san diego part one: is that yours?

Like any red-blooded American Southerner, I get inordinately excited about seeing/participating in/eating/experiencing things I have seen on television. (See also: excitement related to seeing things on television that I have seen/participated in/eaten/experienced in real life.)

So when I got off the plane on Wednesday at promptly 10 a.m. San Diego time and Noah suggested we head to Hash House for brunch, the AS SEEN ON TV neon lights were like stars in my eyes, and you would've thought the late Billy Mays himself were right there handing me a tub of Oxiclean to take care of that drool stain.

And then, the waitress brought me this.

If your reaction to this is HOLY BALLS, please know that this is totally normal.

After eating way more of that meal than I thought physically possible (it seems the laws of reality can often be defied by INCREDIMOUTH), we headed to Noah's house to drop off my stuff and let me change out of my sittin-on-a-plane clothes into my OHMIGAH-IT'S-THE-BEACH clothes. We then set out for Ocean Beach so that I could put my feet in the Pacific. I give you Exhibit A.

And also, Exhibit B, in which I got a little over-zealous and may have sung "The Hills Are Alive" while twirling madly.

We walked a good ways down the beach to the pier and then walked the length of it out into the water for some great views of the city, overcast as it was. (Incidentally I need you to know that everyone calls Ocean Beach "O.B." Why am I the only one who gets the giggles every time I hear that?) The views continued on the way home as we drove through Sunset Cliffs and headed up to a high point on a hill in a neighborhood where we could see the ocean view on one side and the beach on the other.

Fast forward a few hours. We've enjoyed a brief afternoon chair nap, we've eaten mass quantities of sushi and we've had a beer from Noah's very own kegerator. We rejoin our heroine in Pacific Beach, where the Caweins have met up with Noah's friend (and former roommate) Josh.

What I need to tell you next (digressions? me? NEVER) is that my brother (the other one, Ben) once shared with me this theory about how in any given city, Martin Luther King Blvd. is somewhere that you don't want to be. And y'all, that shit is true. Let's save ourselves the grief of getting into the political and uncomfortably racial implications of THAT whole scenario, because I only really bring it up to introduce you to a similar theory that I now have about bars. Certain bars exist in every town. And in San Diego, that particular bar even had the same name. The Lamplighter.

It was divey and they only took cash, but here the PBR was on draft and it was delicious. And at this Lamplighter? There was karaoke. When we got there it was mostly cry in your whiskey country songs, really awful pseudo-metal that you might hear playing in the background of some type of propaganda piece for one branch or another of the armed services and, of course, various and assorted boy band hits of the 80s and 90s.

So the clear choice for me was to open with Notorious B.I.G.'s "Big Poppa."

After I finished my song I resisted the (extremely overwhelming) urge to fulfill one of my five life's goals by mic dropping right then and there in front of half the cast of the Jersey Shore, a handful of lesbians, three middle-aged black women and a slew of gay men. A few minutes later, Noah and Josh were still pouring over the karaoke book trying to figure out what they were going to jam to (but probably suffering from the simultaneous realization that they could never be either a.) as actually amazing as I am or b.) as comically terrible as Dude Singing Kid Rock With Eyes Closed) when I inked my name on the list once again with one of my standards: "Nuthin But A G-Thang."

But as I made my way up to the stage to drop a little Compton on everyone's collective hindquarters, I was stopped short. By a hand. Groping me. On the side of my boob.

And I need to be more clear here: I definitely saw the rest of what was attached to that hand, because it was the tool bag who'd been serenading us against our will earlier in the evening with a Puddle of Mudd song and he resembled the California version of The Situation. He sort of lunged out into my path as I was heading up to sing, reached out and clawed me in the side-boob.

Y'all, I don't know how else to describe it, honestly. It was two fingers, three max, in a weird hook formation that suggested maybe The Sitch thought he was going to snare me by the mammaries and then reel me in over the side of the boat like some kind of human version of The Deadliest Catch. And then, out of nowhere, as I'm still processing what exactly has just occurred on and around my person, this girl leaps in front of me. "It's okay!" she says. "He's my boyfriend!"

You just let that sink right on in, because I can promise you that I have absolutely no explanation for why it is that this fact makes ANYTHING OKAY.

After I finished completely owning every second of "Nuthin But a G Thang," I came off stage and rejoined Noah and Josh at our table only to find that some interesting things had gone down there as well. Apparently a guy had come up to Noah while I was rapping and asked a very pointed question. Ahem.

IS THAT YOURS?

Noah looked at the guy. "Uh, that's my sister." He tried for a quick recovery. "Oh, she's really good at this. Has she ever done this before?" (Really, dude? REALLY?) Noah responded something to the effect of, "Nice save, idiot. Yeah. A few times."

Okay, I may have taken liberties with the idiot part. Sue me.

At this point we're beginning to wrap up the evening, finishing our beers and cheering on the last of the karaokers -- including a woman who sang "Proud Mary," which only encouraged me to yell various arrangements of "preach" and "girl preach" and "PREACH SISTER PREEEEEACH" throughout just about the entirety of the song -- when one of these monkeys gets up and starts singing "I'll Make Love to You" by Boyz II Men.

There's really only one thing you can do in that situation, and it's called the eighth grade slow dance. And slow dance, Josh and I did. (I would so love to show you photographic evidence of us leaving room for Jesus, arms awkwardly and robotically hyper-extended, but it seems my brother does not respond to repeated text messages harassing him to send me the pictures on his phone and camera. Update! Harassment works!)


But our evening couldn't end there. No, no. I had to take it one better. No sooner had the Boyz II Men faded out, here came the comforting, familiar sounds of the musical genius of NSYNC. And I glance up on stage and realize that -- and we must call this what it is, a gift directly from the universe to me -- the song is being sung by not one, not two, but a GAGGLE of short-haired lesbians in hoodies and camouflage cargo shorts. And in that moment, I did what felt like the natural thing to do. I approached the stage. I got on the stage. I turned around. And I booty danced right up on those lesbians with all the fervor and passion that seventh-grade me would've expected during a J.C. Chasez vocal riff. And y'all? (This next part is really just hearsay, because obviously I am sadly devoid of eyeballs in my bum region.) Apparently Camo Pants turned bright red and just FROZE. My backside was the only thing moving in her corner of the stage for a good 30 seconds. Who knew I could have the exact same effect on women as I do on men? Oh, science!

We left our friends (both willing and unwilling) at the Lamplighter and headed back to Josh's house to drop him off and make use of the facilities before we set out for Noah's to call it a night. And as I came out of the little girl's room, I walked into Josh's living room only to meet one of his roommates, who may have thought I was some sort of blonde preppy vision, because the string of conversation that happened next can only be described as follows:

Him: Blah blah something something hug me?

Me: BALL BUST


Ahh, my national pasttime: the perfect end to my first day in San Diego.


cheers,
elizabeth