Oh, seriously.
How do I manage to go so long without updating and then become overwhelmed with the amount of catching-up I have to do every single time I come here? Eek. Back to Wednesday’s episode, in which Jenni and Matt went to the Triple Rock to see the Epoxies with the Phenomenauts. While the Epoxies were awesome and had great energy, I kind of fell in love with the Phenomenauts, because they are a rockabilly band in spaceman-getup, impossible to hate even if you tried really hard. They had a toilet-paper gun, and declared themselves a local band, because they were FROM EARTH, just like we were. Afterwards, we hijacked Cindi and repaired to Jaros’ to meet Bill, Katie, and Bill’s entire softball league, because who’s dedicated to the Greenie Century? We are. Next up was Thursday’s episode, in which Jenni convened with many other extremely dedicated persons at Jaros’ again, and the evening did involve dirty-stroller races down Lowry, silver knuckle tattoos, matching GUN SHOW tattoos, a prank call in which we dialed SJ on a payphone and pushed a lot of buttons as if we were texting her, a half-hour phone call with Lauren, We Like to Party on the jukebox twice (accompanied by frenzied dancing), and also Danny promised to buy us the last 5 drinks in the Greenie Century, for he is indeed a good man, and possibly wants us to go away forever. Cut to 2:30am breakfast at the Uptown Diner, with Bill the lucky one who got to shuttle me, Wendy, Ellie, and Cindi around town in the wee hours of the morning. He is also a good man for not punching us all in the head. Then there was Friday’s episode, in which Jenni sprung out of bed remarkably early, grabbed her knapsack, kissed the cats goodbye, and headed to work. In the early afternoon, she went to Matt and Julia’s house, grabbed her knapsack again, as well as the bag of Greenie supplies from Surdyk’s, kissed Miguel goodbye, and they were off. To Wisconsin. We got to Madison in the early evening, had an awesome dinner and beer sampling at the Great Dane, then headed to the Barrymore Theatre. We got there right as Brother Ali was starting, so I began the night fresh with new beer on my feet, and a shoving-into-the crowd (the Barrymore is an old movie theater with the first section of seats removed so that one may freely rock out). Now, it had been in the 90s all day, and it was still in the 90s inside the building. It was packed and sweaty and AWESOME. Brother Ali wrapped up a little too early (stupid all-ages shows), but at least we didn’t have to wait long between sets. Atmosphere came on and it was all yelling and dancing and fucking amazing and I cried during Pour Me Another because I’m like that, I can’t help it. NTS: Glen says Slug hangs out at the Herkimer at least once a week. Huh. After the show, the area bars looked boring, so we went back to the hotel for offsite Greenies. Julia was the smarter one and went to bed, whereas Matt and I stayed up til 4 so I could allow him to beat me repeatedly at what should’ve been a really simple card game, except for the motor skills. It did involve whiskey, though, so that explains some of why he had all the victory sauce for the night. I DEMAND A (SOBER) REMATCH. There was next the Saturday episode, in which the three of them went to Mickie’s Dairy Bar, an only-in-Wisconsin-type greasy spoon (although it did remind me a lot of the Pork Store on the Haight), and Jenni dined on a cheese-and-mushroom omelette that was 90% Swiss cheese, because it was Wisconsin. Afterwards, we drove to the legendary town of Spring Green, crossing both highways PB and J, which caused much speculation as to the intersection of such. We finally arrived at the House on the Rock, and as before, I cannot accurately express the horror within. I will allow you to browse the photos and judge for yourself whether or not you should go. Allow me to inform you that the correct decision is to go, because you cannot experience it vicariously. We emerged a couple hours later, stunned and muddled, and headed back in the direction of civilization, with an obligatory stop at the Flying J (don’t tell Kaye, but it beats Qwik Trip by a mile) on the way. Upon my return home, I cleaned up and headed back out to Lara’s birthday party with Cindi. I ran into Melanie and her boyfriend there, and much revelry was had. I hadn’t intended to stay late, but the party rocked, so we did. Lastly, there was Sunday’s installment, in which Jenni had family-time. I promised my dad I’d work on his porch-construction project for Father’s Day, so I drove to Eagan. When I found them missing, I set to washing and waxing Miguel by hand, even putting a ridiculous amount of effort into scrubbing the rims. The family arrived and I spent the afternoon with a nail gun, attaching boards to the ceiling. Now, my dad and I both have the same neck injury, and my dad also recently managed to tear his rotator cuff in the exact same process of attaching boards to the ceiling with a nail gun. Did that make me extremely paranoid about my already-dodgy neck? It did indeed. After the woodworking, Wendy came over and we did a 5.5-mile walking tour of beautiful Eagan, which involved so much laughing we occasionally had to stop and recover. And then a stop-to-pee at a gas station, where Wendy bought me a Rugged n’ Ready brand super-studded condom in the bathroom for 75 cents. She is a truly thoughtful friend. Today’s episode was a rerun, in which Jenni went to the gym, grocery-shopped, and cleaned her house. Not even worth watching, really, especially since she spent at least half that time pantsfree. AND NOW, I point you to a million photos. I decided to just start uploading all my pictures (phone and regular) to Flickr, because it’s so easy to organize them there. This weekend’s are a little out of order, but if you’re diligent you will find content related to almost all of the above, as I am a fan of the multimedia presentation. And since I wish to enhance that experience even further, here are some videos for you as well! From the party-cabin:me breathing fire
Sean fire-dancing
Sean breathing fire
and again! From the House on the Rock:
AAGH!
cacophony
the carousel
the carousel again Time for the sleeping! Good night.
Jenni