecue, buy Texas beers, shop at Central Market, see where JFK was murdered, eat sour cream chicken nachos, and drive through the arid plains of West Texas. 

But all of those things took a distant backseat to the main purpose of this trip: spending an entire day watching sports with Troy. 

It's the kind of thing we did often in our teens and early 20s but have not done for at least a decade and a half now. Because life. 

I had these chips for breakfast because why not? 

Trey announced that he was going to make egg rolls but needed bean sprouts, so I offered to go to 99 Ranch Market and get some. And since I was there, I went to 85º and bought us a cheesecake. 

About an hour later, Trey realized he needed canola oil to fry the egg rolls. Troy asked me if I wanted to accompany him to Costco. I said sure, as long as I could watch football. 

I'm trying to imagine someone telling 21-year-old Justin: "In 24 years, you and Troy are going to be driving to Costco together in Dallas while watching the Red River Shootout in HD on a cell phone."

I probably would have asked "What's HD?" 

(And also: "Wait - did we get married? Did I get turned into a gay?")

Admittedly, this might actually be taking things too far.  

Trey's egg rolls were some of the best I have ever had. (And unquestionably the best made by a white person.)

He also made fried bananas because he had bananas and leftover egg roll wrappers so what was he supposed to do... not fry them together? 

We also got Japanese BBQ jerky at Costco because it looked good. 

It was. 

In fact, other than the citrus-rosemary turkey jerky I used to get at Sprouts and have not seen for more than one year, this was probably the best jerky I have ever had. 

Troy had never had these before, and there was a giant bag by the checkout, so I got one. 

"Oh my god," he said. "These are evil. You are evil. Why did you introduce me to these?" 

I had bought this a couple of days earlier at Central Market, intending to eat it for dinner, but then had decided to go out for sushi instead. So I cooked it in Troy's kitchen. One of the best frozen pizzas I have ever had. 

The day was everything I had hoped it would be. 

In the back of my mind, I suppose the thought lingered that we might never do this again. The future is promised to no one. 

If one day we do this again, great.

If we do not, at least the final time was fantastic.