Pretty Damn Good New Year
Ok it was better than pretty good, here comes the eagerly-anticipated (there I go again, being all delusional) recap of New Year’s Eve… This turned out to be long, so I’m cutting it up by day. 🙂
Aside from the morning stress, the day passed by without incident. In the afternoon, Jenifer IMd me to let me know that Philly wasn’t on due to the hotel “losing” our reservation. She was doing her best to find another place for us, but I told her that it wasn’t a big deal seeing as my money was running low after paying for holiday gifts and travel and then Jan’s rent, so if we made it, cool, if not, also cool as we’d find something else to do. We didn’t really have any set plans since the people we would have tried to hang out with all had other plans for the ‘eve.
I got home and started tinkering around with really using the network capabilities of my TiVo, transferring some stuff to it from my PC like the new Doctor Who Christmas special. It’s so much nicer to watch stuff on the big screen from the couch instead of in my computer desk chair on the small screen. The process takes a while, but it wasn’t hard to letterbox the widescreen stuff and convert it. Then once I transfer it I can start watching the show while it continues to copy across the network, not too shabby. I was enjoying that and a little bit of Civ 4 and chatting when Jhim called me up. He’d gone to see Labyrinth, which I would have loved to have joined him for but Thursday night’s Happy Hour effects were still with me on Friday, so I took a pass on it. It was to the point where anything I started to drink, my body recoiled from the sense memory of the booze intake. However having a chance to rest up at home made me feel much better, and when he called to tell me they were on their way out for drinks and dancing, I quickly hopped out of the pajamas and into suitable attire and met up with them at Dupont Circle to go to Apex.
I was still a little touchy about alcohol, but I managed a few drinks courtesy of Jhim. We did the karaoke room for a while, then hit the dance floor. The most interesting thing said to me that evening was, “You have a great fake smile.” There were other gems too. Lord I tell ya people, never say stuff like that to a writer/blogger. Because while it’s fun to make stuff up to post, it’s damn near orgasmic to post true statements (see Overheard in New York). Jhim and I made our leave and metroed out after he grabbed a slice of that fantastic pizza (I’m going to have to try it sober sometime though, to see if it packs the same punch) and I think I crawled in the door around… 2 or 3 maybe?
I finally got up and showered and primped, etc, deciding on a basic black shirt and what I lovingly refer to as, the whore jeans. They’re slightly flared at the bottom, but not 70’s bellbottom style, and there’s barely room for my wallet, keys and phone (maybe I DO need a RAZR!) when I’ve got them on, but damn they look good on me.
There wasn’t much about dinner to report, there were definitely some interesting characters in and out of the place, but the conversation was kinda wary of how the evening might progress. I admit I was still a little bummed about not going to Philly and the proposed plan of a strip club didn’t exactly fill me with anticipation but it was New Year’s and we were going to have fun, even if it killed someone! (not me obviously, I looked too good in those jeans to snuff it)
The Rule of Jhim: He will be late. He will not always try to be late. He simply will be late, sometimes through his own doing and sometimes through the sheer intervention of Fate. — I didn’t realize this until a while after I got to know him and he confided that he’d been making an extra effort in the early part of the year to be punctual. Still this left Jenifer and I on our own at Halo for a while, sitting on the uncomfortable big round tuffet near the front window. It wasn’t as cold as it has been in past visits, but for some people who need back support it’s a nightmare. Add to that the fact that we were trying to take it easy on the alcohol over the evening and we were getting a little bored. Thankfully a group that we’d been observing and only lightly (yeah, right) snarking on left some proper seating open and we snagged it. Then Mike and Mikey showed up, followed by Jhim and then Danny. More chatting, more drinks, the evening started showing some promise and I was really having a good time.
We made some stops to get money and cigars (thank you Jenifer) before moving on. And Mike wasn’t feeling so hot as some previous health issues were rearing their ugly head again, so he and Mikey headed home from that point. (which only further validates my theory that couples can no longer do “fun” stuff on NYE, only stay at home and watch tv/movies in bed) Danny offered to drive us over, so we walked to his car (actually, I’m straining my brain to remember the walk over) parked near The Green Lantern in Logan Circle. In the parking lot we were approached by a guy and a girl, clearly partiers, asking us where there was to go tonight, and then asking “Ok, y’all are gay, right?” The girl sort of resembled a hip and pretty Kelly Osborne and the guy was adorable, tall, southern accent, oh so cute. We did the round of introductions, her name Kim, his Christian. We told them where we were headed and what the party was gonna be and they said they’d probably see us there. It seemed like they were doing the NC to DC equivalent of what Jenifer and I would have done in Philly. Get a hotel room and go, working out what you’re gonna do when you get there.
The clubs Wet and Edge (link probably NSFW), strip and dance respectively, share the same building and on New Year’s they were allowing patrons to pay one entry fee and go back and forth in between them which was cool. So we started in the strip club side after being patted down, which I thought was horribly amusing – but I was drunk. It turned out that whoever was sponsoring the party was looking to cater to the urban crowd, so the music was hip-hop and the dancers all beautifully toned, extremely flexible and well-hung black men. I was a little surprised at first, since anyone that knows me knows I usually go for the dark meat on poultry and the white meat on my men, but there was such a laid back atmosphere it wasn’t hard to have a good time.
I usually have 2 issues with strip clubs, 1: In all the places I’ve ever gone, I’ve seen someone I know working as a dancer/stripper. In some cases, an ex-bf. And that’s just weird. 2: I giggle. I giggle a lot. I love to watch, I am a voyeur, but the absurdity of someone waggling their stuff in my face when I’m not allowed to touch borders that fine line of frustrating and silly. Thankfully the drinks I had loosened me up so I could enjoy it. Plus there’s something about being a group of young and attractive men and walking into a strip club, you get attention from the dancers who feel that maybe you’re not as creepy as other patrons, and you get attention from the patrons who realize that maybe there’s a P.Y.T. they can take home who they CAN touch. My self-esteem was definitely on a high.
We were enjoying the bar show, the layout is pretty cool. They have enough room on the bar for the dancers to walk around, and instead of the standard vertical pole, there’s a horizontal pole that they use to support themselves and occasionally perform some pretty impressive gymnastics and at each end of the bar is a door that leads to their dressing room area. There’s also a shower area at the end of the bar, true to the name Wet where a dancer or two would hop in and get all hot, wet and squeaky clean for the audience.
While I was enjoying the um… assets of the light caramel skinned brutha with the horseshoe/4-leaf clover tattoo right above his ass, I noticed that Christian and Kim, had showed up, the boy was still looking cute, and they were both drunk off their asses. But by that time so was I, the one cigar I smoked actually settled my stomach so the thought of drinking didn’t make me sick anymore (which meant it was time to bring it on!). We had some more fun losing our dollar bills to fund what I am sure are struggling students working their way through school by dancing (I tell myself whatever I need to hear) and then headed over to Edge, which was PACKED.
I’d never been to Edge before either but it must not cater to gay crowds very often because I can’t really see why people would like Nation over Edge. The layout was nice, felt bigger, had more different areas and bars inside and the dance floor was maybe a tiny bit smaller. The crowd was still pretty much all black, but there was no attitude, everyone was having a good time.
The four of us mostly hung out with Christian and Kim near the outside deck/patio chatting and what not. Danny and I went inside to break the chill and get more drinks at which point we found out that screwdrivers were free that night (Lord Hallelujah, I was home!) And I was doing my best to get (and get to) Christian’s vitals and as the midnight hour approached, they put out champagne and non-alcoholic cider fountains and we all toasted… and toasted again and again and I most definitely got my most unexpected New Year’s Eve kiss ever from a 24 year old boy from North Carolina that we met purely by chance. A co-worker told me that whatever you’re doing at midnight sets the tone for your upcoming year and if so… I could get used to that!
There was more dancing and chatting and rounds of kisses and examining piercings. Christian and I exchanged phone numbers and as they were leaving and we were headed to the dance floor he asked me to call him when we were leaving the club. After we’d had our fill of shaking our ass, we headed back to watch the men again and were treated to what Jhim called The Elephant Man, and I was hard-pressed to disagree. The mere sight of it caused Jhim to pony up a fiver (he figured it was for care and feeding), I swear if a man didn’t have inadequacy issues before this… he just might now.
We all metroed back to Jenifer’s car and she drove us to Jhim’s hotel where we collapsed a bit and Jhim treated her to a card reading (returning the favor of palm readings a few nights before). She headed home and Jhim and I wandered out in search of food and praise Tai Shan (same name as the new panda) for being open and happy to fleece the drunken revelers. Honestly, that food coulda been crap and we probably wouldn’t have noticed, it was filling and good and we watched some VH1, professing our lust for many of their “I Love The…” commentators and chatted and passed out.
I know I must have been wasted because I had a dream where I had superpowers. This time the ability to teleport. I usually have superpowered dreams when I’ve had too much to drink.
Jenifer dropped me off home where I picked up the table (I’m grateful there were no spectators as I must have looked a fool trying to get it in the elevator) and then happily SHOWERED. I watched a little tv, got a nap, got in touch with Christian a few times to suggest some evening plans for him and his friends and just chilled out, did a little picking up around the house and read up on New Year’s Day superstitions which are weird and some even contradictory.
Christian wanted to go someplace that had karaoke and I suggested the Green Lantern. Some of the gang went to see Dark Crystal at the AFI in Silver Spring and I met up with them afterwards to head to the GL and keep the party going, albeit a little more low-key. We had a good time and it was nice to see Christian again, but the previous evening’s magic had definitely dulled and I was unable (unwilling?) to drink enough to bring it back up again.
And on Monday, it rained, I napped and nested and it was good.
This definitely goes down as one of my best New Year’s ever and I couldn’t have asked for better people to share it with. Here’s to 2006!
Principal Cast:
- Jenifer (
) - Jhim (
) - Michael (
) - Mikey (
) - Danny (
)
