Life After Connecticut College

....Having GPS definitely takes the edge off of long trips, especially if there's a lot of traffic and inclement weather that can distract you from navigating. Upon arriving at what the GPS considered the destination, however, we couldn't for the life of us find the bowling alley, let alone anything but abandoned business and darkened warehouses anywhere nearby. We circled the block a few times to try to get a clue as to where the place might be, but found nothing and decided just to park exactly where the GPS said it was. We got out of the car, started looking around on foot, and sure enough after a minute or two, Nate heard the crash of bowling pins and waved us across the street towards him. A few more crashes each brought us closer and closer to the source of the sound, and eventually we found the completely unmarked entrance to the place, which was packed to the gills with hipsters. In typical New York fashion, we bumped into multiple Camels, starting with John Menk '06 (sp.) and some Conn grad named Elliot and ending with Dan Griffith '06, who showed up just as we were leaving. After the alley, Mitch and I headed across the river to go to a party at the home of Alexis Meisels '07, while Nate hung back to chill with Winslow. At the party, we also got to hang out with Melissa Skolnick '07 and Aaron Davis '07, who are now roomies with Becca Woll '07. It was actually pretty fun time, but since I had been up until 3am the night before from Thursday's WTF show, worked a whole day, driven over three hours in the rain, and searched for a secret hipster hangout, I was just a little bit tired by the time the party was over. Fortunately, Melissa and Aaron had an extra bed and couch back at their place, so Mitch and I were able to get some solid rest (I fell asleep within approximately 4 milliseconds of lying down).

The next morning, we all went out to brunch, trekking through a torrential downpour to some place that Melissa swore was incredible. Upon arriving, however, we discovered that it was incredibly closed, so we went next door to a Polish restaurant which, according to the sign on the front door, wasn't supposed to open for another hour. We were waited on without question, however, and we each enjoyed (kind of) various combinations of eggs, potato pancakes, vegetables, and something that resembled soggy bacon bits in soup of congealed fat (Mitch thought it looked like a bacon smoothie). Just for future reference, the Polish translation for "vegetarian omelet" is "omlety vegetarianski," and the translation for "Western omelet" is "omlety Western" (keep that in mind next time you're eating breakfast in Łódź). After grubbing up, we returned to Melissa's place through another batch of unrelenting rain and, upon arrival, saw that the restaurant on the first floor of her building served a scrumptious, non-Polish brunch. Oh well.

While drying off inside, we killed time by watching Curb Your Enthusiasm and awaiting the arrival of Lilli Millhiser '07, who showed up with a new haircut (it looks good). We chilled for a while, but eventually Mitch and I decided to ship out to Manhattan to meet up with fellow blogganeer Nate Borgelt '07 and then head over to the venue and set up for the show. Though we had played at this place before, there was a new soundguy this time whose attention to detail was not only refreshing and helpful but bordered on performance art (at one point he placed a microphone in the middle of the room and made various clicking and cooing sounds while we all stood by silently). It was worth the extra effort, however, because the show sounded great, and we even got several compliments on how well-balanced all of the instruments and voices were (our highly extravagant, painstakingly rehearsed dance rendition of CSNY's "Our House" is pretty breathtaking (and also pretty Fosse)).

After the gig, we all went out to a bar called The Pinch (there was a mercifully limited amount of actually pinching) for a little after-party-piece (a few of the Conn attendees: the aforementioned Nates Staub and Borgelt, Kat Varnum '05, Jenny Madden '07, Jon Tortora '07, Lauren Kellersman '03, the list goes on), at which Nate B. definitely had a very good time (a sample of his drunkenness: he kept "losing" his jacket, which basically just involved him putting it on a chair by me and Mitch, then going to hang out with people on the other side of the bar, panicking and saying "Oh my god, where is my jacket?", being told it was over by us, coming and getting it, moving it back to the other side of the bar, hanging out on my and Mitch's side, panicking and saying "Oh my god, where is my jacket?", being told it was back on the other side, etc., etc.). Anyhoo, eventually Nate, his girlfriend Robyn, and Mitch headed out to go back to Nate's apartment, and while Robyn was up ahead flagging down a cab, Nate started to yell out obscenities uncontrollably (feel free to fill in whichever obscenities you want; he used them all). Unfortunately, a passing duo of policeman thought that he was swearing at them! One cop grabbed Nate and slammed him against a nearby wall while a significantly more sober Mitch tried to reason with the other officer. Nate, however, started to yell out "I know people!" and "My brother is in the FBI!", thus exacerbating the already tense situation. After some sweet-talking, Mitch finally managed to squeeze between Nate and the irate cop, wrap his arms around Nate, get a hand in front of his mouth, and promise the cops that he and Robyn would get Nate straight home and directly to bed, to which the angry cop responded "Alright, get him out of my sight, but your friend was about 3 seconds away from getting sprayed!"

Yesterday was pretty laid back compared to that. Mitch and I hit up Chipotle for lunch (total burrito count for the weekend: a delicious 2 for each of us), browsed a few of the guitar shops on 48th Street, and then rolled back to New London, where I was able to catch up on the episode of Lost that I had missed on Thursday because of the first WTF show. Incredibly, this episode was just as hot as the rest of the new season has been; this train keeps on rolling!

I'll be back in New York on Thursday and Friday for work, so hopefully things will be a little more mellow this time around. Then next week I'm on SPRING BREAK! I'm planning on heading up to Boston on Tuesday to sit in with my friends' regular gig at a bar called The Good Life, kicking around New London for a few days, then heading down to DC for another WTF show and maybe a little Easter egg hunting on the National Mall.

See y'all later!