The 4th; Thom's visit

7/2

Dropped Bryan off at the Airport, receipts off at Rice, then headed in to school.

7/3

Band practice, then Cindy & I squeezed in some Sopranos since the next day was a holiday.

7/4

I had intended to hit a couple of 4th of July parties, but I hadn't logged much time on Resident Evil since getting back from California, so I ended up spending a good portion of the day on that. Cindy and I made dinner once she got done in lab; either steak or something Greek-ish, I can't remember...

7/5

For 7-year-old Ward, we went and saw Transformers. The parts that involved giant robots kicking each others' asses were awesome; the parts that involved people talking or situational giant robot comedy were not. But my inner 7-year-old was happy.

7/6

Thom was in for a wedding. We did Goode Co. BBQ for dinner before retiring to Hans' for beer.

7/7

Since Texadelphia hasn't made it to Boston yet, we went there for lunch. Thom and co. spent part of the afternoon getting ready for the wedding, while I played more Resident Evil (pretty much a full blown addiction by that point). When the guys got back from the wedding, there had been some vomit-based collateral damage to Thom's grandparents' Buick, so he got that cleaned up and we all had some Shiners. Except for Dave (not that Dave), who was pretty much passed out by that point.

7/8

We hit Star Pizza for lunch, and Cindy & I went to Rudz for drinks later that evening.

Tweets for Today

• 20:01 Tweets untwittered from yesterday: 1) yay for free pizza @ student talks. #
• 20:02 2) Yay for nice weather and cheap beer @ Valhalla. #
• 21:09 3) Tollhouse pie @ the Chocolate Bar is surprisingly disappointing. Not substantial enough. Should be more cookie and less pie. #
• 21:12 4) Drinks with Grambo and Angela at their place. First time in a year. Char & Alison there too. Always want to play Graham's speakers louder #
• 21:13 5) Dexter back at home. Bed. #
• 23:02 6) Leftover Indian + more Dexter. #
• 23:04 7) Shoe shopping at shoes.com Saturday sale, spent an hour, found good stuff, didn't have my size. FAIL. #
• 23:05 8) Symphony was good tonight. Violin concerto played on a Stradivarius & a nice organ piece. #
• 23:06 And... caught up. #

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Tweets for Today

• 11:45 Bah. Committee meeting tomorrow. Must finish presentation... #
• 12:01 Pitchfork's new fonts: difficult to read at chosen size, exacerbated by using serif for heads and sans for body, rather than vice versa. #
• 12:03 Body text is Calibri; head text is Cambria. I need per-site font settings. #
• 15:51 Made mistake of taking iBuds on the shuttle instead of Ultimate Ears. Regretting. Too many people talking engine noise. #
• 21:37 Somebody thinks they're clever, and they're right: bg5000.tumblr.com/post/31854880 #
• 21:37 Did you know Jack Handey was real? www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/books/04/15/books.jack.handey.ap/index.html #
• 21:43 Seems like Jack Handey and Douglas Adams had use similar techniques to construct their sentences to comedic effect. #
• 21:49 "Eldest children are punished more". I knew it! tinyurl.com/yvrra8/news/2008/04/16/npunish116.xml #
• 22:52 Dairy Queen ad narrator sounds like Dubya, or at least a Dubya impersonator. #

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Tweets for Today

• 11:05 ACL '08 lineup: meh. twurl.nl/5br5z6 #
• 12:18 Boss "suggested" I come to the genetics seminar. Hate it when that happens. Better things to do plus bad signal in here. #
• 15:08 Annoyed, for some reason. Construction in adjacent rooms not helping. #
• 15:25 Monster Cable, you just got served: twurl.nl/hnyhrj #
• 15:31 That letter to Monster Cable just brightened my day. I read the whole thing. #
• 15:44 PowerPoint 2008, though less ugly than the previous version, is also less fast. I am undecided which compromise I prefer. #
• 16:15 Oh Excel, why won't you let me make a *series* of pie charts, formatted identically? Sometimes one pie just isn't enough. #
• 16:35 Finding the Raconteurs album aurally fatiguing. They may be professional, but whoever mixed it wasn't. Low dynamic range, I think. #
• 16:46 The last White Stripes album had some bad clipping. Why be all anal about analog recording and then screw it up in mastering? #
• 17:05 Up next, Love As Laughter's vintage "The Greks Bring Gifts" which I finally tracked down. Contains "Singing Sores Make Perfect Swords". #
• 17:06 Which sounds lo-fi in a My Bloody Valentine haze of sound sort of way. #
• 17:09 Maybe also in a Times New Viking way too. There's a line that was crossed, somewhere. #
• 17:47 This LaL album is all over the place. The MBV-ish tracks are good. The more garage-ish tracks are iffy and a bit too demo-ish. #
• 18:04 Mmm... Grado SR60s never fair to satisfy. An amazing pair of headphones. #
• 18:20 Next, Silkworm's "Firewater". Good stuff. Better than "Libertine", close to son-of-Silkworm Bottomless Pit's great "Hammer of the Gods". #
• 19:22 So far, I'm iffy on this Why? album. But it seems that music listened to and work accomplished on any given day are correlated. #
• 19:46 Why's not bad, but I keep feeling like I have more rewarding things to be listening to. I may come around to it, though. #
• 00:48 Ever wonder about the &? www.adobe.com/type/topics/theampersand.html #

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Tweets for Today

• 09:57 Thank God for wireless at the car dealership. Though I always feel a little dirty that it's filtered: no mazda3forums.com for me. #
• 10:03 Wait. Penny Arcade blocked. This just got worse. #
• 10:16 And Houstonist is blocked. Well, it's not that good anyway. #
• 10:19 & Joystiq. Nothing fun allowed, apparently. #
• 10:48 Pitchfork blocked. Now I'm really feeling oppressed. Thank God for the iPhone... #
• 13:31 Having lunch with 'Brina. #
• 15:20 And now, to try to get some work done. #
• 17:21 I realized last night that I just don't get or give enough drunk dials anymore. #
• 18:13 Okkervil River are a blessing. #
• 18:53 Friday and Battlestar Galactica. What a great combination. #
• 01:07 Wow. Didn't realize how much I missed the office until it came back. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 11:35 Vegan cooking is like trying to drive somewhere only making left turns: you can do it, but it's sort of silly. #
• 11:36 I was referred to last night as a beer expert. I'm honored but it's overstating things quite a bit. #
• 12:18 Papa John's thin crust is ~5x better than their regular crust. But regular *does* have garlic butter. #
• 12:37 "Acquired" very nice pilsner glass and wheat beer glass from bar last night. Brought them $300 of business so I don't feel guilty. #
• 15:14 Take that link and rickroll.it ! #
• 15:15 Sadly Nick and I have discovered that fuck.it is registered. #
• 15:44 Ah, crap. Thao & Xiu Xiu are playing tonight at the Orange Show, but I'm already commiteed to hosting a Battlestar Galactica viewing party. #
• 16:14 Thank God for webcasts. Too rainy to walk to Rice today. #
• 16:15 Stupid QuickTime player won't stay maximized on my second monitor. #
• 16:40 OK, too much math in this talk. #
• 17:30 Battlestar Galactica is back tonight! #
• 02:39 Playing around with Pwnage. Nothing exciting so far, except that I've proven to myself that I won't brick my iPhone. Living on the edge! #
• 04:00 iPhone does look awfully sexy displaying terminal text while booting. Wonder if there's a verbose booting option hidden somewhere? #

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Two Gallants; Niko Niko's; Resident Evil; Packing

6/18

After their previous, disastrous show", Two Gallants were kind and upstanding enough to make it up to the scenesters of Houston by playing a free make-up show.

It maybe wasn't as good as their last one (well, the part of it they were allowed to complete), and it was certainly less exciting, but hey, what a great thing to do for your fans.

6/19

Band practice...

6/20

For the first time in months, there was a new Wii game worth buying. Sure, it was a re-release of a previous-generation game, but I had missed playing Resident Evil 4 the first time around, and the new Wii controls, which included point and shoot aiming, made for a compelling buy. I managed to (barely) swing by Best Buy to pick it up (I have to say, they've certainly gotten extra business from me thanks to handy in-store pickups and 90-days no interest on my Best Buy credit card) before joining Dan and Cindy at Niko Niko's for a $1.75 gyro in celebration of their many years in business. The line was out the door, and the wait was long, but that's not all that unusual for Niko Niko's. And the gyro tastes sweeter when you barely pay anything for it.

I started Resident Evil that night and would be fairly addicted to it over the next few weeks. For my non-gamer readers, the RE games generally involve zombies in some form or fashion, this volume in particular was, unlike its cinematic counterparts, critically acclaimed.

Certainly, firing it up for the first half hour or so, on the big screen with the surround sound and the lights out, it scared the crap out of me. It takes place in a Spanish village, and, as you make your way into it you discover that the villagers are a) homicidal; b) possessed or otherwise zombie-like; and c) surprisingly resilient to being shot, and you are armed only with a pistol. After taking out the initial one and having a crowd of villagers drawn to you, death seems inevitable until church bells ring and, suddenly, the villagers file away.

As you gain firepower, things get easier. Thankfully. The pacing manages to keep you on edge for attacks that aren't constant but do feel as if they could occur at any moment. And there are some amazing set pieces. Like when you find yourself barricaded in an old house, surrounded by zombies, and they start coming in through the windows, through the doors. And you try to hold them off, but they keep coming. So you have to flee upstairs. You knock the ladders away from the windows, you throw grenades down the stairs, but ammo is running low. I must have played that part of the game 5 times or so before I managed to outlast the things.

Did I mention I seem to have a fear of zombies? Something to do with claustrophobia, I think. So the game manages to be particularly effective, but also therapeutic. Sadly, there are some points at which the game feels too easy, and the emphasis on gunplay takes away from the horror elements. But for every level with such issues, there's another one where ammo is limited, and fuck, how am I going to make it out of this?

I'll confess I never actually finished it. I seem to have formed a habit of making it 95% of the way through a game and then getting bored. When you get too close to the end, the need to find out what's around the next corner goes away, and with it the drive to play the same damned sequence 5 or 10 times. I certainly don't have the patience I had back in the old NES days.

But overall, Resident Evil 4 is a great piece of work, and well worth playing. Even if you loathe the undead.

6/21

I helped out with the grad school night for the college summer students, as per usual, and pilfered some food to repurpose for dinner. After some ugliness with somebody who parked in my parking space (which usually results in only a strongly-worded note; as much as I hate people parking in my space, I hate more a) tow truck drivers and b) having my car vandalized), there was dinner and Sopranos.

6/22

After staying a bit late at work to wrap up a few things before going out of town, Cindy and I got some Tapatia for dinner, I snuck in some Resident Evil, and I managed to pack ahead of our unnecessarily early flight the next morninng.

Cecil's; Steak & Sopranos; Happy hour & farewell

6/11

A good old-fashioned Monday night at Cecil's.

6/12

Cindy and I had, independently, concluded that we needed to experience "The Sopranos". So I joined up with Blockbuster's by-mail program (at the time, clearly a better deal than Netflix, though I'm considering a switch), and we prepared for a night in.

Cindy found some cheap steak, which we decided to dress up with a chimichurri sauce. Now good steak is its own reward, but sometimes you want steak for cheap, and in those cases it doesn't hurt to dress it up. And chimichurri seems to be good on just about anything that's been grilled, particularly beef. On the side, we put together a nice salad of corn, avocado, tomatoes, peppers, and cilantro. A nice, south of the border-style meal all around.

As for the Sopranos, well, we enjoyed it thoroughly and found it and its characters compelling. I question how well it held up over the course of the series, and as such I think that, taken as a complete work, it's not as good as some of the very best of television such as "Lost". But it's still some of the best TV around.

Actually, this whole TV-on-DVD experience has highlighted for me the way I watch television in the DVR age. The best shows are the ones that have the same sense of scale as movies, and I think to just refer to them as "television" just connotes too many images of yokels slack-jawed in front of the idiot box. I almost never watch live TV now; to sit down in front of something I don't care for when there are so many other rewarding things going on is just boring. I watch the shows that I want to see, and avoid other things. Sometimes I am guilty of having it on just to have it on, but even then it's something I was at least interested in enough to record.

So, perhaps calling the Sopranos "TV" is doing it a disservice. "Serialized cinema", perhaps?

6/13

From here on out, if I skip a day, Cindy and I probably just stayed in and knocked out a few episodes of the Sopranos.

6/14

At the genetics department retreat every year, a contest is held and monetary awards given out for skits and videos. The money is administered by the school, though, and must be used for something that is ostensibly "educational" in nature. Used to be you could at least get an iPod, but it's apparently getting harder to swing fun things.

Except, apparently, beer. One pair of winners decided to share the wealth and throw a departmental happy hour. And there was a lot of beer. And when 5:00 rolls around and you've already had a few, the sensible thing to do is to just call the day "over", which Cindy and I did.

So after that, we had a little "good-bye" party for the grad student in lab who always managed to get on my nerves. Beers were had at Gingerman and then dinner at Nit Noi. After that I think Cindy wanted to watch some sort of televised sporting event and I may have snuck a nap in after all the beer.

Cooking; Symphony & Clientele; Ghostland Observatory; Car bullshit & Woodrow's

Once again, we have a post written, but not posted, within a reasonable time after it occurred. Maybe that means it contains something interesting...

5/14

Since the last time the Good Eats episode on garlic came on, I had been wanting to make Alton's recipe for chicken and forty cloves. So, after a long overdue trip to the store, Cindy came over and we made dinner.

We started with a chicken, cut into pieces, salted and (lemon) peppered, and then browned. Tossed it a pot with some olive oil, the 40 cloves (actually, more, because you can never have too much garlic), and some sprigs of thyme. We added a little white wine for good measure. Baked it for a while.

Garlic gets its sharp flavor from a chemical reaction that occurs when cell walls break; if you cook it whole, the the enzymes denature before teh cell walls break, the compound doesn't form, and the garlic has a nice, sweet flavor, so the dish doesn't end up being all that garlicky. The olive oil picks up a lot of flavor from the chicken, thyme, garlic, and wine, and if you put it on some toasted french bread along with the garlic cloves and some fresh cut tomato, you've got some nice bruschetta.

We also cooked some fresh green beans. We steamed them first, and then cooked them up with a little olive oil, some more white wine, a poblano pepper, some tomato, lemon juice, and more garlic.

All in all, a great dinner, accompanied by some good TV: the penultimate episode of Heroes for the season.

5/15

Band practice; the first one in a while. We were a little rusty...

5/16

I heated up the leftover chicken and, once again, had a nice dinner. Cindy came over and we watched Lost.

5/17

Our final set of tickets for the symphony was Gershwin. They played a Cuban piece, a piano-based something that I wasn't familiar with, "Porgy & Bess", and "An American in Paris". Good stuff all the way around, but it didn't top my favorite part of the season, the Sibelius piece they did.

Afterwards, a quick jaunt over to Walter's for a concert. We missed seeing Beach House, which was a big disappointment, but made it just in time for the Clientele.

Unfortunately, the audience was horrible. Wouldn't fucking shut up. I'm afraid it pissed off the band, though I hope it didn't. It was hard to get past that to enjoy the show, but I guess the band was good, if not as good as the last time I saw them there. It was nice being back at Walter's. If I've been there since the Two Gallants show, I can't remember when.

5/18

I'm convinced that my now former funding organization requires me to go to these conferences/symposiums/retreats to pad out their numbers. This one was in Galveston, on the UTMB campus. I showed up a little late, put up my poster, ran out to my car to get my laptop during a break, sat through talks, and then headed on back to Houston.

Back in town, I dropped a labmate off, gave Cindy a ride to pick up her car, and then dropped by home for a little while. Cindy had brought me some leftovers from a lunch she had been to, so we had dinner and some beers before heading to the Warehouse to meet up with Greg and then girlfriend Jessica to catch Ghostland Observatory.

Although the security staff were characteristically dickish (and I had to walk back to the car to drop my pocket knife off, though it had never been a problem before, and I probably could have snuck it in but decided not to fuck with it further), the show was great. I'm still not a big fan of the group, but I have to say that for once, being in the big room made a show better. The band seemed energized by the crowd, and they put on a fun show with their crazy dance disco.

After that, Cindy and I picked up some Taco C and then caught up on the season finales of Grey's Anatomy (reaction: WTF?) and the Office (expertly done as usual).

5/19

One more day of conference. I showed up just in time to join Char, Angela, and Char's labmate Jilian at the Mosquito Café, which was cute, but a bit yuppie. During my 15 minute wait to order, I had to listen to the past-her-prime twenty-something in front of me ramble on about wedding plans. The interior had that same all-wood, house feel as, say, Café Azul in Austin. I opted for the pulled pork sandwich with fruit chutney and a house salad. The salad was a little plain, and the pork was bland, but it was good with the chutney. The balcony we sat at overlooked the patio, and it was all lined with various well-kept plants. On a beautiful day, the fact that I may not have picked the best meal in the place didn't matter; it was nice to be there.

After that, back to the conference for a while and then we cut out early, got some beer, and walked the strand, which is, in my estimation, a tourist trap.

So eventually I headed back to Houston, stopped for gas, and noticed that some fucker had backed into my car at some point, leaving white paint and some deep scratches, a couple of which went through the paint.

So after picking up laundry and heading to Susan and Jerry's, I got a car wash (which was on my agenda anyway) and then went to work with the wax. It looked better, definitely, but there was some paint I couldn't get out, and of course the deepest scratches I could do nothing for. I fumed about that for the rest of the weekend. Damn my luck with cars.

Anyway, I got home, had some time to chill, and eventually met up wtih Char, his siser, and Angela up at Woodrow's where Will was working. Cindy joined us eventually and we had a nice night there.

5/20

Which brings us to what is, at the time of writing, today. It's been a quiet day. I'm still pissed off about the car, considering my options, but other than that it's been nice and restful, with a sprinkling of productivity here and there.

More work; Cooking and TV; the Davenport; Art Car parade and 28 Weeks Later; Day of Rest

I'll note that this post was written on 5/16. It'll probably still be six months (try seven!) before anyone reads it, but at least it was written when everything was still fresh on my mind.

5/7

Continued working on the paper. Got in on time, stayed late, came home, ate a quick meal (veggie burger), got back to work, stayed up late working. Wow, how dedicated of me.

5/8

The "deadline" artificially imposed by the boss having come and gone on the paper, I was free for the evening. Cindy picked up a couple of New York strips, which I seasoned in the manner passed on to me by my father (lemon pepper and steak seasoning) and grilled up in my grill pan. I'm still getting the hang of doing steak on the thing. It's tough because it seems to hold heat and the steak keeps cooking more than one would expect after I remove it. So my steak was a little too done for my taste, but Cindy fixed us up a nice lemon butter sauce for it which covered my mistakes. She had also picked up a whole bunch of vegetables: zuchini, eggplant, bell pepper, and a big portabello muchroom. We tossed them in some balsamic vinegar, olive oil, habanero tobasco, garlic, and maybe something else I'm leaving out, and then grilled them in the grill pan. The veggies came out a little better, particularly the mushroom and eggplant. The zuchini was a little bitter.

Anyway, there was some Heroes and 24 to keep us entertained during our meal.

5/10

Another night of cooking and TV. This time we fixed Bo Kho, a Vietnamese beef stew. It didn't turn out as well as what I'd had at Mai's, but hey, it was my first time cooking Vietnamese. I don't know what Cindy's excuse was!

Grey's Anatomy (where, once again, everyone does infuriatingly idiotic things) and the Office (beach party episode, great) were watched.

5/11

I snuck a nap in after getting home. Cindy and I didn't make it in time to catch a showing of 28 Weeks Later, so instead we went up to the Davenport and had a round of martinis. I had the Dixie, which contained SoCo (always reminds me of Rebecca and my trip to Europe) and Disarono. Tasty. Cindy had a dreamsicle, which really didn't taste all that dreamsicle-ish.

The tamale people came by, and Cindy intelligently took advantage. She had a couple then and there, but we saved the rest for...

5/12

...breakfast the next morning. Not much better than tamales and fried eggs. Mmm. After that we packed a cooler and Cindy's fancy new DSLR camera, and took off for the Art Car parade. We had both been concerned about finding parking, but we called Jeff, who was there with his friend Chandra, and headed for their location, finding plenty of parking lots with entirely reasonable rates. A short walk later, we caught the parade.

Some of the cars were cool, but overall, I was a bit nonplussed. Maybe if there had been alcohol, or maybe it was that things would have been better if you could see the fine details in the cars they would have been more impressive. It was fun and I'll do it again, but maybe not as wonderful as I had been lead to believe. We went over to Chandra's well-appointed and very moderne townhouse nearby, hung out for a while, and then headed home.

I made for Susan and Jerry's, stopping to pick up some peach tulips for Susan for Mother's Day. A little later, I headed back home, Cindy came over, and we went to the slightly ghetto AMC 30 theater out west to catch a late showing of 28 Weeks Later.

I saw the original film with Thom at the old Waco Square Six that had been turned into a second-run theater, on the occasion of one of my first weekends back in Waco after moving to Houston. I remember enjoying it.

The sequel, however, was torture. Very technically impressive and artfully done, cleverlyh relevant to current events, etc., etc., but also extremely scary, violent, disgusting, and, worst of all, cynical and hopeless. I guess I'd recommend seeing it just because it was all so well done, but where the first movie ends with a note of hope, this one (spoiler) teases hope and then destroys it.

If nothing else, the political parallels are deftly handled. Great film making, but I felt dirty afterwards. That, and I had recently had a nightmare involving being in a big house at night, with floor to ceiling windows, and zombies outside trying to get in. Both experiences made me want to invest in a blunt, heavy object, if not a gun. Still need to go to Lowe's to pick up that crowbar.

5/13

The Sunday I had been waiting for for three weeks had finally come. No obligations, nothing pressing. Absolutely wonderful. I read, I played video games, I framed posters which had been waiting a month on me.

Cindy and I went up to Rudz and met Dan for some cheap Lonestar. A Miller rep was there handing out samples (samples? what happened to a free bottle?) of Miller Chill, their "chilada" beer. Now I know a good michelada, and have even been known to make a good one on occasion, but this, this was some sweet lime flavor in very weak beer. The beer was just a hint of flavor, really, compared to the lime and the sweetness. A good analog would be the most bland beer you can find mixed with Rose's sweetened lime juice.

But it got me thinking, hey, this would potentially be a great base for a margarita. In fact, hell, I'd drink one with a shot of tequila mixed in it, particularly if it was a double shot of triple sec and tequila. That would be pretty good, actually. And I think I will buy a six pack before it goes off the market (this shit is not going to last, seriously; too malt beverage for the beer drinkers and too beer for the malt beverage drinkers) and construct a margarita around it. It will be interesting.

I got home, a little buzzed from the Lonestar, and, in a very unneighborly gesture, finished hanging my posters (actually, I'm not even sure I have neighbors in that apartment right now). Then it was time for a late dinner.

There is something to be said for taking food and charring the hell out of it. I applied that method to my quesadilla that night in a drunken orgy of cooking. I defrosted a chicken breast, seasoned with jalapeño seasoning, garlic powder, salt, fajita seasoning, and jalapeño tobasco, gave it a nice sear on the grill pan and the cooked it through while also cooking some garlic cloves, chopped it up, put a tortilla down on the grill pan, spread some salsa on, sprinkled on cheddar and the seasonings I used for the chicken, dropped the chicken on top (all of it), and let the tortilla brown.

With all that chicken on top, there was no way I'd be able to add the top half and flip the thing; instead I cooked the top half sepparataely and then put it on top.

Served it with some sliced pickled jalapeños and damn was it ever good. Best quesadilla I've ever had. My drunken cooking was an exercise in excess, but a successful one.

Lab meeting and new toy; BBQ; Vinyl Edge and Jana Hunter

2/5

Did the lab meeting thing. I had new data which covered up any inadequacies in my presentation quite nicely.

Took off early to get home and grab my new toy, a Roku Soundbridge M1001. Of course, it ended up not really working. But more on that later.

Later: Cindy, TV, and Dan DJs at the Prole.

2/8

Once I had, new toy in hand, listened for a while to the receiver that Oliver had given to me, I noticed the right channel going in and out, and after confirming that the problem did not lie with my speakers or my subwoofer crossover/amp, I decided that I liked the receiver well enough to see about getting it cleaned, etc. At least I thought that was what it needed. Some of the switches made some noise when they were flipped, so I figured that was what it needed. And the backlighting seemed to be dim in one place.

So I first called up the one stereo store in town that I had any amount of faith in, Audio Concepts, who had previously been very nice about showing me some Magnepans and some Vandersteens (speakers). I asked if they did service or could refer me to someone. After telling them about the vintage Pioneer receiver, they referred me to somebody that did warranty work for Pioneer gear.

They were assholes. "Well, we don't have time to be wasting on old gear, so we'll do it when we can get to it, and it'll probabaly cost $400." Fuck you, you pretentious dicks.

So, on to polling through the "TV and radio repair" (how quaint!) section of Citysearch. I made about 20 calls. There was "no, we don't do that". There was "yes, we can do that; is it under warranty"—I said it was from 1974; your asking if it's under warranty clearly shows that you were not listening, or that you're an idiot, neither of which results in you getting my business. There was "yes, we can probably do that". And finally, there were two "Don't those old Pioneers sound great? We'll go over it with a fine tooth comb. All we do is service, so we want to earn your business." Bingo. One was west of the loop and the other was in Clearlake; and so I went with the one that was closer, Houston Audio Video.

Anyway, once I had found a place, I took Thursday morning and drove out and dropped it off to be, hopefully, well cared for.

Over Christmas, Dad, Becca and I had smoked some more ribs. We backed off on the rub too much, and they weren't quite as good, but that's nothing that heating them up slow in the oven drenched in BBQ sauce wouldn't fixed.

So to enjoy that, Cindy came over and she made potato salad and I made baked beans, and we had a nice little BBQ dinner together.

After that, a little trip up to Woodrow's to meet some people for some beer.

2/9

Got a ride with Char to seminar. At Rice, all visitor parking is paid, and fairly steep at that. However, there seems to be some sort of understanding that you can park along the interior streets, if you leave your emergency flashers on. I'd certainly done it before, and Char was in the habit of doing it for Keck.

Except he forgot to turn his flashers on. So when we got out, he had a ticket. Under the comments section, "no flashers". That's right. Flashers equals no ticket; no flashers equals ticket. There's some kind of internal logic there, but nothing that can really be considered logic in the strict sense of the word.

2/10

Detour to Vinyl Edge; Jana @ Rudz

Despite the fact that Susan and Jerry had warned me against going there after dark, I took the jaunt from their place over to Vinyl Edge not too far east of them, which Cindy insisted was perfectly safe. And, well, it was.

Anyway, the point to this excercise was to buy a few concert tickets without the service fee. But I checked out the shop while I was there. Small place, lots and lots of records, a lot of which weren't really... organized. If I was a real record collector, I could imagine the place being very exciting. Still, interesting to check out, and mission accomplished.

Afterwards, Cindy and I went up to Rudyard's to see Jana Hunter play. She seemed glad to see us there, but quite nervous: when onstage, "I like it when you guys are quiet. It makes it feel like I'm not performing for an audience". Anyway, good show.

Justice League, Disturbing news, the Prole; Pizza score; Hans'; Jana Hunter and Lola's; Valhalla, Tapatia, the Petrol Station; Borat; Wii

11/13

Will came over and we watched some Justic League. Which was good.

Amidst that, Bryan sends me an IM and mentions he had gotten an e-mail from Rachal, who, apparently, is now married. I could list many reasons why this should have meant absolutely nothing, and they're all pretty much true, but at the time, it was like being punched in the stomach, having the wind knocked out of me. It took a good week or two to process. In the end, all is well, but hell, we're over three years past this and it still stings a bit. Maybe it always will, maybe it won't. But the worst is long past over, and that I'm thankful for.

So shortly after that I went up to the Prole for the usual Monday activities. I was more than a bit distracted, but good company, good beer, and good music improve any situation.

11/14

I only stop here to note that after journal club, I managed to snag a whole Star Pizza to take home. Yoink!

11/16

Jana Hunter, whom Cindy and I had met in Austin, was playing her first show in Houston since I'd met her. I only knew her musically through her affiliation with Devandra Banhart and the "freak folk" movement.

What she played was nice, light, pretty folky acoustic stuff. It was really good, actually, and I really enjoyed the show. It's funny, hearing her voice, it was like hearing a different person from the one I knew.

Afterwards, I caught up with Merry-Lynn and some of the other youngsters from school at Lola's for some cheap drinks. After paying the homeless guy a couple bucks to not deface my car, I walked into the ultra-divey place. I liked it a lot, actually. A few parts Scruffy's, a few parts Mary Jane's. Dan later would ask if I went there to buy drugs, but it didn't seem that shady to me. I thought it was rather nice, though nice as in pleasant, not nice as in high quality.

11/17

Cindy, as usual, was working late, so Kim from Keck and I went to get some dinner at Tapatia since we don't always get to hang out much, and it's a good time.

Cindy and I had made arrangements to hang out with her friend Tyson and his maybe-maybe-not girlfriend Louisa. We me them at their place up in the Heights, or, actually, in their neighbor's backyards where we were promptly offered food and beer. We took them up on the latter, noticed how nice and neighborly they were, (The Heights: Houston's Canada), and then drove a little ways to the Petrol Station, which was, gasp, outside the loop.

It was a charming little place. Equal parts neighborhood coffee shop and neighborhood bar, there was tastefully mismatched furniture both inside and outside, and pleasant-seeming people both inside and outside. Even some playground equipment out back (you know, for the kids), and a fire, which sadly we did not sit around. There was a nicely chosen selection of beer available. I'm not exactly wholly comfortable with Tyson, and his situation with Louisa was pretty strange, too, so it wasn't the most socially at-ease evening, but seeing this hidden gem of a bar was reward enough.

11/18

It was t-minus 12 hours and counting until Wii-day, and I was determined to do what I could do get one. I knew Toys 'R Us was having a midnight sale, so I called them to see what the deal was, and apparently there were already 60 people in line for 100 systems. That option didn't look good.

Cindy had made plans for us to see Borat with her brother. I made sure that it would be over in time for me to hit Amazon at 11:00 PM when the system would theoretically be available.

The film was, frankly, awful. I liked the wonderment at the cultural differences of the Americas; I hated the naked fat guys, the other gratuitous nudity, and other low-brow humor that was neither clever nor particularly funny.

Anyway, we did a sweep by Toys 'R Us just to confirm that there was, in fact, a long line, more to witness the spectacle than anything else.

We got home, I started hitting the reload button on Amazon, and Cindy went for Whataburger. Amazon never put the systems up for sale, or, rather, I missed the 15-second window in which they were up for sale. I resolved to hit one Target location for an 8:00 opening, the next for a 9:00 opening, a Circuit City across the street for a 10:00 opening, and Sam's for an 11:00 opening.

I stayed up a little longer, until 2 AM, still thinking that Amazon might put the Wii up for sale. No such luck, so, to bed.

11/19

Up at 7:05, threw some clothes on, and Cindy and I took off for the South Main Target. We got there and only saw a few people in line, and I knew that it couldn't be that easy. Apparently they had already given out the tickets for all available Wiis and that the people who had them had gone for coffee, breakfast, and/or bathroom breaks.

The remaining people politely filled us in on the situation. I quickly made for the Meyerland Target store, arriving there by 7:30. I was told by the nice ladies waiting in line to get systems for Christmas for their kids that there were 34 systems available. I think I was something like 35th in line, but not everyone in line was buying one, so I figured I was safe.

Cindy's brother wanted us to pick one up for him, too, so just to be safe, Cindy went across the street to Circuit City and was second in line after a hispanic family, who apparently was buying them to sell on eBay, and had other family members in line all over town. A fucking racket, apparently.

Anyway, turns out the store was opening early (8), so soon the manager came out and passed out tickets. As he got closer, I got nervous, as the stack rapidly seemed to diminish. Turns out, I had reason to worry, because the bastards only passed out 30 tickets (I later saw two spare Wiis sitting out).

But I got the last ticket, #30. I couldn't believe my luck. I had maybe five minutes to spare between my arrival and the arrival of the people behind me. One of the guys behind me stayed in line because he was special or something. The rest went across the street to try CC. I chat pleasantly with the ladies in front of me, some of whom wanted iPod advice for Christmas presents.

So they open up the store, and we walk to the electronics section in the back and line up. Basically, they let people walk down the aisle one at a time to pick out games and accessories. I grab Zelda, the primary impetus for the entire outing, consider picking up two more games to get a free gift card but decide it's probably not worth it, as there aren't really two more games worth buying and I already have some store credit to use at Best Buy. I also grab an extra remote, so that Cindy and I can play Sports, and, against my better judgment, grab an extra "nunchuck" attachment, which at the moment only allows for two-player boxing, and also against my better judgement, the "classic" controller for playing more traditional games with more traditional controls.

I then get up to the register and get one of the last three Wiis. The guy behind me asks to make a phone call, puts the sales associate on the phone to talk to whoever it is on the other end of the line, and is given a system to buy, just like that. Nice that he didn't try to take one of the vouchers from the unconnected customers.

So, bag o' Wii in hand, I wander through the store to the built-in Starbucks and get beverages for Cindy and I, walk out, stow the Wii safely in my locked car, and go over to Circuit City to wait with Cindy.

There's a rumor that the store will also open an hour early, but they don't, nor do any of the employees entering offer up any additional information. The wait's a bit long, and slightly cold, but a bit before 10 vouchers are passed out. There's some bullshit about having to show a driver's license so that they only do one per household, which is completely silly but not important. Then they say that if multiple people came in the same car, but of course there's absolutely no way to enforce that. Idiocy.

I briefly consider buying one to sell on eBay but decide instead to let somebody else in line have one in hopes that it will go to a loving home. I ocasionally regret that decision...

Circuit City is a bit short on games and accessories, so I'm glad that I bought my system at Target. Cindy and I return to my place, I quickly hook the thing up, and we play some tennis. It's great, though most of you reading this already know that. Cindy leaves to go visit her parents', and I take a nap.

Later I'll get up and get started on Zelda...

Rocking & Headache; Afghani and BtS; Grey's & Beer; Downing & Sweater; Devil & Daniel Johnston; Okkervil & Jenny

10/17

More band practice, followed by a bad neck ache thingy.

10/18

Way back in '04 when I visited Thom in Boston, he and Ali took me out for "terrorist food" at an Afghani restaurant. The food was spectacular, and when I returned to Houston I immediately asked Citysearch where I might find such food in Houston, only to be greated with its cold, digital reply that there was none to be found.

Two years later, I happen to be reading the Houston Press and see a writeup on a new Afghani place that had opened up out West. I made a mental note, and suggested it to Cindy for this particular occasion.

Afghan Tandoori King was unassuming, in a small strip center. The interior was spacious, sparse, and the restaurant wasn't particularly busy. We were quickly seated by an enthusiastic waitress. I ordered a squash and yogurt appetizer that was in theory the same as the pumpkin-based dish we had ordered in Boston, but not as tasty. I ordered a chicken dish served with rice, carrots, and golden raisins; it wasn't particularly impressive. Cindy did much better, ordering something akin to wontons or pot stickers, filled with a very mediterranean array of meet, veggies, and sauce. That dish was much closer to the cuisine we had in Boston.

Our enthusiastic waitress pushed dessert quite heavily, so we accepted. It was good, if different. Sort of a pudding, but beraing a fairly unique selection of spices (though I think I've had something simpler in Indian cuisine).

All in all, not as good as the place in Boston, but I think I owe them a second visit.

Afterwards we took off to go see Built to Spill at the (blech) Warehouse. We got there about 10 or so, not expecting the show to start until 10:30 or 11:00, only to find the band already in their second song as we entered.

We got reasonably up front, emulating the strategy that worked so well at the Gnarls Barkley show. But Buil to Spill are a band very much dependent on sonics, and in an environment as harsh as the Warehouse, they just weren't as good as when I had seen them in better venues.

It was worth going, though, to hear them play their almost-forgotten "Nowhere Nothing Fuckup", adapted from the Velvet Underground's "Oh, Sweet Nothin'". Also, I felt vidincated when Doug thanked us for coming to hear what it would be like if they "played in a giant shower".

10/19

Cindy comes over to watch Grey's Anatomy and drink beer. No one is shocked.

10/20

Cindy and I decided to check out Good Co. Hamburgers & Taqueria, as part of our continued search for the best burgers in Houston. The interior was definitely very taqueria, and there was a nice patio in the back dominated by a huge fountain. The burger setup was very Fudruckers, with all the fixins in a salad bar setup. The burgers themselves were tasty, probably on par with Beck's Prime, with some nice mesquite (?) smoked flavor. The atmosphere at Goode Co. probably pushed it ahead. Both places are maybe a little pricey for fast food-ish burgers, but a whole step ahead of most fast food chains, and maybe a half step ahead of Whataburger.

Afterwards, another night at Downing St. with Angela, the Marshes, the Bakers, and Char... except, they turned me away at the door for wearing a t-shirt. Guy inside is wearing fucking scrubs and I can't get in in a t-shirt and jeans? Fuck you, Downing Street, and in particular, fuck you, asshole door guy who probably singled me out because I was white. Yes, I went there.

Char saw us walk away, and arranged to bring me... a woman's sweater. Yep. Thankfully, it was big. Black. Plain. A little tight, maybe, but not particularly affeminate. So I put it on and the asshole door guy let me in.

But beer and cigars (surprisingly reasonably priced at the in-store humidor) made that all better...

10/21

Cindy and I decided on a movie night, and, after some debate, settled on watching the documentary The Devil & Daniel Johnston. I had heard of the man, as Guster (and a whole bunch of other notable bands) had performed covers of his songs on a tribute disc, and Dan and Kristin had gone to see a play about him, and I knew him to be a somewhat crazy songwriter.

By then end, I felt like I knew him intimately. An eccentric kid who made outsider art and wrote simple songs, he somehow ended up in Austin after briefly working for a travelling carnival, and then followed the local scene before frying his brain a bit with LSD. After that a bipolar disorder dominated his life and led to frequent delusions that the devil was all around him, haunting him and the people he loved. But enough people (musicians in particular) liked his music that he developed a following, which exploded when Kurt Cobain wore one of his t-shirts on MTV.

In the end, I couldn't really tell whether he was an eccentric outsider artist who developed this persona, or an idiot man-child whose condition was exploited to the success of his art, and a question I still can't answer even after seeing him live.

10/22

Look, I have nothing personal against Jenny Lewis. I'm sure she's talented and her fans have legitimate reasons for liking her solo work and her work with her band, Rilo Kiley.

But she doesn't hold a candle to Okkervil River. And when I miss a chance to see Okkervil river headline because their headlining show was cancelled and they were moved to an opening slot for Jenny Lewis's show, I get fucking pissed off.

I'm sure it was a financially beneficial arrangement for all parties involved. I'm sure it made complete logical sense to the bands and the promoters.

But fuck you, Jenny Lewis and Super Unison, for depriving me of an Okkervil River headlining set. Fuck you for promoting a steaming pile of mediocrity over one of the most interesting and talented bands to emerge this decade. And fuck you, fans of steamping piles of mediocrity, for making it all possible.

But we went anyway. I mean, hell, it's Okkervil river, right?

And it was a beautiful night. First cold night of the year, which is an occasion for me to be happy. Cold weather energizes me and makes me giddily happy to be alive. It makes me wonder if I would be genuinely a more well person if I lived somewhere that wasn't Texas. It was a beautiful night to be out, and catch a short set by a great band, and then hang out on the patio drinking beer and bloody marys while the fools inside listed to Jenny Lewis.

Cindy picked up a sweet collection of prints by Will Sheff. His art is a little violent and psychotic for me, but it's good, and I think it will be a neat thing for Cindy to use to decorate her apartment. I had to prod a little, but the collection was $30 for 10 or so prints, and though that's a lot of money, it was a good deal, and I reminded Cindy that she was paying less than 1% per print of what I had payed for my art.

I wanted to pick up their Australian tour EP, which has the great "Love to a Monster" and "The President's Dead" on it, but I guess it's called Australian for a reason. I've since remedied that situation through other venues, but it was a bit disappointing at the time.

Still, a great night out. Even with fucking Jenny Lewis fucking headlining.

(Nothing personal, Jenny, I swear, although the award for hottest indie rock redhead still goes to Neko Case. But seriously. Nothing personal. You were just the beneficiary of bad circumstances, and an easy target for my wrath.)

The Prole; Rocking; Heroes; GSC Happy Hour and Magnolia Electric Co.; Get Your War On and Mai's; Serena Maneesh; Dinner

9/25

Another night at the Prole with Dan DJing...

9/26

And another night of band practice...

9/27

Heroes, from its rather pedestrian beginnings as a standard comic book story, has been coming into its own, now that it has developed its charactyers and introduced compelling mysteries, rather than just showing dramatic visuals and having plot points that seem significant, but God knows why. For this week's viewing, thanks to the magic of DVR I delayed it a few days until Cindy could join me for it.

9/28

The end of the first term of the school year brought, as usual, a graduate student council happy hour. Char arranged for us to return to the inviting environs of Hans' Bier Haus, complete with cheap Zigen Bock and several platters from Buffalo Wild Wings. There was plenty of beer, good, and socializing to be had.

In a bittersweet turn of events, though, Magnolia Electric Co. had a show scheduled at Rudz that night, which I had almost forgotten as it hadn't made my calendar. Thankfully I had remembered the day before, so we made an early exit from the happy hour and headed to Rudz.

As I've mentioned before, Rudz has a great little venue upstairs, and a perfect place to see MECo play. Some guy at the table next to Cindy and I bought us beers, for some reason. I offered a round to the band but they declined. By the time I went on I had a nice buzz on, and we moved up close to enjoy the show.

They played a longer show than the extremely short shows from the last tour, but once again it was a bit short on the older material and too heavy on the newer material. They were tight as always, but I think that the fact that their new album hadn't made a big impression on me detracted somewhat from the experience.

Still, a good show, all in all. By the time we got around to leaving, the happy hour was over, so we didn't get to drop back by, but it was a good evening all told.

9/29

Somewhere Cindy had heard about the stage adaptation of the comic strip Get Your War On by Austin troupe the Rude Mechanicals, playing at Houston art venue Diverse Works, so she arranged an outing for us, roommate Sara and boyfriend Bryan, and a friend of hers from school.

We met at Cindy's, carpooled to Diverse Works, which was just north of downtown in a converted warehouse (as so many cool things are), grabbed a beer, and then some seats.

The production was good. The adaptation basically took strips from specific dates (announced at each "scene change"), and, as they're pretty much dialogue-driven, had the actors recite the dialogue from the script, which worked quite well when delivered with the proper tone and emphasis on the word "fuck" which was frequently in the strip. Certainly it was more of a stand-up routine than story-driven theater, but it was also well-done and very funny. Good job, kids.

There was an accompanying art exhibit which we checked out afterwards (my favorite was the mushroom cloud treehouse). Then on to Mai's for some post-game dinner. A good evening, and something different.

9/30

Serena Maneesh had put out a good shoegazer album in '05, so I was glad for the chance to hear them play at the Proletariat. The show was good if maybe by-the-numbers. I was going to buy their album, but the greedy bastards had priced it at $15, or maybe higher. However much it was, at the time I deemed it way too expensive and decided to pass on it.

If anyone reading this is in a band, $15 is too much to charge for a CD at shows. $12 is acceptable. $10 is encouraged. $8 will guarantee lots of sales.

10/1

Cindy, good girlfriend that she is, made dinner. Maybe blackened catfish?

Pappadeaux's & the Ginger Man; Practice; Batman Beyond; Khyber & Snakes on a Blog; Minty drinks; Woodrow's; Cooking

8/14

We were interviewing a postdoc candidate in lab, and I was asked to take him to dinner, which seemed like a good idea at the time.

This was right around the time of all the "heightened airport security" bullshit, so after I ran home to get my car and picked up the interviewee, I had to take him to get bubble wrap so he could pack his laptop in his luggage. Then I had to run back up to school to pick up my lab mate that was joining us.

The trouble with dinner was, our interviewee he was (originally) from Algeria, and because of the culture he was raised in, didn't "like to be around drinking". So no beer on the lab budget, tragically. I took him to Pappadeaux's, as he seemed willing to try something new. Lab Mate (who happens to be a little dense) managed to order the cold shrimp and raw oyster plate—without realizing that the oysters were raw. Smooth. Seemed like such a waste. I tried one, but I wouldn't necessarily say that I enjoyed it. Thankfully, I had ordered crab cakes for us as an appetizer, which were good. Our interviewee went with fried crawfish; labmate went with some kind of plank grilled fish, and I tried the blackened catfish (which was actually disappointingly bland). Lab Mate also has an annoying habit of hearing things, misinterpreting them, and spitting out the misinformation at a later point, so I spent a good portion of the evening correcting some of his notions about the US, Texas, Houston, BCM, and the lab for our guest.

I talked them into getting the sweet potato pecan pie for dessert, though, so it wasn't all bad.

Then I had to take interviewee back to the hotel, and then David home, and finally, finally, made it back home to enjoy the rest of my birthday. Cindy came by and picked me up to take me out for beer at the Gingerman.

8/15

Band practice. I continue to suck less. We pick up a few cool covers. Jeff has a nice original called "Satellite" that's a waltz. Rocking occurs.

8/16

At some point I had borrowed a DVD with the first few episodes of the animated Batman Beyond on it. I had not long before that rediscovered my love for the excellent DC Comics animated TV shows (Batman, Superman, Justice League) and so was glad to get to fill in this missing piece.

I think I had previously watched the DVD, but since then I downloaded a bunch of episodes off of BitTorrent and so I spent my evening working my way through them. The show was entertaining, but probably the least so of the four cartoons. It seems to be a bit far from being a masterpiece, but I can't help but wonder if the feature-length movie corrects some of that—particularly, darkening the tone a bit, which is a bit kiddie because of its teenaged protagonist.

8/17

Graham and Angela hadn't made it to my birthday party, and offered to make that up to me by taking Cindy and I out to dinner. We ended up at Indian restaurant Khyber, which was quite tasty.

Afterwards, we had a date with Will to see Snakes On A Plane (seems overly pretentious to capitalize that). The movie delivered what was on the tin, and did so in a completely entertaining manner. So, surprisingly not criticisms from me.

Well, more tits wouldn't have hurt it. I mean, it was just that kind of movie. Oh, and that music video at the end was just awful.

8/18

Despite the best efforts of Kristin to get us up to the Prole, Cindy and I opted for a cheap night in. Cindy brought over some mint leaves and we made mint julips (which were good but would have been better with seltzer instead of plain water) and mojitos. TV was probably watched.

8/19

Matt, who had previously left school, was back in town for the weekend and wanted barbecue. He, Graham, Char, Will and I hit up Goode's for some sauce-drenched goodness before wandering across the street to Goode's Armadillo Palace for a round.

Notes indicate that I went to Woodrow's that evening. No more details available.

8/20

Notes would seem to indicate that I spent the evening cooking. I think (think!) that was probably the evening that I tried a couple of Alton Brown gazpacho recipes. One was sort of a dip that used Bulgar wheat in addition to the traditional tomato and bell pepper flavors. The other was fruit-based, but in the more traditional cold soup form. The tomato-bssed dip one didn't really turn out very well; it just never quite tasted good.

The fruit one, on the other hand, was pretty good. I should have cut the cucumbers, and I was short on walnuts, but the grapes, white grape juice, and apples combined well with everything and it ended up being tasty—especially after I added my own touch, one (carefully) seeded habanero.

The next night I would try an Alton Brown macaroni and cheese recipe, which turned out badly thanks to my managing to fuck up tempering the egg into the sauce. A suggestion for the recipe was to take a bar of the final product, chilled, and batter and fry it, which redeemed it, though I would imagine it would redeem just about anything.

Will & Justice League; Practice and the Prole; Bloc Party; 702 soap opera

8/7

Will had no softball on Monday night, for once, so he came over and we watched some Justice League Unlimited, thanks to my Mac mini and BitTorrent.

8/8

Band practice, with the new gear for the first time. It facilitated much additional rocking. Stopped in at the Prole on the way home for a drink (with whom I'm not entirely sure; a safe guess is that Dan was there).

8/9

Bloc Party was one of the best acts at ACL last year, and the album managed an impressive showing at #7 on the top albums list last year. So, naturally, I'd been looking forward to their Houston show.

It was my first show in Warehouse Live's ballroom, and it turns out that it was the beginning of a burning hatred that I have for the place. I was none to fond of their "studio" room, but it looks great by comparison.

The acoustics were nothing short of awful. Huge amounts of reverb resulted in a frothy santorum of indistinct, mushy sound. There aren't many ways to ruin a show by such a kick ass band, but those fucktards at Warehouse Live managed it. It's not gotten any better, though ear plugs and being close to the stage result in slight improvements.

It wouldn't be such a big deal if it weren't for the assload of good bands booked there. The Engine Room, the Meridian, even fucking Numbers are preferable venues. Hell, I might even prefer the damned Verizon and its atmosphere killing corporatism, seeing as how the sound doesn't suck there.

Plus, they have fucking bathroom attendants. For the love of God, let me piss in peace.

8/10

Will, as is his typical MO, managed to stretch the truth just so and involve me in it for the purpose of spending time with a girl. She was a waitress at Woodrow's, but also tended bar at 702.

So Will tells her that I'm trying to decide which bar to have my birthday party at, and that I'd like to come see 702. Which isn't quite true, since I've already picked Rudyard's, but I agreed to play along.

So we get there, and have some drinks. The place has some decent lounge-iness going on. Anyway, it's got a rectangular bar in the center of the room, and we're on one side.

On the other side are two guys in shirts and ties (presumably still dressed from work), talking to two girls. It's pretty obvious that the guy in the orange shirt is jumping on a grenade for the guy in the blue shirt. This goes one for a while.

Blue Shirt and his girl go outside. Cell phones come out, numbers are presumably exchanged, and they come back in. More talking.

We see Blue Shirt's girl walk back toward the bathroom, followed closely by Blue Shirt. They disappear into the men's bathroom. Char, his curiosity piqued, decides now's a good time to make a bathroom trip. Around the same time, one of the bartenders mentions this development to management, who goes in and tells the couple to get out.

More talking.

Pretty soon after that, Blue Shirt and his girl leave.

We figured that with the primary objective accomplished, Orange Shirt would leave to recover from his grenade-jumping-on. But soon, he and Grenade are making out. They leave together.

After an hour or so, Blue Shirt's girl returns, sits down at the bar alone for a while, and has a drink. Pretty soon after that, Grenade comes back and joins her.

Curtains.

It was much more entertaining in person, I swear.