'Cause I Remember What a Night

Here is a picture of the mighty Mississippi for Gyuss. Since he's going to be canoeing down it in a few months, I thought he'd want to see how it's doing right now.

Today I'm combining a couple of things. I never got around to doing the Saturday Scavenger Hunt thingy. I thought I'd mix it up with the rest of this post. So, here goes:

I know I said last week that Sunday the 13th marked the two year anniversary of the tornado that took the roof off my house and the back window out of car, right? Well, let me tell you what we did to commemorate it.

This is where I do the Scavenger hunt part. The word this week was sharp. This is the house right next door, and the tornado took all the cars and smashed them together making for many sharp edges. It also busted out most of the windows in the neighborhood, and all that sharp glass meant that we probably still shouldn't walk around barefoot even two years later. See how I tied it all together?

In my neighborhood, we like to celebrate everything - even the bad stuff. We also like food and beer and music and apparently, very loud people. Have I ever mentioned how much I like my neighbors? Anyway, we had the party in the alley between Hotz and Rochester Street. There was an outdoor fireplace, much alcohol, tons and tons of food, and this guy, Dave Zollo played and sang in one of the neighbors garages. We joked a little about how much our neighborhood had expanded in the last year, as it seems like a lot of people from other places crashed it to get to hear Dave play for free (or a small donation). I did not choose to partake in the drinking of alcohol, since I didn't see the need for any more after Saturday. I did eat food and enjoy the music (especially the part where one of our neighbors was drunk dancing and actually fell down).

Mostly, I was happy to hang out with my friend Joanne and her girlfriend Stacy. They really crack my shit up. Joanne always laughs at me for dating men, but she seems to get a kick out of my awkward male/female relationship stories. On Sunday, I had plenty of goofy dating stories for her to make fun of. I'm always happy to brighten someone's day.

During these events, the kids in the neighborhood generally run around in packs. I remember last Summer one of the neighbors saying, "Maybe if we cut one away from the herd, we can weaken them and they won't be able to hunt us down later on." Which is what it feels like when you get all those kids together and many of them are now teenagers - like we'll all end up with our heads on sticks before the party's over.

Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera. There's nothing more entertaining than trying to watch a bunch of White people dance and I would have loved to present you with that. You'll just have to wait until the next neighborhood party, when I haven't spent the weekend at a pool tournament and my mind is a little sharper.