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Happy New Year! Again!
Again!
 J: We threw a really big
party at our place on Friday the 2nd. We had a huge crowd, and besides
the usual campfire, music, food and drinks, we also celebrated a
birthday (Kevin Hollenbeck's) and a New Year, second time around.
Amethyst was sick on New Year's Eve so Dorian played it all over again
for her at our party. We counted down and shouted Happy New Year, made
a lot of noise, then mingled around giving hugs and wishes. Then Dorian
turned the clock back a few minutes and we did it again! Whee! G: Know what was fun? Celebrating the new year over and over, whenever the mood struck me or someone else, for days afterward. Someone would bring it up, and I'd start counting down from 10, others would join in. We'd yell "Happy New Year!", clap and holler, and start singing that Auld Lang Syne song. J: The party was great fun, but I suffered a bit of sensory overload, or maybe party overload. I managed to muddle through, sitting and talking with one or two people at a time while I filtered out the rest of the party. After attending parties practically every night since the 21st of December, I'm done for a while, I think. On Saturday Gina, Carol (who had slept over after the party), and I went for a walk around the lake with Dorian, Luisa, Alfredo, Mark(?) and Kali, Dorian's Collie. As we left for the walk Gina remembered that she had to walk two other dogs, Sam and Zoe, Jill's two Boston terriers. We stopped off at Jill's and the terriers came out, and immediately attacked Kali. Once we had them under control, sort of, we started off around the lake. Kali was fine, she mostly stayed off-leash and was very well mannered, but the two terriers were more than a handful of insanity. They're exceptionally strong for such tiny dogs, and fast, too. The two of them could drag Gina, so I took Zoe under tow, or rather she took me. They were like two high speed elementary dog particles -- doggions, if you will, zipping this way and that, twisting their leashes together, peeing every fifteen seconds. It was the most tiring walk I ever had around that lake, mentally and physically exhausting. When we dropped the doggions back off at Jill's house I felt immense relief, but it took an hour to de-stress. On Saturday night Gina and I went to the Uptown Theater in DC to see The Return of the King with Paul & Susan and Craig & Terri. The Uptown has a huge curved screen and surround sound, all of which looks and sounds great as long as you sit in the exact middle of the theater. We had reserved tickets and the show was sold out when we got there, so all the good seats were taken. We split up into couples; Gina and I sat on the side so that everything to the left on the screen looked bigger and squished sideways. Paul and Susan sat closer, but also to the side. Craig and Terri found a couple lucky seats in the balcony. Some idiots sitting behind us brought a three or four year old child who couldn't have been their daughter -- who would do that to their own child? About one minute into the film the kid said in a little trembling kid voice, "I'm scared." I didn't hear much out of her from then on; maybe the monsters who where posing as her parents devoured her during one of the film's loud epic battle scenes. So much for the Age of Man; there are still orcs among us. After the movie we found a little Irish-style pub called Nanny O'Brien's. We found seats there, drank a few beers and ate a lot of food, and listened to music from two guys, amazing musicians who could play guitars very fast and and loose (and tight, if they wanted). One of the guys also played a mean fiddle. Before every set they'd line up several pints in front of them, and when the pints were finished, so was the set. In between the third or so set I found one of them, complemented him on their upbeat rendition of the Pogues' Dirty Old Town, and asked him if they had any CDs for sale. He was very drunk, seemed just as amazed at his own playing as I was, and said no, they didn't have any CDs. I asked him what the name of their duo was, but he said, "We don't have one! We just meet here every now and then to jam!" I think their names are Patsy Whelan and Brian Gaffney. Brian's the owner of the pub I think, and Patsy is the devil with the fiddle. They play on some Wednesdays and Saturdays so go have a listen, they sound really fine. They sing a great version of Lyle Lovett's If I Had a Boat, too. On Sunday night Gina and I went to the New Deal Café for an art reception. About twenty artists, including Gina, have pieces hanging in the café. We enjoyed some veggies and grapes, and conversation with other artists and neighbors. Afterward we descended on Dorian and Amethyst's house along with Luisa, Ginger and her friend Jim, to watch Some Like It Hot. That film has aged well, hasn't it? Kory is recovering ever so slowly from surgery he had a couple weeks ago. He's holed-up in his apartment; we're supplying food and DVDs. |
THE HEAP where we wade the web japan saq |
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