I woke up in a closet.

With about two minutes left in the hot dog eating contest, I started to feel myself going hoarse from screaming KOBAYASHI, but the post-graduate group of men in American Eagle t-shirts behind me were way louder with their USA USA USA! and CHESTNUT! chants. If you ask me, Kobayashi won, and the contest was biased.

I’m in love with the announcer. I got to the contest early, so to fill time, they introduced the contestants, had them go back stage again, then made the announcer tell a few jokes and have a really awkward conversation with an old Jewish man on stage while the hot dog suits danced around. At one point he started talking about a black hole. “I’m not afraid of death. I’m afraid of leaving all you guys behind, that’s why I want it to take all of us!” that was kind of creepy, but when the contestants started eating: “They are Spartans! Warriors! Their ancestors stand behind them!”

Oh yeah, and Nathan’s made a donation to the World Food bank. Said the announcer, “This is a very, very… nice donation that Nathan’s is giving. This is not a real check and it’s not for $100,000, but for 100,000 hot dogs!”

After Kobayashi and Chestnut tied, they went into sudden death (who could eat 5 hot dogs the fastest), and I had a hankering for beef in tube form. Rather than go to the Nathan’s where the contest took place, we jetted for the boardwalk in hopes of a smaller line. Alas, we stood around for another 20 minutes– long enough to see a hilarious confrontation between beach goers kicking each other’s coolers and taking off their shirts to threaten fighting — we had hot dogs and cheese fries. I can’t even tell you the last time I had a REAL hot dog, but it was off my plate and in my stomach (where I can still feel it festering three hours later) in about fifteen seconds.

In the spirit of any American holiday, I’m stuffing myself full of food and drinking today.

“She left China and a career as a scientist to come to this nation to pursue a career in competitive eating. It’s everything that’s right and wrong with this world.” -Hot Dog Eating Contest Announcer