So, it’s a Saturday night; what ever is there to do? I suppose I could reorganize my “Star Trek” reading material, or I could hone my fingerprinting ability and dust for prints at the video store to see who last took out “Brian’s Song.”

In lieu of all those ideas I thought it best that I be more social and decided to attend gathering at one of my amigo’s hacienda (that’s Spanish for “I’m going to be cool and say friend’s house grammatically incorrect in another language”), and then proceeded to head downtown for a night out.

While in downtown Binghamton we picked ourselves a bar and remained there for a few hours. Upon exiting the establishment we were greeted with a conundrum.

There was, it would seem, a man sitting in a camp chair directly behind “Franca’s Franks,” home of delicious and well-priced hotdogs. I had no idea where this man came from, nor did any of my companions, and neither did the proprietor of the street side micro-delicatesan. It was my choice to merely head on without giving him any further notice. However, one of the smaller members of my convoy decided to investigate.

I’m not quite sure what she, we’ll call her “Linda,” said to him, but considering what I estimated her BAC to be at the moment, I highly doubt it was “Hello friend, why are you sitting in a camp chair?”

Without any conventional response or warning, this man reached out and made contact with the mammary gland of Linda, just short of punching it.

Needless to say Linda was less than euphoric. She then spent the next five or so minutes “bitchin’ him out” and then finishing the deal by knocking his superman hat off. Considering he did not move faster than a speeding bullet, or use his heat vision, the hat was a lie (that joke was stolen from Dane Cook who, if all goes well, will be performing here at Binghamton).

Though he didn’t use yellow-sun-powered-super-abilities, he did stand up finally and made as if to assault my approximately 4-foot-10 female friend. However his plans for vengeance were quickly thwarted by the heroic response of one of my other companions, whom we’ll call “Rick.”

Rick took a moment from his delicious and well-priced hotdog and intervened between the man of pseudo-steel and the diminutive Linda. Meanwhile, my fourth companion, we’ll call her “Addie,” restrained Linda from further berating her target. And where was I, you might ask? Why, writing all this down of course! And satisfying my beer munchies with a delicious and well-priced hotdog.

The events of that night made me begin to wonder: that man could have easily been profiled as a townie (whether the case or not, I lacked the time to verify by way of “the handshake”), and could have easily contributed to the “creepy State-Street townie” stigma. Thusly he would further the fears about the violent crime rates in Binghamton.

In truth, according to the 2004 FBI Crime Reports, the amount of violent crimes committed in Binghamton is lower than the national average by about 131 instances per 100,000 people (national average being 465.5 per 100,000 people).

While I doubt the FBI keeps track of “drunken chair sitter” encounters, I doubt our experience could even be considered. I would surmise that the gentleman had probably been drinking heavily for the first time in a while and not been himself. I would even go so far as to suggest that he would have apologized to the proprietor of the delicious and well-priced hotdog stand.

Dan Lyons is a junior English and theater major