A sheepish hello to anyone who is still with us, looking for us, or forgot about us but came back eventually. It is so easy not to blog. So easy.
Especially as time wears on, and you do all these neat things that you want to tell about and have a record of to help you remember, but it is so much that it’s a challenge to start.
On Feb 7th we went to the 20th anniversary of our friends Eryq and Deb getting together. They had a marvelous party at the New Deal Cafe. Treated everyone to dinner and drinks. What a fabulous couple.
The next weekend we attended the Pirate Feast. Lots of fun as always; I tended bar part of the night. Much merriment was had.
The following weekend was JAM packed. Friday night was a Paul & Storm and Jonathan Coulton concert at The Birchmere. TVTom, Renee, Alex, Rich, and Izolda all came, and Rich was celebrating his birthday that night. Ann and Duncan were supposed to come, but couldn’t make it. Some friends of Tom’s bought their tickets and sat at the table next to us with some of their friends. (Also saw other folks I know there – Buckley, and a couple I know from dancing.) Getting there early got us the most excellent seats in the house. I was directly in front of Jonathan at the front of our table. It was so great to see them again since it had been almost a year since the last time Jonathan played around here (John and I saw Paul & Storm a few months ago with Duncan and Ann), after seeing them all SIX times in one year. I playfully gave Jonathan a hard time about that after the show, and he said he could get audiences in so many more places now, he was busy playing lots of other places and couldn’t play here as much.
The next day we went to a birthday party for our friend Liam. He was celebrating turning 40, even though he was turning 29 – he was saving celebrating his 29th for a time when he was older and wanted to feel younger. Or something. We played some fun games and couldn’t stay the whole time, since John and I were going to see JoCo and P&S that night at the Ram’s Head! TVTom and Renee also came again, and Luisa and Dorian and Amethyst came along to this show. And, alas for them, Duncan and Ann couldn’t come to this show either, so I arranged for Craig and Nancy to get their tickets, which they were totally pysched about. There was a whole ‘nuther bunch of people that I know (mostly from The Gathering) that Renee knew too there as well.
I took video of some of the songs from each show and put them up on youtube. Check them out! If you keep up with our blog you already know how AWESOME I think JoCo and P&S are. If not, let me tell you, that is one show where you will be thoroughly entertained. Renee suggested we go up to NYC to see them again at Symphony Space, and catch a Broadway show too. Which we are going to do.
The next day (now we’re at Sunday Feb. 22) we went to Union Station with Alex and Renee and met up with Dave and his mom and Jake there for lunch and to see Fanboys. Then we headed to the bowling alley to meet up with a bunch of people to duck-pin bowl with Rich for another fun birthday celebration. I sucked at it this time. I’m usually luckier at it than I was this time. I say luckier because I obviously have no skills whatsoever.
From there we went to Alex and Renee’s to watch the Oscars, and we stayed until the end. I’ve read some things here and there that weren’t too positive about the show, but I loved Hugh Jackman and really enjoyed his presentations. I don’t have many complaints about the rest of it either.
I told you it was a jam packed weekend!
I’m on twitter (ginamai), and following a local gal, Aparna, who is a comedian who I happened to see at some shows we went to in the past to watch Chris perform. After we saw her open for Paul F. Tompkins a couple of months ago, he tweeted something to her, and that’s when I noticed her there (on twitter) and started following her. So on Friday the 27th of Feb., she tweeted about a show she was doing with Maria Bamford that night at the Arlington Cinema and Drafthouse. So I told a few folks who I thought would be interested and we ended up going. It was me, John, Dave, and Rich (same bunch that went to see Tompkins). It was a fun show; Maria Bamford is very kooky, but I like that. Afterwards I told Aparna that her tweet was why we came to the show, and she remembered us from the last show, and was very pleased that the tweet actually brought folks out. We started joking about stalking her, and she hung around with us while we waited in line to meet Maria and buy her cd. The line wasn’t very long but it took a long time, and as it turned out, it was because Maria was very friendly and chatty and did not seem the least bit hurried and talked with us for quite a while (there was only one more group after us). She asked me and Dave what we did and signed the cds we bought referring to what we said. Very amusing stuff. I got my camera ready and asked if we could have a picture, and she said of course, and I handed her the camera and posed with my friends. She was not the least bit confused by this and took our picture and got pretty excited about my camera too. Then we got some pics with her in them too.
The next night we had tickets to see Patton Oswalt at Lisner auditorium, the first of two shows being taped for Comedy Central (I hope our audience wins…). We drove down with Rich and Izolda and met up with Dave and two of his friends at The Thai Place nearby. We had a pretty good meal there.
Dave had an extra ticket that he couldn’t seem to unload, but once we were seated we thought the extra seat made a nice coat holder. Then I saw Kevin – and although his seat was in a row closer to the stage, it was waaaay over to the side, so he took me up on my offer of our extra seat. The show was very very funny; we had a great time, and if our audience does win (the show that gets aired), there is a pretty good chance you will see us, I think.
After that we all ended up going back to The Thai Place for desserts and drinks. I was actually a bit disappointed with my choices (fried bananas sound good, but they were wrapped in spring roll wrappers and not very sweet. And the hot chocolate/decaf coffee/Kahlua wasn’t as good as it sounded either). But the company was good.
I gave blood on Sunday March 1st. I sipped a Sprite while doing it. It took a very long time for me to fill the bag, and I took my time getting up from it, so no dizziness or fainting this time! Yay!
But when I got home I heard terrible terrible news. Our dear friends Dorian and Amethyst’s son Brandon had died the day before, likely from an accidental drug overdose. I’m still feeling shock and terrible sadness for them. The night of First Friday they came back from Indiana, where Brandon lived, and came to the gathering to find comfort in the arms of many friends there.
If you know them or knew Brandon, there is a celebratory memorial service this Sunday, March 15th, at the Paint Branch Unitarian Universalist Church, 3215 Powder Mill Rd. in Adelphi at 4pm. Vegetarian potluck to follow, same location.
We went to two birthday parties this past Saturday. We started out at the New Deal Cafe to celebrate Joe’s 40th. We ran in to Breno and Morwen there, celebrating Breno’s 34th. We ate and drank and were merry and watched Joe and Andy perform (their band is called Play With Me - warning, myspace page). We had to leave before their performance was over in order to make it to Satish’s 30th birthday celebration at Clyde’s in Chinatown. We had Chris with us by this time and Mary was also at Joe’s party and planning on going to Satish’s so we all went together. We arrived in time for the drinks after dinner. I put a candy necklace I got at Joe’s party on Satish and took pictures of me, Mary, another woman, and Dominic biting the candy off his neck. Except Dominic bit through the elastic and sent the remaining candy flying everywhere!
We had a lot of fun – although a lot of the time we were just hanging with and talking to the people we already knew and always see – Dave, TVTom, Chris… I did get to talk to Dominic and Satish some. I had a mojito which was very good. I mean really good. Yum yum. Then I split one with Dave that was not quite as good as the first one. Nope, not by a long shot, really.
Anyway… ah yes, dance night was Sunday – Beth finally came along and we both had a great time. That’s all for now!
