MegaFest!

When it comes to inspired festivity, Chris and Megan Abad don’t mess around.

Chris’ thirtieth birthday celebration, AbadFest ’08, put me in the hospital (well, kinda’).

A casual afternoon football game at Chris and Meg’s Hell’s Kitchen apartment once turned to a wildly-competitive beer pong tournament in a heartbeat. They’ve even make presidential debates fun.

So it was with equal parts exhilaration and trepidation that I RSVP’d in the affirmative for Meg’s big birthday bash, MegaFest.

And so it was that — at the end of a week that included the Oscar Red Carpet in Los Angeles, the Reality Digital Social Media Conference in San Francisco and three cross-country flights — Abbi and I met Chris and Meg at the top of 55th Street, hailed a cab, and headed downtown.

MegaFest did not disappoint. Creek Bar, a modest little basement on Mulberry, was thumpin’ in no time There were cupcakes and pints, dancing and dumb jokes (mine), hip-hop hugs and Happy Birthdays. I fought back red eye-inspired yawns despite the great company and general tomfoolery. In the end, though, there was just one thing I wanted Meg to know.

“I was picking up my Oscar credential last week thinking, ‘This is such a hassle: all the people, and parking, and production schedules,'” I told her, “When I remembered feeling the same way the night before I left for the inauguration. And I remembered you telling me to be enthused and appreciative and because I was lucky be witness those sorts of things first-hand and I just wanted you to know that you were right.”

Say what you want about beer pong and cupcakes; that’s the kind of inspiration that makes a friendship worth celebrating.