Buffalo — Dyngus Day

Flew into Buffalo for Dyngus Day — the Monday after Easter, and apparently the biggest Polish-American celebration in the US. Polka bands, pierogi, pussy willows used as ceremonial weapons (it's a thing, look it up).

I drove past a Family Dollar three minutes from the Airbnb on the way in and rode that knowledge for most of the trip. There was a Buffalo chicken sandwich early in the visit that I told a friend about in real time: "if this is not the best goddamn buffalo chicken I've ever had in my life I am turning around immediately."

Day two went off the rails. I remember being at a bar at 3pm getting a drink. The next thing I remember is waking up at 9pm on a couch with no memory of the intervening six hours. Sara had to walk me through everything I'd done, like a first-person account of a stranger. "Like, Sara is telling me what I did on the way home and I have no recollection at all." I never figured out exactly what was in that drink.

Buffalo's a city I would not have visited without a specific reason. Glad I did.