Mar 24-27 - Early starts, Late Endings and Nice Times

The week started a little earlier than usual. A Thursday of pizza dinner was not looking to inviting so an invitation to meet friends for dinner was on point. I got onto the E train, forgot to transfer and just took it all the way up to 14th Street. I was able to make my way out of the station and walk down the street until I joined the throngs at the corner of 14th and the 9th Ave in the always happening meatpacking district. I met my friends at Son Cubano, a nice and hip place that specialized in spanish cuisine. To fit the mood I had a Corona and chatted with new friends and my friends that had already had some appetizers. When the food came it was served family style and we had shrimp in a creamy bean sauce (not a shrimp person myself) and shredded steak in some sort of edible baked cup (which I was all over). I ended up having 2 of the little steak cups and sharing another half of one. Still hungry but the dinner was over and people were jocking our now food free table. We got the check and had the people in waiting nearly run us over to get into the table space. We got out of the place with our skin intact, picked up the girls of our group who were waiting outside after finishing cigarettes, and made our way across the street to Rare. Rare was below ground but plenty big and after making our way past the doorman and the party girls at the cash register we got in with the owner and picked up our complimentary drinks (something with mango, kinda sweet) and after making sure our friends were watching our coats and bags me and the girls headed into the main room, drinks in hand. We danced to cuts from Thrill kill cult and some random bands I knew nothing of but it had a beat. We found it each time and danced to it, making it seem easy. When our time was up we headed back to the guys at the bar and then left to our own separate homes. Pais and myself gave Jodi and Bruce a ride in the Murano back to their place in the village. After leaving them safe we headed over to Joe's Pizza and picked up a slice each so we would not need to eat after we got back to Bk. We headed for home after the pizza slice and made it back to Bk with no stress and little traffic. Went to bed a little earlier than usual and said I would save my energy for tomorrow.

Friday afterwork was a little rushed but I got to the gym in one piece and completed a slightly modified workout to finish the workout by 8:40pm. I then headed home to dinner. The Steak was good and it was finished off and I was doing the usual readiness routine in no time. Clothes, hair, and the general idea of where to go under wraps and we headed down to the car with the new CD in car (street beats vol1, my R&B mix) and made our way over to Gym even though at the time I was not sure where it was. We drove up 8th avenue and we were immediately eye caught by the line of people in front of a place with no name (yet). as well as projected images of swimmers that we could see on the inside wall from the street. After circling the block we ended up finding a parking spot just across the street right on the ave. We crossed over and ended up waiting on a line in front of the bar as the place was kinda crowded. We watched the guys in the smoking section (off of the street but behind a fence, like a little yard) and then waited as different people gave up on the line, passed by commenting or just waited. We finally got inside after waiting on line for like 21 minutes. And squeezed up to the bar to say hi to... Barman Brett in his new home. It was a nice hello and a nice space, a new sportsbar with a nice staff, plenty of tvs and a great looking plasma right over the bar showing the latest teams in the March Madness. We saw Ernesto, Billy, Tim, Molly and several more of our softball friends who were in for the grand opening. We watched the end of the Knicks game, much March Madness and finally grabbed some souvenir posters, picked up our coats from the coatcheck, who had to go downstairs for the coats, and made our way out to the car and drove around the corner to find parking so we could go to Splash. Better late than never. After showing up at 1am and checking our coats we headed up to see how DJ Alex Lauterstein was doing. The crowd was upbeat and the place was full of dancing bodies. I looked up to see a new light guy on the boards but I decided to go up top anyway and say hi. The new guy was a little defensive at first but I just told him I was there to say hi to Alex and he let me be. I waited until Alex had a free moment and then when he walked up I thanked him for spinning another great set and then I handed him 2 of my latest mixes (The Techno set and the Black Ice mix) and even the card for my blog. He took them and went back to his set and I headed back down into the crowd to do some dancing. Pais hung out at the front bar while I headed between the speakerbox and the front bar dancing on the box when the music was right (high energy rmx of "Tweakin") and having a drink with Pais when it was between beats. We finally headed out just after 3:30am and headed back for Bk. The night was good and weekend was well under way.

Saturday woke up early afternoon and enjoyed the breakfast delivery. Eggs and bacon was good and then I used my powers for good by cleaning up and generally doing enough housework to make sure I would be able to get a good nap later. In order to refill the cubbards we headed out to Pathmark and picked up all the essentials before heading down 4th ave to KFC and got us some meals for eating. The drive and music were all good and the dinner hit the spot. I finished working the on the office pc, did some web browsing and finally took a nap and rested up before cleaning up and setting up the outfit (new paramedic pants and worn once Ecko White/Orange reflective shirt) so we could head out in style. The Jimmy had already arrived and after making sure all was set we stepped out and down to the vehicle in waiting.

We rode in with some traffic on the bridge and it was all good until during the crossing of Chambers street we turned off onto Hudson. The summer months seem to mean that more and more traffic is on the streets and with a broken light on Canal St. and sheer volume going up Hudson street it seemed we had a bad travel night ahead of us. We made it all the way up to 15th St and turned onto 10th ave and after a quick look over we found the most excellent parking on 20th street right before the last 2 spots were taken. Happy with that outcome of the wild ride in we made our way down to the club and waited on the nonexistent line before going in. The door staff waved us in, the wristband set checked us over and the cashiers rang us up. I walked right over to the coat check, was wished a good night and then rushed in to see the eclectic decorating that the staff had done to the usually themed Roxy. From the hanging red shiny streamers, the white drapes in some sections and the black drape in other sections I was not set for any sort of expectation but I have always felt if you have no expectations you will not be disappointed. Well the DJ Hex Hector, (who I felt did us a great disservice when he spun at the White Party last year), was on the wheels tonight and I was still interested to see how he would see fit to entertain the boys. I was pleasantly surprised with the very consistent mixing, very smooth, that moved the crowd into a truly happy set. Just when I felt that the moment was due for myself to go out to the speaker in the asian section he shocked me and the crowd with a nice trip back into clubbing with "Muzikizum Pt 2" which we had not heard in 5 years and it was like it had never left. Me and Pais waxed poetic about having heard it but it was before my Roxy time and I had never heard it played in the space before. With barman Barker making sure our drinks were on point and the place getting truly packed at some points we hung out with the Jimmy, Duane, Keith and several more of the guys hanging out both inside and out but the moments just kept getting better. We were all in the black section right in front of the stage while he played a Michael Jackson dub of "Who's Bad" when he then launched into a totally on point remix of "They Don't Really Care About Us". We thought that was fun, but upon my return to the speaker the DJ made sure we remembered his greatest Remix past hits from "I Learned From the Best" with Whitney and then segued flawlessly into "Waiting for Tonight" from JLo. For songs that I had heard endlessly and not danced to at Roxy in a truly long time it was as if I had a whole choreographed routine just waiting to be unfurled. I was happy even when new people came up onto the speaker to dance (having chased off the obsessive and downtrodden), and all was well after the girl gave me props on my look from the back. All that gym going gives the viewers what they want. (Yeah!) From that point on it was as if the DJ could do no wrong as I continued far into the night and even warned Pais that there was no way we were leaving anytime around 4am. I ended up dancing on every speaker except for two, as well as the stage and found myself coordinated enough at 4:30am to be able to dance with both hands lit and and both lights in motion (not just the right hand, but truly ambidextrous light spinning). I watched many smiling faces in the crowd and even though we ended up leaving the space around 5:40 am the place was still plenty full of a dancing crowd. Plus when we went out it was just starting to brighten outside but I was not about to go home without refreshing the calories up at the diner. We tore into a greatly done breakfast and made the repast disappear faster than it was prepared. Despite the fact Pais believed we would never find a taxi at this hour we wandered over to the corner of 23rd and immediately got a car that was ready to take us back to BK. A nice restful ride back towards the house and once again the night drew to a close. I think I had finally enjoyed a 5 for 5 night and have no idea how I could have topped it. (Maybe more friends and better lighting) Personally if the party was just how much fun I had by myself I was all over it and could not have done it better myself (well maybe..)

Sunday I got up in the early afternoon once again and settled in before the TV to just chill and decompress. Thank goodness we had gone shopping the day before so I just had to sit about and veg. A lot of web browsing, watching of basketball and nice serving of delivery breakfast. (They stiffed me on the fries and got me hash browns instead-so nasty spicy) However I still enjoyed the fries and bacon (oh to have one of the bad boy BK sandwiches about now).
The rest of the afternoon was just spent chilling until I got it into my head to start playing Neverwinter Nights on my PC once again. I picked up the game where I left off (right in the middle) and kinda whiled away the time until I had to cook dinner. We settled on spaghetti with red sauce with sweet sausages. The end result had plenty of sausage but the sauce ended up being not as thick as the last time I cooked it a few months ago and was not as good I thought. I will definitely have to do better next time. It was good enough for dinner though. Afterwards I watched "Punk'd" and then the strange shows that come on MTV latenight sunday like "Wondershozen" which was totally twisted and somewhat shocking at some points and definitely should come on after 11pm with the total puppets who do bad things and strange skits and songs (White People, oppressed people and all kinds of interviews where someone should just beat the puppet or the kid-the puppet interviewer did get cursed out a few times).
I went to bed much later than I should have. Guess I just did not the weekend to be over with.

If only they were all this good. Very busy but all good. Thank goodness for friends, good music and good times. We will do this again. Keep it hot.