Well, here I am again in Denver airport waiting on my connection, although this time to Montana. I flew out of Miami this morning around 8:30 am with the flight completely full, so full in fact that they offered a free ticket to anyone who cared to cancel their reservation and fly the next day. I was tempted by that for a moment, but just wanted to get back to what I call home.
The weekend has been fun, there were some ups and down as always, but it was still worthwhile. I woke up on Saturday morning around 11 am again, and the three of us (Jill, Anthony and I) had a very lazy day. We didn't think much about leaving the house until Jill and I went to a bookstore around 5 pm and stayed there having coffee and cake until about 7 pm. That was fun, I grabbed a few science magazines to read, and Jill was flipping through the pregnancy/childbirth genre. For example did you know that the active component in catnip is actually a better insect repellent than DEET? Being quite addicted to caffeine I was suffering from my headache withdrawal symptoms, but a quick latte had me purring away quite contentedly.
Anthony was at home sleeping and when we got back he got to work cooking his well known (amongst friends) alfredo. Our friend Ivan was getting off work at 9 pm and he was coming up to Ft. Lauderdale with Avi and Pablo to go out. Of course, things were a little later than expected, and they didn't get to the house until about 11 pm and we didn't leave until about 11:30 pm. Our destination was “Howl at the Moon”, a “duelling piano bar”, which was a concept I had admittedly never heard of. Upon arrival things were clearer, it was a regular sort of bar with two pianos facing each other and the appreciative audience sung along with the pianists. The favoured drinks were Long Island Iced Tea's served in 85 oz buckets. Yes, buckets… I had drunk a few hard lemonades before going out, so I was feeling like drinking anything else, but Pablo was flirting with the waitress, and so he kept on ordering drinks. Jill of course was pregnant and therefore not drinking which must not have been much fun, but Anthony was in his “super-social” mood which was fun. Avi on the other hand was extremely drunk, and was not doing very well, I was surprised since I didn't think he'd had that much, but some people can't digest alcohol so that might have been it.
Ivan went to the adjacent club and started chatting up a girl, with Anthony acting as “wingman”, a term I'd never heard before. Jill went to the bathroom and Pablo went after the waitress, leaving me with the increasing ill Avi who had his head down on the table. Of course, nature alas took it's course, and without going into the gritty detail, Avi threw up all over the floor and was ejected from the bar. At this point of the evening, things started to go downhill as I'd just planned on having a nice time and then going home. Nobody could be found, and Ivan didn't want to break off his little interlude with the girl he had met. It took seemingly forever (maybe only an hour real time) to get everyone together, by which time Avi had thrown up multiple times and our little spot had been joined by a girl who was rather astonishingly, even more intoxicated. We helped the boyfriend get his girlfriend up and with a cop and security looking on, Anthony got her into their car. That left us to deal with Avi, and after more drama we finally got him home. Anthony's neighbour was up and partying, and so without telling me, everyone went over there, leaving me to take care of Avi. Given that I had no idea where they were, and I was left with the now passed out Avi, I was somewhat pissed. I didn't want to be selfish, but the reason for our going out was that I was in town and the evening (now more like 3 am) was ruined and I was left holding the bag.
Anthony came and we talked for a bit and he is such a sweet, wonderful guy that I couldn't stay angry. It was silly of me I guess, but well I'm human and therefore not completely sane. I stopped hiding in the guest bedroom and came out to talk with the others, and we sat up talking until almost 5 am, and Ivan and Avi stayed the night. The next morning we woke up in various stages, and as usual I didn't emerge until about 11 am. Most everyone was up already, probably because they are on local time, Avi drove me down to the supermarket so I could grab some bacon, eggs and so forth for a nice, hot greasy breakfast. The exact plan for the day was