You can ask me to do many difficult things, but walking slowly is not one of them.
And, sadly, at the Richmond Folk Fest, there are frequent times when I am forced to walk at the snail's pace of humanity. It is excruciating, I can assure you.
And that was after I tried traversing the block along Second and Grace where a quintet of skateboarders had made it their own this Saturday afternoon. A guy walked by me, warning, "You better walk faster, this is now a skate zone."
Then he leaned in chuckling, saying, "Ain't never seen a guy with a gray beard on a skateboard." Clearly you don't spend enough time in certain parts of the city, then. I know 50-somethings who still skate regularly.
Because a writing deadline had kept me from making it down to the Folk Fest until the shank of the afternoon, I was bound to wind up in the crush of music fans heading across the bridge to Brown's Island at the exact same moment (side note: how do people stand to walk that slowly?).
By the time I reached the dance pavilion, I'd run into the radio show host, my favorite hippie musicians, a WRIR DJ and two musicians in search of the best world music. Before the day was over, I also saw the printmaker and her husband, one of my first blog fans and her man, the bookseller and my neighbor, in a particularly gregarious mood after 4 beers (and on his way to score his fifth).
My arrival was ideally timed to find a spot on the dance floor barely four people back from the stage that gave me a bird's eye view (minus his feet) of Memphis soul singer Don Bryant and his band the Bo-Keys, who played without Don on the first song to build the anticipation.
Then the dapper Don joined them and you could just see the joy of performing radiating from his face. This is a 75-year old man who put out his first album in 1969 and his second this summer, a man still marveling at his good fortune.
He kicked off their set by measuring out the ingredients he was going to need - four tablespoons of Memphis guitar, a cup of fatback drumming, a pinch of organ (I was especially taken with the organist's showmanship: every time his hands left the keys, he yanked them back dramatically, as if he'd touched something hot and beamed a smile) - and began strutting and dancing like a man half his age.
As far as I could tell, his only concession to age was alternating a barn burning song with a slow jam to allow him to catch his breath.
When I'd interviewed him a few weeks ago, he'd told me his show would be all about the love and he wasn't kidding. The set included songs about doubting your partner, jealousy, being hurt by love and being true and the ones that weren't danceable were perfect for swaying to, slow dance-style.
Don's voice, honed by years of singing gospel, had no problem producing notes high and low that got the crowd screaming in appreciation. "Don't Turn Your Back on Me" gave us possibly his best lyric:
I'm doing the best that I can
Remember, I'm only a man
Don't worry, we never lose sight of that. Then, just to prove he's still nothing but a man, he closed with "One Ain't Enough (and Two's Too Many)," entreating the adoring crowd to sing along and offering the mic to a few people up front to sing the classic line about having too few or too many women.
Crossing the footbridge after his set ended, I heard a terrified-sounding woman tell her children about the overcrowded bridge, "We're all gonna die." Quality parenting at its best.
Dropping money in one of the Folk Fest's orange buckets to earn my Saturday sticker, I was caught off guard when the guy bearing the bucket threw his arms around me, then turned to the crowd, shouting, "Cheap stickers, free hugs!"
After scoring a foil-wrapped Maryland-style crabcake, I headed up the hill to the Community Foundation stage and soon ran into a DJ/musician friend heading away. I was incredulous that he wasn't staying for Be'la Donna, the all-women go-go group from D.C. I'd been looking forward to all day.
"Doesn't sound like go-go to me," he grumbled. I didn't take him for an expert on all-women go-go groups and kept going to find a better view.
Besides having great hair and all the energy in the world, these women were dressed to impress in bright dresses and tops that made for an explosion of color as they sang, danced and played in high-heeled lock step, singing, "They don't love you like I love you" and doing shout-outs to prove it.
No question it was hot onstage and one of the singers used a large folding fan to cool herself off in between stints at the microphone.
Near where I was standing watching, a mother with an affection for go-go began dancing in circles around her mortified teen-aged daughter who couldn't even look her mother in the eye as she gyrated. A better question might have been, how could the daughter not be moving at all to such an infectious beat?
When their set ended, I began walking, only to hear my name called and see my favorite part time server/professor beckoning me over to meet her friend ("Karen's not too cool to go to a poetry reading," she assured him) and catch up. Before it was all over, we'd covered a multitude of unmentionable topics before moving on to going to Godfrey's Latin night later and the demise of the Virginia State Penitentiary that once stood near where we did.
It's what we like about each other: our interests swing widely.
Walking back up the hill toward home, who should I run into again returning for a second stab at the Folk Fest, but the two musicians with a taste for world music? Turns out they'd taken my advice and parked on my block before hoofing it down rather than wasting time trying to park downtown.
Still, at a festival teeming with people, it was amazing to happen on the same two twice in one day.
With enough music under my belt to be able to live with myself, I finished out the night at the Comedy Coalition to watch three of the house teams do long form improv. It was completely different than what 'd been doing since yesterday and for that reason, it was a fine way to close out my day.
The Johnsons' cue was "planetarium" and that sent them off riffing on scarecrows hitting on people in a corn maze ("Don't flatter yourselves. I said I had pimento cheese!") and a married woman making a Jolene-esque plea to her husband's first wife so he'd pay attention to her instead.
Dollar Machine, in their last performance ever, got "basement" as their starting point, which took us to hoarders, colonies of feral cats and hamsters being buried in Crystal Light containers. Just as funny were alley trolls who put strolling daters to various tests (like demonstrating second base) to see if they'd make sound couples.
If only such a thing could be determined so easily in an alley.
Last up was Big Bosses, comprised of the Coalition's heavy hitters, long time staff and teachers, making light of a phrase from a bad Christmas movie, "It's turbo time!" which quickly became, "It's justice week!"
Before long, we were enmeshed in comedy involving Superpowers like Single Dad Man, Subtraction Man and Inquisition Man and a reporter who persisted in saying, "I'm from the local papes" before taking notes.
A character named Dick Cheney was the bad guy (casting to type), fixing the 2000 election and killing anyone who disagreed with him. These days, you laugh so you don't cry.
But only after you've danced to a Memphis soul singer reminding you to never give up on love. His rationale? "Love's not giving up on you!"
Is that a promise? Because I would be willing to walk slower to make it so.
Showing posts with label richmond comedy coalition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label richmond comedy coalition. Show all posts
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Saturday, September 2, 2017
53rd Place Trophy
So, when did we start celebrating the American labor movement with explosives?
Personally, I just learned about it today while driving to the Northern Neck in the pouring rain. Signs and stands along Route 360 were advertising "Labor Day fireworks!" Huh?
But, as always, it was worth it for my companion and I to spend the day with my parents who never cease to entertain with their pithy political commentary, extensive bird knowledge and hilarious reflections on life.
We had crab melts for lunch, the lump crabmeat from as near as Reedville, and then settled in for hours of conversation while keeping an eye on the non-stop flight patterns of birds incoming for meals at their various feeders despite the continued onslaught of rain.
A couple of tiny hummingbirds were adorable to watch, the sparrows were particularly tenacious in returning and a male cardinal arrived so drenched that the crest on his head was flattened out completely.
From my perch on the wicker settee, I watched as the rain obliterated the land on the far side of the river, making it look like the silvery water met the sky.
For fun, we looked through a massive album full of old photos, ticket stubs, poems and notes that one of my sisters had made for my Dad's 70th birthday. I especially loved the pictures of my parents from the '70s, my Dad with his massive mutton chops and plaid pants with white belt and my Mom in short skirts and hip jewelry.
My groovy parents.
One photo in particular caught my eye because it showed Dad with his six young daughters at the beach in 1969, which led to ribbing about how very fertile Mom had been.
"With three of my daughters, all I had to do was throw my shorts on the bed and she got pregnant," my Dad cracked to uproarious laughter and mild mortification on the part of my companion. Dads will be dads, no?
Of course, once he heard laughter, he couldn't stop himself from going for more, bringing up my, ahem, colorful past and passing judgement on it as only a man who found the love of his life at 23 can. Must be nice to be so lucky that way.
By the time we drove back to Richmond (with only a few minor episodes of hydroplaning, yikes), we had just enough time for a meal in service of my hired mouth before parting ways.
Given that it was already after 7, all I could think was thank goodness you don't have to look good for comedy, so I tidied up and set out (again, this time on foot through massive puddles) in the pouring rain for the Comedy Coalition and some non-Dad humor.
Tonight's show was "What Was I Thinking?" and was based on journal entries from people brave enough to share their adolescent angst.
From her Hello, Kitty locked diary, Kim read several entries from 1997 and 1999 about the posters on her walls, the songs she liked and Anthony, her one true love since 3rd grade, although she was still nervous about fast dancing with him unless there were plenty of people around. Slow dancing, now that was fine.
Life sucks. I might have to move to Cali. I might have scoliosis.
The improv performers wasted no time in riffing on her teen-aged malaise, like using pinhole cameras to avoid eye contact with someone you liked and explaining human vibrators. Best line from a Mom to her daughter: "You're going to be alone because no man is going to want to listen to your music!"
Matt was the next victim willing to bare his journal and, in his case, ephemera for the sake of comedy.
He'd brought posters acquired over time - "You don't get that kind of collection overnight" ("Ace Ventura," Ren & Stimpy, the Road Kill Cafe, Green Day, aliens) - plus the journal he'd begun when he started drinking and writing and a scrapbook of his sports accomplishments (swim team ribbons ranging from 1st place to 23rd place) compiled by - who else? - his Mom.
Your eyes take me too close to a past I'm not ready to look at yet
That mother lode resulted in a bit about his Mom knitting a sweater that incorporated his accomplishments (53rd place in arriving to school on time) and a pair of Converse painted with the names people, including bullies, called him. Another centered on "X Files" and mouth-probing aliens.
Last to sacrifice her dignity on the altar of comedy was Katie with her fuzzy blue leopard spotted journal detailing her first mosh pit at Sauce-a-palooza ("Jeez, it was so spiffy!"), poetry ("Let love come to you. If it doesn't, you don't deserve it." was topped only by "Now and forever, you are an obstetrician. You helped me be born again.") and a list of every cliched '90s CD she absolutely needed (Disturbd, System of a Down, Sublime).
Like Kim's diary entries, Katie's listed every single friend she went places with, even if it was 20 people, sometimes with first and last names and other times with just a first name and last initial, as if to keep their identity secret. Hilarious.
Clinging to you like a pair of wet jeans
Heavy on the wet
No one get deep like a teen-aged girl.
It was some rich material to pull from and the performers mocked high school poetry competitions (one teacher trading a year of overseeing detention to get out of judging the competition) and girls who started thinking marriage after a boy did no more than talk to them, all of which involved ridiculously long lists of friends' names ("Was that Cher B. or Cher M? I think it was Cher C.").
This rainy day turned out to be full of laughs start to finish. They say you have to let comedy come to you and if it doesn't, you don't deserve it.
Hell, I don't mind driving or walking to it if the laughs are good.
Personally, I just learned about it today while driving to the Northern Neck in the pouring rain. Signs and stands along Route 360 were advertising "Labor Day fireworks!" Huh?
But, as always, it was worth it for my companion and I to spend the day with my parents who never cease to entertain with their pithy political commentary, extensive bird knowledge and hilarious reflections on life.
We had crab melts for lunch, the lump crabmeat from as near as Reedville, and then settled in for hours of conversation while keeping an eye on the non-stop flight patterns of birds incoming for meals at their various feeders despite the continued onslaught of rain.
A couple of tiny hummingbirds were adorable to watch, the sparrows were particularly tenacious in returning and a male cardinal arrived so drenched that the crest on his head was flattened out completely.
From my perch on the wicker settee, I watched as the rain obliterated the land on the far side of the river, making it look like the silvery water met the sky.
For fun, we looked through a massive album full of old photos, ticket stubs, poems and notes that one of my sisters had made for my Dad's 70th birthday. I especially loved the pictures of my parents from the '70s, my Dad with his massive mutton chops and plaid pants with white belt and my Mom in short skirts and hip jewelry.
My groovy parents.
One photo in particular caught my eye because it showed Dad with his six young daughters at the beach in 1969, which led to ribbing about how very fertile Mom had been.
"With three of my daughters, all I had to do was throw my shorts on the bed and she got pregnant," my Dad cracked to uproarious laughter and mild mortification on the part of my companion. Dads will be dads, no?
Of course, once he heard laughter, he couldn't stop himself from going for more, bringing up my, ahem, colorful past and passing judgement on it as only a man who found the love of his life at 23 can. Must be nice to be so lucky that way.
By the time we drove back to Richmond (with only a few minor episodes of hydroplaning, yikes), we had just enough time for a meal in service of my hired mouth before parting ways.
Given that it was already after 7, all I could think was thank goodness you don't have to look good for comedy, so I tidied up and set out (again, this time on foot through massive puddles) in the pouring rain for the Comedy Coalition and some non-Dad humor.
Tonight's show was "What Was I Thinking?" and was based on journal entries from people brave enough to share their adolescent angst.
From her Hello, Kitty locked diary, Kim read several entries from 1997 and 1999 about the posters on her walls, the songs she liked and Anthony, her one true love since 3rd grade, although she was still nervous about fast dancing with him unless there were plenty of people around. Slow dancing, now that was fine.
Life sucks. I might have to move to Cali. I might have scoliosis.
The improv performers wasted no time in riffing on her teen-aged malaise, like using pinhole cameras to avoid eye contact with someone you liked and explaining human vibrators. Best line from a Mom to her daughter: "You're going to be alone because no man is going to want to listen to your music!"
Matt was the next victim willing to bare his journal and, in his case, ephemera for the sake of comedy.
He'd brought posters acquired over time - "You don't get that kind of collection overnight" ("Ace Ventura," Ren & Stimpy, the Road Kill Cafe, Green Day, aliens) - plus the journal he'd begun when he started drinking and writing and a scrapbook of his sports accomplishments (swim team ribbons ranging from 1st place to 23rd place) compiled by - who else? - his Mom.
Your eyes take me too close to a past I'm not ready to look at yet
That mother lode resulted in a bit about his Mom knitting a sweater that incorporated his accomplishments (53rd place in arriving to school on time) and a pair of Converse painted with the names people, including bullies, called him. Another centered on "X Files" and mouth-probing aliens.
Last to sacrifice her dignity on the altar of comedy was Katie with her fuzzy blue leopard spotted journal detailing her first mosh pit at Sauce-a-palooza ("Jeez, it was so spiffy!"), poetry ("Let love come to you. If it doesn't, you don't deserve it." was topped only by "Now and forever, you are an obstetrician. You helped me be born again.") and a list of every cliched '90s CD she absolutely needed (Disturbd, System of a Down, Sublime).
Like Kim's diary entries, Katie's listed every single friend she went places with, even if it was 20 people, sometimes with first and last names and other times with just a first name and last initial, as if to keep their identity secret. Hilarious.
Clinging to you like a pair of wet jeans
Heavy on the wet
No one get deep like a teen-aged girl.
It was some rich material to pull from and the performers mocked high school poetry competitions (one teacher trading a year of overseeing detention to get out of judging the competition) and girls who started thinking marriage after a boy did no more than talk to them, all of which involved ridiculously long lists of friends' names ("Was that Cher B. or Cher M? I think it was Cher C.").
This rainy day turned out to be full of laughs start to finish. They say you have to let comedy come to you and if it doesn't, you don't deserve it.
Hell, I don't mind driving or walking to it if the laughs are good.
Sunday, August 13, 2017
Hard to Handle
How do you blog about your innocuous Saturday when white supremacist terrorists are mowing down peaceful protesters an hour away?
The same way a person deals with any of the unpleasantness of life - heartbreak, sickness and death of a loved one, natural disaster - I would guess, so any way you can.
When I left for my walk, I knew several friends were in Charlottesville as part of the resistance to the rally, but other than observations that some brawling had been happening, they seemed to think things were going well.
Walking down Fifth Street, I passed two motorcycle guys in leather vests dragging a cooler up the hill. When I commented that surely the load was lighter coming up than it had been going down, the one with the vest marked "chaplain" offered me (and a family exiting their SUV) bottles of cold water from his cooler (thereby proving that even heathens can benefit from a chaplain's ministrations).
Friday night's rain meant that some of the more elaborate spiderwebs on Brown's Island were dotted with raindrops, looking luminescent and lacy in the partly cloudy light.
I wasn't surprised to see how un-populated the pipeline was with just one guy fairly far ahead of me. What did surprise me was when he stopped, turned and began shooting photos of the pipeline where yours truly just happened to be walking.
For a nanosecond, I thought I was being smart by passing him, but now I'm not so sure.
Under a massive rock stood two men off to the side and submerged far enough that they looked to be naked, with the nearby rapids splashing water on their bodies. Ever the art historian, it looked to me like a study for Frederick Bazille's "Summer Scene."
Climbing out on to the rocks to put my feet in the water, the scent of men's cologne wafted toward me, although I couldn't see another person around. But it persisted and a while later, I saw a quartet of kayakers paddling downstream. One even waved at me.
As I was waving back, I couldn't help but wonder if one of these guys had decided to bathe in cologne before shooting the rapids this morning. Maybe what I'd been smelling had been traveling across river and not island.
Walking home along Broad Street, I overheard a young woman tell another that a state of emergency had been declared and her friend, busy texting, asked, "Why?" in a completely uninterested way. Clearly more had happened in Charlottesville since I'd left.
As I breezed through Jackson Ward, I spotted a family standing on a corner, clearly looking for help, so I offered my services. All the nice Australian tourists wanted was a lunch suggestion and preferably someplace their three young sons would be happy and I delivered three options.
They voiced their gratitude but offered me no "G'day, mate" as I walked on.
Facebook gave me all the unpleasant updates, although when people began posting video of the neo-Nazi driving into the crowd of counter protesters, I had no stomach for watching such a thing. Seeing photographs of people flying in the air as the car hit them was horrific enough for me.
I was most interested in reading the accounts of people I knew who were there, but just as compelling was the online commentary by my friends of color. I don't think there's any doubt that if a black group had organized this rally, the police presence would have been far larger and more proactive.
Sadly. At least none of my friends had been hurt.
I wasn't sorry to turn off my computer and go eat in service of my hired mouth while discussing the day's mayhem with a like-minded sane person. It seems forever ago that dinner dates didn't have to involve a rehash of whatever the latest can-you-believe-it-scenario-of-the-day is.
We decided to drown our sorrows on the patio at Saison where we acted as the clean up crew, finishing off bottles by having the last two glasses of a Jura bubbly before doing the same with a Willamette Valley Rose.
"Well, if we didn't, who would?" my date inquired, tongue firmly in cheek. Isn't that the staff's job?
Next to us was a guy with his adoring dog Jada Boo (who wasn't above snapping at a stranger) and on the other end, a trio of tattooed young women discussing all the things the men they've gone out with don't know.
The night isn't long enough for that subject to be exhausted, ladies.
Because today had been a difficult one in terms of where our country seems to be, it only made sense to spend the last of it laughing, so we rounded the corner from Saison and went to Comedy Coalition's late show.
If long form improv by the most senior members of the comedy troupe can't distract you for a while, you may as well call it a day. But it did and before long we were laughing at all of it and, for one bit where the guys slipped into a pretend language, so were the comedians.So hard they couldn't talk.
The bit was funny but their reactions were funnier.
It was a good thing, too, because I arrived home to read that people had died yesterday because of the rally over white supremacy. That was sobering news to learn.
It's difficult to process everything that happened in Charlottesville, but personally, today changed my mind. Up until now, I still thought that context could allow the statues on Monument Avenue to stand, probably because no art geek wants to lose public sculpture.
Wrong, so, so wrong. Those statues need to be relocated to someplace where only people who choose to view them can do so. They have no place on any street in our city.
If calling a statue-less street Monument Avenue bothers you, then let's replace the losing white men sculptures with some celebrating our non-white past (say, Gabriel Prosser, John Lewis or John Jasper and for heaven's sake, some women) and begin to unite as a city.
Before going to bed, I sat on the balcony and admired my lone moonflower in the near-darkness. It feels impossible to take anything for granted anymore when normal changes so often.
Only resistance remains a constant now.
The same way a person deals with any of the unpleasantness of life - heartbreak, sickness and death of a loved one, natural disaster - I would guess, so any way you can.
When I left for my walk, I knew several friends were in Charlottesville as part of the resistance to the rally, but other than observations that some brawling had been happening, they seemed to think things were going well.
Walking down Fifth Street, I passed two motorcycle guys in leather vests dragging a cooler up the hill. When I commented that surely the load was lighter coming up than it had been going down, the one with the vest marked "chaplain" offered me (and a family exiting their SUV) bottles of cold water from his cooler (thereby proving that even heathens can benefit from a chaplain's ministrations).
Friday night's rain meant that some of the more elaborate spiderwebs on Brown's Island were dotted with raindrops, looking luminescent and lacy in the partly cloudy light.
I wasn't surprised to see how un-populated the pipeline was with just one guy fairly far ahead of me. What did surprise me was when he stopped, turned and began shooting photos of the pipeline where yours truly just happened to be walking.
For a nanosecond, I thought I was being smart by passing him, but now I'm not so sure.
Under a massive rock stood two men off to the side and submerged far enough that they looked to be naked, with the nearby rapids splashing water on their bodies. Ever the art historian, it looked to me like a study for Frederick Bazille's "Summer Scene."
Climbing out on to the rocks to put my feet in the water, the scent of men's cologne wafted toward me, although I couldn't see another person around. But it persisted and a while later, I saw a quartet of kayakers paddling downstream. One even waved at me.
As I was waving back, I couldn't help but wonder if one of these guys had decided to bathe in cologne before shooting the rapids this morning. Maybe what I'd been smelling had been traveling across river and not island.
Walking home along Broad Street, I overheard a young woman tell another that a state of emergency had been declared and her friend, busy texting, asked, "Why?" in a completely uninterested way. Clearly more had happened in Charlottesville since I'd left.
As I breezed through Jackson Ward, I spotted a family standing on a corner, clearly looking for help, so I offered my services. All the nice Australian tourists wanted was a lunch suggestion and preferably someplace their three young sons would be happy and I delivered three options.
They voiced their gratitude but offered me no "G'day, mate" as I walked on.
Facebook gave me all the unpleasant updates, although when people began posting video of the neo-Nazi driving into the crowd of counter protesters, I had no stomach for watching such a thing. Seeing photographs of people flying in the air as the car hit them was horrific enough for me.
I was most interested in reading the accounts of people I knew who were there, but just as compelling was the online commentary by my friends of color. I don't think there's any doubt that if a black group had organized this rally, the police presence would have been far larger and more proactive.
Sadly. At least none of my friends had been hurt.
I wasn't sorry to turn off my computer and go eat in service of my hired mouth while discussing the day's mayhem with a like-minded sane person. It seems forever ago that dinner dates didn't have to involve a rehash of whatever the latest can-you-believe-it-scenario-of-the-day is.
We decided to drown our sorrows on the patio at Saison where we acted as the clean up crew, finishing off bottles by having the last two glasses of a Jura bubbly before doing the same with a Willamette Valley Rose.
"Well, if we didn't, who would?" my date inquired, tongue firmly in cheek. Isn't that the staff's job?
Next to us was a guy with his adoring dog Jada Boo (who wasn't above snapping at a stranger) and on the other end, a trio of tattooed young women discussing all the things the men they've gone out with don't know.
The night isn't long enough for that subject to be exhausted, ladies.
Because today had been a difficult one in terms of where our country seems to be, it only made sense to spend the last of it laughing, so we rounded the corner from Saison and went to Comedy Coalition's late show.
If long form improv by the most senior members of the comedy troupe can't distract you for a while, you may as well call it a day. But it did and before long we were laughing at all of it and, for one bit where the guys slipped into a pretend language, so were the comedians.So hard they couldn't talk.
The bit was funny but their reactions were funnier.
It was a good thing, too, because I arrived home to read that people had died yesterday because of the rally over white supremacy. That was sobering news to learn.
It's difficult to process everything that happened in Charlottesville, but personally, today changed my mind. Up until now, I still thought that context could allow the statues on Monument Avenue to stand, probably because no art geek wants to lose public sculpture.
Wrong, so, so wrong. Those statues need to be relocated to someplace where only people who choose to view them can do so. They have no place on any street in our city.
If calling a statue-less street Monument Avenue bothers you, then let's replace the losing white men sculptures with some celebrating our non-white past (say, Gabriel Prosser, John Lewis or John Jasper and for heaven's sake, some women) and begin to unite as a city.
Before going to bed, I sat on the balcony and admired my lone moonflower in the near-darkness. It feels impossible to take anything for granted anymore when normal changes so often.
Only resistance remains a constant now.
Sunday, July 23, 2017
Take Door #2, Son
Sometimes you just need to take a break and catch up with friends.
That meant brunch at Helen's with the girlfriend I'd run into at several shows in the past two weeks, but hadn't sat down to dish with in eons. We'd both had too much life going on of late not to make time to debrief the other.
We timed it just right, sliding into one of the two window tables just as the early crowd was paying their checks. I'd forgotten about the charming flowered oil cloths that lend such kistch charm to the tables at the classic Richmond spot.
Because it had been far too long, we took turns eating and talking, so I got to hear about her life while diving into a well-constructed BLT with avocado on crusty sourdough toast while she listened intently to me while inhaling huevos rancheros.
In that typical Richmond-is-so-small way, when she began telling me about a guy who'd caught her eye but is looking at moving to the Big Easy, I knew who she was talking about before she even mentioned his name. When I shared details about my recent second trip to the beach, she already knew about the group house I'd gone to and with whom.
Small world.
We have no true secrets in Richmond, just the most delicate tendrils connecting us all whether we know it or not.
When we parted ways after giving each other love life advice, it was to do weekend girly-type things: go shopping for bras and flowerpots.
My evening's plans had been decided a few days ago when FotoBoy reached out to me.
I'm dateless Saturday I just found out and am wondering if you wanna do something with me?
Coincidentally, I was also dateless tonight, so I immediately suggested sharing some laughs at the Comedy Coalition, which got an enthusiastic thumbs-up from him. My idea was to meet here and walk the 6 blocks there even if it was still 97 degrees outside and he knew me well enough to agree.
En route, we passed a dozen or so people milling about and taking photos at the Maggie Walker statue and he marveled at the sheer amount of merchandise on the sidewalk in front of Circle Thrift. How do they get away with that?
Although we were greeted by a major blast of cold air inside the comedy theater, the air soon rose to a comfortable but not especially cold level once humans started filing in and soon we were joined by a third, a buddy of his, also dateless and looking for some Saturday night fun.
Turns out he'd found out 2 hours too late about "Stop Making Sense" playing the Byrd the other night and was mildly envious I'd been there, at least until he heard about the interview with Jonathan Demme and David Byrne that proceeded it and then he was hugely jealous.
I, in turn, was mildly envious he'd seen the film originally at the Biograph in 1984 when he was in 10th grade. I only became hugely jealous when he shared that he'd seen Demme and Werner Herzog interviewed in NYC and actually spoke to Herzog on the street before the event.
We put our petty jealousies aside when the show began.
Host Ryan reminded the crowd that what we were about to see would never be repeated and exhorted us to, "Breathe it in! Live in the moment!" before our evening of long-form improv began.
Ambassadors were up first and their verbal starting point was "old pants." That somehow took us to a closed Old Navy store ("I thought I had some idea of what capitalism would be like when it collapsed, but no!"), remorse about Circuit City closing and memories about the highs and lows of Orange Julius (there's a throwback).
The team was fairly young, so their comedy included references to pretentious young people, technology ("I'm swiping left and he\s still here!" about an intruder) and fluids.
Their climax involved kicking down a door, cocking a shotgun and yelling, "Biscuit!" but you had to be there to see how they got there.
Second team Da Vinci got started with a cue of "bike tires" and a couple of witches wanting to switch from brooms to bikes to save their magic.
Naturally, the witches weren't very nice. "Do you burn children?" they were asked. No, why, they wanted to know? "I have a nephew I don't like."
They made us laugh with comedy that referenced "Game of Thrones," accusations of infidelity, "Survivor" and boob sweat. There was also a cigarette-smoking bad father who needed to learn to hate less.
Big Bosses, the final team, was made up of the long-standing coalition members, the people who've been doing this since before they had a brick and mortar place to do it and were nomads.
These are the people who make it look so easy.
Their cue came from a guy in the front row after they asked the audience what our favorite soundtrack album was and the guy shouted out "Titanic." He was then mercilessly razzed about whether he knew anything else on the soundtrack besides "My Heart Will Go On" and he didn't seem to.
Naturally, their improv began on the bow of the Titanic, with passengers explaining how they got their tickets (murder, theft, death) and how they planned to find the American dream and segued into a bit about a Russian and American sub in the Arctic Ocean, each being manned by a guy who'd eaten too much chocolate and needed to poop.
One of the funniest bits concerned two passengers on a first date, one who was obsessed with his dead grandparents to the point of taking her to the cemetery to talk to the man who'd buried them.
After amusing herself playing Candy Crush while he chats up the gravedigger, she gets tired of waiting for him to finish questioning the man about them.
"Hey! You can live in the past or come with me and at least get a hand job!" she calls out, bored and impatient.
I thought I had some idea how my Saturday night would end, but no. Hand jobs aside, I think we can all agree there's no point in living in the past.
And biscuits? Well, they'are always a good idea.
That meant brunch at Helen's with the girlfriend I'd run into at several shows in the past two weeks, but hadn't sat down to dish with in eons. We'd both had too much life going on of late not to make time to debrief the other.
We timed it just right, sliding into one of the two window tables just as the early crowd was paying their checks. I'd forgotten about the charming flowered oil cloths that lend such kistch charm to the tables at the classic Richmond spot.
Because it had been far too long, we took turns eating and talking, so I got to hear about her life while diving into a well-constructed BLT with avocado on crusty sourdough toast while she listened intently to me while inhaling huevos rancheros.
In that typical Richmond-is-so-small way, when she began telling me about a guy who'd caught her eye but is looking at moving to the Big Easy, I knew who she was talking about before she even mentioned his name. When I shared details about my recent second trip to the beach, she already knew about the group house I'd gone to and with whom.
Small world.
We have no true secrets in Richmond, just the most delicate tendrils connecting us all whether we know it or not.
When we parted ways after giving each other love life advice, it was to do weekend girly-type things: go shopping for bras and flowerpots.
My evening's plans had been decided a few days ago when FotoBoy reached out to me.
I'm dateless Saturday I just found out and am wondering if you wanna do something with me?
Coincidentally, I was also dateless tonight, so I immediately suggested sharing some laughs at the Comedy Coalition, which got an enthusiastic thumbs-up from him. My idea was to meet here and walk the 6 blocks there even if it was still 97 degrees outside and he knew me well enough to agree.
En route, we passed a dozen or so people milling about and taking photos at the Maggie Walker statue and he marveled at the sheer amount of merchandise on the sidewalk in front of Circle Thrift. How do they get away with that?
Although we were greeted by a major blast of cold air inside the comedy theater, the air soon rose to a comfortable but not especially cold level once humans started filing in and soon we were joined by a third, a buddy of his, also dateless and looking for some Saturday night fun.
Turns out he'd found out 2 hours too late about "Stop Making Sense" playing the Byrd the other night and was mildly envious I'd been there, at least until he heard about the interview with Jonathan Demme and David Byrne that proceeded it and then he was hugely jealous.
I, in turn, was mildly envious he'd seen the film originally at the Biograph in 1984 when he was in 10th grade. I only became hugely jealous when he shared that he'd seen Demme and Werner Herzog interviewed in NYC and actually spoke to Herzog on the street before the event.
We put our petty jealousies aside when the show began.
Host Ryan reminded the crowd that what we were about to see would never be repeated and exhorted us to, "Breathe it in! Live in the moment!" before our evening of long-form improv began.
Ambassadors were up first and their verbal starting point was "old pants." That somehow took us to a closed Old Navy store ("I thought I had some idea of what capitalism would be like when it collapsed, but no!"), remorse about Circuit City closing and memories about the highs and lows of Orange Julius (there's a throwback).
The team was fairly young, so their comedy included references to pretentious young people, technology ("I'm swiping left and he\s still here!" about an intruder) and fluids.
Their climax involved kicking down a door, cocking a shotgun and yelling, "Biscuit!" but you had to be there to see how they got there.
Second team Da Vinci got started with a cue of "bike tires" and a couple of witches wanting to switch from brooms to bikes to save their magic.
Naturally, the witches weren't very nice. "Do you burn children?" they were asked. No, why, they wanted to know? "I have a nephew I don't like."
They made us laugh with comedy that referenced "Game of Thrones," accusations of infidelity, "Survivor" and boob sweat. There was also a cigarette-smoking bad father who needed to learn to hate less.
Big Bosses, the final team, was made up of the long-standing coalition members, the people who've been doing this since before they had a brick and mortar place to do it and were nomads.
These are the people who make it look so easy.
Their cue came from a guy in the front row after they asked the audience what our favorite soundtrack album was and the guy shouted out "Titanic." He was then mercilessly razzed about whether he knew anything else on the soundtrack besides "My Heart Will Go On" and he didn't seem to.
Naturally, their improv began on the bow of the Titanic, with passengers explaining how they got their tickets (murder, theft, death) and how they planned to find the American dream and segued into a bit about a Russian and American sub in the Arctic Ocean, each being manned by a guy who'd eaten too much chocolate and needed to poop.
One of the funniest bits concerned two passengers on a first date, one who was obsessed with his dead grandparents to the point of taking her to the cemetery to talk to the man who'd buried them.
After amusing herself playing Candy Crush while he chats up the gravedigger, she gets tired of waiting for him to finish questioning the man about them.
"Hey! You can live in the past or come with me and at least get a hand job!" she calls out, bored and impatient.
I thought I had some idea how my Saturday night would end, but no. Hand jobs aside, I think we can all agree there's no point in living in the past.
And biscuits? Well, they'are always a good idea.
Friday, April 21, 2017
The Ghastly Menace
Fritos are not just for food anymore...and other cautionary tales from April 20.
Visiting the Northern Neck today came with the added bonus of my oldest nephew being there as well as getting to explain the genesis of the holiday 4/20 to my Mom while my Dad and nephew chortled mightily. Mom just rolled her eyes.
It was over a lazy lunch on the screened-in porch that we began discussing the significance of Fritos in the cosmic scheme of things. Family law dictates that liverwurst sandwiches can only be served with Fritos, and despite not having liverwurst today, we were having Fritos. Nephew pointed out that they were the heaviest chip because of all the oil, which makes them handy when he's hiking the Appalachian Trail.
Fritos can be used as emergency fire starters, he informs us, like oil-soaked kindling sticks you can buy. Tor prove his point, he lighted one - not even a Scoop, just a regular one - right there at the lunch table. It flared at the touch of a match, impressing us with its instantaneous flame.
I only hope the Girl Scouts know this.
It was a gorgeous day to be at the river - all kinds of fragrant flowers and bushes in bloom, the water half a dozen shades of blue - and an unexpected opportunity to be learning which snacks are flammable. I'm always happy to learn.
Keeping the holiday theme going, I put on my flowered rubber boots to walk over in the pouring rain to Coalition Theater for "It's a Wonderful Plant," a comedic take on a world without weed (see: Frank Capra, spinning in his grave) and an outgrowth of the "High There!" live comedy series - I'd seen three humorous episodes - they'd done.
The boots ensured that no puddle was too deep to ford, no downspout too powerful to stick my foot under, no uneven juncture of the pavement unworthy of exploration. Granted, a few overly-zealous splashes did result in some interior boot splattering, but, truthfully, I brought that on myself, and my feet were barefoot inside the boots so what did it matter?
No need to worry about a lot on 4/20. Better to laugh.
With a guardian angel trying to earn his bong, "It's a Wonderful Plant" made a strong case for rollin' and bowlin' over reading "Cat Fancy" magazine and praying with your family, which is apparently what happens when people don't have weed. Oddly enough, in a world without pot, people use McDonald's coffee to alter their reality and things are really tense, making for some pretty hilarious sketch comedy.
And once live comedic actors have reminded you that the world is a better place where the devil's salad is served, any earnest 4/20 celebrant (or, ahem, any pathetic student of popular culture who hasn't seen it) really has no choice but to head to the Byrd to see a late screening of "Reefer Madness."
Like me, the ballet dancer (who moved here last Fall from Charlotte and is loving Richmond) in front of me in the popcorn line was a "Reefer" virgin and, like me, she was there as a student of cultural history. Where I was able to blow her mind was in telling her that even when I was in college, this was a very old and dated cult classic film.
"Wow, I had no idea it was that old," she marveled, with no clue of the implication there.
The sheer melodrama of a black and white 1936 church-made piece of propaganda about the violent narcotic and unspeakable scourge that was destroying the fabric of American youth had those of us in the audience howling in laughter just reading the introduction. And my goodness, when we got to the scenery-chewing histrionics of the low-budget actors, the crowd's younger members were groaning and giggling in agony at the remnants of old-school silent-era over-acting.
Now that I think about it, it sounded a lot like the uncontrollable laughter that the film said was the first effect of using the demon drug.
Once I'd had the full range of 4/20 experiences, I could wade through the sticky air to go home. Walking past my neighbor's porch, he called out asking how I was doing tonight. Great, I told him, because it feels like a warm summer night and I love that. "You can't ask for more!" he called as I rounded my garden.
Unless it's for more Fritos, I can't. I don't.
Visiting the Northern Neck today came with the added bonus of my oldest nephew being there as well as getting to explain the genesis of the holiday 4/20 to my Mom while my Dad and nephew chortled mightily. Mom just rolled her eyes.
It was over a lazy lunch on the screened-in porch that we began discussing the significance of Fritos in the cosmic scheme of things. Family law dictates that liverwurst sandwiches can only be served with Fritos, and despite not having liverwurst today, we were having Fritos. Nephew pointed out that they were the heaviest chip because of all the oil, which makes them handy when he's hiking the Appalachian Trail.
Fritos can be used as emergency fire starters, he informs us, like oil-soaked kindling sticks you can buy. Tor prove his point, he lighted one - not even a Scoop, just a regular one - right there at the lunch table. It flared at the touch of a match, impressing us with its instantaneous flame.
I only hope the Girl Scouts know this.
It was a gorgeous day to be at the river - all kinds of fragrant flowers and bushes in bloom, the water half a dozen shades of blue - and an unexpected opportunity to be learning which snacks are flammable. I'm always happy to learn.
Keeping the holiday theme going, I put on my flowered rubber boots to walk over in the pouring rain to Coalition Theater for "It's a Wonderful Plant," a comedic take on a world without weed (see: Frank Capra, spinning in his grave) and an outgrowth of the "High There!" live comedy series - I'd seen three humorous episodes - they'd done.
The boots ensured that no puddle was too deep to ford, no downspout too powerful to stick my foot under, no uneven juncture of the pavement unworthy of exploration. Granted, a few overly-zealous splashes did result in some interior boot splattering, but, truthfully, I brought that on myself, and my feet were barefoot inside the boots so what did it matter?
No need to worry about a lot on 4/20. Better to laugh.
With a guardian angel trying to earn his bong, "It's a Wonderful Plant" made a strong case for rollin' and bowlin' over reading "Cat Fancy" magazine and praying with your family, which is apparently what happens when people don't have weed. Oddly enough, in a world without pot, people use McDonald's coffee to alter their reality and things are really tense, making for some pretty hilarious sketch comedy.
And once live comedic actors have reminded you that the world is a better place where the devil's salad is served, any earnest 4/20 celebrant (or, ahem, any pathetic student of popular culture who hasn't seen it) really has no choice but to head to the Byrd to see a late screening of "Reefer Madness."
Like me, the ballet dancer (who moved here last Fall from Charlotte and is loving Richmond) in front of me in the popcorn line was a "Reefer" virgin and, like me, she was there as a student of cultural history. Where I was able to blow her mind was in telling her that even when I was in college, this was a very old and dated cult classic film.
"Wow, I had no idea it was that old," she marveled, with no clue of the implication there.
The sheer melodrama of a black and white 1936 church-made piece of propaganda about the violent narcotic and unspeakable scourge that was destroying the fabric of American youth had those of us in the audience howling in laughter just reading the introduction. And my goodness, when we got to the scenery-chewing histrionics of the low-budget actors, the crowd's younger members were groaning and giggling in agony at the remnants of old-school silent-era over-acting.
Now that I think about it, it sounded a lot like the uncontrollable laughter that the film said was the first effect of using the demon drug.
Once I'd had the full range of 4/20 experiences, I could wade through the sticky air to go home. Walking past my neighbor's porch, he called out asking how I was doing tonight. Great, I told him, because it feels like a warm summer night and I love that. "You can't ask for more!" he called as I rounded my garden.
Unless it's for more Fritos, I can't. I don't.
Saturday, March 4, 2017
Pies and Thighs
Call it just another laid-back Friday in the city, but don't call it casual.
A girl could be forgiven for wishing that casual Friday was just the slippery slope that finally leads to a four-day workweek, but the pragmatist in me has to accept that's it's become no more than an automatic default when describing the last day of the workweek.
The four VCU students bursting with Friday energy and spilling out of a house on Marshall Street when I walked by (yes, walked, despite the cold and wind because my day in the country meant I'd had no walk today) had no interest in anything except yelling f*ck in various phrases (it, you, that, -in' A) to demonstrate how ready they were - or not - for the weekend.
Studied casual, personified.
The Richmond Symphony, on the other hand, was definitely trying to be with Dominion Casual Fridays - a dreadful moniker for several reasons - a great chance to see the Symphony on the cheap and still have your whole Friday night ahead of you.
To acquaint an atypical symphony audience with Stravinsky's ballet score "Petrouchka," conductor Stephen Smith took the time to explain the story of the ballet, demonstrate which instruments represented each of the three characters in the ballet and share how drums would mean "end of scene."
The ballet's first scene was set during - wait for it - the Shrovetide Fair, which I now know means pancake-eating Fat Tuesday and the two days before.
Leave it to art to teach me about religion while listening to the dulcet tones of contra-bassoon and bassoon.
Walking down Grace Street afterward, I overheard a young woman telling her date how much she'd been able to imagine the ballet dancers after the conductor explained the story and instrumentation. Her date asked if she'd ever been to the ballet. "No, but now I want to go," she said aspirationally.
Well done there, Richmond Symphony.
Because it was First Friday, there was no reason not to return to Candela Gallery and see the rest of "Chop Shop," the digitally-manipulated photography show I hadn't had time to see all of last night. Seeing it again, my brain struggled just as hard to read the images with an eye for truth and once again gave up in frustration.
Headed to the door, I ran into a photographer friend and dove immediately down the rabbit hole of process-focused photography, deciding that it was our age that precluded us accepting the images without seeing them as untruths.
Fact is, "Chop Shop" is the kind of photography show that starts conversations as people react and compare impressions, whether accepting or rejecting what they're seeing.
I slid into Gallery 5 briefly to check out the print sale before moving over to Big Secret to see the poster reveal for April's Mozart Festival. The Shepard Fairey-like red, white and blue image of Mozart will make an excellent reminder of the dark days after we lost the noble President pictured in the original poster.
A fellow Jackson Ward neighbor and I talked about his adjustment to living with his girlfriend and composting, two challenging but worthwhile efforts for a man who'll turn 37 years old tomorrow. When I found out he's also part of Team Mozart, I put in my vote for Nate's Bagels as part of the event.
Big Secret's owner asked if I'd had Nate's black sesame bagel yet (claims it's a religious experience and says he's Jewish so he knows) - um, no - only to admit that it's a minuscule number that are made and held for certain very special individuals.
As for people like you and me, my friend, we'll never even lay eyes on a black sesame bagel.
Richmond Comedy Coalition was offering "Casual Friday with RVA Tonight" - another god-awful label - for the late show featuring the cast and crew of the fake news show with big guests (Senator Tim Kaine, Governor Terry McAuliffe) telling stories and improvising on them.
Before the show even began, a stellar slide show was projected with images from RVA Tonight sketches, panels and guest interviews. So it was that I recognized a photo of Mayor Levar Stoney in his red and white Christmas sweater showing off the Levar Stoney socks his "team" had given him (familiar since I'd been at the original show), Beau Cribbs with Nutsy the Squirrel, Tim Kaine cracking up at something.
Over a dozen cast and crew members took the stage, sitting down in chairs to reminisce about favorite guests (McAuliffe is apparently hilariously inappropriate), sketches they pitched that never made it on to the show, moments gone wrong onstage and anything else they cared to bring up.
Josh told of a sci-fi sketch he pitched repeatedly that was rejected repeatedly, so Beau suggested he try pitching it to the audience. Most looked bored while one guy laughed. One.
"I write niche, artisanal jokes," Josh said sarcastically, trying to explain his limited appeal. I found him laugh out loud-worthy when he played a hapless male poet with no clue about women, saying things such as, "How do I convey the vastness of my sorrow! With rhymes!"
Grace, who's responsible for costumes and wigs, recalled one sketch that called for a voice-over but they'd forgotten to write it, and the sketch made no sense without it. Another time, the entire cast had forgotten they needed a turkey costume until 20 minutes before show time and then had to scramble.
During a sketch where McAuliffe's aide tells him, "Okay, Governor, today we're going to go over good touch and bad touch," and promptly grabs the Governor by his lower thigh, Beau as McAuliffe whines, "Being governor is hard!"
But being an audience member was informative. Beau told the audience that a past show's research had proven that the Comedy Coalition building had originally been a horse hospital (naturally abbreviated to "horse-pital" for the sake of comedy), a bit of neighborhood lore I'd never heard.
The cast talked about "refillable bits," sketches that could be dragged back out and refreshed for a second or third round of laughs.
When Beau reminded Matt that he'd said that his family used to own Frederick Douglass, Matt was outraged. "I did not say that!" and here he paused for dramatic effect. "I said my family once owned Booker T. Washington!" And so the comedy goes.
When the guy who does the graphic work for RVA Tonight mentioned how he liked to slide in sly asides and insider jokes "to reward our regulars," Beau laughed out loud. "Both of them!"
They all remembered the frustration of performing in the Science Museum's IMAX Dome because the dome's design means that sound travels only from the stage to the seats and not vice versa. So it was that the improv team did an hour and a half show without ever hearing a single laugh.
Not because the audience wasn't laughing, just because the sound wasn't reaching their ears. Ouch.
After one of her first performances, Lauren recalled being complimented by a fellow cast member for how well she'd acted out a panic attack onstage, which of course had been real.
That led to a seriously hysterical hall-of-mirrors type sketch where a couple happens on a woman having an anxiety attack and think it's performance art. Someone else seems them arguing about it and presumes they're street theater. Another couple spots them from across the street and wonders if it's a notable guerrilla theater performance group. And on and on...
No one takes anything happening in the real world as reality. Say, that sounds an awful lot like looking at photographs of people and things that never actually existed but were documented as if they did.
Casual Friday is perhaps the ultimate niche, artisanal joke.
A girl could be forgiven for wishing that casual Friday was just the slippery slope that finally leads to a four-day workweek, but the pragmatist in me has to accept that's it's become no more than an automatic default when describing the last day of the workweek.
The four VCU students bursting with Friday energy and spilling out of a house on Marshall Street when I walked by (yes, walked, despite the cold and wind because my day in the country meant I'd had no walk today) had no interest in anything except yelling f*ck in various phrases (it, you, that, -in' A) to demonstrate how ready they were - or not - for the weekend.
Studied casual, personified.
The Richmond Symphony, on the other hand, was definitely trying to be with Dominion Casual Fridays - a dreadful moniker for several reasons - a great chance to see the Symphony on the cheap and still have your whole Friday night ahead of you.
To acquaint an atypical symphony audience with Stravinsky's ballet score "Petrouchka," conductor Stephen Smith took the time to explain the story of the ballet, demonstrate which instruments represented each of the three characters in the ballet and share how drums would mean "end of scene."
The ballet's first scene was set during - wait for it - the Shrovetide Fair, which I now know means pancake-eating Fat Tuesday and the two days before.
Leave it to art to teach me about religion while listening to the dulcet tones of contra-bassoon and bassoon.
Walking down Grace Street afterward, I overheard a young woman telling her date how much she'd been able to imagine the ballet dancers after the conductor explained the story and instrumentation. Her date asked if she'd ever been to the ballet. "No, but now I want to go," she said aspirationally.
Well done there, Richmond Symphony.
Because it was First Friday, there was no reason not to return to Candela Gallery and see the rest of "Chop Shop," the digitally-manipulated photography show I hadn't had time to see all of last night. Seeing it again, my brain struggled just as hard to read the images with an eye for truth and once again gave up in frustration.
Headed to the door, I ran into a photographer friend and dove immediately down the rabbit hole of process-focused photography, deciding that it was our age that precluded us accepting the images without seeing them as untruths.
Fact is, "Chop Shop" is the kind of photography show that starts conversations as people react and compare impressions, whether accepting or rejecting what they're seeing.
I slid into Gallery 5 briefly to check out the print sale before moving over to Big Secret to see the poster reveal for April's Mozart Festival. The Shepard Fairey-like red, white and blue image of Mozart will make an excellent reminder of the dark days after we lost the noble President pictured in the original poster.
A fellow Jackson Ward neighbor and I talked about his adjustment to living with his girlfriend and composting, two challenging but worthwhile efforts for a man who'll turn 37 years old tomorrow. When I found out he's also part of Team Mozart, I put in my vote for Nate's Bagels as part of the event.
Big Secret's owner asked if I'd had Nate's black sesame bagel yet (claims it's a religious experience and says he's Jewish so he knows) - um, no - only to admit that it's a minuscule number that are made and held for certain very special individuals.
As for people like you and me, my friend, we'll never even lay eyes on a black sesame bagel.
Richmond Comedy Coalition was offering "Casual Friday with RVA Tonight" - another god-awful label - for the late show featuring the cast and crew of the fake news show with big guests (Senator Tim Kaine, Governor Terry McAuliffe) telling stories and improvising on them.
Before the show even began, a stellar slide show was projected with images from RVA Tonight sketches, panels and guest interviews. So it was that I recognized a photo of Mayor Levar Stoney in his red and white Christmas sweater showing off the Levar Stoney socks his "team" had given him (familiar since I'd been at the original show), Beau Cribbs with Nutsy the Squirrel, Tim Kaine cracking up at something.
Over a dozen cast and crew members took the stage, sitting down in chairs to reminisce about favorite guests (McAuliffe is apparently hilariously inappropriate), sketches they pitched that never made it on to the show, moments gone wrong onstage and anything else they cared to bring up.
Josh told of a sci-fi sketch he pitched repeatedly that was rejected repeatedly, so Beau suggested he try pitching it to the audience. Most looked bored while one guy laughed. One.
"I write niche, artisanal jokes," Josh said sarcastically, trying to explain his limited appeal. I found him laugh out loud-worthy when he played a hapless male poet with no clue about women, saying things such as, "How do I convey the vastness of my sorrow! With rhymes!"
Grace, who's responsible for costumes and wigs, recalled one sketch that called for a voice-over but they'd forgotten to write it, and the sketch made no sense without it. Another time, the entire cast had forgotten they needed a turkey costume until 20 minutes before show time and then had to scramble.
During a sketch where McAuliffe's aide tells him, "Okay, Governor, today we're going to go over good touch and bad touch," and promptly grabs the Governor by his lower thigh, Beau as McAuliffe whines, "Being governor is hard!"
But being an audience member was informative. Beau told the audience that a past show's research had proven that the Comedy Coalition building had originally been a horse hospital (naturally abbreviated to "horse-pital" for the sake of comedy), a bit of neighborhood lore I'd never heard.
The cast talked about "refillable bits," sketches that could be dragged back out and refreshed for a second or third round of laughs.
When Beau reminded Matt that he'd said that his family used to own Frederick Douglass, Matt was outraged. "I did not say that!" and here he paused for dramatic effect. "I said my family once owned Booker T. Washington!" And so the comedy goes.
When the guy who does the graphic work for RVA Tonight mentioned how he liked to slide in sly asides and insider jokes "to reward our regulars," Beau laughed out loud. "Both of them!"
They all remembered the frustration of performing in the Science Museum's IMAX Dome because the dome's design means that sound travels only from the stage to the seats and not vice versa. So it was that the improv team did an hour and a half show without ever hearing a single laugh.
Not because the audience wasn't laughing, just because the sound wasn't reaching their ears. Ouch.
After one of her first performances, Lauren recalled being complimented by a fellow cast member for how well she'd acted out a panic attack onstage, which of course had been real.
That led to a seriously hysterical hall-of-mirrors type sketch where a couple happens on a woman having an anxiety attack and think it's performance art. Someone else seems them arguing about it and presumes they're street theater. Another couple spots them from across the street and wonders if it's a notable guerrilla theater performance group. And on and on...
No one takes anything happening in the real world as reality. Say, that sounds an awful lot like looking at photographs of people and things that never actually existed but were documented as if they did.
Casual Friday is perhaps the ultimate niche, artisanal joke.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
My Wit is Nothing to Her
There are so many metaphors to be found in the goings-on of a busy Valentine's Day.
It's when your first "Happy Valentine's Day" comes from a stranger on Broad Street but is quickly followed by one from your walking companion who's already heard it from her honey.
Like today's soundtrack, whether my new Prince albums (home), classics like "Torn" and "Love is a Battlefield" (dinner) or the sweeping innuendo of James, which greeted me at the theater.
Got a dark heart for Valentine's Day? Looking to fill that empty space in your life with food? Come, be alone...together!
With the promise of angst-filled love/hate songs like "Don't Speak" and cheap food, it wasn't hard for a dark heart to be seduced by the Lonely Hearts pop-up mixer at Citizen, where I took the sole remaining bar stool directly in front of the kitchen and was immediately handed a bowl of spiced chickpeas.
Butternut tamales with mole and BBQ shrimp with bread for sopping smokey broth followed by flourless chocolate almond cake delivered satisfying sustenance while the kitchen provided the entertainment, succeeding at making me laugh a lot.
Whether touting the uses of tongs ("They just invented them!") or telling his assistant how best to start a pastry cone, the chef kept his suggestions terse. "If you have to force it, you're doing it wrong."
When I said, "That's what she said," my server was at my side in an instant, saying, "I'm glad it was you that said it." You're welcome.
When we touched on the loud, pulsing club vibe of District 5's Sunday brunch scene, the assistant pronounced the place a "UR bro scene," a subset of the collegiate population I disdain as much for the large purses and high-maintenance looking women as for their inability to parallel park.
Tonight's crowd was anything but.
Next to me was a guy who seemed to always be a dish or two ahead of me - but somehow managed to eat through $57 worth of food but barely drank, significant when everything was priced at $4, $5, and $6 - while marveling that I live without a cell phone.
'How can you do that?" he asked. Too general a question. Ask me specifics of how I do things, sir.Yet, he said he loved being overseas and not having a phone for the freedom it afforded him.
Interesting compartmentalization, right?
When I asked for my check, my server looked surprised. "You don't want to stay for the rest of the playlist?"
Kind of, sure, but I have tickets for a Valentine's Day show. Besides, as soon as I got in my car, "Love is for Lovers" came on and you can't do much better than the dbs for a soundtrack today.
James' "Laid" provided the soundtrack as I took a seat at the Comedy Coalition for "It's Complicated," an evening of sketch comedy done in a variety format, kind of like "Laugh In" with different recurring characters and scenes and new bits throughout.
Next to me was a comedic couple from Chicago who moved here two years ago and recently landed in Barton Heights, which they love for its easy access to everything. Behind me, I overheard some young comedic types kvetching. "Man, that goes all the way back to Belushi and Akyroid."
The way he said it, he could have just as easily said Abbott and Costello. Or Fred and Barney.
"Now when I go back and visit Chicago, I go to the Tower and cool shit, which I never did when I lived there. My family always just went to the museums," another voice says. Bummer of a childhood, dude.
"It's Complicated" ran the gamut of relationship issues from distasteful (daughter sings a song at parents' suburban cocktail party to tell them the neighbor's been abusing her) to film geeky (parents square off over the appropriateness of letting children watch "Star Wars" prequels) to topical (a duo tries out for a wedding gig but all their songs turn out to be activist songs - "But policy change brought us together!" the bride laments - so not exactly right for a reception).
A recurring bit involved two old broads, one with an eye patch, the other formerly married to a stuntman, at a bar drinking bloody Marys and ruminating on life. "As a child, I always wanted to be divorced," Eye Patch says. "I always wanted to be a widow. It's why I married a stuntman," the cigarette-smoking other says.
Some humor was overwhelmingly millennial, like a sketch about a guy's meticulous preparations to pop the question, only to have his girlfriend guess immediately and upset everything. When she runs roughshod over his speech about bower birds feathering a nest by calling her mother, he says, "Could you just stop? I've put a lot of work into this presentation."
He didn't want a trophy, just her attention.
In between sketches, there were commercials for "Scwartzman Diamonds, Cupid's Jeweler," focusing on inter-tribal warfare over diamond mining, stealing diamonds from tombs and other blood diamond concerns that always ended with a slow fade to a couple embracing and in love.
A dating game show called "You're Too Thirsty" ("thirsty" being a euphemism for "needy") involved three bachelors taking questions from a bachelorette about important relationship concerns such as how soon he would return a text, while another sketch had a nobleman falling in love with Alexa (and, yes, I know what Alexa is, smartypants) although he couldn't figure out why she didn't return his love.
Or answer his questions when he didn't say her name just right.
The three tenets of marriage - active listening, creativity and teamwork - were taught to a prospective son-in-law by the girl's vaguely psychotic Dad, who tested him with sports trivia, intruder scenarios and viable conspiracy theories.
One of which involved '60s musicians in Laurel Canyon with parents working for military intelligence and how they made music that created secret brain slaves to the Doors' Jim Morrison.
Confidentially, I think the Doors' Jim Morrison may have had enough overt sex slaves to preclude the need for any secret brain slaves, although it makes for a solid contender for a conversational heart: B MY SBS.
But it's Citizen who gets the award for most romantic. Each item of food was listed on the receipt as "Lonely Hearts," so you know they put a lot of work into that presentation.
If you have to force at laugh at that, you're doing Valentine's Day wrong.
It's when your first "Happy Valentine's Day" comes from a stranger on Broad Street but is quickly followed by one from your walking companion who's already heard it from her honey.
Like today's soundtrack, whether my new Prince albums (home), classics like "Torn" and "Love is a Battlefield" (dinner) or the sweeping innuendo of James, which greeted me at the theater.
Got a dark heart for Valentine's Day? Looking to fill that empty space in your life with food? Come, be alone...together!
With the promise of angst-filled love/hate songs like "Don't Speak" and cheap food, it wasn't hard for a dark heart to be seduced by the Lonely Hearts pop-up mixer at Citizen, where I took the sole remaining bar stool directly in front of the kitchen and was immediately handed a bowl of spiced chickpeas.
Butternut tamales with mole and BBQ shrimp with bread for sopping smokey broth followed by flourless chocolate almond cake delivered satisfying sustenance while the kitchen provided the entertainment, succeeding at making me laugh a lot.
Whether touting the uses of tongs ("They just invented them!") or telling his assistant how best to start a pastry cone, the chef kept his suggestions terse. "If you have to force it, you're doing it wrong."
When I said, "That's what she said," my server was at my side in an instant, saying, "I'm glad it was you that said it." You're welcome.
When we touched on the loud, pulsing club vibe of District 5's Sunday brunch scene, the assistant pronounced the place a "UR bro scene," a subset of the collegiate population I disdain as much for the large purses and high-maintenance looking women as for their inability to parallel park.
Tonight's crowd was anything but.
Next to me was a guy who seemed to always be a dish or two ahead of me - but somehow managed to eat through $57 worth of food but barely drank, significant when everything was priced at $4, $5, and $6 - while marveling that I live without a cell phone.
'How can you do that?" he asked. Too general a question. Ask me specifics of how I do things, sir.Yet, he said he loved being overseas and not having a phone for the freedom it afforded him.
Interesting compartmentalization, right?
When I asked for my check, my server looked surprised. "You don't want to stay for the rest of the playlist?"
Kind of, sure, but I have tickets for a Valentine's Day show. Besides, as soon as I got in my car, "Love is for Lovers" came on and you can't do much better than the dbs for a soundtrack today.
James' "Laid" provided the soundtrack as I took a seat at the Comedy Coalition for "It's Complicated," an evening of sketch comedy done in a variety format, kind of like "Laugh In" with different recurring characters and scenes and new bits throughout.
Next to me was a comedic couple from Chicago who moved here two years ago and recently landed in Barton Heights, which they love for its easy access to everything. Behind me, I overheard some young comedic types kvetching. "Man, that goes all the way back to Belushi and Akyroid."
The way he said it, he could have just as easily said Abbott and Costello. Or Fred and Barney.
"Now when I go back and visit Chicago, I go to the Tower and cool shit, which I never did when I lived there. My family always just went to the museums," another voice says. Bummer of a childhood, dude.
"It's Complicated" ran the gamut of relationship issues from distasteful (daughter sings a song at parents' suburban cocktail party to tell them the neighbor's been abusing her) to film geeky (parents square off over the appropriateness of letting children watch "Star Wars" prequels) to topical (a duo tries out for a wedding gig but all their songs turn out to be activist songs - "But policy change brought us together!" the bride laments - so not exactly right for a reception).
A recurring bit involved two old broads, one with an eye patch, the other formerly married to a stuntman, at a bar drinking bloody Marys and ruminating on life. "As a child, I always wanted to be divorced," Eye Patch says. "I always wanted to be a widow. It's why I married a stuntman," the cigarette-smoking other says.
Some humor was overwhelmingly millennial, like a sketch about a guy's meticulous preparations to pop the question, only to have his girlfriend guess immediately and upset everything. When she runs roughshod over his speech about bower birds feathering a nest by calling her mother, he says, "Could you just stop? I've put a lot of work into this presentation."
He didn't want a trophy, just her attention.
In between sketches, there were commercials for "Scwartzman Diamonds, Cupid's Jeweler," focusing on inter-tribal warfare over diamond mining, stealing diamonds from tombs and other blood diamond concerns that always ended with a slow fade to a couple embracing and in love.
A dating game show called "You're Too Thirsty" ("thirsty" being a euphemism for "needy") involved three bachelors taking questions from a bachelorette about important relationship concerns such as how soon he would return a text, while another sketch had a nobleman falling in love with Alexa (and, yes, I know what Alexa is, smartypants) although he couldn't figure out why she didn't return his love.
Or answer his questions when he didn't say her name just right.
The three tenets of marriage - active listening, creativity and teamwork - were taught to a prospective son-in-law by the girl's vaguely psychotic Dad, who tested him with sports trivia, intruder scenarios and viable conspiracy theories.
One of which involved '60s musicians in Laurel Canyon with parents working for military intelligence and how they made music that created secret brain slaves to the Doors' Jim Morrison.
Confidentially, I think the Doors' Jim Morrison may have had enough overt sex slaves to preclude the need for any secret brain slaves, although it makes for a solid contender for a conversational heart: B MY SBS.
But it's Citizen who gets the award for most romantic. Each item of food was listed on the receipt as "Lonely Hearts," so you know they put a lot of work into that presentation.
If you have to force at laugh at that, you're doing Valentine's Day wrong.
Saturday, February 4, 2017
Too Many Things, Not Enough Clocks
The green fairy opened her arms and welcomed us in tonight.
Pru and Beau came by to scoop me up (early, it should be noted, and with a flapper dress I need for an upcoming soiree because only Pru has an extra flapper dress lying around) to go to the VMFA.
There we walked through the 20th century European gallery, pausing to admire Salvador Dali's "God of the Bay of Roses" in advance of one of tonight's cultural offerings, but also prompting a discussion of the role of a muse.
Following the music as we exited into the atrium, we saw Plunky Branch enthusiastically performing onstage to a middlin' sized crowd, but strolled slowly enough to enjoy the jazz he and his band Oneness were putting out. Even better, once upstairs at an uncrowded Amuse, we could still hear every note, right down to the band's cover of P-Funk's "One Nation Under a Groove."
With a window table facing west to admire the darkening sky, Beau ordered J. Mourat Rose and our server responded by looking at Pru and I, asking what we'd be drinking. Just bring the damn bottle, man, and be done with it.
Although I'm not entirely certain what our starting point was, the conversation may have begun with cross-dressing, which quite naturally led to hiding "junk," but Pru was able to inform us that such a thing as thong gaff panties exist to hide a male bulge.
Every night is a learning experience when you're with the right people.
According to Pru's ratings of what we ate, her artichoke hearts with fennel, carrots and an obscene buerre blanc took top honors, closely followed by my amberjack over roasted cauliflower with fried garlic and frisee in a caper vinaigrette, but Beau made a case for his special of housemade ravioli stuffed with Ricotta cheese with housemade sausage in a red sauce. Venison stew got a tepid reaction.
Clearing the table of plates and stacking them precariously, our server noted, "Who knew Tetris was a life skill?" The consensus was that it was clever, but sounded like a line he'd used before.
After I ordered dessert of salted chocolate bar over lemon curd with whipped cream and my compadres requested coffee, we each ordered an absinthe drip, only to have the drip placed at the center of the table within minutes.
My introduction to an absinthe drip had happened at this very museum restaurant years ago during the Picasso exhibit and while it no longer sits at the end of the bar, I happen to know it will be brought out for anyone who asks.
Me, I ask.
As we each adjust the dripping of ice water over a sugar cube and into the glass of absinthe, we get caught up in a reverie of the pleasures of not just this spirit, but this manner of drinking it and the process of creating your own iteration of the green fairy based on how you set your tap, how much of the cube you allow to dissolve and how much water you want mixed in.
It's not long before Pru, who'd earlier regaled us with descriptions and photos of her new wine jail, decides than an absinthe drip is her must-have birthday present, conveniently coming up soon.
Dropping hints for Beau like Hansel and Gretl dropped breadcrumbs, she gives him one last instruction,
"Don't go half-assed on me." As if Beau ever goes half-assed on anything.
While sipping this nectar of the gods, we went down the rabbit hole of licorice (Beau's never met any he didn't like) and the distinction between "old man licorice" as opposed to more refined examples of the flavor profile such as absinthe. Twizzlers were, we decided, not worth mentioning although Pru admitted to being a fan of black jellybeans.
I never met anything licorice-flavored I liked until I met absinthe, so I didn't have a dog in this fight.
When we got back down to the atrium, the crowd had tripled or perhaps even quadrupled and Plunky and Oneness had the room in its thrall, making it impossible not to dance our way through the hordes of happy people. Had we not had tickets for a show, I'd have happily stayed there for the rest of the evening.
But we did because tonight was Richmond Famous at the Comedy Coalition and sharing personal stories so he could be mocked (by the talented improv artists of RCC) was writer and hatted flaneur Harry Kollatz.
Because we'd lallygagged a bit over our absinthes, we arrived barely moments before the show was to start, joining the owner of Saison (who introduced me to his wife as, "Karen, a woman about town") in line and scrambling for seats once inside.
All the cool kids were there, including a favorite photographer who told her friends, "I always feel better if I see Karen when I go out because it means I'm in the right place." I don't know about all that, but I saw a lot of familiar faces in the room.
A blue wing chair was brought out for Harry to relax in after telling his stories about his Dad's collection of Edsels and how, as a youth with no friends, he had plenty of time to catalog the items found in these old cars.
Being the organized type, he'd list them by the Edsel's year, the object found and the weather. This, ladies and germs, is probably the seed of how Harry wound up giving weather reports from under the Lee's Chicken sign lo these many years later.
The RCC crew managed to turn Harry's geekdom into comedy about the lubricants of adventure and a used kid lot ("Never turn your back on a kid you've disowned"), while a reminisce about encountering a "dangerous bees" sign on a hike resulted in riffing on Dungeons and Dragons (David: "Hey, pretty lady, have you ever had a man really listen to you before?" Josh: "Wow, this man can role play a loser!") and a reference to Yahtzee.
When the comedy at Harry's expense ended, the audience was told to vacate the building before the staged reading which was to come next, but fortunately we already had a plan for how to best enjoy those 25 minutes before returning, having already verified with the owner that Saison carried absinthe.
"Carried" was a bit of an exaggeration because they were down to their last two pours, but the affable bartender stretched it to fit into three glasses, we fashioned our own drips and were back on the sidewalk heading to RCC in time to score far better seats this time.
Friday night Part Deux was the 20th anniversary performance of Harry's play, "The Persistence of Memory" about that time in 1966 when Richmond considered having Salvador Dali create a sculpture for Monument Avenue to commemorate Captain Sally Tompkins for her heroic nursing work during that war.
Dali won out because Henry Moore was too sensuous and Giacometti had just died. Leave it to Harry to document for posterity one of Richmond's most absurd moments in history.
Waiting for it to start, I was totally digging the soundtrack - Herb Alpert's "A Taste of Honey," "The Ballad of the Green Beret" and other groovy mid-60s hits - when Nancy Sinatra's "The Boots Are Made for Walkin'" came on, prompting Pru to tell me about a recent Nancy Sinatra film she'd seen, "The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini."
Because a bikini doesn't already reveal enough?
When the woman in the seat nearest me smiled at me, I began chatting with her, only to learn that she was a musician and had opened the show every night for a week when Harry's play had originally been produced, so she was especially tickled to be witnessing it again 20 years later.
I'm here to tell you that fabulous as it may have been, "The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini" couldn't possibly have compared to "The Persistence of Memory."
The story involved the village people (the blase local artists who hung out at the Village, albeit before it moved to its present location), the Monument Avenue committee (which included two of the original cast members who crossed state lines to perform tonight) including Mrs. Douglas Southall Freeman, Dali (local actor Jeff Clevenger on video talking on an actual lobster), Harry as his secretary of the military and his assistant, plus the Reynolds company representative trying to get a statue made with his aluminum.
Naturally Harry's script set the scene first, with references to Henry Miller, LSD, LBJ, Vietnam, Anais Nin and Gypsy Rose Lee ("My talking was always better than my stripping") courtesy of the village people, all sunglasses, snapping fingers and condescension about art as commodity.
Besides telling a fascinating story, the play brought on laughter, audience finger snapping and a fresh appreciation for how far Richmond has come since the time when change was seen as unacceptable.
Playwright Harry practically busted his buttons watching from the back and afterwards taking much-deserved congratulations from the crowd.
Out on the sidewalk, the air was freezing and we were still on this side of Saturday, but just barely.
Ordinarily, we're a trio who like one final stop for the sake of discussion post-culture, but He Who Starts to Wane (Pru's pithy descriptor of her man) is still getting the hang of hanging with us and looked a bit peaked so we called it a night.
His absinthe drinking was never as good as his Dungeons and Dragons role playing, but he is catching on. Meanwhile, my talking continues to be better than my almost everything else.
Just don't hold me to any green fairy giddiness, no matter the topic. Beau, I'm looking at you.
Pru and Beau came by to scoop me up (early, it should be noted, and with a flapper dress I need for an upcoming soiree because only Pru has an extra flapper dress lying around) to go to the VMFA.
There we walked through the 20th century European gallery, pausing to admire Salvador Dali's "God of the Bay of Roses" in advance of one of tonight's cultural offerings, but also prompting a discussion of the role of a muse.
Following the music as we exited into the atrium, we saw Plunky Branch enthusiastically performing onstage to a middlin' sized crowd, but strolled slowly enough to enjoy the jazz he and his band Oneness were putting out. Even better, once upstairs at an uncrowded Amuse, we could still hear every note, right down to the band's cover of P-Funk's "One Nation Under a Groove."
With a window table facing west to admire the darkening sky, Beau ordered J. Mourat Rose and our server responded by looking at Pru and I, asking what we'd be drinking. Just bring the damn bottle, man, and be done with it.
Although I'm not entirely certain what our starting point was, the conversation may have begun with cross-dressing, which quite naturally led to hiding "junk," but Pru was able to inform us that such a thing as thong gaff panties exist to hide a male bulge.
Every night is a learning experience when you're with the right people.
According to Pru's ratings of what we ate, her artichoke hearts with fennel, carrots and an obscene buerre blanc took top honors, closely followed by my amberjack over roasted cauliflower with fried garlic and frisee in a caper vinaigrette, but Beau made a case for his special of housemade ravioli stuffed with Ricotta cheese with housemade sausage in a red sauce. Venison stew got a tepid reaction.
Clearing the table of plates and stacking them precariously, our server noted, "Who knew Tetris was a life skill?" The consensus was that it was clever, but sounded like a line he'd used before.
After I ordered dessert of salted chocolate bar over lemon curd with whipped cream and my compadres requested coffee, we each ordered an absinthe drip, only to have the drip placed at the center of the table within minutes.
My introduction to an absinthe drip had happened at this very museum restaurant years ago during the Picasso exhibit and while it no longer sits at the end of the bar, I happen to know it will be brought out for anyone who asks.
Me, I ask.
As we each adjust the dripping of ice water over a sugar cube and into the glass of absinthe, we get caught up in a reverie of the pleasures of not just this spirit, but this manner of drinking it and the process of creating your own iteration of the green fairy based on how you set your tap, how much of the cube you allow to dissolve and how much water you want mixed in.
It's not long before Pru, who'd earlier regaled us with descriptions and photos of her new wine jail, decides than an absinthe drip is her must-have birthday present, conveniently coming up soon.
Dropping hints for Beau like Hansel and Gretl dropped breadcrumbs, she gives him one last instruction,
"Don't go half-assed on me." As if Beau ever goes half-assed on anything.
While sipping this nectar of the gods, we went down the rabbit hole of licorice (Beau's never met any he didn't like) and the distinction between "old man licorice" as opposed to more refined examples of the flavor profile such as absinthe. Twizzlers were, we decided, not worth mentioning although Pru admitted to being a fan of black jellybeans.
I never met anything licorice-flavored I liked until I met absinthe, so I didn't have a dog in this fight.
When we got back down to the atrium, the crowd had tripled or perhaps even quadrupled and Plunky and Oneness had the room in its thrall, making it impossible not to dance our way through the hordes of happy people. Had we not had tickets for a show, I'd have happily stayed there for the rest of the evening.
But we did because tonight was Richmond Famous at the Comedy Coalition and sharing personal stories so he could be mocked (by the talented improv artists of RCC) was writer and hatted flaneur Harry Kollatz.
Because we'd lallygagged a bit over our absinthes, we arrived barely moments before the show was to start, joining the owner of Saison (who introduced me to his wife as, "Karen, a woman about town") in line and scrambling for seats once inside.
All the cool kids were there, including a favorite photographer who told her friends, "I always feel better if I see Karen when I go out because it means I'm in the right place." I don't know about all that, but I saw a lot of familiar faces in the room.
A blue wing chair was brought out for Harry to relax in after telling his stories about his Dad's collection of Edsels and how, as a youth with no friends, he had plenty of time to catalog the items found in these old cars.
Being the organized type, he'd list them by the Edsel's year, the object found and the weather. This, ladies and germs, is probably the seed of how Harry wound up giving weather reports from under the Lee's Chicken sign lo these many years later.
The RCC crew managed to turn Harry's geekdom into comedy about the lubricants of adventure and a used kid lot ("Never turn your back on a kid you've disowned"), while a reminisce about encountering a "dangerous bees" sign on a hike resulted in riffing on Dungeons and Dragons (David: "Hey, pretty lady, have you ever had a man really listen to you before?" Josh: "Wow, this man can role play a loser!") and a reference to Yahtzee.
When the comedy at Harry's expense ended, the audience was told to vacate the building before the staged reading which was to come next, but fortunately we already had a plan for how to best enjoy those 25 minutes before returning, having already verified with the owner that Saison carried absinthe.
"Carried" was a bit of an exaggeration because they were down to their last two pours, but the affable bartender stretched it to fit into three glasses, we fashioned our own drips and were back on the sidewalk heading to RCC in time to score far better seats this time.
Friday night Part Deux was the 20th anniversary performance of Harry's play, "The Persistence of Memory" about that time in 1966 when Richmond considered having Salvador Dali create a sculpture for Monument Avenue to commemorate Captain Sally Tompkins for her heroic nursing work during that war.
Dali won out because Henry Moore was too sensuous and Giacometti had just died. Leave it to Harry to document for posterity one of Richmond's most absurd moments in history.
Waiting for it to start, I was totally digging the soundtrack - Herb Alpert's "A Taste of Honey," "The Ballad of the Green Beret" and other groovy mid-60s hits - when Nancy Sinatra's "The Boots Are Made for Walkin'" came on, prompting Pru to tell me about a recent Nancy Sinatra film she'd seen, "The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini."
Because a bikini doesn't already reveal enough?
When the woman in the seat nearest me smiled at me, I began chatting with her, only to learn that she was a musician and had opened the show every night for a week when Harry's play had originally been produced, so she was especially tickled to be witnessing it again 20 years later.
I'm here to tell you that fabulous as it may have been, "The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini" couldn't possibly have compared to "The Persistence of Memory."
The story involved the village people (the blase local artists who hung out at the Village, albeit before it moved to its present location), the Monument Avenue committee (which included two of the original cast members who crossed state lines to perform tonight) including Mrs. Douglas Southall Freeman, Dali (local actor Jeff Clevenger on video talking on an actual lobster), Harry as his secretary of the military and his assistant, plus the Reynolds company representative trying to get a statue made with his aluminum.
Naturally Harry's script set the scene first, with references to Henry Miller, LSD, LBJ, Vietnam, Anais Nin and Gypsy Rose Lee ("My talking was always better than my stripping") courtesy of the village people, all sunglasses, snapping fingers and condescension about art as commodity.
Besides telling a fascinating story, the play brought on laughter, audience finger snapping and a fresh appreciation for how far Richmond has come since the time when change was seen as unacceptable.
Playwright Harry practically busted his buttons watching from the back and afterwards taking much-deserved congratulations from the crowd.
Out on the sidewalk, the air was freezing and we were still on this side of Saturday, but just barely.
Ordinarily, we're a trio who like one final stop for the sake of discussion post-culture, but He Who Starts to Wane (Pru's pithy descriptor of her man) is still getting the hang of hanging with us and looked a bit peaked so we called it a night.
His absinthe drinking was never as good as his Dungeons and Dragons role playing, but he is catching on. Meanwhile, my talking continues to be better than my almost everything else.
Just don't hold me to any green fairy giddiness, no matter the topic. Beau, I'm looking at you.
Saturday, October 29, 2016
Out There versus Not
Musical karma, that's what it is.
I'm talking about that thing that happens when you first discover a new band or someone tells you about a terrific band and then, bam! You find out they're about to play nearby, so you can indulge your new-found interest or appreciation almost immediately.
It was kind of like that tonight.
When last the Barrister and I met, we'd naturally talked music and he'd brought up a new-to-me local band, Paulo Franco (and the Freightliners, as it turned out), saying he was fond of their sound.
The very next morning, he messaged to share that he'd been reading Style and seen that they were playing Friday night.
Horse trading of a sort ensued because my plan was to take in some seasonal comedy at the Coalition Theatre, specifically "Vincent Price's Late Night Horror Program," so I agreed to go to hear Paulo if he'd come be horrified with me.
A deal was struck and we made plans to meet at Saison Market, which only became problematic when I arrived there to find an absent Barr and that no food was being served because, yet again, Restaurant Week had reared its ugly head.
The former situation was rectified when I found him drinking brown liquor at Saison's bar where we toasted his new-found qualifications in the Peach State which, we agreed, he need not exercise immediately. The latter problem was solved with fish tacos from Tarrant's back door, eaten at a table pre-set for Restaurant Week overflow guests because a server insisted we do so.
Fortified, we crossed the street to be spooked.
In the grand tradition of bad Vincent Price variety shows, we found good seats in a sold out room for a series of laugh-worthy episodes. The show's delayed start gave us time to exchange information that people who have only laid eyes on each other three times in a life time are not yet privy to.
Fact: before Barr embraced the law, it was geology that floated his boat. He, in turn, said he wouldn't have figured me for a Terrapin. We discovered a mutual admiration for the National.
We ceased our blather when the show finally began.
When the impeccably dressed Vincent - in silky shirt and ascot - wanted to summon the spirit of Poe, Player's cheesy "Baby, Come Back" blared from the speakers, inadvertently summoning Ellen Adger Poe in period attire by mistake.
She was far less melancholy than her brother.
Then the Paranormal Sisters of Kalamazoo spotted ghosts around the room and brought people onstage to explain their presence.
Dakota thought one angry ghost might have been his great-great-great grandfather, a restaurateur who prohibited certain kinds of guests from eating in his restaurant.
"You mean he was racist?" one sister asked of poor Dakota. "Just say racist! You think we haven't talked to a racist ghost before? We're in Richmond!"
The other Kalamazoo sister contacted the dead by having sex with them. Onstage while we watched and listened.
"Has anyone seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary appearing in front of them? No? Just me?"" her sister asked the crowd before finding a guy who'd lost his Aunt Frenchy because she was old.
Vincent returned wearing a pink-trimmed apron that read, "Kill the Cook" to demonstrate a recipe for candy corn from his new cookbook that involved teeth and shaved corns, the kind from feet.
The master of horror was especially adept at bad horror puns. "Can you necro-feel the love tonight?' he asked to groans, and, "Don't let me slip up carrying this Edger Allen Po-dium."
A segment involving a cursed camera had two characters frantically thumbing through to look up something in an imaginary Yellow Pages, causing the girl to crack wise with millennial humor. "Man, won't it be great one day when we can just look stuff up?"
Which is, of course, exactly what she was pretending to do, but she didn't see it that way.
"Fly versus Fly" had Vincent challenging Jeff Goldblum to an obstacle course to prove who was the better fly, while offering Goldblum a chance to ramble on about nothing and everything, to Vincent's great consternation.
Perhaps because I'm a fan of his demeanor, it had never occurred to me how easy it would be to imitate Goldblum's distinctive delivery and detours.
The final segment was a "Match Game" parody with celebrity guests such as Chris Rock, Katherine Hepburn, pro wrestler Macho Man, the part French/part Spanish designer Phillippe, and Obi Wan Kenobi.
Questions involved such burning issues as what First Man Bill Clinton can't wait to install in the White House (a stripper pole, the Force, a zero-gravity bidet) as well as cultural commentary, such as Chris Rock's answer to how Target bathrooms could be divided ("There are no Targets in the 'hood").
By the time the show ended, people were crowding the lobby and sidewalk out front for the 10:00 show and we had two miles to cover to access my companion'sneeds for the evening half of the deal.
He'd already scored a table in front when I walked in during the first song of Paulo's second set, demonstrating impeccable timing on our part. With his rose-colored glasses, Paulo bore a distinct resemblance to Jerry Garcia and his four-piece played a tight set for a diminishing crowd.
Although new to me, Barr was hoping for a few songs from Paulo's latest album.
Too bad about the smaller crowd because the songs were compelling, whether they were murder ballads, sung in Spanish (Paulo is Colombian), or when they were his wife's favorite (because it was about his ex-wife).
That three of the band members sang added a lot to their sound.
Returning from the bathroom, Barr told of a guy's peculiar hygiene habits and I, naturally, passed judgment on the unseen miscreant. "You're okay if we can talk bathrooms," the Barrister informs me.
Wait, he's just now deciding I'm okay? "It shows your range," he corrects himself.
I said good night to the last of my tequila as Paulo and the boys finished out their set, wistfully singing, "Good night, whiskey, mend my broken heart."
That's karma for you, book-ending the evening with brown liquor and song.
I'm talking about that thing that happens when you first discover a new band or someone tells you about a terrific band and then, bam! You find out they're about to play nearby, so you can indulge your new-found interest or appreciation almost immediately.
It was kind of like that tonight.
When last the Barrister and I met, we'd naturally talked music and he'd brought up a new-to-me local band, Paulo Franco (and the Freightliners, as it turned out), saying he was fond of their sound.
The very next morning, he messaged to share that he'd been reading Style and seen that they were playing Friday night.
Horse trading of a sort ensued because my plan was to take in some seasonal comedy at the Coalition Theatre, specifically "Vincent Price's Late Night Horror Program," so I agreed to go to hear Paulo if he'd come be horrified with me.
A deal was struck and we made plans to meet at Saison Market, which only became problematic when I arrived there to find an absent Barr and that no food was being served because, yet again, Restaurant Week had reared its ugly head.
The former situation was rectified when I found him drinking brown liquor at Saison's bar where we toasted his new-found qualifications in the Peach State which, we agreed, he need not exercise immediately. The latter problem was solved with fish tacos from Tarrant's back door, eaten at a table pre-set for Restaurant Week overflow guests because a server insisted we do so.
Fortified, we crossed the street to be spooked.
In the grand tradition of bad Vincent Price variety shows, we found good seats in a sold out room for a series of laugh-worthy episodes. The show's delayed start gave us time to exchange information that people who have only laid eyes on each other three times in a life time are not yet privy to.
Fact: before Barr embraced the law, it was geology that floated his boat. He, in turn, said he wouldn't have figured me for a Terrapin. We discovered a mutual admiration for the National.
We ceased our blather when the show finally began.
When the impeccably dressed Vincent - in silky shirt and ascot - wanted to summon the spirit of Poe, Player's cheesy "Baby, Come Back" blared from the speakers, inadvertently summoning Ellen Adger Poe in period attire by mistake.
She was far less melancholy than her brother.
Then the Paranormal Sisters of Kalamazoo spotted ghosts around the room and brought people onstage to explain their presence.
Dakota thought one angry ghost might have been his great-great-great grandfather, a restaurateur who prohibited certain kinds of guests from eating in his restaurant.
"You mean he was racist?" one sister asked of poor Dakota. "Just say racist! You think we haven't talked to a racist ghost before? We're in Richmond!"
The other Kalamazoo sister contacted the dead by having sex with them. Onstage while we watched and listened.
"Has anyone seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary appearing in front of them? No? Just me?"" her sister asked the crowd before finding a guy who'd lost his Aunt Frenchy because she was old.
Vincent returned wearing a pink-trimmed apron that read, "Kill the Cook" to demonstrate a recipe for candy corn from his new cookbook that involved teeth and shaved corns, the kind from feet.
The master of horror was especially adept at bad horror puns. "Can you necro-feel the love tonight?' he asked to groans, and, "Don't let me slip up carrying this Edger Allen Po-dium."
A segment involving a cursed camera had two characters frantically thumbing through to look up something in an imaginary Yellow Pages, causing the girl to crack wise with millennial humor. "Man, won't it be great one day when we can just look stuff up?"
Which is, of course, exactly what she was pretending to do, but she didn't see it that way.
"Fly versus Fly" had Vincent challenging Jeff Goldblum to an obstacle course to prove who was the better fly, while offering Goldblum a chance to ramble on about nothing and everything, to Vincent's great consternation.
Perhaps because I'm a fan of his demeanor, it had never occurred to me how easy it would be to imitate Goldblum's distinctive delivery and detours.
The final segment was a "Match Game" parody with celebrity guests such as Chris Rock, Katherine Hepburn, pro wrestler Macho Man, the part French/part Spanish designer Phillippe, and Obi Wan Kenobi.
Questions involved such burning issues as what First Man Bill Clinton can't wait to install in the White House (a stripper pole, the Force, a zero-gravity bidet) as well as cultural commentary, such as Chris Rock's answer to how Target bathrooms could be divided ("There are no Targets in the 'hood").
By the time the show ended, people were crowding the lobby and sidewalk out front for the 10:00 show and we had two miles to cover to access my companion's
He'd already scored a table in front when I walked in during the first song of Paulo's second set, demonstrating impeccable timing on our part. With his rose-colored glasses, Paulo bore a distinct resemblance to Jerry Garcia and his four-piece played a tight set for a diminishing crowd.
Although new to me, Barr was hoping for a few songs from Paulo's latest album.
Too bad about the smaller crowd because the songs were compelling, whether they were murder ballads, sung in Spanish (Paulo is Colombian), or when they were his wife's favorite (because it was about his ex-wife).
That three of the band members sang added a lot to their sound.
Returning from the bathroom, Barr told of a guy's peculiar hygiene habits and I, naturally, passed judgment on the unseen miscreant. "You're okay if we can talk bathrooms," the Barrister informs me.
Wait, he's just now deciding I'm okay? "It shows your range," he corrects himself.
I said good night to the last of my tequila as Paulo and the boys finished out their set, wistfully singing, "Good night, whiskey, mend my broken heart."
That's karma for you, book-ending the evening with brown liquor and song.
Saturday, September 17, 2016
Kissing Like a Bandit
Because ultimately, don't we all gotta have it?
But first of all, we gotta have that indefinable "thing."
Sitting in the Grace Street Theater waiting for the second installment of the inaugural Afrikana Independent Film Festival, the three of us - full as ticks after fish tacos at Asado - were seriously grooving to Afrikana's usual excellent pre-show mix (see 1985's "Oh Sheila") when "Wishing Well" came on and all our faces lit up.
"Terrance Trent D'Arby," my photographer friend announced authoritatively and his girlfriend immediately leaned over close, rubbing up against him, saying, "I love this man" because he'd known the artist's name.
Of course, in my perfect world, all men would recognize the sound of Terrance Trent D'Arby. It would be a fine way to separate the men from the boys.
We agreed that everyone needs their person to know certain things and he'd just scored big by knowing that one. But there's no way to know what your potential person needs you to know and therein lies the rub.
Seeing Spike Lee's first film, "She's Gotta Have It" on this, the 30th anniversary of the film, delivered a fascinating look at the '80s (white socks almost up to the knees, jumpsuits, Jane Fonda-era workout gear and men in gym shorts), female sexuality (I recall from seeing it in the theater what a huge deal the depiction of a black woman's sexuality was) and the very beginnings of the indie movie genre.
I can't recall how the black and whiteness of the film registered in '86, but tonight it felt right for the time, meaning that the interlude in color with singing and dancing amounted to an unpleasant reminder of bad '80s cliches.
For that matter, the audience cracked up at many of the cheesy '80s details throughout, but then, it had already been established that few in the audience had ever seen the film on a big screen, being far too young.
Which means that for them, the film's message of societal acceptance of female choice when it comes to number of partners must seem ridiculously obvious since they've never known any other reality.
For those of us seeing it 30 years later, it was a poignant reminder of the long arc of the double standard.
Because whether they're concurrent or consecutive, we shes of the world do gotta have it. Fact.
Bidding goodbye to the "sleepy" (perhaps a euphemism for "needing to have it") couple, I did a fast walk to Comedy Coalition for "Live from the Pacement," a variety show staged by trombonist/percussionist extraordinaire, Reggie Pace.
He and co-host Aaron sat in chairs with a revolving colored lamp on the floor casting patterns on the wall and welcomed an odd assortment of guests, to great hilarity.
Josh told online dating and Tinder ("The shallowest dating app ever") stories, asking for a show of hands on who's used Tinder, only to find a model couple there who'd met on the shallow app. In his own experience, he'd learned that nerd girls date for life because ~ spoiler alert, he said ~ to them, they don't see any difference in one guy from another.
From my vantage point of seniority, I could challenge that but I won't.
We got music from jazz guitarist Scott Burton, keyboard player Larry Branch and Reggie playing his smorgasbord of percussion, after which he pocketed his triangle. That led to a discussion of how John Popper wears a bandoleer to hold all his harmonicas and a side story about a man who carries his pacemaker in a similar vest.
It was real variety with potato jokes courtesy of comedian Katie as Mrs. Potatohead (What's the difference in mashed potatoes and pea soup? Anyone can mash potatoes), interpretive dancing (Josh: "That was proof that the girls in "Napoleon Dynamite' do grow up") and, in a more serious vein, a gorgeous flute rendition of "Winter Spirits" by Lauren Serpa.
"That was beautiful and now we're gonna ruin it," Aaron said, introducing Jim as Eleanor Gasm, who had the ability to read people's sexual histories by touching their foreheads.
Touching a couple's foreheads, she announced, "They don't love each other." To a guy with a peculiar high-pitched laugh, "You're going to die alone." To a guy about his date: "She likes the goatee, but lose the mustache." Her: "No, it's the reverse, lose the goatee."
To the crowd, "Who's willing to go home with someone here tonight?" No hands raised.
When he got to me, he touched, asked how I was doing tonight and announced that I was looking for two men. No one said Eleanor was always right.
The two guys next to me got highly uncomfortable when he asked how long they'd been dating (a month) and then if they'd done it yet ("We're not going to talk about that," the more uptight one said).
Man of the evening Reggie expressed amazement that Eleanor was polling the audience on their sex lives, noting that things had taken a turn for the worse. That was actually one of the best parts of the evening: watching Reggie as audience member onstage (when he wasn't performing), squirming and laughing along with the rest of us
Before the night was over, there was a hot dog break with three costumed hot dogs and a riff on "Rapper's Delight" done by Reggie's "father" in a bad fake mustache and high voice ("My boy is so talented!").
The collection of hosts and performers on the stage eventually came up with a takeaway for the evening: Things can always get worse.
Now there's a mantra for a Friday night.
To prove it, the show closed with "Barb" in a glitter vest and wearing rollerblades, entreating people to join her in karaoke, including a Dido tune which evolved into a rousing group singalong.
Because sometimes you gotta make do when you gotta have it and can't.
But first of all, we gotta have that indefinable "thing."
Sitting in the Grace Street Theater waiting for the second installment of the inaugural Afrikana Independent Film Festival, the three of us - full as ticks after fish tacos at Asado - were seriously grooving to Afrikana's usual excellent pre-show mix (see 1985's "Oh Sheila") when "Wishing Well" came on and all our faces lit up.
"Terrance Trent D'Arby," my photographer friend announced authoritatively and his girlfriend immediately leaned over close, rubbing up against him, saying, "I love this man" because he'd known the artist's name.
Of course, in my perfect world, all men would recognize the sound of Terrance Trent D'Arby. It would be a fine way to separate the men from the boys.
We agreed that everyone needs their person to know certain things and he'd just scored big by knowing that one. But there's no way to know what your potential person needs you to know and therein lies the rub.
Seeing Spike Lee's first film, "She's Gotta Have It" on this, the 30th anniversary of the film, delivered a fascinating look at the '80s (white socks almost up to the knees, jumpsuits, Jane Fonda-era workout gear and men in gym shorts), female sexuality (I recall from seeing it in the theater what a huge deal the depiction of a black woman's sexuality was) and the very beginnings of the indie movie genre.
I can't recall how the black and whiteness of the film registered in '86, but tonight it felt right for the time, meaning that the interlude in color with singing and dancing amounted to an unpleasant reminder of bad '80s cliches.
For that matter, the audience cracked up at many of the cheesy '80s details throughout, but then, it had already been established that few in the audience had ever seen the film on a big screen, being far too young.
Which means that for them, the film's message of societal acceptance of female choice when it comes to number of partners must seem ridiculously obvious since they've never known any other reality.
For those of us seeing it 30 years later, it was a poignant reminder of the long arc of the double standard.
Because whether they're concurrent or consecutive, we shes of the world do gotta have it. Fact.
Bidding goodbye to the "sleepy" (perhaps a euphemism for "needing to have it") couple, I did a fast walk to Comedy Coalition for "Live from the Pacement," a variety show staged by trombonist/percussionist extraordinaire, Reggie Pace.
He and co-host Aaron sat in chairs with a revolving colored lamp on the floor casting patterns on the wall and welcomed an odd assortment of guests, to great hilarity.
Josh told online dating and Tinder ("The shallowest dating app ever") stories, asking for a show of hands on who's used Tinder, only to find a model couple there who'd met on the shallow app. In his own experience, he'd learned that nerd girls date for life because ~ spoiler alert, he said ~ to them, they don't see any difference in one guy from another.
From my vantage point of seniority, I could challenge that but I won't.
We got music from jazz guitarist Scott Burton, keyboard player Larry Branch and Reggie playing his smorgasbord of percussion, after which he pocketed his triangle. That led to a discussion of how John Popper wears a bandoleer to hold all his harmonicas and a side story about a man who carries his pacemaker in a similar vest.
It was real variety with potato jokes courtesy of comedian Katie as Mrs. Potatohead (What's the difference in mashed potatoes and pea soup? Anyone can mash potatoes), interpretive dancing (Josh: "That was proof that the girls in "Napoleon Dynamite' do grow up") and, in a more serious vein, a gorgeous flute rendition of "Winter Spirits" by Lauren Serpa.
"That was beautiful and now we're gonna ruin it," Aaron said, introducing Jim as Eleanor Gasm, who had the ability to read people's sexual histories by touching their foreheads.
Touching a couple's foreheads, she announced, "They don't love each other." To a guy with a peculiar high-pitched laugh, "You're going to die alone." To a guy about his date: "She likes the goatee, but lose the mustache." Her: "No, it's the reverse, lose the goatee."
To the crowd, "Who's willing to go home with someone here tonight?" No hands raised.
When he got to me, he touched, asked how I was doing tonight and announced that I was looking for two men. No one said Eleanor was always right.
The two guys next to me got highly uncomfortable when he asked how long they'd been dating (a month) and then if they'd done it yet ("We're not going to talk about that," the more uptight one said).
Man of the evening Reggie expressed amazement that Eleanor was polling the audience on their sex lives, noting that things had taken a turn for the worse. That was actually one of the best parts of the evening: watching Reggie as audience member onstage (when he wasn't performing), squirming and laughing along with the rest of us
Before the night was over, there was a hot dog break with three costumed hot dogs and a riff on "Rapper's Delight" done by Reggie's "father" in a bad fake mustache and high voice ("My boy is so talented!").
The collection of hosts and performers on the stage eventually came up with a takeaway for the evening: Things can always get worse.
Now there's a mantra for a Friday night.
To prove it, the show closed with "Barb" in a glitter vest and wearing rollerblades, entreating people to join her in karaoke, including a Dido tune which evolved into a rousing group singalong.
Because sometimes you gotta make do when you gotta have it and can't.
Wednesday, May 4, 2016
Highway to the Danger Zone
So, those 18 years of near daily walking? Paid off in spades by 10:30 this morning.
"You've got a badass walk," a guy informs me on Cary Street as I walk toward Can Can to have an apricot scone while my companion destroys a half baguette, the sausage of the day and a French Press.
Badass, you read that right.
Fittingly, I end the day with Mac, who never seems to have an umbrella on a rainy day (you have to appreciate a person's idiosyncrasies) despite prodigious walking skills but who doesn't mind borrowing or mocking one of mine (what's a few broken spokes between friends?).
Umbrellas in hand, we made it to Saison Market before the deluge was unleashed on J-Ward. There was an appropriately groovy alternative soundtrack while we ate the Springiest of Spring salads: asparagus, fresh peas, pea shoots, radishes, carrots, pickled onions and goat cheese lovingly drizzled with a practically perfect coriander vinaigrette.
Because how much help, really, do Spring vegetables need?
Fact is, I've been craving asparagus since spotting bunches of local Northern Neck asparagus on the counter at Ellen's store yesterday.
We followed our salads with oxtail sopas, which looked so enticing that a woman who sat down next to us asked what they were as if she might order them. Originally from Mechanicsville, she'd worked at an Applebee's there, which had proved to her that she needed to escape Mechanicsville ignorance and move into the city (her words).
A trip to the loo resulted in a memorization exercise when I flipped on the light switch and found the bulbs burnt out, but I only had to open the door once to determine the position of the essentials. Mac's subsequent visit benefited from me alerting the staff to the darkness problem and only then did I learn that the chalkboard wall in the loo had become a tribute to Prince. Sorry to have missed that.
I didn't even need the purple umbrella for the trek to The Basement, but the front had changed dramatically while we were eating, making it far cooler and drier than it had been pre-rain.
On Broad Street, we ran into some theater types "taking a walk" which they said was code for "sharing some gossip and talking about people," and isn't that one reason why having a walking buddy is essential sometimes?
Down the steps to the Basement we went, only to be greeted by the Prince station playing - although naturally there was no actual Prince music - but who's going to whine about Sheila E. and MJ?
My only complaint was when a Marvin Gay song came on and someone (Mags, was that you?) skipped it forward to Earth, Wind and Fire, whom I have nothing against (in fact, everything for) but seriously, no one at any time should ever be allowed to skip Marvin.
While the music was Purple-themed, the Basment's loo read, "Have you kissed a Canadian today?' with a drawing of a maple leaf beneath it. And you know what? I hadn't.
Tonight's comedy show was called "The Set Up" and featured four of Richmond Comedy Theatre's finest doing long-form improv on the set of TheatreLAB's current production of "Venus in Fur." For the uninitiated, this gave them access to a lounge chair (the kind psychiatrists had in their offices in Doris Day/Rock Hudson movies in the '50s and '60s), a desk, a radiator, two metal folding chairs and a fur coat.
Oh, yes, and a flip phone that was touted as a "brand new $800 Nokia phone" and got tons of laughs.
Using a bad Uncle Cracker song (redundant, I know) as a starting point, the first two actors took the lyric, "Swim through your veins like a fish in the sea" as their starting point for a riff on a shaky marriage ("I told you marrying me was a big mistake"), a Caddyshack-themed wedding ("Remember when the priest came out of the hole in the ground?") and a deluded attempt to arrange for more couple quality time to get the magic back by having their daughter kidnapped ("I have to come home every night and clean up my life!").
The crowd wasn't large but most everyone was doubled over with laughter watching masturbation under a fur coat and frustration with putting shoes on ("Double knots!").
Two people in the audience became part of the show with their non-stop commentary ("Oh, no, he did not just do that!") and reactions (hand slap to forehead, shaking head in disgust) as the drama and comedy unfolded.
Intermission gave everyone time to refill their glasses and give their face a rest from cracking up. Those of us huddled under a windbreaker were thrilled when the artistic director dialed back the A/C and put the warmth back in May.
For the second skit, the jumping off point was a song called "Nobody's Darlin' But Mine" - somebody in the audience's wedding song, awwww - with a line about, "Come lay your sweet head on my brow."
Somehow, this took us to the Founding Fathers' penchant for rye whiskey ("That's how they balled out") and getting the McGillicuddy contact ("Mama's gonna eat a lobster tonight!"). Maybe you have to be there to understand the transition, but it made perfect sense at the time.
What soon became clear was that when someone gets a grant to map the genome of a human squirrel, it's just a hop, skip and a jump to her injecting herself with squirrel venom containing squirrel genome.
The only problem with someone admitting, "I'm going to level with you, I'm 75% squirrel now," is that it also means they now have strong, furry thighs to climb a tree and that's not everyone's cup of tea (or bag of nuts).
With a cohabitation clause stipulating, "And they lived happily ever after" in her work contact, the squirrel woman finds out that contractually, she has to live in a tree with her coworker.
When he offers to inject himself with squirrel venom, she tells him, "I'm not attracted to squirrels," but she does sit him down to school him on what is and is not acceptable to say to squirrels.
She didn't mention it, but I'm pretty sure it's always okay to tell a human squirrel that she has a badass scamper. It's all in the furry thighs.
"You've got a badass walk," a guy informs me on Cary Street as I walk toward Can Can to have an apricot scone while my companion destroys a half baguette, the sausage of the day and a French Press.
Badass, you read that right.
Fittingly, I end the day with Mac, who never seems to have an umbrella on a rainy day (you have to appreciate a person's idiosyncrasies) despite prodigious walking skills but who doesn't mind borrowing or mocking one of mine (what's a few broken spokes between friends?).
Umbrellas in hand, we made it to Saison Market before the deluge was unleashed on J-Ward. There was an appropriately groovy alternative soundtrack while we ate the Springiest of Spring salads: asparagus, fresh peas, pea shoots, radishes, carrots, pickled onions and goat cheese lovingly drizzled with a practically perfect coriander vinaigrette.
Because how much help, really, do Spring vegetables need?
Fact is, I've been craving asparagus since spotting bunches of local Northern Neck asparagus on the counter at Ellen's store yesterday.
We followed our salads with oxtail sopas, which looked so enticing that a woman who sat down next to us asked what they were as if she might order them. Originally from Mechanicsville, she'd worked at an Applebee's there, which had proved to her that she needed to escape Mechanicsville ignorance and move into the city (her words).
A trip to the loo resulted in a memorization exercise when I flipped on the light switch and found the bulbs burnt out, but I only had to open the door once to determine the position of the essentials. Mac's subsequent visit benefited from me alerting the staff to the darkness problem and only then did I learn that the chalkboard wall in the loo had become a tribute to Prince. Sorry to have missed that.
I didn't even need the purple umbrella for the trek to The Basement, but the front had changed dramatically while we were eating, making it far cooler and drier than it had been pre-rain.
On Broad Street, we ran into some theater types "taking a walk" which they said was code for "sharing some gossip and talking about people," and isn't that one reason why having a walking buddy is essential sometimes?
Down the steps to the Basement we went, only to be greeted by the Prince station playing - although naturally there was no actual Prince music - but who's going to whine about Sheila E. and MJ?
My only complaint was when a Marvin Gay song came on and someone (Mags, was that you?) skipped it forward to Earth, Wind and Fire, whom I have nothing against (in fact, everything for) but seriously, no one at any time should ever be allowed to skip Marvin.
While the music was Purple-themed, the Basment's loo read, "Have you kissed a Canadian today?' with a drawing of a maple leaf beneath it. And you know what? I hadn't.
Tonight's comedy show was called "The Set Up" and featured four of Richmond Comedy Theatre's finest doing long-form improv on the set of TheatreLAB's current production of "Venus in Fur." For the uninitiated, this gave them access to a lounge chair (the kind psychiatrists had in their offices in Doris Day/Rock Hudson movies in the '50s and '60s), a desk, a radiator, two metal folding chairs and a fur coat.
Oh, yes, and a flip phone that was touted as a "brand new $800 Nokia phone" and got tons of laughs.
Using a bad Uncle Cracker song (redundant, I know) as a starting point, the first two actors took the lyric, "Swim through your veins like a fish in the sea" as their starting point for a riff on a shaky marriage ("I told you marrying me was a big mistake"), a Caddyshack-themed wedding ("Remember when the priest came out of the hole in the ground?") and a deluded attempt to arrange for more couple quality time to get the magic back by having their daughter kidnapped ("I have to come home every night and clean up my life!").
The crowd wasn't large but most everyone was doubled over with laughter watching masturbation under a fur coat and frustration with putting shoes on ("Double knots!").
Two people in the audience became part of the show with their non-stop commentary ("Oh, no, he did not just do that!") and reactions (hand slap to forehead, shaking head in disgust) as the drama and comedy unfolded.
Intermission gave everyone time to refill their glasses and give their face a rest from cracking up. Those of us huddled under a windbreaker were thrilled when the artistic director dialed back the A/C and put the warmth back in May.
For the second skit, the jumping off point was a song called "Nobody's Darlin' But Mine" - somebody in the audience's wedding song, awwww - with a line about, "Come lay your sweet head on my brow."
Somehow, this took us to the Founding Fathers' penchant for rye whiskey ("That's how they balled out") and getting the McGillicuddy contact ("Mama's gonna eat a lobster tonight!"). Maybe you have to be there to understand the transition, but it made perfect sense at the time.
What soon became clear was that when someone gets a grant to map the genome of a human squirrel, it's just a hop, skip and a jump to her injecting herself with squirrel venom containing squirrel genome.
The only problem with someone admitting, "I'm going to level with you, I'm 75% squirrel now," is that it also means they now have strong, furry thighs to climb a tree and that's not everyone's cup of tea (or bag of nuts).
With a cohabitation clause stipulating, "And they lived happily ever after" in her work contact, the squirrel woman finds out that contractually, she has to live in a tree with her coworker.
When he offers to inject himself with squirrel venom, she tells him, "I'm not attracted to squirrels," but she does sit him down to school him on what is and is not acceptable to say to squirrels.
She didn't mention it, but I'm pretty sure it's always okay to tell a human squirrel that she has a badass scamper. It's all in the furry thighs.
Saturday, April 30, 2016
Honk If You See Me
Sometimes, you take a newspaper to a restaurant, only to get moved three times.
Every seat at Amuse's bar was taken when I walked in, so I was directed to one of the mod green chairs, a perfectly fine perch for a solo diner intent on reading her Washington Post and all the better if I could find someone who wanted to read a section with me.
Just as I was finishing the Weekend section, sipping a glass of Rose and awaiting my food, I was asked if I minded moving so a group of four could use the chairs.
No problem. I took a chair near a couple who told me they were busy dissecting their awful Friday, but since my day had consisted of a walk (where one of the guys down on Dock Street had greeted me by saying, "I'd recognize that walk anywhere! Where's your hat today?") and hours in at my desk writing to make a deadline, I didn't have a lot to complain about with them.
It was a bit awkward trying to eat chicken tortilla soup while seated in a deep chair hovering over a low bar table, but the bartender's recommendation of the soup was right on. Full of chicken, chickpeas and tortilla strips, the broth had the level of heat that ensures you crave another bite immediately but not so hot that it was ever burning my mouth.
I was only halfway through the bowl when I was alerted that a seat had opened up at the bar, if I was willing to move yet again. With another drippy course on the way, it seemed wise to get to a closer surface to eat off of.
The bar crowd welcomed me into their fold, I cleaned my bowl of soup and started on a bowl of Mussels and ham in a white wine butter broth that eventually left me in a butter coma after sopping up an obscene amount of it.
Needing to move for fear I'd fall asleep, I strolled the new photography show, "Kertesz," marveling at the photographer's Modernist eye in the collection of stunning black and white images, some familiar like the one of two people looking at a circus through a hole in a fence. For another, Kertesz used his brothers as models, the two in Speedos, holding hands and using their body weight to counterbalance each other in mid-air.
I'll need to go back when I have a bit more time to scope out the show in full.
When a familiar face called my name, I joined their group, which involved tasting a new cocktail of mezcal, moonshine, pineapple juice and vanilla shrub (you'll never disappoint me with a mezcal cocktail) and discussing my trip to California with one who lived there a dozen years. It isn't often I meet someone who's also stayed at the Timber Cove Lodge, so that made for a delightful surprise.
Another restaurant type informed me that she'd spotted me in my natural habitat - J-Ward - recognized me immediately ("I spotted those legs and knew it was you!") but resisted the urge to hit the horn, knowing I wouldn't recognize her car. What's a random honk among friends?
Despite the dining room being completely full, for a change the bar wasn't overcrowded, so we had no guilt camping out to reminisce about the history of Richmond's restaurant scene and why certain neighborhoods are so far superior to others. Fan? No, thank you. Church Hill? Too isolated. Woodland Heights? Not for me.
When I pulled out my card to pay, I made a crack about its prehistoric nature since I don't yet have a chip card. As soon as I said it, the guy in the seat next to me whipped around to explain that if I called Wells Fargo, I could get a chip card immediately.
He pulled out his card to show me the graphic pattern he'd designed to go on his card and suggested when I do get my new card that I have an image put on it (so, yes, this stranger was trying to drag me into the 21st century right here at the bar) to further personalize it.
Explaining patiently to him that I'd only gotten a Wells Fargo card last year - yes, I've been carrying around a Wachovia card for years after the 2009 merger - he laughed.
I'm in no hurry for a chip card, I told him, because I'm a Luddite. When I said I had no cell phone, he countered proudly that he didn't use Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. As a 29-year old, he thinks his generation is losing social skills due to reliance on technology and as a millennial who realizes this, he's an exception.
The funny part was, he sees the generation behind him (the early 20-somethings) as completely clueless and overly-dependent on devices in a much worse way than his people. I tried not to laugh at the distinction, then belatedly noticed he had a companion.
Wait, are you on a date? Yes, he says and turns back to it reluctantly. Good luck and godspeed with that, friend.
I got home to find a message waiting for me requesting the pleasure of my company and before long I was walking over to the Comedy Theater for some laughs and a Red Eye chocolate chip cookie, which, if you ask me, was a cookie tailored to the taste of generations raised on slice and bake cookies.
Overly sweet, not enough texture, just a lame sort of cookie. Granted, their target demographic is students studying and munched out at 2 a.m. and that's not me, but I couldn't help but be disappointed.
Luckily, the comedy made up for the cookie with the Disco Lemonade team kicking things off with a skit about boys - What do dudes like to do? Play video games and smash things - and the Work Family team taking on this unfortunate election cycle - I am a millennial and we are the future - with no hesitation about slamming Trump - I went to a restaurant and there was no T-bone on the menu. What's this world coming to? - and the rationalizations of racism - I think I'm a cute racist - all in pursuit of laughs.
Walking home in the finest of drizzles, my butter coma finally starting to wear off, I took stock of my evening. A few good laughs and excellent food and wine savored in multiple seats, although epic failure at finding a fellow reader.
Wait, I went to an art-filled restaurant and there were no newspaper-readers to discuss its articles with? What's this world coming to?
Every seat at Amuse's bar was taken when I walked in, so I was directed to one of the mod green chairs, a perfectly fine perch for a solo diner intent on reading her Washington Post and all the better if I could find someone who wanted to read a section with me.
Just as I was finishing the Weekend section, sipping a glass of Rose and awaiting my food, I was asked if I minded moving so a group of four could use the chairs.
No problem. I took a chair near a couple who told me they were busy dissecting their awful Friday, but since my day had consisted of a walk (where one of the guys down on Dock Street had greeted me by saying, "I'd recognize that walk anywhere! Where's your hat today?") and hours in at my desk writing to make a deadline, I didn't have a lot to complain about with them.
It was a bit awkward trying to eat chicken tortilla soup while seated in a deep chair hovering over a low bar table, but the bartender's recommendation of the soup was right on. Full of chicken, chickpeas and tortilla strips, the broth had the level of heat that ensures you crave another bite immediately but not so hot that it was ever burning my mouth.
I was only halfway through the bowl when I was alerted that a seat had opened up at the bar, if I was willing to move yet again. With another drippy course on the way, it seemed wise to get to a closer surface to eat off of.
The bar crowd welcomed me into their fold, I cleaned my bowl of soup and started on a bowl of Mussels and ham in a white wine butter broth that eventually left me in a butter coma after sopping up an obscene amount of it.
Needing to move for fear I'd fall asleep, I strolled the new photography show, "Kertesz," marveling at the photographer's Modernist eye in the collection of stunning black and white images, some familiar like the one of two people looking at a circus through a hole in a fence. For another, Kertesz used his brothers as models, the two in Speedos, holding hands and using their body weight to counterbalance each other in mid-air.
I'll need to go back when I have a bit more time to scope out the show in full.
When a familiar face called my name, I joined their group, which involved tasting a new cocktail of mezcal, moonshine, pineapple juice and vanilla shrub (you'll never disappoint me with a mezcal cocktail) and discussing my trip to California with one who lived there a dozen years. It isn't often I meet someone who's also stayed at the Timber Cove Lodge, so that made for a delightful surprise.
Another restaurant type informed me that she'd spotted me in my natural habitat - J-Ward - recognized me immediately ("I spotted those legs and knew it was you!") but resisted the urge to hit the horn, knowing I wouldn't recognize her car. What's a random honk among friends?
Despite the dining room being completely full, for a change the bar wasn't overcrowded, so we had no guilt camping out to reminisce about the history of Richmond's restaurant scene and why certain neighborhoods are so far superior to others. Fan? No, thank you. Church Hill? Too isolated. Woodland Heights? Not for me.
When I pulled out my card to pay, I made a crack about its prehistoric nature since I don't yet have a chip card. As soon as I said it, the guy in the seat next to me whipped around to explain that if I called Wells Fargo, I could get a chip card immediately.
He pulled out his card to show me the graphic pattern he'd designed to go on his card and suggested when I do get my new card that I have an image put on it (so, yes, this stranger was trying to drag me into the 21st century right here at the bar) to further personalize it.
Explaining patiently to him that I'd only gotten a Wells Fargo card last year - yes, I've been carrying around a Wachovia card for years after the 2009 merger - he laughed.
I'm in no hurry for a chip card, I told him, because I'm a Luddite. When I said I had no cell phone, he countered proudly that he didn't use Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. As a 29-year old, he thinks his generation is losing social skills due to reliance on technology and as a millennial who realizes this, he's an exception.
The funny part was, he sees the generation behind him (the early 20-somethings) as completely clueless and overly-dependent on devices in a much worse way than his people. I tried not to laugh at the distinction, then belatedly noticed he had a companion.
Wait, are you on a date? Yes, he says and turns back to it reluctantly. Good luck and godspeed with that, friend.
I got home to find a message waiting for me requesting the pleasure of my company and before long I was walking over to the Comedy Theater for some laughs and a Red Eye chocolate chip cookie, which, if you ask me, was a cookie tailored to the taste of generations raised on slice and bake cookies.
Overly sweet, not enough texture, just a lame sort of cookie. Granted, their target demographic is students studying and munched out at 2 a.m. and that's not me, but I couldn't help but be disappointed.
Luckily, the comedy made up for the cookie with the Disco Lemonade team kicking things off with a skit about boys - What do dudes like to do? Play video games and smash things - and the Work Family team taking on this unfortunate election cycle - I am a millennial and we are the future - with no hesitation about slamming Trump - I went to a restaurant and there was no T-bone on the menu. What's this world coming to? - and the rationalizations of racism - I think I'm a cute racist - all in pursuit of laughs.
Walking home in the finest of drizzles, my butter coma finally starting to wear off, I took stock of my evening. A few good laughs and excellent food and wine savored in multiple seats, although epic failure at finding a fellow reader.
Wait, I went to an art-filled restaurant and there were no newspaper-readers to discuss its articles with? What's this world coming to?
Wednesday, April 20, 2016
The Light, the Heat
It's 4/20. We know you're hungry!
~ sign outside the Village Cafe
Today is 4/20 (smiley face)
~ sign outside Rumors Boutique
A 420 Carol
~ tonight's show at Comedy Coalition Theater
With all that in mind, it only made sense to start the evening in a split level, just the kind of house where kids probably smoked pot to escape their southside ennui.
The occasion was another Designmonth RVA event, this one at a 1954 house on Riverside Drive that has been renovated from a suburban-looking cliche to what the architects referred to as "West coast modern," which involved re-imagining it by removing the split level and replacing it with an enormous vertical addition, moving the garage to the front and putting a massive garage rooftop patio atop it.
Besides more bedrooms than I can recall, it had a home brewing room (see: drain in center of floor), a closet that ran the length of thee master suite and was wide enough for a couch and gorgeous old azaleas in full bloom crowding the back deck.
One of the Modern Richmond crew referred to Riverside Drive as "Mulholland Drive Richmond" because of its view sheds and distinctly mid-century architecture. Driving out, I saw several houses that supported that theory.
Headed back to the Fan for dinner, I couldn't help but notice how much better at being pedestrians the VCU students are at this point. It's a shame, but by the time we train them in the art of walking around in a city, it's the end of the school year. Pity.
Today's warm yet dry weather meant that the top of the blue Dutch door at Garnett's was open, the screen door keeping bugs on their side of it, but allowing soft evening air to waft in.
The only two seats open in the lively restaurant were at the counter and we took them.
The two women behind us were discussing experiences with men in bars, a couple was enjoying a bottle of Early Mountain Rose as part of the date night deal and a young couple with twin babies was trying to have a meal despite two vocal babies.
When our server took a small hotel pan filled with boiling water to their table, it was to put a baby bottle in it to warm the milk. Impressed with her ingenuity, I complimented her on such cleverness. "Yea, I was pretty proud of that," she grinned. "I used to babysit a lot."
Before we'd even finished our salads, we ordered double chocolate cake and the check because we knew "A 420 Carol" was starting soon. Walking by Gallery 5 to Coalition Theater, the throbbing sounds of a punk show reverberated out while black-clad and deliberately disaffected-looking kids milled about outside smoking cigarettes. It could have been 1982.
Ah, youth.
Using the characters and premise from RCC's recent improvised series "High There" about a guy who inherits a head shop from his stoner Uncle Jim, tonight's special edition focused on owner Jonathan's indifference to the high holy day for potheads while his staff wants to close up and experience Bongzilla, the $11,000 bong that's the shop's centerpiece.
Ho, ho, ho, Merry Spliffness and good luck finding the true meaning of 4/20 and all that.
The staff wants to close the shop and party while he wants a good night's sleep (early morning meeting) while they keep the shop open for the expected 4/20 consumers. Further complicating things is that it's his anniversary and all his wife wants is to celebrate that ("He is a boner, but tonight, he should be my boner").
But, of course, Jonathan's sleep is interrupted repeatedly through the night, beginning with the Bob Marley poster on his wall coming to life as the ghost of Uncle Jim, complete with long multi-colored dreadlocks and lots of beads.
"Every mistake I made, I put a bead in my hair," Marley tells Jonathan. So glad that's not a universal rule.
Poor Jonathan, all he wants to do is sleep - "My mellow is 18 hours of sleep a night. Don't harsh my mellow!" - but all Uncle Jim has done is prepare him for a series of ghost visitors to keep him up.
The ghost of 4/20 past showed him how much fun he used to be, frequently using "Full House" analogies, reminding him of nights capped by a group sing of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes," while the ghost of 4/20 present, wearing Redskins pajamas and stuffing jalapeno potato chips in his gob, wanted to know why he wasn't celebrating 4/20.
"Because I'm sleepy and I want my store to be profitable tonight?" he asked. In the voice of Moses, host of 4/20 present thundered, "Oh, what have you become?" and proceeded to show poor Jonathan how dull the party was downstairs without him.
An ongoing source of laughter was how none of the ghosts could remember their role, always identifying themselves as the "ghost of Christmas, I mean 4/20 past, present or whatever." Sounds to me like ghosts are freelancers who take whatever jobs they can.
You wear as many hats as you need to to make rent.
Wearing black satin elbow-length opera gloves ("These gloves feel amazing right now" said the first-time satin wearer) and a black shroud, the ghost of 4/20 future points out Jonathan's grave marker and shares that if he doesn't change, his High There shop will wind up becoming a Blimpie's when he's gone.
"Which would be perfect if Blimpie's came back," Future opined, momentarily unconcerned about Jonathan's fate for the sake of a good sub.
Laugh-out-loud improvised moments were constant, including a Matthew Broderick/Godzilla reference even some of the actors didn't get ("Huh?") but was quickly explained. Once Jonathan realizes that he really does have a wonderful life, he tells his girlfriend, "It's our anniversary! Roll me into a blunt and smoke me like one of your French girls."
That was the cue for the staff to toast each other with blunts and begin singing "In Your Eyes" again.
The end, except not really, because the sound guy immediately cues up the real "In Your Eyes" and everyone in the audience went out on a high note, possibly even hungry, definitely not harshed.
And my mellow? Nine hours of sleep a night. Yea, I'm pretty proud of that.
~ sign outside the Village Cafe
Today is 4/20 (smiley face)
~ sign outside Rumors Boutique
A 420 Carol
~ tonight's show at Comedy Coalition Theater
With all that in mind, it only made sense to start the evening in a split level, just the kind of house where kids probably smoked pot to escape their southside ennui.
The occasion was another Designmonth RVA event, this one at a 1954 house on Riverside Drive that has been renovated from a suburban-looking cliche to what the architects referred to as "West coast modern," which involved re-imagining it by removing the split level and replacing it with an enormous vertical addition, moving the garage to the front and putting a massive garage rooftop patio atop it.
Besides more bedrooms than I can recall, it had a home brewing room (see: drain in center of floor), a closet that ran the length of thee master suite and was wide enough for a couch and gorgeous old azaleas in full bloom crowding the back deck.
One of the Modern Richmond crew referred to Riverside Drive as "Mulholland Drive Richmond" because of its view sheds and distinctly mid-century architecture. Driving out, I saw several houses that supported that theory.
Headed back to the Fan for dinner, I couldn't help but notice how much better at being pedestrians the VCU students are at this point. It's a shame, but by the time we train them in the art of walking around in a city, it's the end of the school year. Pity.
Today's warm yet dry weather meant that the top of the blue Dutch door at Garnett's was open, the screen door keeping bugs on their side of it, but allowing soft evening air to waft in.
The only two seats open in the lively restaurant were at the counter and we took them.
The two women behind us were discussing experiences with men in bars, a couple was enjoying a bottle of Early Mountain Rose as part of the date night deal and a young couple with twin babies was trying to have a meal despite two vocal babies.
When our server took a small hotel pan filled with boiling water to their table, it was to put a baby bottle in it to warm the milk. Impressed with her ingenuity, I complimented her on such cleverness. "Yea, I was pretty proud of that," she grinned. "I used to babysit a lot."
Before we'd even finished our salads, we ordered double chocolate cake and the check because we knew "A 420 Carol" was starting soon. Walking by Gallery 5 to Coalition Theater, the throbbing sounds of a punk show reverberated out while black-clad and deliberately disaffected-looking kids milled about outside smoking cigarettes. It could have been 1982.
Ah, youth.
Using the characters and premise from RCC's recent improvised series "High There" about a guy who inherits a head shop from his stoner Uncle Jim, tonight's special edition focused on owner Jonathan's indifference to the high holy day for potheads while his staff wants to close up and experience Bongzilla, the $11,000 bong that's the shop's centerpiece.
Ho, ho, ho, Merry Spliffness and good luck finding the true meaning of 4/20 and all that.
The staff wants to close the shop and party while he wants a good night's sleep (early morning meeting) while they keep the shop open for the expected 4/20 consumers. Further complicating things is that it's his anniversary and all his wife wants is to celebrate that ("He is a boner, but tonight, he should be my boner").
But, of course, Jonathan's sleep is interrupted repeatedly through the night, beginning with the Bob Marley poster on his wall coming to life as the ghost of Uncle Jim, complete with long multi-colored dreadlocks and lots of beads.
"Every mistake I made, I put a bead in my hair," Marley tells Jonathan. So glad that's not a universal rule.
Poor Jonathan, all he wants to do is sleep - "My mellow is 18 hours of sleep a night. Don't harsh my mellow!" - but all Uncle Jim has done is prepare him for a series of ghost visitors to keep him up.
The ghost of 4/20 past showed him how much fun he used to be, frequently using "Full House" analogies, reminding him of nights capped by a group sing of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes," while the ghost of 4/20 present, wearing Redskins pajamas and stuffing jalapeno potato chips in his gob, wanted to know why he wasn't celebrating 4/20.
"Because I'm sleepy and I want my store to be profitable tonight?" he asked. In the voice of Moses, host of 4/20 present thundered, "Oh, what have you become?" and proceeded to show poor Jonathan how dull the party was downstairs without him.
An ongoing source of laughter was how none of the ghosts could remember their role, always identifying themselves as the "ghost of Christmas, I mean 4/20 past, present or whatever." Sounds to me like ghosts are freelancers who take whatever jobs they can.
You wear as many hats as you need to to make rent.
Wearing black satin elbow-length opera gloves ("These gloves feel amazing right now" said the first-time satin wearer) and a black shroud, the ghost of 4/20 future points out Jonathan's grave marker and shares that if he doesn't change, his High There shop will wind up becoming a Blimpie's when he's gone.
"Which would be perfect if Blimpie's came back," Future opined, momentarily unconcerned about Jonathan's fate for the sake of a good sub.
Laugh-out-loud improvised moments were constant, including a Matthew Broderick/Godzilla reference even some of the actors didn't get ("Huh?") but was quickly explained. Once Jonathan realizes that he really does have a wonderful life, he tells his girlfriend, "It's our anniversary! Roll me into a blunt and smoke me like one of your French girls."
That was the cue for the staff to toast each other with blunts and begin singing "In Your Eyes" again.
The end, except not really, because the sound guy immediately cues up the real "In Your Eyes" and everyone in the audience went out on a high note, possibly even hungry, definitely not harshed.
And my mellow? Nine hours of sleep a night. Yea, I'm pretty proud of that.
Saturday, January 30, 2016
No Truth is Marching On
Another night in J-Ward, another new friend wowed.
Lessons learned from Mama J's on a Friday night: Arrive at 4:00, like the couple next to us (he'd also been there last night, pre-KRS-One at the National) or after 7:00 (happy hour is over) when the waits are shorter than the length of the meal, a worthy goal.
Ordinarily, I'd never attempt Mama's at prime time but that's the window we had available and I wanted to show off the neighborhood fried chicken and cake. Okay, and the fried catfish, the perfectly cooked greens and the corn muffins.
As it was, with the bar two deep and a crowd of people waiting by the door, I used the time to school my newbie on the importance of choosing your cake variety early to have it cut and set aside before the cake's all gone.
Coincidentally, chocolate cake with white icing is tops for both of us, so that worked out very nicely.
We were making do with one stool when the bartender pointed us to the end of the bar and two open stools, but I no sooner planted my backside when the stool's previous owner got indignant with me. Of course I moved and the barkeep apologized, but also whispered that she'd been ready for some new faces, namely us.
A table soon opened up so I could introduce my first-timer to Jackson Ward soul food while the Spinners and O'Jays played overhead. I pity the fool who isn't won over by that combination.
Our massive slice o' cake had to accompany us to Richmond Comedy Coalition for "High There," the weekly improvised sit-com set in an inherited head shop. Odd as that might sound, it isn't the first time I've shown up there with cake in hand (last time it was Garnett's).
Cake and comedy, it's a natural, don't you think?
Tonight's sealed envelope revealed the two-pronged plot: High Times magazine was coming to review High There while the two ditzy staffers plot to get a 50-cent an hour raise. Grace needs it for her kombucha brewing start-up and Townsend tells Grace she needs more money because her cat, Mr. Tibalt, has colitis and it's getting very expensive (Grace: "I know, I follow the blog!").
The dreadlocked reviewer Star Brody shows up and mistakenly interviews Joe, the owner of the bookshop upstairs, while the staff waits on a woman they think is the reviewer but is actually writing for Water Aerobics Weekly ("Yes, weekly, there's enough water aerobics news for a weekly!").
And if you're dying to know how the shop fared with the review, you'll be happy to know that it was rated three pot leaves and a half. Not only that, but the staff managed to sell the 8-foot king bong (with matching tiara), so they both got 75-cent raises.
Let's just have a moment, shall we, to appreciate the RCC talent, a group of people who are able to improvise such hilarious situations and dialog on the fly.
Just like when I saw episode #1, between scenes we were shown the cheesiest vintage commercials known to man. I'm talking Mr. T cereal and Valley Ball, a Van Nuys bar boasting a vodka drip and topless dancers. An amusement park called Flintstones Bedrock City in British Columbia ("Kids, get your dinosaur driving license!") and a Chuck Norris movie of non-stop violence called "Code of Silence."
After this week's episode ended with a group hug, our host invited everyone to stay for the late show, but, alas, my companion works tomorrow morning, so we walked back to my house and said goodnight, but not before I was given way too much credit for dreaming up a great evening.
Stop that, it's just not all that tough to do where I live.
I couldn't think of any reason not to go right back for the late show, even getting the same seat, for a show based on Reddit's ridiculous postings. The funny part was, more than a few of the comedy crew admitted that they had no idea what Reddit was before planning this show.
Oh, good, then it's not just me.
A screen shot of several Reddit pages and the accompanying comments were screened on the wall, honing in on a guy named Superthug with an obviously Photoshopped gash on his head, a bullshit caption and, in the comments, a brief video of what claimed to be "Siri's ass."
I suppose for those of you who follow Siri's directions, this might hold some appeal.
Believe it or not, this evolved into a skit starring a man with a head gash because of having sex with a shark (but still looking for more action) and a stilted-voiced Siri checking her data base, only to inform him that Helen Mirren was "DTF."
You can challenge me on this, but I'm willing to bet that Helen Mirren and "DTF" have never before been used in the same sentence.
After a miscue by our host who tried to send us home before the second part of the program. we again scanned Reddit, this time coming up with a piece about a guy who took credit for telling Obama, "Yes, we can" and creating his campaign slogan. The comments section yielded a reference to Forest Gump and his indelible effect on history and they were off and running.
Two brothers both want to be president, but it's the simple-minded Marquise who talks of nothing but recycling, composting and garbage (his three-pronged political plan) who gets the support of big money, Angela Merkel and the little people, who chant, "Marquise, Marquise, Marquise."
Along the way, Dark Justice gives a speech while others hum the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and an interpretive dance is done. "Did you just shoot me with an interpretive dance gun?" DJ asks Marquise incredulously. Sure did and probably recycled it afterwards.
You'd think people couldn't make this stuff up, but I'm here to tell you they can. Glory, glory, hallelujah.
Lessons learned from Mama J's on a Friday night: Arrive at 4:00, like the couple next to us (he'd also been there last night, pre-KRS-One at the National) or after 7:00 (happy hour is over) when the waits are shorter than the length of the meal, a worthy goal.
Ordinarily, I'd never attempt Mama's at prime time but that's the window we had available and I wanted to show off the neighborhood fried chicken and cake. Okay, and the fried catfish, the perfectly cooked greens and the corn muffins.
As it was, with the bar two deep and a crowd of people waiting by the door, I used the time to school my newbie on the importance of choosing your cake variety early to have it cut and set aside before the cake's all gone.
Coincidentally, chocolate cake with white icing is tops for both of us, so that worked out very nicely.
We were making do with one stool when the bartender pointed us to the end of the bar and two open stools, but I no sooner planted my backside when the stool's previous owner got indignant with me. Of course I moved and the barkeep apologized, but also whispered that she'd been ready for some new faces, namely us.
A table soon opened up so I could introduce my first-timer to Jackson Ward soul food while the Spinners and O'Jays played overhead. I pity the fool who isn't won over by that combination.
Our massive slice o' cake had to accompany us to Richmond Comedy Coalition for "High There," the weekly improvised sit-com set in an inherited head shop. Odd as that might sound, it isn't the first time I've shown up there with cake in hand (last time it was Garnett's).
Cake and comedy, it's a natural, don't you think?
Tonight's sealed envelope revealed the two-pronged plot: High Times magazine was coming to review High There while the two ditzy staffers plot to get a 50-cent an hour raise. Grace needs it for her kombucha brewing start-up and Townsend tells Grace she needs more money because her cat, Mr. Tibalt, has colitis and it's getting very expensive (Grace: "I know, I follow the blog!").
The dreadlocked reviewer Star Brody shows up and mistakenly interviews Joe, the owner of the bookshop upstairs, while the staff waits on a woman they think is the reviewer but is actually writing for Water Aerobics Weekly ("Yes, weekly, there's enough water aerobics news for a weekly!").
And if you're dying to know how the shop fared with the review, you'll be happy to know that it was rated three pot leaves and a half. Not only that, but the staff managed to sell the 8-foot king bong (with matching tiara), so they both got 75-cent raises.
Let's just have a moment, shall we, to appreciate the RCC talent, a group of people who are able to improvise such hilarious situations and dialog on the fly.
Just like when I saw episode #1, between scenes we were shown the cheesiest vintage commercials known to man. I'm talking Mr. T cereal and Valley Ball, a Van Nuys bar boasting a vodka drip and topless dancers. An amusement park called Flintstones Bedrock City in British Columbia ("Kids, get your dinosaur driving license!") and a Chuck Norris movie of non-stop violence called "Code of Silence."
After this week's episode ended with a group hug, our host invited everyone to stay for the late show, but, alas, my companion works tomorrow morning, so we walked back to my house and said goodnight, but not before I was given way too much credit for dreaming up a great evening.
Stop that, it's just not all that tough to do where I live.
I couldn't think of any reason not to go right back for the late show, even getting the same seat, for a show based on Reddit's ridiculous postings. The funny part was, more than a few of the comedy crew admitted that they had no idea what Reddit was before planning this show.
Oh, good, then it's not just me.
A screen shot of several Reddit pages and the accompanying comments were screened on the wall, honing in on a guy named Superthug with an obviously Photoshopped gash on his head, a bullshit caption and, in the comments, a brief video of what claimed to be "Siri's ass."
I suppose for those of you who follow Siri's directions, this might hold some appeal.
Believe it or not, this evolved into a skit starring a man with a head gash because of having sex with a shark (but still looking for more action) and a stilted-voiced Siri checking her data base, only to inform him that Helen Mirren was "DTF."
You can challenge me on this, but I'm willing to bet that Helen Mirren and "DTF" have never before been used in the same sentence.
After a miscue by our host who tried to send us home before the second part of the program. we again scanned Reddit, this time coming up with a piece about a guy who took credit for telling Obama, "Yes, we can" and creating his campaign slogan. The comments section yielded a reference to Forest Gump and his indelible effect on history and they were off and running.
Two brothers both want to be president, but it's the simple-minded Marquise who talks of nothing but recycling, composting and garbage (his three-pronged political plan) who gets the support of big money, Angela Merkel and the little people, who chant, "Marquise, Marquise, Marquise."
Along the way, Dark Justice gives a speech while others hum the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and an interpretive dance is done. "Did you just shoot me with an interpretive dance gun?" DJ asks Marquise incredulously. Sure did and probably recycled it afterwards.
You'd think people couldn't make this stuff up, but I'm here to tell you they can. Glory, glory, hallelujah.
Friday, January 8, 2016
Porno for Political Philosophers
Schneider's dead. And that's not even the most interesting obituary I read in the paper today.
That honor would go to writer Florene King, whom I'd never heard of when I awoke, but whose work I'm now determined to explore because of this sentence from her Washington Post obituary: Miss King, who once wrote pornographic novels for fast money, was a punctilious prose stylist who became an essayist and pretense-flaying satirist along the lines of a latter-day H.L. Mencken or Dorothy Parker.
Sign me up. One quick question, though. I could be making fast money writing pornographic novels? Why am I just learning this information now?
Of lesser import but kind of fascinating was actor Pat Harrington's obit, not because I watched a lot of "One Day at a Time" (I didn't), but because I learned that the man who played the clueless chauvinistic building superintendent had a master's degree in political philosophy in real life.
Damn, that's a hella good actor.
Closer to home, I started at Reynolds Gallery where Richmond's art elite regularly gather at openings and tonight was no exception. Richard Roth's "Speed Bump," Leigh Suggs' "Double Vision" and Tara Donovan's "Slinkys" attracted an "A" list of local talent, mainly women and I happily chatted with all the ones I knew.
Suggs' intricate hand-cut pieces were a marvel to inspect at close range, at least when I could get the social set to move from in front of them so I could actually see the art. I know, I know, see and be seen.
It was a completely different scene at ADA Gallery for Tom Condon's "Haptic Fugitive" (and, yes, I learned a new word tonight- def: based on the sense of touch), a series of direct positives that resembled nothing so much as the images of a black and white kaleidoscope.
What was cool was hearing eager-beaver VCU students cornering him to pepper him with questions. How did you do these? It looks like you manipulated this part, did you? Was that done in the darkroom? When I left, he was explaining that he'd decided not to include his recent large-format digital photographs in this show because they had such a different feel than these.
From there, it was a short walk under my umbrella to Richmond Comedy Coalition for the premiere of "High There," a new weekly improvised sitcom. "You can't binge-watch this one! This is appointment-only comedy!" host Ryan warned us.
As if I binge-watch anything.
Set in a head shop Jonathan inherits from his uncle, each week's episode begins by opening the envelope with the week's premise. Tonight's was - drum roll, please - the pilot episode. Time to establish characters and scene, in other words.
After an appropriately corny theme song, we watched and laughed as Jonathan and his girlfriend Eve (who intends to be president once she's 40 and can't decide if the weed connection in her past will be a pro or a con for her run) acquaint themselves with their new property.
They're not exactly experts on weed or paraphernalia.
To help them out, they have two staffers, one of whom, Townsend, has been quietly embezzling $25,000 since Uncle's death and the other, Grace, a dizzy type, who, when told that no matter how big a number is, you can't divide it by zero, says enthusiastically with a big smile, "That doesn't mean anything to me, but I'm gonna Google it!"
Talking to Eve about her political aspirations, she wonders, "Are you, like, a liberal or a little bit cuckoo?" Because those are the choices in politics.
Laughs came courtesy of young Jonathan's travails, but also the vintage TV commercials between acts that about brought the house down. A vintage Doritos ad, one for a cheesy '70s bar called Al E. Gator's, complete with ferns and disco dancing, a pineapple burger at McDonald's "for a limited time only" (thank you, Ray Kroc) and a Pepsi commercial that focused on why Coke had changed its formula, all had the crowd in stitches with disbelief.
That's just how corny TV was in the olden days, I'm afraid. Toni Tennille haircuts were everywhere.
Naturally, weed humor abounded, such as when Jonathan mistakes a vaporizer for a "pen with a light" and employee Grace brings him up to speed, informing him it's called an "El Discreeto."
Also helping him learn the ropes is new-agey Waylon who runs a bookstore upstairs and knew Uncle. When the $25,000 shortage is discovered, Waylon says, "I'd offer to lend you the money but I run a Mom and Pop bookstore," which got a big, knowing laugh.
Luckily, Waylon has a philosophy for Jonathan's first day of business blues and it's this: Things work out, you break even and then everybody dies.
Fortunately, not anytime soon. There's seven more weeks of laughs at High There and the best part is you have to be there to find out what happens. It's the showing up that appeals to me most.
Just this morning, a friend messaged me to say he couldn't make our planned movie date next week. He excitedly tells me his consolation was finding a European streaming site that allowed him to watch the new Tarantino film last night.
Nice, but no help for me, I write him back.
You have computer and Internet, it's just not as social, he assures me. I remind him that I don't watch movies anywhere but in public places with others, the way god and MGM intended.
He points out that I sleep late and am sometimes late for appointments now, changes from ten years ago, so there may be hope for me yet. I dismiss this entirely.
I see a cell phone in your future, he audaciously writes (which is doubly funny since just two days ago I got an email from another friend wishing me a happy new year and asking, "Will you buy a cell phone in 2016? I don't think so but doesn't hurt to ask."). As if.
Then he asks what movie I'll go see without him. "Maybe I'll see if I can find that one online. Then we can discuss."
Not entirely certain, but I think he's suggesting an appointment-only movie discussion. I hope my sigh of disgust doesn't transmit through the Interwebs.
Am I an alarmist to think that this is how the world will eventually separate itself, into those willing to show up for life and those just as happy to experience it alone and on a screen?
Excuse me, I may feel the need to pen an essay or perhaps a pretense-flaying satire on the subject, but first I've got a punctilious pornographic novel to write. Pen name: El Discreeto.
Fast money, baby, to be spent out and about in the real world.
That honor would go to writer Florene King, whom I'd never heard of when I awoke, but whose work I'm now determined to explore because of this sentence from her Washington Post obituary: Miss King, who once wrote pornographic novels for fast money, was a punctilious prose stylist who became an essayist and pretense-flaying satirist along the lines of a latter-day H.L. Mencken or Dorothy Parker.
Sign me up. One quick question, though. I could be making fast money writing pornographic novels? Why am I just learning this information now?
Of lesser import but kind of fascinating was actor Pat Harrington's obit, not because I watched a lot of "One Day at a Time" (I didn't), but because I learned that the man who played the clueless chauvinistic building superintendent had a master's degree in political philosophy in real life.
Damn, that's a hella good actor.
Closer to home, I started at Reynolds Gallery where Richmond's art elite regularly gather at openings and tonight was no exception. Richard Roth's "Speed Bump," Leigh Suggs' "Double Vision" and Tara Donovan's "Slinkys" attracted an "A" list of local talent, mainly women and I happily chatted with all the ones I knew.
Suggs' intricate hand-cut pieces were a marvel to inspect at close range, at least when I could get the social set to move from in front of them so I could actually see the art. I know, I know, see and be seen.
It was a completely different scene at ADA Gallery for Tom Condon's "Haptic Fugitive" (and, yes, I learned a new word tonight- def: based on the sense of touch), a series of direct positives that resembled nothing so much as the images of a black and white kaleidoscope.
What was cool was hearing eager-beaver VCU students cornering him to pepper him with questions. How did you do these? It looks like you manipulated this part, did you? Was that done in the darkroom? When I left, he was explaining that he'd decided not to include his recent large-format digital photographs in this show because they had such a different feel than these.
From there, it was a short walk under my umbrella to Richmond Comedy Coalition for the premiere of "High There," a new weekly improvised sitcom. "You can't binge-watch this one! This is appointment-only comedy!" host Ryan warned us.
As if I binge-watch anything.
Set in a head shop Jonathan inherits from his uncle, each week's episode begins by opening the envelope with the week's premise. Tonight's was - drum roll, please - the pilot episode. Time to establish characters and scene, in other words.
After an appropriately corny theme song, we watched and laughed as Jonathan and his girlfriend Eve (who intends to be president once she's 40 and can't decide if the weed connection in her past will be a pro or a con for her run) acquaint themselves with their new property.
They're not exactly experts on weed or paraphernalia.
To help them out, they have two staffers, one of whom, Townsend, has been quietly embezzling $25,000 since Uncle's death and the other, Grace, a dizzy type, who, when told that no matter how big a number is, you can't divide it by zero, says enthusiastically with a big smile, "That doesn't mean anything to me, but I'm gonna Google it!"
Talking to Eve about her political aspirations, she wonders, "Are you, like, a liberal or a little bit cuckoo?" Because those are the choices in politics.
Laughs came courtesy of young Jonathan's travails, but also the vintage TV commercials between acts that about brought the house down. A vintage Doritos ad, one for a cheesy '70s bar called Al E. Gator's, complete with ferns and disco dancing, a pineapple burger at McDonald's "for a limited time only" (thank you, Ray Kroc) and a Pepsi commercial that focused on why Coke had changed its formula, all had the crowd in stitches with disbelief.
That's just how corny TV was in the olden days, I'm afraid. Toni Tennille haircuts were everywhere.
Naturally, weed humor abounded, such as when Jonathan mistakes a vaporizer for a "pen with a light" and employee Grace brings him up to speed, informing him it's called an "El Discreeto."
Also helping him learn the ropes is new-agey Waylon who runs a bookstore upstairs and knew Uncle. When the $25,000 shortage is discovered, Waylon says, "I'd offer to lend you the money but I run a Mom and Pop bookstore," which got a big, knowing laugh.
Luckily, Waylon has a philosophy for Jonathan's first day of business blues and it's this: Things work out, you break even and then everybody dies.
Fortunately, not anytime soon. There's seven more weeks of laughs at High There and the best part is you have to be there to find out what happens. It's the showing up that appeals to me most.
Just this morning, a friend messaged me to say he couldn't make our planned movie date next week. He excitedly tells me his consolation was finding a European streaming site that allowed him to watch the new Tarantino film last night.
Nice, but no help for me, I write him back.
You have computer and Internet, it's just not as social, he assures me. I remind him that I don't watch movies anywhere but in public places with others, the way god and MGM intended.
He points out that I sleep late and am sometimes late for appointments now, changes from ten years ago, so there may be hope for me yet. I dismiss this entirely.
I see a cell phone in your future, he audaciously writes (which is doubly funny since just two days ago I got an email from another friend wishing me a happy new year and asking, "Will you buy a cell phone in 2016? I don't think so but doesn't hurt to ask."). As if.
Then he asks what movie I'll go see without him. "Maybe I'll see if I can find that one online. Then we can discuss."
Not entirely certain, but I think he's suggesting an appointment-only movie discussion. I hope my sigh of disgust doesn't transmit through the Interwebs.
Am I an alarmist to think that this is how the world will eventually separate itself, into those willing to show up for life and those just as happy to experience it alone and on a screen?
Excuse me, I may feel the need to pen an essay or perhaps a pretense-flaying satire on the subject, but first I've got a punctilious pornographic novel to write. Pen name: El Discreeto.
Fast money, baby, to be spent out and about in the real world.
Monday, December 21, 2015
You Are Dreaming
Holiday hustle and bustle, my ass. I'm losing track of where I've been and what's still left to do.
One thing that got crossed off my to-do list was a sunny road trip to Williamsburg for research.
There I meet a restaurant owner whose son is having his reception there tonight (I spot the large silver sparkly letters spelling out "Mr. and Mr." through the doors of the charming enclosed patio), making her a bit harried trying to find enough time to be both mother of the bride in full preparation mode and a restaurant owner.
Three guys in a British pub argue vehemently about the proper ingredients for chili while I eat a bowl of the house black bean and beef chili and eavesdrop. A local walking by advises me, suggesting I try an osteria because, "You can't beat it for the money." I like how the plastic enclosure on the patio is so heavy it looks like old-fashioned wavy glass (cue Ye Olde Paul's Deli).
It's been a good week for timely train rides and a belly dancer with undulating hips and a sword balanced on her head.
When I say I'm going to Lulu's for a band, everyone at Pizza Tonight is surprised to learn they occasionally do weekend live music, but when I mosey over for The League of Space Pirates 3rd annual "There's No Winter in Space" non-denominational holiday special, no one is surprised to see a heathen like me in attendance.
Besides, I'm all about celebrating the winter solstice or anything to bring on even an extra minute of daylight every day. Let guitar and bass duo Flashlight Tag sing it into being so and I will watch.
I've noticed I make it difficult for some people. Walking briskly past a guy on Broad Street, he asks if he can walk with me. I assure him he can't keep up. "I would try!" he insists, then proves he can't. Walking towards GWAR bar with a fellow film and music enthusiast, I hear from behind me, "You're walking too fast for a guy with a sore foot."
Surely it's okay to razz a 42-year old about already having old man-itis, isn't it?
I hope all the photographers I know are capturing Mother Nature's rare December pageantry. Every day I pass rose bushes covered in fragrant flowers. Entire hedges of pink and white azaleas are in full bloom around the Siegel Center. In my own yard, I currently have dianthus, daisies and geraniums blooming. A musician friend and I spend time marveling at now meaningless traditional rules of what to plant when.
Best rapper line comes from local Noah-O, who, when he spots a plastic squirt gun on the stage, leans down and exclaims, "Oh, shit, I'm not a rapper without this," and tucks it in his waistband.
I'm inordinately happy to be told that my Style Weekly piece on the Historical Society's new "Dressing Downtown Abbey" exhibit is up and getting good reads. The way some of us see it, beautiful dresses never go out of style.
Nor, apparently, do cool threads. The members of a band covering vintage '60s and '70s music dress like it's 1967. I'm particularly taken with the white and gray striped bell bottoms the guitarist is wearing, but they're all looking pretty groovy singing "Dance to the Music" as people do.
Three days, four bands, the poetry of a pie with Calbrese and a glass of Sangiovese, late night fried bologna served on the bartender's penultimate shift and the distinct pleasure of listening to my now-functional car CD player and specifically, my favorite Swedish export, the Shout Out Louds.
Unbeknownst to anyone, it was their "Time Left for Love" that provided the name for this blog.
The rumor said it was a serial killer
But they got hit by a Caterpillar
You know the engine was still on
I smashed a window, I could go on...
And on, as you may have noticed. Keep up if you can.
One thing that got crossed off my to-do list was a sunny road trip to Williamsburg for research.
There I meet a restaurant owner whose son is having his reception there tonight (I spot the large silver sparkly letters spelling out "Mr. and Mr." through the doors of the charming enclosed patio), making her a bit harried trying to find enough time to be both mother of the bride in full preparation mode and a restaurant owner.
Three guys in a British pub argue vehemently about the proper ingredients for chili while I eat a bowl of the house black bean and beef chili and eavesdrop. A local walking by advises me, suggesting I try an osteria because, "You can't beat it for the money." I like how the plastic enclosure on the patio is so heavy it looks like old-fashioned wavy glass (cue Ye Olde Paul's Deli).
It's been a good week for timely train rides and a belly dancer with undulating hips and a sword balanced on her head.
When I say I'm going to Lulu's for a band, everyone at Pizza Tonight is surprised to learn they occasionally do weekend live music, but when I mosey over for The League of Space Pirates 3rd annual "There's No Winter in Space" non-denominational holiday special, no one is surprised to see a heathen like me in attendance.
Besides, I'm all about celebrating the winter solstice or anything to bring on even an extra minute of daylight every day. Let guitar and bass duo Flashlight Tag sing it into being so and I will watch.
I've noticed I make it difficult for some people. Walking briskly past a guy on Broad Street, he asks if he can walk with me. I assure him he can't keep up. "I would try!" he insists, then proves he can't. Walking towards GWAR bar with a fellow film and music enthusiast, I hear from behind me, "You're walking too fast for a guy with a sore foot."
Surely it's okay to razz a 42-year old about already having old man-itis, isn't it?
I hope all the photographers I know are capturing Mother Nature's rare December pageantry. Every day I pass rose bushes covered in fragrant flowers. Entire hedges of pink and white azaleas are in full bloom around the Siegel Center. In my own yard, I currently have dianthus, daisies and geraniums blooming. A musician friend and I spend time marveling at now meaningless traditional rules of what to plant when.
Best rapper line comes from local Noah-O, who, when he spots a plastic squirt gun on the stage, leans down and exclaims, "Oh, shit, I'm not a rapper without this," and tucks it in his waistband.
I'm inordinately happy to be told that my Style Weekly piece on the Historical Society's new "Dressing Downtown Abbey" exhibit is up and getting good reads. The way some of us see it, beautiful dresses never go out of style.
Nor, apparently, do cool threads. The members of a band covering vintage '60s and '70s music dress like it's 1967. I'm particularly taken with the white and gray striped bell bottoms the guitarist is wearing, but they're all looking pretty groovy singing "Dance to the Music" as people do.
Three days, four bands, the poetry of a pie with Calbrese and a glass of Sangiovese, late night fried bologna served on the bartender's penultimate shift and the distinct pleasure of listening to my now-functional car CD player and specifically, my favorite Swedish export, the Shout Out Louds.
Unbeknownst to anyone, it was their "Time Left for Love" that provided the name for this blog.
The rumor said it was a serial killer
But they got hit by a Caterpillar
You know the engine was still on
I smashed a window, I could go on...
And on, as you may have noticed. Keep up if you can.
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