S-L-O-W. In spite of myself.
I`m only going to say a couple of things about this before I succumb to superstition and caution.
1) I met the Lit Prof. I like him. We`ll be going out again.
2) I`m going to do my best to approach this thing like a normal person, ie, not go batshit talking about him either in person, or in the blogland, until I actually know him better, and feel like I`m not just meandering through a cotton candy planet that could get stuck in a warm rain at any moment.
3) The head pixie is not acting up, which is a good sign.
And in the land of rational concrete things....
It has been an incredibly manic few days. The Black Tie event on Saturday night was lovely. I spent most of the evening hanging out with my co-worker/date (a married chic who completely cracks me up) and another girlfriend and her man. For the jews out there, my girlfriend H is the quintessential Shiksa. Her boyfriend, of course, is the end-all of nebbishes.
If you don`t follow, just find a friend who noshes on kugel, and ask 'em to explain it to you, nu?
Sunday was essentially a recovery day. Nothing to report.
Monday morning I got up early and hopped on a train to Washington DC. The ostensible reason for the trip was to go sit in on three Supreme Court hearings on Tuesday morning. However, through the wonders of bloggery, I remembered that I have a few friends in the DC area.
Upon arrival, I met up with Eternal Freshman for lunch. I would just like to note, that I have never seen a girl look more smashing in a pair of sweatpants. Rock on trainer-EF!!
Following our lunch, I went back to my hotel and tried to get online. My stupid crackberry was crapping out on me for some reason, and lo and behold, the wireless in my room wasn`t working. I complained to the concierge, who then tried to shove me into another room...where the wireless STILL didn`t work. I gave up, went back to the first room, and realized that I have a problem.
Repeat after me, people. Life does not end without internet access.
Yeah, right. Pfah!!
Frustrated, yet also resigned, I ran out the door to meet up with my friend L. L and I were great friends back in the early 90`s in NYC. Of course, back then, we wore combat boots, worked at piercing and tattoo shops, and had all kinds of colors in our hair. I had not seen L since those glory days...These are actually my favorite types of reunion. Wild girls gone good. L is now a hot-shot corporate sort, and I`m a lawyer. We sat in a coffee shop sipping americanos and munching biscotti talking about her fiance, my law school experiences, and generally patting ourselves on the back for having become such upstanding young women. Hilarious. L is also tattooed, so it was nice to share a giggle over how completely shocked our superiors would be if ever we were to run into them on a beach...
Since L had to go back to the office, I decided to take a leisurely walk back through the Capitol District to get to my hotel. I got slightly lost. But, if I`m going to get a little lost, DC was definitely the place to do it. The law-geek in me was thoroughly enthralled walking past the Washington Monument, the headquarters of the American Bar Association, assorted embassies and administrative offices and the spectacular greco-roman and quasi-french architecture that intimidates, impresses, and humbles the wee folk in it`s shadow on the street.
Once I finally found my hotel, I gave Jamy a holler, and we arranged to meet up for dinner and some swing-dancing. Jamy was a really generous hostess, and arranged to pick me up in azipcar. We went to a tapas restaurant-- the food was good, the service was well....let`s just say that we hemmed and hawed over whether 15% was even justified. I was completely entertained when Jamy and I discovered our mutual mathematical incompetence:
V: Ok, so the check is 36.00 total, so we each put in 13.00.
J: Ok, well, I have a 20, so if you give me 7, we should be good.
V: OK. (Hands over 7.00)
Gold star for the first one to catch our error here!!! Sigh.
Finally, we left the restaurant and went over to the dance-studio where the swing dancing was taking place. At first, I was more than a little nervous. I was a dance major in college, and used to do amateur competitive swing in NYC in the late '90s, but it had easilly been 4 years since the last time I hit the floor. Jamy got right out there, and looked like she was having a blast. There were some really stellar dancers out there as well, so I didn`t really mind sitting out the first few dances.
Finally, with the help of Jamy`s friends M and CK, I got out on the floor. It took a few songs to get my groove back, but the muscle memory brought me right back into it. Sure, I wasn`t as smooth as I was in my competitive days, but I definitely felt solid enough to hold my own with the intermediate level dancers on the floor. I danced with everyone who asked me...which, granted, was mostly old men. But old men are HUGE amount of fun to dance with. Not gropey, always grateful, and usually both charming and skilled on the floor.
All in all, a wonderful wonderful evening. Jamy may find me showing up in DC more often unless I can scare up a swing dance venue here in Philly.
I wont bore y`all with the details of the Supreme Court hearings....needless to say, it was impressive stuff.
The one thing to note....remember the whole Anita shenanigan with Justice Thomas? I think the bigger problem with this man is not his tendency to be a sexist groping conservative haughty snot-bag. His issue is NARCOLEPSY. It really freaks me out that the man literally slept through the hearings. WTF???
