Part of this is practicality. In addition to loving Minneapolis, I love saving gas and gas money, I love utilizing public transportation and walking to the grocery store, and most of all, I love drinking. I love drinking, and then getting into my own cozy bed at the end of the night. Also I love keeping my parking space on my street. So I want to drink in my neighborhood, and then I don't have to leave my car parked anywhere. If I venture downtown or southward, the cab ride home won't be as expensive.
The area inside the blue border in the Google map below is my hood. Why would anyone want to party in the suburbs, anyway? For the generic sports bars? The 18+ clubs? Everything you want for a sexy night out is in Uptown or Downtown.
I will occasionally go to St. Paul, in the purple border.
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Therefore, it has to be a special occasion to get me to travel outside my hood. Like a birthday party. On Saturday night, I had to traverse the border pictured in red, in order to hit up TWO birthday parties. Melody's 30th birthday party (symbolized by the martini glass) in White Bear Lake (holy f**k, that's' far away!) and Sarah's 31st birthday party (symbolized by the camera) in Hopkins (supposedly "close" to Uptown, but anything on the other side of Hwy 100 for me does not normally fit that description).
Mel and Sarah, however? Totally worth it. But oh my goodness. White Bear Lake is very far away.
It's sort of incredible that I have the nerve to go on and on about how far away certain suburbs are, and express my annoyance that any of my friends have the audacity to live in the 'burbs, and additionally, expect people to travel out there to see them, considering the fact that I spent my teenage years driving all over the Black Hills on any given weekend night. The closest movie theater to my home was 30 miles; the closest mall was over 50 miles away. It was nothing to take off for any of these locations when I lived in a rural area. Now it's a Herculean task to get me to drive down to Apple Valley. And Shakopee? Oh hells no. Don't even say "Chaska" or "Prior Lake" to me. LAKEVILLE?! That's the same as asking me to drive to Iowa.
I think I feel differently about this issue when other people are driving. "Me driving" is definitely a factor. Relaxing and zoning out in the passenger seat is a low stress consideration.
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The parties were markedly different. At Mel's we enjoyed a spread of snacks, grilled brats and burgers, beer and wine. After talking in the kitchen and livingroom for a couple hours, we sat around the dining room table politely playing a board game. (I am blanking on the name. You had to call out words that began with the letter of the card, describing the subject on another card. Although I loved being there with my friends, I admit that it wasn't my favorite game.)
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I believe there was food at Sarah's, and definitely there was beer and liquor, but no delicious Moscato d'Asti. (Which was good, as I'd stopped drinking anyhow, so I could get myself home.) The group was playing games around a table here, too, only the attempt at Uno Attack! consisted more of ten people screaming their conversations, some related to explaining the game, some not, at each other for 20 minutes, before the game was folded. Next came Catchphrase, a game that is sure to follow me around for the rest of my life. I love how *I* play Catchphrase, and I love how people who play like me play Catchphrase. What makes me absolutely NUTS is people who aren't good at Catchphrase, and on the opposite team, but somehow manage to squeeze out the correct answer from one of their teammates, after a ridiculous amount of laughing and snorting about how "this one is so hard" before handing the disc to one of MY teammates a split second before the buzzer goes off.
I like my Catchphrase fast and hard. No bullshit! This is a competition!
Prologue.
Later I entertained the crowd with a little "falling down the stairs" action. Everyone loves their slapstick. I was tromping down the carpeted basement stairs, and suddenly one of the heels of my adorable patent leather red high heels caught on the carpet, and I tumbled down the second half of the flight.
Not just "landed on the my ass and slid." I tumbled. As in, my body completed a couple revolutions, wherein I was facing the wall, then my back faced the wall, then around again, until I landed in a heep at the bottom of the stairs, my back colliding with a Hoola Hoop that had been leaning against the wall. For a millisecond I thought that since this action all took place on the carpet, the people in the basement were absorbed in their games and hadn't noticed.
*snort*
They all noticed, and responded by performing a 15-person synchronized gasp.
Awesome.
Kristy (the lady of the house) assured me that people are constantly falling down those stairs. That may be, but I was the only coolness who managed to do so last night. Next time I will time my pratfalls to come after a game that I win.
2 comments:
i feel a little bad about this, but... AAAHHAAHAHAAA! dude, i am always falling down in front of people! however embarrassing it is in the moment, it always makes for good storytelling later on. :o) i hope you were wearing pants!
H - Heehee...I know, I keep laughing about it myself. It was pretty damned embarrassing at the time, however. I still have some bruises on my body.
And yes I was wearing pants.
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