By Chris Giblin
The wenty two-year old Ithaca resident and IC student Jeff Connelly has drawn up elaborate drinking game rules for far too many movies, several friends said upon leaving his Prospect Street apartment in collective disgust early Friday night.
Image By Bryan Cipolla
Connelly disillusioned several of his friends Friday when he unveiled his new rules for a Schindler’s List drinking game, promising, as always, that it would get everyone “completely fucked up.”
“We thought we made it clear to Jeff that we were just pre-gaming at his place before going out,” friend Matt Judge said after the event. “Then he pulls some fucked up shit like that. What the hell is wrong with him? I just told my girlfriend he’s one of my friends. She probably thinks I’m a psycho now.”
“It’s really pretty sobering when you look at the meticulously typed sheet of rules he made up for the film,” roommate Ken Thomas said as he read over Connelly’s work, titled “Schindler’s List of Drinking Rules.”
The list included taking a drink of beer for every new train arriving at the concentration camps, as well as taking a shot for every certain number of people murdered in the film.
“I know it can get a little complicated,” Connelly explained to a group of disturbed friends Friday. “But just follow my lead and I assure you, you’ll get so fucked up.”
“I think he has a real problem,” Thomas added. “We need to have an intervention or something. Honestly, I wouldn’t care if he were just an alcoholic, but this is a whole new level.”
Thomas says at first, he was merely amused by Connelly’s affinity for making movie drinking rules, as he watched Connelly come up with guidelines for classics such as Back To The Future and Forrest Gump last spring. Thomas, however, grew more suspicious when Connelly began making rules for less conventional films such as Reign of Fire and The Matrix Reloaded.
“No normal person would ever sit down to watch those movies, let alone make drinking games out of them,” Thomas added.
Connelly now estimates he has laid out rules for over 120 feature length films, though he seems unaware of the consequences his obsession has had on his social life. Friends and roommates have slowly drifted away from him, and ex-girlfriend Kelly Evans cites the drinking games as the main reason for ending their relationship two months ago.
“He was always working on a new set of movie rules,” Evans said. “Even when he asked to see me, all he wanted to do was play his drinking game for Fever Pitch. He thought it was appropriate since it was a chick flick.”
Some of Connelly’s friends speculate his problem stemmed from their own support of his hobby months ago.
“Last semester, I remember we all had a great time watching Pulp Fiction and Jurassic Park while following his rules,” casual friend Anne Proctor said. “But then it became something he was doing every week, whether he had friends to join him or not. I think we got him hooked by supporting him too much in the beginning.”
As Thomas tries to round up friends to execute an intervention, Connelly has drawn up rules for the movie Up!, and is looking to watch his new DVD of the film this weekend with whoever wants to keep him company.
“Come on down and get fucked up,” Connelly said. “Who’d go to a party to drink when you could just do it sitting around watching a movie?”
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Chris Giblin is a junior TV-R major who’s drinking whenever the Doc says “Great Scott!” E-mail hm at [email protected].