At 11:30 p.m. the group began gathering downstairs. Fellow fraternity members gave Jeff Schlesinger some last minute advice -- eat bread, drink milk and, most importantly, be prepared to bow to the porcelain god.

At midnight, Schlesinger would turn 21.

They left the house at 11:45 to uphold a tradition that the birthday boy be enroute to the bars while Old Main bongs the stroke of midnight.

For many students, turning 21 is a bigger milestone than graduation. At least students know when they'll come of age, while the date of graduation often remains a little "iffy."

The ritual entails friends trying most sadistically to give you a birthday night you will never remember in a bar tour extraordinaire.

Schlesinger and posse hit Cafe 210 West, 210 W. College Avenue, for their first stop. Friends graciously picked up the tab for drinks of Prairie Fires(shots of tequila with a few dashes of Tabasco) and Gorilla Farts (Old Grandad and tequila mixed together to produce a drink with low olfactory appeal).

By the time the rest of the group wanted to hit the next bar, all Schlesinger wanted to do was go home. But his friends coaxed him on to Zeno's.

"They told me Blair Thomas was there, so I agreed to go," he said.

What happened next the men pieced together the next morning.

"My friends told me I went up to Blair and said, 'My name's Jeff and it's my birthday, thanks for making it, man,' " Schlesinger said. "He was real nice and said, 'Nice to meet you.' "

On the same night, Kelli Howie also joined the rank of the over-21 club. Like Schlesinger, Howie's friends aimed to introduce her to the bar scene.

"I was a little scared," Howie said. "I knew I was going to get sick, but I was excited too."

Pam Young, manager of The All-American Rathskeller, 108 S. Pugh Street, said patrons are usually very excited on their 21st birthday.

"We give them a draft or a drink and wish them Happy Birthday," she said.

Once the new bar-monger gets out of control, Young said she keeps her eye on them.

"Someone will ask for a shot and I'll ask them who it's for and they'll say birthday person and I'll say, Noooo," Young explained. "Then they'll send someone else up for a shot and I'll ask them who it's for and they won't say, and I'll still say Noooo."

At the Lion's Den, 118 S. Garner St., manager Keith Dickert said birthday patrons come with a purpose.

"Most bars have a special for birthdays," he explained. "People come to the Den because they know they get a free Boilermaker," a shot of whiskey in a glass of beer.

The usual stay for a 21st birthday stop is about 15 minutes, Dickert said. The celebrants come in, gulp their free drink and split.

"For most of these people, they've never seen the inside of these bars before," he said. "And tonight they're going to try and see them all."

One student said her 21st birthday is a night that still lives on in infamy.

After being served numerous Kamikaze drinks, she said she became more obnoxiously drunk than she has ever been before.

"At one point I was imitating that funny scene from When Harry Met Sally as I walked down College Ave.," she said, referring to the scene in which Sally fakes an orgasm in a delicatessen. "All the guys in Uni-Mart had their faces plastered up against the window."

When the group went to The Lion's Den later in the evening, her friends took advantage of her drunken stupor.

"They had me going around with a bucket to collect money for beer," she remembered. "And the people all laughed at me and threw a few coins in."