thursday night at the moon

I have been working off and on today on my top 100 book list, but it's not ready to post just yet. It might take a while, because first I have to narrow the list to a hundred, and then of course I have to rank them. Ranking them will take the longest, I think. The top five are not a problem for me, but it's the rest that might cause some internal dispute.

Otherwise, I've spent the day doing laundry, hanging with Murphy, emailing people, and reading. I don't work until 6:15, so it's almost like having a day off. Well, except for the part about how I have to work until 2am and then be back at work at 9:30am tomorrow. But that's ok.

As I put in an email to Angela very early this morning, or extremely late last night--however you want to consider 4am--last night was broken up into several chunks, and all were fun for their own reasons:

1. I worked until 8:15. When my shift ended, I changed clothes at work and did my best to cover up the steamed milk/coffee smell, which while nice when you're ordering a latte, isn't exactly how I like to smell when I go out with friends.

2. Left work and went directly to meet up with one of my friends at the house of one of her friends, where we theoretically had game night, but instead sat around with beer and talked and laughed. Most of us there currently or at some point have worked with kids or in some incarnation of the education field, so we compared horror stories, which is always a riot. Other than my friend, I had never met any of these people, and felt weird going to a stranger's house, but it was all cool. Everyone was awesome. And by the way, this house was huge. On my way in, I actually had to stop at a gatehouse, where a guard asked me whose home I was going to, wanted to see my ID, and called the guy's house to confirm before he'd let me in. This was a new and bizarre experience for me.

3. Suddenly after a couple hours, my friend and I decided to leave and go to New Moon, the bar in Lauderdale. We followed each other there, and then she went to her friends, and I went to mine (strange when two people who don't really have mutual friends hang out and then suddenly return to their respective posses). Well, that's not exactly how it happened. First I stood in front of the tv on the patio for a long time and watched the rest of the Cardinals game, surrounded by lesbians who are transplants from New York and who weren't too thrilled with my cheering when the Cards beat the Mets. Then, I went in and found some of my buds, who were already ass-deep in karaoke, which is the Thursday night ritual for most of them, though I'm just a spectator in this event. There are already lots of videos and pics floating around the internet of a couple performances, so some of you may have already seen them. I did not sing, but rather took some of the pictures, so thankfully, I'm not documented at all. This is a good thing.

4. Spent several hours with them and the bar was quieting down as the night came close to being over. Then, the friend I started the night with found me again, but this time she was pretty drunk. So I left the bar to make sure she got home safely. Once back at her place, we went in and she wordlessly went into the kitchen to heat up soup she'd made earlier. It was actually some kick-ass soup, some of the best I've had recently. And I hear she's a fabulous cook, though I don't really know as she still hasn't made anything for me, other than this soup! ;) Then, half-way through her bowl of soup, she passed out, which I knew was coming at any moment. She was safe, her dogs were happy she was there, so I headed home.

5. I arrived home at 3:45am. My drive home included a stop for gas and water. And lots of fabulous music from my ipod, which was lost for months and has recently resurfaced under a bunch of crap in my car.

6. Was too wired to sleep for a long time after I got home, so I sent out some email and uploaded some pics I took at the bar. Eventually, I went to sleep.

Fun night. And I managed to not get drunk. Had enough beer to completely relax and feel very happy, and then I left it at that. Or maybe it was laughing and watching people do karaoke that made me happy. Or maybe it was the Cardinals' victory. Or sitting back at times last night and taking in what fabulous friends I've made since moving here.

Time to take a shower and get ready for work...