Trouble, Trouble, Boil, and Bubble
Night two of party central. There is something so dissatisfied when fun comes to an end - you wake up to an honest light of day and you are forced to take stock of your life - realize that it's almost 2pm, I am still mildly hungover, my apartment is an absolute disaster, and I have tons of reading left to do. But, for what it is worth, I am glad I went out big last night and had fun. We watched the French serial "Fantomas" in the afternoon with our professor and our adorable & brilliant 6yr old son. From there, we went right to the opening of JJ's drawing show, I'll get the link up here - www.wendycoopergallery.com - sadly, I don't know the blogger code to put up links anymore (the Mac interface doesn't allow to click a button) - and it was an interesting introduction to the Madison art scene, hipster looking boys & girls... the show itself was a little hard to get into... I've never been a big drawing fan, I just don't have the aptitude or appetite to have enough of merit to say. Thankfully Eric and Jen made for good company and we seemed to react similarly to all of the works. We stopped off at Eric's neighborhood liquors merchant, bought a magnum of cheap red wine, and went back to his place, consumed it and listened to some records.
Then, keeping with the new year's resolution, we went to Nick's for dinner. I pass this place daily, but I've never been. It is a very retro feeling diner with black leather booths with gold lemay patterning. Usually, State Street is very trendy, but walking inside felt like entering another world, another decade... we had great turkey club sandwiches and it was a satisfying, great find.
Well, we then opted to go to an old favorite - Paul's Club (home of the $4 Bombay sapphire) and took over a window booth, where we acquired Laura, Jen II, and Kate. It was a lot of fun, we laughed a lot, scoped out some guys and Laura and I made it a pack to try to meet some new peeps. Wonderfully drunk by the end, and I have no idea how our combined bill (as a table of 6) came to $56, when Eric and I surely drank that much in gin alone.
Needing a change of scene - we went up to Jenna's where it was too crowded to move, but we bumped into Jim Kreul (an older filmie who is a life-long resident of Madison and a regular fixture at the bars we most frequent). Instead, as the usual back-up plan predicts, we went next door to the equally as a retro high backed Hollywood-type horseshoe leather boothed Tornado Room. It's a much more relaxed atmosphere. We stayed for an equally cheap round of drinks there. On the way home, we made one more stop at the cigar bar minutes from my house, Madouro, where we stayed for last call and ended the night on a celebratory note. All in all, it was a good way to go out, enjoy it, and not have too face too many consequences. Even though Eric was ever-present, it felt like a girls' night out and everyone was getting on surprisingly well. It was a night that renewed some of my waning faith in the Madison social scene.
Just the same - this apartment is a pit, I have laundry everywhere and my floors need to be swept and washed... so I'll spent some time making things more respectable before our office dinner party (thrown by Maureen) later this evening. I am craving some good vegetarian chili and I can't wait for some homemade cornbread!
posted by lmjasinski at 1:53 PM
