Year: 2007

There’s a first time for everything

First off, let me begin with thanking everyone who has emailed, messaged, called, or in other ways communicated a Happy Birthday to me. It really was great to hear from all of you, and I’m going to try to respond to everyone individually, but in case I don’t, please know that it was well appreciated.

To those of you who’ve been following, you might know that I’ve been going through a lot of changes as of recent, and I thought today would be a great time to jot down a whole lot of things that I’ve done for the first time, while giving some background to make it interesting.

I started my second decade in service to the Israeli Air Force, and have ended it living in Manhattan. Big jump, and wildly exciting.

These past few months of living in the USA have opened first-times for me all over again, and I thought that some of them might be of interest, or maybe even inspire you.

First time living completely on my own – no roommates. Not that there’s anything wrong with roommates (wink at YAP), but it’s something I’ve never done. Now I live on my own.

First gym sign-up and actual attendance. It’s going well, my trainer likes me to push myself harder than I would on my own. Isn’t that the point? Bah humbug.

First time visiting places like Boston, MA, Stanford, CT and Long Island. What can I say? Never been there. Now I have friends and family there. First time eating Hibachi-style!

First time skydiving. And sledding. First time to walk around in public without a shirt on in a place that’s not the beach.

First time watching Broadway – and then off-Broadway, and going back again and again. Needs major update.

First Mac. Ugh. Call me crazy, but I’m not liking it.

First large history post. I thought a lot about that one, and it’s good to re-read it. I never continued on my personal history, maybe another time.

So that’s a lot of the past year – not everything by a far stretch, but a lot of great and goodness.

Today marks another first for me – turning 30 (yes, I know the cat’s out of the bag now. I don’t care). On December 25, or the Fifteenth of Tevet, depending on which calendar you follow, I turned thirty years old. So to mark this occasion, I did another first – snowboarding. Yes, yours truly went out with some friends and headed up a mountain, to hurt himself in ways that have gone previously undiscovered by himself.

It’s not as easy as it looks, but I was in full cold weather gear, and needed it. My butt slammed into the snow so many times today that I think I might need a new pelvis. Same with my knees (and I don’t mean that I need a new pelvis for my knees…), and curiously enough – my big right toe.

Turns out that if you have feet larger than the board, you should try not to slam them into hard packed snow when trying to get up. So I slammed my big toe (while in a two-ton snow boot attached to a snowboard) int the ice, and now it’s scary black-and-blue. Ouch.

So I got to celebrate my birthday, for the first time in a long time, and to end it off, when I got home tonight, and got some dinner ready, I sat down to watch one of my favorite films – The Neverending Story. Don’t laugh at me – I love that movie. I get all teary-eyed and shivers run down my back and all. I guess I’m a big sap, but I love a story that meant a lot to me – the power of books, a good story, adventures and such. It’s probably really cheesy to today’s world and standards, but it’s awesome.

So there. Now I’m going to kick back and relax, and fall asleep to another of my favorite movies – Labyrinth – and wake up all sore in the morning.

If you celebrated the Channukah thing or the Xmas thing, hope you had a good one. Watch The Hebrew Hammer and rejoice!

Parties all around

So last night was the company’s annual Holiday Party. Call me crazy, but I like my company – they’ve held a few celebrations since I’ve been here, and all of them rocked my socks.

It was held at Pressure, which has this great top floor bar/pool hall/dance floor combo space, and we shared it with a party from NBC – but they were on the other side of the bar and didn’t really concern us at all.

Started off by grabbing a drink at the bar and moseying around, played a few games of pool, I even rocked a game of Guitar Hero! I didn’t do the whole buffet thing, I just wasn’t hungry I guess.

I think where I really had the best time was on the dance floor, where I’ve always tried to have a great time. It’s so awesome to see a bunch of crazy people, people I work with, break out their moves. Some of them more interesting than others, but all awesome. I guess it takes a certain type of personality to decide: “I can’t dance in the more conventional sense of the word – but I don’t care, I’m dancing anyways!” So watch out for that good old funky white boy dance – it can spring up at you at a moment’s notice

I had some nice salsa steps and merengue to base on, and then there was some group interpretive modern dance, that got some amazing response, and one more memorable one was Sir Mix-a-Lot’s memorable song, to which another dude and I totally rocked and cracked everyone up. I showed a bit of my groove to “Billy Jean”, a good song for footwork, and wished there was a little more step-worthy music, or at least clog-able, like “The Devil Went Down..” but hey, it was still awesome.

I got to meet a whole lot of people that I work with – some whom I’ve never met before – and some of their friends, spouses, SI’s etc. in a non-work environment. It was fun to see everyone relax and have a good time.

On the whole, it was one hell of a party, and I can’t wait for the next one. Big thanks to M, for making it happen!

Let it snow, let it snow…

Creepy Tree So in the past couple of weeks it’s snowed a bit and covered the ground with enough that this past weekend I went sledding for the first time in a VERY long time.

I started the day visiting my uncle and cousin, having a light bite and tea, then driving around my uncle’s Chevy in a neighborhood in New Jersey, where we went to the top of a multi-level parking lot and intentionally sped up and slammed on the brakes on untouched ice to skid. Feels odd. Don’t do that.

Then drove all the way to his house, and then out again onto the highways and byways, dealing with weekend traffic.

I met other cousins at a halfway point between New Jersey and Conneticut, where I switched cars, and drove up further north to someone’s house on a hill where I then sledded down at breakneck (literally!) speed into brambles and bushes.

Ah, yes, it was a lot of fun. Cold, but it gets the heart pumping faster as you fly down the slope, and hope you don’t run into someone else or worse – a tree (that happened!). Also,word of advice that might seem obvious to the rest of you – if you’re going down head first, don’t try to brake using your shoulder against the ground – that only makes it angry. Retaliation was in the form of me flipping onto my head, doing a full 360, and landing on the hard snow. Ouch. Some more pictures are available beyond the cut.

Overall, it’s was pretty awesome.

After sledding, we went to have dinner at a Japanese Hibachi place – I’d never been to one of those, and that was quite the experience as well.

The next day, I had my first Costco’s visit – and let me tell you, I was impressed by the sheer size of everything. It’s all so huge!

Anyways, I hope you had as good a time as I did.

Continue reading Let it snow, let it snow…

The world has gone mad! Mad, I tell you!

First off, let me apologize for falling off the grid since the beginning of October – it’s been crazy around here, and I’ve been trying to deal with a lot.

That being said, I wanted to take a moment to express my wonderment about a morning talk show piece that I saw.

The hosts had a few guests, and the tagline at the bottom of the screen read “CHOKING GAME”. My interest was had, and I began to listen on how parents are finding their kids unconscious, and in a few cases, lifeless, after indulging in a little fun game that we all know as asphyxiation.

As some of you may know, our bodies are fueled in part by oxygen. When oxygen is kept from the body, a state called hypoxia begins to affect certain tissues and organs, and mainly, the brain.

And that, which I thought would go without saying, can also cause death. Yes, death.

That having been said, there were some kids and parents who are involved with asphyxiation in some form or another. Some have lost children who have essentially hung themselves, not realizing the dangers. Others were kids who have tried this and enjoyed it, yet no longer attempt this.

One of the reasons a kid said they did it was “It’s not drugs or alcohol, it’s nothing illegal…”

So the fact that people are using asphyxiation as a pastime is nothing really new. And that’s not what bothers be.

One of the hosts actually asked the kid: “Should the dangers of the Choking Game be taught in school? How do we prevent this from happening?”

That bothered me to no end.

I believe Chris Rock said it best: “People want to get high.” It’s true. People have always wanted to get some sort of feeling of a rush, get the blood pounding, adrenaline pumping, or conversely, the chill-out, relaxed feeling.

So yeah, people want to alter their state of existence. This is nothing new. The methods of which we have done so in the past seem to be no longer acceptable in this day and age. Back in the days of Prohibition, people wanted the fire-water, and they got it, any way they could. Then throughout the Sixties, there were more drugs floating around everywhere.

Both of these items have been legally capped – either by age restrictions or legal ruling. Beyond that, from the moment they are old enough to hear, the evils and dangers of these items, and are encouraged to stay as far away from them as possible.

Is that bad? I don’t know. Maybe.

But asking a kid whether he thought strangling himself would be dangerous, that’s just foolish.

Kids that want to get a rush will do whatever they think they can do to get that. Hell, I jumped out of a plane for a rush! That’s dangerous, too. But the danger is much more calculated and different.

Schools, in my opinion, are to teach you knowledge about things you may need to know later on in life. Some of them may be superfluous, others may not be taught well enough, but that’s another topic completely.

Parents are responsible to guide their child to a life path that they believe is the best for their child, no matter what it is. And a parent, that hasn’t taught a kid that putting your hand into the blender is a bad idea, is probably the same parent whose kid doesn’t realize that choking yourself is a fun way to pass the time.

I am not blameless in the life-threatening pursuits. But I know that whatever I do, and the outcome of it, is a choice I have made, not some game gone wrong.

Bottom line – kids everywhere want to have fun. Find a good alternative that they can have that kind of fun, like a vertical wind tunnel simulator, or going on roller coasters, or whatever. Don’t blame the schools for not teaching that choking yourself can get you killed. Running into traffic can get you killed, too. Who taught you to not do that?

And if all else fails, consider this: Natural selection? Could be.

At 13,000 feet nothing else matters

A few weeks ago a coworker of mine decided that he wanted to celebrate his birthday with something big – and came up with the brilliant idea of going skydiving. He had been once before, and he’s a very thrill-seeking kind of guy, as well as a snowboarding instructor in the winter.When he sent out a general invitation to all to join in on the fun, I was initially excited, as this is something I’ve thought about doing, but never really pursued the subject at all. So my initial reactions were mixed – want to go, yes, really! But then the terror of jumping out of a plane? That’s insane!!

Lucky for me, the Saturday he had scheduled for was Yom Kippur, and I was already going to be with my uncle in the local synagogue, and then break the fast with some cousins in New Jersey.

Little did I know that Yom Kippur was going to have just enough rain to keep everyone from skydiving that day, and that everyone left and rescheduled for the following Saturday.

Back at work, hearing this, I immediately jumped on board for the next Saturday’s jump, and put it on my calendar and didn’t schedule anything else.

During the week, I kept on reconsidering, reflecting on whether or not I really wanted to do this. I mean, really, going up into the air, and dropping like a stone from a plane that’s turning right around and landing anyways! How crazy is that!

Turns out, my kind of crazy.

Saturday morning, I head over to Harrison, New Jersey and get picked up by Gavin (whose brilliant idea it was), along with Christophe and his friend Fernando. We meet up with Vincent, Olga, Alex and Marissa. We exchange directions, and head down to South Jersey, a place called Willamstown.

On the way, I call Freefall Adventures to inquire about the weather conditions impacting the day’s activities, and am informed that it’s going to be ok, just a major delay as the early morning was unsuitable for jumps, so everyone got pushed back a few hours. Once we arrived at the location, we met up with Mike S. and Veronica, more friends that live in the closer area and had a much shorter drive.

The we line up for forms and such, and get handed a pile of stuff to read and fill out, waivers and such, who to notify in case of accidents, and whether we have any physical distinguishing marks. The last was the source of many a joke. Much gallows humor had by all.

There were a large crowd of people hanging around, and not much jumping going on. There was some good music playing, and we eventually found a deck of cards, and had lunch, shot some hoops, chatted and had an all-around good time hanging out, with the eternal wait.

We also got called in for the orientation video, where we saw some other jumps and guidelines, as well as the president of the company repeating that this is a dangerous activity and that they will try to keep us safe at all times, but accidents happen. Nothing disillusioning about that.

So we hung out for longer and longer, until finally at around 4:30pm, we get called in to get into harness and get instructed. This goes on for about half an hour, where we learn what we’re going to do and how to react. We also perform some of the stances that we will be in. My pulse is racing.

At about 5:00pm, the sun is starting to drop low in the sky, and 24 of us – a large amount of experienced single jumpers and 6 of our crew and accompanying instructors – board the Otter and take off.

We rapidly climb to about 12,000-13,000 feet (around 2 miles or 4 kilometers, give or take a bit), all the while being checked and double checked for straps, connections and everything else. One instructor, a crazy Frenchman, kept screaming at random intervals, “We’re going streaking!” with no apparent relevance to anything else.

As we near jump height, they open the door, and the first three jump. I’m fourth, and I’m almost freaking out, I can only remember that on the ground they told us that when jumping, the instructor will use the “Ready, set, go!” method while rocking together. My instructor, a huge Brazilian dude named Jonei, dumped us out on “set”, which helped my adrenaline levels skyrocket.

In the 60 seconds of freefall that followed, all I can explain that the completely foreign feeling of falling at of a rate of over 120MPH (more like 200KPH) was so phenomenal and alien that I wish it had gone on much longer.

At about 6,000 feet, Jonei yanks my left arm in front of my face to show me the altimeter dropping fast, and I have about 5 seconds to pull my own ripcord before he does it for me at 5,200 or so. I slowly reach back to my right hip for the toggle, and find Jonei’s hand on it already. As soon as he feels my hand tap, he pulls the cord, and the chute deploys.

If you’ve never gone before, that rapid deployment seems like it’s going to yank you really hard, but it’s actually not that bad. A little unexpected, but not bad. I fold my arms to my chest as Jonei checks the straps and we begin slowly gliding downwards at a much more leisurely rate. I let out a battle whoop, releasing that pent up tension, and feel the blood pounding and rushing. Whoa.

He then proceeds to point out some of the landmarks that you can see from that high above, none of which I can recall right now. We do some crazy turns and spins, stalls and swoops, and he hands me the toggles to control, explaining what they do. I do a few simple maneuvers as he instructs me, hoping that this thing is resilient and won’t drop us to the ground.

He takes back the reins, and then proceeds to freak me out, doing a couple of 360’s almost parallel to the ground, some cool turns, and finally landing in turn after swooping over some trees nearby. We ride in and slide me on my butt, as described as the probable method of landing during the instruction phase.

I collapse and lay down to enjoy the feeling of all that coming to an end, and then Jonei pulls me up, and I head back to turn in my gear.

We all talk exuberantly about the experience, while waiting for our other 4 friends to go up and jump. While they do, we rehash our experiences and have some great laughs.

After our friends’ jump (the final one of the day), we hang out with the skydiving crew in their hangar – very laid back, fun-loving kind of crowd. They crack open some beers, we all joke around, and a few of us try our balance on an Indo Board – with varying degrees of success. Something like that is a pretty cool way to spend your time waiting for your jump.

So we then sat down and watched some of the videos that were taken during the final jump, and had some laughs and and then left to get some food and drinks.

After a delicious dinner at some place called “The Office” in New Jersey, I was dropped off at a PATH station and headed home for a good sleep.

All in all, an awesome way to spend a day. I’m definitely interested in doing this again.

At 13,000 feet nothing else matters

A few weeks ago a coworker of mine decided that he wanted to celebrate his birthday with something big – and came up with the brilliant idea of going skydiving. He had been once before, and he’s a very thrill-seeking kind of guy, as well as a snowboarding instructor in the winter.When he sent out a general invitation to all to join in on the fun, I was initially excited, as this is something I’ve thought about doing, but never really pursued the subject at all. So my initial reactions were mixed – want to go, yes, really! But then the terror of jumping out of a plane? That’s insane!!

Lucky for me, the Saturday he had scheduled for was Yom Kippur, and I was already going to be with my uncle in the local synagogue, and then break the fast with some cousins in New Jersey.

Little did I know that Yom Kippur was going to have just enough rain to keep everyone from skydiving that day, and that everyone left and rescheduled for the following Saturday.

Back at work, hearing this, I immediately jumped on board for the next Saturday’s jump, and put it on my calendar and didn’t schedule anything else.

During the week, I kept on reconsidering, reflecting on whether or not I really wanted to do this. I mean, really, going up into the air, and dropping like a stone from a plane that’s turning right around and landing anyways! How crazy is that!

Turns out, my kind of crazy.

Saturday morning, I head over to Harrison, New Jersey and get picked up by Gavin (whose brilliant idea it was), along with Christophe and his friend Fernando. We meet up with Vincent, Olga, Alex and Marissa. We exchange directions, and head down to South Jersey, a place called Willamstown.

On the way, I call Freefall Adventures to inquire about the weather conditions impacting the day’s activities, and am informed that it’s going to be ok, just a major delay as the early morning was unsuitable for jumps, so everyone got pushed back a few hours. Once we arrived at the location, we met up with Mike S. and Veronica, more friends that live in the closer area and had a much shorter drive.

The we line up for forms and such, and get handed a pile of stuff to read and fill out, waivers and such, who to notify in case of accidents, and whether we have any physical distinguishing marks. The last was the source of many a joke. Much gallows humor had by all.

There were a large crowd of people hanging around, and not much jumping going on. There was some good music playing, and we eventually found a deck of cards, and had lunch, shot some hoops, chatted and had an all-around good time hanging out, with the eternal wait.

We also got called in for the orientation video, where we saw some other jumps and guidelines, as well as the president of the company repeating that this is a dangerous activity and that they will try to keep us safe at all times, but accidents happen. Nothing disillusioning about that.

So we hung out for longer and longer, until finally at around 4:30pm, we get called in to get into harness and get instructed. This goes on for about half an hour, where we learn what we’re going to do and how to react. We also perform some of the stances that we will be in. My pulse is racing.

At about 5:00pm, the sun is starting to drop low in the sky, and 24 of us – a large amount of experienced single jumpers and 6 of our crew and accompanying instructors – board the Otter and take off.

We rapidly climb to about 12,000-13,000 feet (around 2 miles or 4 kilometers, give or take a bit), all the while being checked and double checked for straps, connections and everything else. One instructor, a crazy Frenchman, kept screaming at random intervals, “We’re going streaking!” with no apparent relevance to anything else.

As we near jump height, they open the door, and the first three jump. I’m fourth, and I’m almost freaking out, I can only remember that on the ground they told us that when jumping, the instructor will use the “Ready, set, go!” method while rocking together. My instructor, a huge Brazilian dude named Jonei, dumped us out on “set”, which helped my adrenaline levels skyrocket.

In the 60 seconds of freefall that followed, all I can explain that the completely foreign feeling of falling at of a rate of over 120MPH (more like 200KPH) was so phenomenal and alien that I wish it had gone on much longer.

At about 6,000 feet, Jonei yanks my left arm in front of my face to show me the altimeter dropping fast, and I have about 5 seconds to pull my own ripcord before he does it for me at 5,200 or so. I slowly reach back to my right hip for the toggle, and find Jonei’s hand on it already. As soon as he feels my hand tap, he pulls the cord, and the chute deploys.

If you’ve never gone before, that rapid deployment seems like it’s going to yank you really hard, but it’s actually not that bad. A little unexpected, but not bad. I fold my arms to my chest as Jonei checks the straps and we begin slowly gliding downwards at a much more leisurely rate. I let out a battle whoop, releasing that pent up tension, and feel the blood pounding and rushing. Whoa.

He then proceeds to point out some of the landmarks that you can see from that high above, none of which I can recall right now. We do some crazy turns and spins, stalls and swoops, and he hands me the toggles to control, explaining what they do. I do a few simple maneuvers as he instructs me, hoping that this thing is resilient and won’t drop us to the ground.

He takes back the reins, and then proceeds to freak me out, doing a couple of 360’s almost parallel to the ground, some cool turns, and finally landing in turn after swooping over some trees nearby. We ride in and slide me on my butt, as described as the probable method of landing during the instruction phase.

I collapse and lay down to enjoy the feeling of all that coming to an end, and then Jonei pulls me up, and I head back to turn in my gear.

We all talk exuberantly about the experience, while waiting for our other 4 friends to go up and jump. While they do, we rehash our experiences and have some great laughs.

After our friends’ jump (the final one of the day), we hang out with the skydiving crew in their hangar – very laid back, fun-loving kind of crowd. They crack open some beers, we all joke around, and a few of us try our balance on an Indo Board – with varying degrees of success. Something like that is a pretty cool way to spend your time waiting for your jump.

So we then sat down and watched some of the videos that were taken during the final jump, and had some laughs and and then left to get some food and drinks.

After a delicious dinner at some place called “The Office” in New Jersey, I was dropped off at a PATH station and headed home for a good sleep.

All in all, an awesome way to spend a day. I’m definitely interested in doing this again.

Waste some time? I can do that!

I seem to be hemorrhaging words today. Hope you’re enjoying it.

Tonight I went to a show.

I say “show”, but I’m a little concerned that this might lend some preconceived notions as to its purpose, quality, and overall experience.

I saw the event listed on the NonsenseNYC email list update (thanks to Jeff Stark). He had an interesting description there, and had listed that the event would be starting at 8pm, and that the event price was $5. I say again, $5 – not $15, which I was asked for at the door.

Since the event was scheduled to start at 8, I came a little early, and bought a beer. Went outside to drink it – on the street! Ha! Outside, I met another couple of people – a guy waiting for a lady friend of his from Hungary to arrive, and another lady named Aida who was, like me, there alone, and because of the listing.

So we chatted a bit, and when the doors opened for admission, we entered a smallish performance hall, and got the best seats in the house, right on the floor, not a foot away from some of the actors. On the other hand, considering the performance value, it may not have been the best seats in the house – those might have been outside.

With harsh red overtones, and a 4-piece band playing discordant music, smoke pouring in, it was more than a little bit eerie. The name of the piece – Hot Blood Cabaret – seemed to be apt to the scene.

As the band played on, and my eyes adjusted to the dimness, they wandered over the room, where the performers were already in place, doing whatever they were supposed to do.

The once that stays fresh in my mind is one gal, dressing in black lingerie, heaving over a toilet bowl, for about 45 minutes – it never got old. She’s take a break, feel something come up again, and dive right back into it, with vim and vigor.

The show was MC’ed by a severed head, with running humorous patter – probably a large amount of improv worked in there. He was amusing enough to keep the audience from getting too restless with some of the other performers.

There was a guy who played both parts in a short classical monologue piece, turning from left to right to display the gender of the character he was speaking as. He strayed from the original, bringing in a lot of modern language and concepts to the piece. Quaint.

Anyways, as Aida and I left – we turned to each other and said the same – “It was worth $5 – not $15!”.

Good night.

Only 15 minutes? I want more!

It is said that you get 15 minutes of fame.

What happens when that fame is not the fame you wanted? Can you get a refund, trade in, rebate or something like that?

About a month and a half ago, my friend Beka and I went out to see The Fantasticks.

It was a fun show, and as we were leaving the theater, we were set upon by media people – men with cameras and lights and microphones and such, asking questions about the show we had just seen.

They were from a new web site, that hadn’t launched yet – NWHYC.com (catchy name?) – and the both of us, being theatrically oriented, had no problem standing in front of them and pushing a few lines their way. They edited them heavily, obviously, so the transitions are not some effect of a space-time warp something or other.

Here’s the videos of us (if they don’t show up on my site, drop me a comment and I’ll link to another video mirror):

Me:
[flv:http://perepartnership.httpsvc.vitalstreamcdn.com/perepartnership_vitalstream_com/manual/20070821_a1_mike_f_theater_fantasticks.flv 490 327]

Beka:
[flv:http://perepartnership.httpsvc.vitalstreamcdn.com/perepartnership_vitalstream_com/manual/20070821_g1_rebecca_b_theater_fantasticks.flv 490 327]

The $1,000,000 question really is: Are these videos specific to this show, or could they be applied to any show? You decide.

Fresh Salt! Get yer Fresh Salt here!

I may have written about this place before, but I’m going to again.

Sunday night, I headed over a couple blocks towards the South Street Seaport, and on the way, there’s this nice little place that’s pretty unobtrusive, a great little neighborhood place.

Fresh Salt is its name, and it has great little neighborhood feel, in an area that has precious little neighborhood feel to it.

Once there, comfortably at the bar, I ordered a beer from Maggie, a lovely young 20-something behind the bar. She was running the iPod playlist with great music, some oldies but goodies, some more modern, and then fell into a complete album of Sweet, which was enjoyed by all.

She had mentioned that her friend Katie would be coming by later, and had requested that Maggie mix her a cocktail, including tequila and grapefruit juice. So she consults Mr. Boston, and comes up with a couple of drinks – neither of which sound all that great.

So after another few minutes of contemplation, I offer up a mix of my own, on the spot creation, as I have been known to do before.

  • 3 parts tequila
  • 1 part Cointreau
  • 3 parts grapefruit juice
  • top off with Sprite/tonic/seltzer (to individual’s sweet tooth level)
  • splash of Grenadine

She made a taster, and liked it enough to make a couple for Katie and Annie when they arrived.

So I met the two ladies, now drinking “The Katie” and they were joined by a couple of other guys, and then I was regaled with not one, not two, but three great stories from the three ladies. One was about Katie’s neighbor – Rick something – and how he’s pretty odd. Then Maggie told us about the time her roommate passed out and locked her out of her own apartment. Finally, to close off the evening, Annie told one about a friend (?) of hers that had crapped his own pants, bought a new pair on the way home, and managed to lose both of them while trying to change pairs in between moving subway cars.

Ah, the memories.

Now, at this point I had probably too much to drink, so I proceeded to close my tab, and stumble off home.

Here’s to next Sunday!

Weigh, Hey & Up She Rises!

So last night I went to see/hear a a band in a bar.

Now, you may ask – “What’s so special about that? Band play in bars all the time!”

Well, this one was a little different.

The band – Scythian – are a lively bunch of young guys from DC, who apparently like to have a good time, while playing a mix of what you’d normally see in a rock band – and what you weren’t expecting, like a couple of fiddles, an accordion and even a ukulele.

They played three consecutive sets (I only stayed for two) and they put a whole lot of energy into the room. At one point, one guy comes down and dances the length of the bar while playing a fiddle. They played a lot of variations on traditional Iris and Scottish tunes – including the ole fave – Drunken Sailor! My cousin and her friend were a little amazed that I actually knew the words, and that I knew more verses than the band played.

The venue for their monthly show – Stout NYC – leaves a bit to be desired. It got VERY crowded very fast, and there’s just not enough room for people to finish a drink and then make it up to the bar and get back to their friends. And I think the sound guy may have had it in for everyone there, as when I left, it took a good twenty minutes to regain some semblance of hearing. So turn it down just a notch! But other then that, it was a great layout for this kind of performance.

The band played on a little balcony above the bar – in full view for almost any angle. They seemed to be having a good time, as did most of the crowd. So it was a good time had by all, and a merry night ’twas indeed.

I’m planning on seeing their next performance in NYC on Oct20th same place, you’re welcome to join me.