A gorilla in a sundress was talked politics over the screech of a fire alarm. He was waving his burly arms to and fro in the air, grasping onto a polish sausage in one hand, and a battered alarm clock in the other.

Suddenly, my eyes blasted open and I realized it was 10 a.m. and I had overslept. I was once again late for catering, but it probably didn’t even matter anyway.

The big bosses at UA catering, where I worked on the weekends, often were bad at scheduling people and never seemed to put the right number of students on a shift. Sometimes there weren’t enough to do the job right, but more often than not, there were twice as many. These days, I would watch reruns of “”Date My Mom”” for three hours, lift a piece of bread somewhere halfway through and leave with three plates of lasagna seven hours later.

As I rushed down the stairs of the Student Union to find 11 zombie-people, I knew it would be one of those days.

“”Now that everybody’s here,”” there was a pause and a few stolid looks in my direction, “”I want to tell you we’re going to be catering a very special event tonight,”” the overenthusiastic boss announced.

“”We’ll be working a special commemorative dinner for the theatre department. There are going to be a lot of rich people there, so we have to take this really seriously. Plus, there’s going to be an open bar, so…””

At those words, three people shot up out of their chairs with anticipation and stood awkwardly in the middle of the room until the boss forgot she was talking in the first place.

Having an open bar at an event was an opportunity to seek the holy grail of catering: the trinity of mixed drinks, shots and beer.

Unfortunately, the bar was forbidden to us students, and the legends whispered to have taken advantage of it were catering messiahs.

“”Now get to work!”” yelled the confused boss, who remembered where she was and what was going on just in time to get angry.

We all stood up, shuffled out the door to the theatre building, realized we couldn’t get in, and sat down again. This sitting process lasted for three more hours.

Apparently there was nothing to do, and the rumor was that the big bosses had scheduled too many people too early in the day on purpose to avoid a crisis. The extremely cold air was beginning to blister my skin, and I was getting hungrier than a rabid antelope on Trimspa, but I wasn’t allowed to leave.

“”I seriously think someone should make a movie of my life!”” the obnoxious blonde girl boasted. “”I just do so many weird things. Like, did I tell you guys about the time I drove backwards through Jack in the Crack?””

Everyone laughed hysterically, as if replacing Box with Crack was a real joke. The blonde girl had a habit of telling completely inane stories in a dramatic voice, and then pausing so everyone could roar in hilarity.

I turned my head in the other direction, and somehow got swept up in a heated argument about politics. One of those clean designer-clad Latino guys with perfect hair was saying that we should keep the borders closed, because our country is full enough already.

“”But seriously, they aren’t American,”” he pointed out to the acquiescence of everyone in the circle.

I resisted my urge to point out the fact that he too, was Mexican, but held my mouth until the situation got really ridiculous.

“”They’re lazy, they’re lazy. How many times do I have to say it?”” he screamed at the top of his lungs, sitting on the step for the third hour in a row. “”And seriously, if you let them in, you let in the terrorists.””

I stood up, walked around the building and noticed they had finally opened the doors. It was almost six o’clock, and we had been outside for seven hours now. The palace inside looked like Willy Wonka’s castle if it had been taken over by ravers. The black theatre was filled to the brim with neon plates, napkins, balloons and futuristic centerpieces of bright wires and multi-colored melted plastic.

But the most important centerpiece of all stood tall in the middle of the room: the bar.

A few minutes later, hundreds of billions of old people shuffled through and began taking the illusive drinks from the bartenders. All the while, I conjured up different ways I could sneak one.

At seven o’clock, all of our efforts had paid off and the banquet began. I hastily ran around for the first time all day, flinging plates of fish, vegetable cutlet and some fried pork object in the shape of a starfish at the attendees. When it was time for dessert, I accidentally dropped a piece of chocolate cake on a woman’s back.

“”It’s okay, did it get on me?”” she asked forgivingly. The back of her white blouse was completely covered in brown sludge.

“”Yup, you’re good,”” I stammered, and then quickly ran away.

After another two hours, the banquet was coming to a close. I had not gotten my drink yet and decided just to give up. There were too many people roaming around, and I’d never go unnoticed.

When everyone left and it was time to clean up, the Mexican guy raced around the tables like a human machine, picking everything up at top speed

“”You’re lazy. You’re lazy,”” he belted out while running past me. Before I knew it, he had cleaned up the entire place, two hours ahead of schedule. If I hurried up, I might still have enough time to get home before my friends started drinking.

“”I always, like, do the craziest things,”” the blonde girl boasted as we were heading out the door. “”When nobody was looking, I got the bartender to give me a drink. It always works if you flirt a little. I swear, my life is so zany!””

“”You’re a regular Jesus,”” I said, and then lost my religion forever.