The wife had this idea to have a party and show her favorite musical movie, Hedwig and the Angry Inch (yes, Inch...not Itch....damnit!).  She invited the Usual Suspects, including several HuSi users and readers, all of whom I used to work with at Dell. We ordered 10.2 metric fuckloads of pizza and cleaned the house a bit.

All told, a good time was had.  A+++, would party again.  My favorite individual moments are best kept under wraps.  I do miss seeing my former coworkers on a daily basis. They're a good bunch of people.  And drop-dead attractive, every one of them.

It Wasn't That Kind Of Party

Back in 94 or 95 I went to this party at my cousin's house in El Paso.  I was somewhat single at the time (maybe 70 percent single) and was told that I was going to meet a girl at this party, a friend of a friend of etc.  So I got all gussied up (as gussied as a mullet-having Mustang-driving chain-smoking greasy white kid could get) and drove to the lower-east side, close to the river, close to the kleig lights of the border patrol.  I drove down there bearing gifts: a carton of smokes and a flask of Old Sock.

The party, a backyard barbequeue the size and population of Rhode Island, was in full swing when I arrived.  The cabrito was already half-gone, the quarters of pig and cow were being demolished, and the 300 or so family, neighbors, and friends were many sheets to the proverbial wind.  I was at a disadvantage.

Being a younger more capable version of myself, it took me no time to get caught up.  I'd just finished my fourth cup of whiskey and was taking part in a heated debate of the worth of construction grade pine vs consumer grade fir when a hand descended over my eyes from behind.  Thinking it to be my cousin, I reached up and grabbed the wrists that were attached to the hands and spun around, keeping them captive.  My cousin was a short girl, blonde with blue eyes.  The girl writhing in pain from my half-drunken wrist lock was brown haired and had brown eyes.  And this really amazing caramel skin. And she was sort of wincing in pain.

That's not a great way to meet a chick, but she should have ben expecting it what with the way my family is.  In later conversation, it turned out she was the daughter of a woman who knew my dad, and by knew...well, my dad was a drummer in a rock band for many years.  On finding that out, I lost any interest in pursuing her.

I mean, there's every chance she was my half-sister.

Boring and Sophisticated

The wife and I drove to the breezy cosmopolitan metropolis of San Marcos yesterday to shop for clothes, as a birthday present for her (and out of rampant necessity for me).  I had to engage my Think Positive, Be Positive warm gooey center to overcome my fear of 1) pain and 2) shopping.  My back was OK-ish, a little rough in the morning and when I got out of the car.  But after a middling drive through dense, southern California-style traffic we arrived at our destination, the San Marcos Outlet Mall Thingy.  San Marcos has a huge tract of land turned into a huge strip mall of many factory outlet stores.  There's a Sak's 5th ave store, Perry Ellis, Calvin Klein, Brooks Brothers, etc.  You name it, they probably have a store there.  Mingle that with some low-rent stores and the usual smattering of sunglass, watch, and jewelry stores then multiply it by 20 square miles and you have the Outlet Mall Thingy.  We got there at noon-thirty, had to dance-fight for parking within the confines of the mall thingy, and started what would end up being our four hour tour.  Laurea was apprehensive about my outlook and attitude, but I had a really good time making fun of the fashions, the people, myself, and the general state of the crowd.  There are, at any given time, between three hundred and four hundred thousand people in the complex milling around, bumping in to one another.  I found the least crowd density at the Neiman Marcus (I don't know how to spell any of these store names) outlet, where overstuffed leather furniture was on display next to diamond-crusted Jaguar XJs.  We stayed there a bit, contemplating the handbags made of rare birds and the rhino-encrusted Gulfstream Jet, then marched on to Brooks Brothers, where I found a navy suit jacket that nearly killed me it was so perfectly capable.  I put it on and immediately took on the stature and countenance of a golden god.  I waved at my peeps and they waved back unto me, and it was Good.  I removed the jacket and placed it in a nearby Ark, to be never seen by human eyes again.

The bulk of my purchases were made at a Van Heusen store, where everything that was normally $50 was only $10.  I also purchased a pair of linen trousers from some shop that smelled of coconuts and reeked of high-end golf talk.

My purchases were all tactical and necessary save for one: a black velvet blazer from Perry Ellis.  I have no excuses for that one...it was too ridiculous to pass up and cost only $60.  Can you imagine?  A black velvet blazer? I plan on wearing only it and a pair of these snug cotton boxer briefs to work tomorrow.  I mean, c'mon.  Goddamn.

All in all, it was a good trip.  We did have to dance fight our way back out of the parking lot, and I did have to keep my mind off of the wife's last purchases (some wisps of material from a Jockey store), and in the end I traded my soul for a black velvet blazer, but all told, A++++, would shop again.

At Some Point, You Have to Quit.

T-minus whenever it feels right is in effect.