After much tedious thought and consideration, I make my choices and get back to the table where my beer and the coterie of friends from different sections of Noah's life (roommates, co-workers, randoms) is waiting. Probably half an hour (and five or so AMAZING songs) later, Josh and his roommate arrive to join us. His roommate, you will recall: oh he of the "we do hugs in this house" Wednesday night ball-busting smackdown. And he sat down right across from me.
I'll give you three guesses as to what happened next. First two don't count.
He'd already had plenty to drink that night, so he was in rare form. And I had an audience, so god knows I was on FI-YA. He may or may not have said something about his late grandmother to which I may or may not responded that if I had feelings, I'm sure I'd be real torn up about it. (Too much? You've read this blog before, right? Also: HE STARTED IT.)
Turns out that all this back-and-forth didn't jive too well with one of Noah's friends, the bartender at Karl Strauss. According to Noah he has "a low tolerance for bullshit." And, also according to Noah, despite the fact that I was "handling my shit," it was becoming difficult for him to resist the urge to squish someone's head between his fingers. But probably in a more literal way, and not at all like this.
What I learned from later reports -- since I was too busy entertaining the hell out of myself -- is that at some point there was uninvited eye contact. (Mommy! HE'S LOOKING AT ME.) Someone's hackles got raised and then someone felt the need to ask someone whether there was a problem and then someone felt the need to swing their manparts around in someone else's face; I'm not entirely clear on the details. What I do know is that people were having to separate other people and next thing you know it's 10 minutes til 2 in the morning and I'm walking away from a chilled tequila shot because, according to Noah, "it's time for us to roll, kid."
I was frustrated, because it was my last night and I was already dreading going back to real life. Of course I guess you can't get mad at the zookeeper for trying to contain the animals when you were the one poking them in the first place. No matter, none of it changes the fact that I had an incredible trip, and it turns out I had no idea what frustration really felt like until the next day when my flight schedule became more flexible than a yoga instructor and I ended up getting my wish to spend a little more time in San Diego.
I finally made it home close to 11 that night, exhausted. And before I staggered into bed, I spent just a few quick minutes searching for music industry jobs in San Diego.
Sue me.
cheers,
elizabeth
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