-During my five-year college reunion in May, I snuck into my old fraternity house, which at the time was being used as some sort of community service dorm.  As I wandered about taking pictures, a student approached and asked politely, “Excuse me, who are you?”  Instinctively, I turned around and yelled menacingly, “Who the fuck are YOU?”  The girl scurried off, but the incident made me introspective.  Here I am, twenty-seven-years old, with a relatively successful career, regular car insurance payments, and pillowcases that match my comforter.  Yet at the same time, I can’t drink one beer without drinking twenty, I can’t converse with a girl without trying to take her home, and I can’t even step foot in a fraternity house without immediately regressing into an asshole.  While college is many years behind me, vestiges of the experience remain deeply ingrained in my personality.  Welcome to the world of a recovering frat boy.

-Of course, I’m not the only one.  There’s an entire faction of twentysomethings out there who live seemingly mature lives – but only to the naked eye.  Take my friend Mike, a successful software developer in New York whose downtown apartment has actually been passed down for years to successive generations of graduates from his fraternity like an off-campus party house.  Or my buddy Justin, a writer here in LA who is looking to move to a new place – but has yet to find one big enough to fit his beer pong table.  Unfortunately for him, “Hardwood floor quickly soaks up cheap beer” is generally not an amenity typically found on craigslist.

-Recovering frat boys aren’t required to have ever been Greek.  In fact, they don’t even have to be boys.  On average, every other Evite I received from girls over the past year has been for some sort of elaborate, costume/theme party that reminds me of sophomore year.  If you’re a strong, independent woman in her mid-twenties who is still throwing parties entitled Pimps & Hos, Forties & Hos, or Golf Pros & Tennis Hos, you are most definitely a recovering frat boy.  Dressed like a whore.

-To me, the phrase, “Let’s grab a drink” is both the rallying cry and secret password of the recovering frat boy movement.  For some reason, no one uses that phrase until they’ve graduated college, and then they use it so frequently it becomes virtually devoid of meaning.  If you really think about it, you only actually grab a drink with about 10% of the people you say that to.  Of that 10%, most think you literally want to have a solitary cocktail and exchange pleasantries or discuss current events (these people are often married or lawyers).  The remainder – who you quickly recognize as kindred spirits – take “grab a drink” to mean “play beer pong and find that party where chicks are dressed as tennis hos.”