My friday night

So tonight began with great hope. We were going to a place in minneapolis called Gustav's(?-may not actually be called this but some part of it is? I'm sorry I know that's confusing) where reportedly they have polka music and they serve beer in glass boots and the second to last person to finish the beer has to buy the next one. I, to the great annoyance of the girl organizing the trip, kept calling it frauhaus, as I thought a german whorehouse by that name would be pretty sweet. Anyway, after I discovered that the polka at its basic level is a souped up version of the waltz I was very pumped and excited to go. Of course as the non-drowzy reader may suspect by now, this is not what wound up happening.

The car broke down about 6 miles from our point of origin and about 34 miles from our intended destination along highway 65. After playing extended versions of zoom schwartz perfigliano and ink pink we decided that we should hike back up the highway to a bar and have fun there. We saw a traffic light in the distance and hoped that it could salvage the remnant of our friday night. Four of us began our hike with great hope that the evening could be saved, and not only because we were in a dancing mood, and had a large square of delicious home-baked focacia (I'm sorry but correct spelling is unknown to me at present). Several of us had to go to the bathroom so we went to the hunter's inn first and had a beer. A strange man grabbed my female friend on the sides and said hi on his way out, it was that kind of place. We decided that we should press on to fatboys; it is sad that this became our city-on-a-hill so to speak as its a rather upscale biker bar that because of the price of the bikes on display I am hesitant to believe that many of the genuine cowboys of the highway visit very often. We arrived and quietly sipped our beers as the DJ attempted to coax people to the dance floor with heavy metal and other painful melodies. Eventually music more suitable to my style of dancing was played and I ventured to the dance floor.

For the first time in my life within 20 minutes of stepping on the dance floor I totally owned it. While I'm hesitant to toot my own horn I was startled by the number of women checking out my moves as my hips gyrated in sync with the music (thanks charity) and my contorted facial expressions showed my expressions of joy from both dancing and drinking. Granted I was only up against 25-35 year old white men from minnesota, not really on the cutting edge of dance moves, but hey I'm no great talent myself. I think the night hit its apex when I waltzed with a married woman named Joy; fortunately her husband was not in attendance. Another highlight was looking back and seeing an older gentleman in biker apparel conversing with my two friends, I was later to learn that he was inviting them both to Amsterdam for a wild time and seemed to express his interest in both of them, I think my friends were more amused than anything, which is good. Anyway I spent a fun 2.5 hrs dancing before we decided to head back. Sadly my closing game is still more like a Farnsworth (former unsuccessful closer/middle reliever for the Cubs) than a rivera (the closer for the yankees for those who don't follow the sport regularly) and I am back here alone, which is why I'm writing now I suppose.

This past week was good, cut down trees, closed down a dirt road to the great consternation of the locals (but hey, they shouldn't dump their old sofas, treadmills, and most strangely; their kilns there) and got a headache from a touch too much sharpie fumes, frankly thats a pretty good trifecta right there. I will close with two comments. First BJoyful which happens to be a pretty sweet license plate and also the inspiration to my dancing, and secondly I am drunk, eric I hope this post measures up. Finally, since I find myself long-winded and with a third comment, feel free to add your heckles and commentary here. I am, at least for the short-term, still your humble correspondent north of the twin cities metropolitan area and the king of fatboy's, if only for 30 minutes.

Misplaced items and a city that won't stay dead

So I was a touch forgetful in recalling my texas experience. Two minor things I would like to note. We were on a road that was under construction and there was a large hole on the other side where there once was a lane with 4 construction workers in it. Three of the four were wearing white cowboy hats as opposed to the more traditional hardhat. That was a welcome to texas moment. The other was my attendance at my young cousin's football practice, he's 9, and watching the 6 dads direct their sons in the fundamentals of life's most important game. The next morning we went to one of his contests. It was a thriller and I say that in all sincerity. They were down by two scores but came back to win with a pass and a snazzy reverse play that really fooled the other team. Apparently they had only been scored on once all season prior to this game. The quarterback/safety on the other team was an animal. He was quite fast and a sure tackler. By the carnage he was wrecking he was like an urlacher or ray lewis out there, though smaller in stature, so it was actually a little jarring when he made a tackle near me and I could see that he was a sandy haired kid with freckles.

Onto Pheonix:
We arrived friday and went to a nice mexican cantina in Scottsdale for the rehearsal dinner. We had a bit of a medical emergency when my aunt bit her tongue and the blood wouldn't stop oozing out for some time. Also when we finished supping my uncle noticed a powerful little sports car pulled up next to the cantina: a ferrari. However, what made it especially interesting was the fact that the hood on the aft mounted engine was clear, so you could see directly into the inner workings of the V22 or whatever it was. The wedding went well. Since it was at a baseball park I was hopeful that they would incorporate more baseball things into the ceremony. I was picturing my uncle signalling to the bullpen for the right-hander and having my cousin driven in on the cart. Or unshelled peanuts being available during the wedding with the options of throwing the shells at the wedding party as they left, I imagine its better for the birds than rice; not so sadly, the wedding incorporated none of these elements. My brother and I did manage to tear up the dance floor though that evening and drew rave reviews. I should also mention that earlier that day I watched the 45+ world series, San Jose won. I think the highlight was when they announced an attendance of 48: that includes those of us who were helping set up for the wedding.

In other news my dad's cat is now on the feline version of Prozac. Apparently the cat is depressed; I thought that was funny until I wrote the previous clause, now I think its just sad, rest assured though I will not fall into the trap of taking prozac myself to deal with a depressed cat on prozac, that would be nutty. The other item of animal news is that when I got to my mom's house I saw a rather realistic looking 'coon tail in the carhouse. Apparently my stepdad has taken to collecting the 'coon tails and the attached fur that he finds in the woods behind my house, or the street outside, and has some future plans for them that may or may not involve a hat; I never realized that he had a bit of a habberdasher in him. (it should be noted that my mother strenuously objects to the whole project)

Well I went back to Chicago after being in pheonix for 2 days, hung out with jesus as promised and played some beer die. Brunch with Nadine and friend the next morning, still love salonica's. Went up to kings and caught up on Lost and AD, bryan informed me that they are cancelling AD: I have given up on the american people. Went with Bryan, Rachael McCarthy, Akira, and Eleanor to a spanish place and then to Darwin's for drinks. Eleanor who was a member of SuperSnatch when Akira and Rachael were still students was and presumably still is one of the most polite and considerate people I've met in a while. Was a good time, went back and played some scattegories with tony, bryan, and rachael; that was good fun. Tony also gave me some warm apparel he apparently has no further need for. One of the items had a hole in the sleeve, this will come up later.

So I took Amtrak back to MN with a delay in arrival of only 75 min, not bad for Amtrak. I decided that this time I would try to get more of the train experience and so I had dinner in the dining car, the beef pot pie was pretty good. I ate with a gentleman in a catholic seminary and a couple headed to the Mayo clinic to make sure the husband's cancer was still in remission. Apparently the Mayo clinic helped him when other's thought he was terminal; he was very keen on the Mayo. We discussed religion primarily. Afterwards I watched batman begins in the observation car.

Upon my arrival in the twin cities I was picked up by a friend and we were supposed to meet another friend at a bar called nye's. Nye's was a very cool mix of polka, las vegas karaoke lounge (if such a thing still exists or ever did), and college basement party. Quite the range of clientele as well with every thing from college students to evening dressed ladies and gentlemen, to men in suits. We did not find my friend.

Lastly last night those of us still here went to a local bar called the Vanishing Point where we played pool and danced, I did more of the latter than the former. I should note that is when I discovered that I had sewn the seam on the wrong side of the shirt Tony had given me so now the underside of that sleeve looks somewhat ridiculous. I was somewhat embarrassed but others were impressed that I had tried to sew anything. I danced a lot, worked on a little break dancing, lost a dance off, danced more, and in general had a good time.

Today it was in the high 30s, raining, and I worked outside. It wasn't too bad though as we kept warm by putting in a new firebreak which required a lot of sawing, axe swinging, chainsawing, hauling out stumps with a truck, digging out and cutting up stumps, and apparently breaking a lot of axes. We broke 1 maul,1 double headed axe, and two firemen axes. At the end we were trying to dislodge a particularly large stump and I suggested those swingin' give it some oomph; the oomph cost us a maul and one of the fire axes, but on the plus side you can now wiggle the stump, which was honestly quite the achievement though it might seem small.

That's it for tonight, except that I ate potato-leek soup while watching jack nicholson and art garfunkel act, sadly for art his acting didn't amount to much when he parted with nicholson. Wasn't a bad movie, was called Carnal Knowledge. Well that's it for now, sorry it took a while to add anything. Was good to see everyone, and enjoy winter's opening salvo when it hits you in a day or so, its snowing here right now.