The dance of many bars

Philito and I headed out early to take care of some band business and basically go carousing. It was quite the fun time and we made lots of great new friends although Philito managed to totally piss off some hatchet faced no fun pissed off dildo of a woman at Ben’s Chili Bowl. Despite her it was thoroughly a fantastical evening full of mirth and good tidings and massive quantities of cheap yet tasty domestic beer.

Stop 1 – Wesley’s house: I had forgotten to get CD’s so it was off to Wesley’s to pick up a supply. He let us in and called us a name or two and then went back into the studio and produced the…..the object. It was the first time I was allowed to hold it and caress it. I kinda wanted to lick it all over and taste its golden caramel goodness. I think I got a wee bit of a tightening in the loins, it was just that sexy. Goddamit, it’s a beautiful guitar that Wesley is building for me. I’m in love with it. He took it away after a bit and looked repulsed, gave us CD’s and sent us on our way.

Stop 2 – Rite-Aid: Had to stop and pick up supplies. I got a pack of swank airmail envelopes, a notepad, two pens, some Altoids and a Dr. Pepper. We were armed and ready to roll.

Stop 3 – CD Cellar: Dropped flyers for the show, looked at some CD’s and left. As we were walking up the street I stepped on something that was both squishy and crackly at the same time. I didn’t know quite what it was at first but was reasonably sure I wasn’t going to be a fan of stepping in whatever it was. I looked down and it was a dead bird…a squished and oozing dead bird. I somehow managed to squelch the explosive vomit reflex that was kicking in and kept on truckin’!

Stop 4 – Galaxy Hut: Popped in for a beer and to write a letter to the powers that be at Iota. There’s something about actually writing with pen and paper anymore that seems really foreign which is sad. We had some happy hour beers and I scrawled my note. Friend Jon was at the bar and we chatted with him and his pal about Natalie Wood and wars in outer space and stuff like that, good guys and good chatter for the gray matter.

Stop 5 – Iota: Had to drop off my letter and, of course, have a beer. I was amazed that the new bartender who I had only met once before remembered my full name from our previous encounter. I can barely remember how to get home from the grocery store, between that and not caring an ounce about the happiness of my customers it’s no wonder I was such a shitty bartender. Not sure who played at Iota last night but the woman that was soundchecking had a great voice and was wearing a totally snazzy bright red outfit. If you have a time machine I suggest you go back and check her out. Friend Jon was there having migrated from Galaxy Hut and he took our picture with a disposable camera. I think he now owns our souls. Ah well, who needs them anyway.

Stop 6 – Black Cat: Dropped off ye olde Press Kit with Bernie who runs the place. I have met Bernie about 9,000 times and he still has no idea who I am. That’s the thing I guess, he’s the kind of person that people want to meet and I’m the kind of person that wants to meet people. Sniffle. Had some beers, the bartender was cool and the tunes were rocking on the juke. Good stop and it had us revved up for the long walk to 9th Street.

Stop 7 – café’ Saint-Ex: Stopped in to see my old drummer and lifelong compadre’ James but he wasn’t working. Philito had never been to Saint-Ex before so we wandered through and went downstairs to receive the complimentary stare-down from the loner homosexuals at the bar. It’s like the old drunk lunatic stare only openly carnivorous and not closeted. We beat a hasty retreat and headed down the road.

Stop 8 – Bar Nun: After three blocks it was time to have some refreshment so we popped into Bar Nun. There were these two idiots dressed up like extras from a Harvey Keitel gangster movie who were obviously scared to go in because of the four black people sitting at the bar. We brushed past them and hunkered down to have some beers and really kick-ass pretzels. We started shooting the shit with the patrons and gave out some flyers and just had a good old time talking with the kind of folks that in the course of my day I don’t usually get a chance to talk to. I think one or two of the gang might actually show up which would be cool as shit. When we were leaving the bartender said, “Stay cool playah”, which totally made me feel like a supreme badass and I strutted on to the next destination.

Stop 9 – Velvet Lounge: Our primary destination of the evening as we had a bag full of flyers and a new roll of tape to get rid of. Well armed, we were ready to plaster the place silly but we started drinking first as it would have been rude to just start hanging flyers up without properly settling in to the environs. We talked for a while with the bartender and Rob who books the place and runs sound. Rob is a cool dude and I think he likes the band a lot. He clued us in on an email he got from someone super-secret but totally bossarific asking him to record our show which sent us into tizzies of joy exacerbated by the gallons of alcohol that had been poured down the old gullets by that time. Good stuff. We got to flyering and wallpapered the place pretty well, our marketing efforts have been put to good use. After two more beers we belched our farewells and happy Thanksgivings’ and stumbled out the door. Philito promptly stepped on an empty pint bottle that went skittering down the sidewalk with a fantastic clatter and made me laugh hysterically. Alcohol is great when you don’t have a lot of A-grade humor material around.

Stop 10 – DC9: By the time we got to DC9 our heads were beginning to spin quite magnificently. We went in and paid the cover and headed up the steps, which seemed very long because I was sorta drunk. A band called I In time was playing and we both found them to be cool, I thought they were sorta Joe Jackson-y in a good way, (my opinion being that Joe Jackson is either really good or really really shitty most of the time but all the time he is better than Pete Yorn. Just in general, because Pete Yorn eats ox cock). Anyway, the band finished and we headed downstairs to get the stuff together that we needed to drop off with the folks at DC9 and drink some more beers. We sat at the end of the bar and this hopped-up totally whacked out maniac from Ghana decided that Philito was the one and only person on earth that he should be shouting at and he had a lot to say…so he said it….at 500 miles per hour with his eyes bugging out of his head like the Judge when he got flattened at the end of “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”. Mike Holden walked by as the ranting was going on, Mike being a local guy around town that was playing later on that night, and laughed obviously having seen us in this kind of situation before.

Eventually the bouncer bounced the cackling refugee and left us to our thoughts and beers. We had totally lost our train of purpose regarding why we were there in the first place and sat plugging away at the longnecks watching the crazy dude out on the sidewalk yelling at cars. Another friend, Jon Kaplan from the Bicycle Thieves, came in and looked at us with a smile. He told me that I looked a bit tired and I said I was but I was lying as I was really just drunk and fuzzy in my brain. We paid out and left with the bag of stuff that we had been carrying around all night with the sole purpose of leaving at DC9. We might be fun but sometimes we’re really stupid.

Stop 11 – Ben’s Chili Bowl: Ben’s is a D.C. institution known for giving their patrons institutional levels of flatulence and gastric distress. It’s fantastically great for the drunken palette not to mention the fact that Bill Cosby loves it and Charles Barkely supposedly pissed on the sidewalk out front one time. We went in to rest our heads and sop up the booze with some chili dogs and chips and do some people watching because that place is all full of interesting people. After macking down the grub and burping and dropping chili on my pants I went to the can and left some flyers over the urinals, (that’s high-quality marketing right there boys and girls).

Post pee-pee and band promotion I came back out to pay up and head for the comfortable environs of old Virginny. As I turned the corner I saw Philito talking up some folks at a table, two rummy looking guys and a shrew that looked like taming her would take an army of Siegfreid and Roy’s teamed up with an armored battalion of Archie Bunkers. The guys were flapping their gums about this or that and the shrew was battle-axing about the state of this or that in rock and roll and how it disempowers the ladies or some such thing. Philito told her blithely that, “your friends seem to really enjoy it”, which garnered them laser-death stares and sent her further into a tizzy.

She sucked so we summarily ignored her yammering and went about our business, leaving her filthy presence with a wave and a cloud of dust (coming out of our butts and aimed at her face).

So it was a long walk with burning bellies down the misty streets and we were all joy to the world and full of good cheer. We passed the Black Cat and pondered a return visit but decided it was the better idea to head on back which we did. All in all a really good night save for the squished bird and the bitchy hag at the Chili Bowl. We need to do that kind of thing more often…like this Saturday when I know I’m going to Iota to see a kick-assula rock and roll machine called Kung Fury. Good times ahead if you wanna join in the mayhem.

Have a good Thanksgiving and be thankful that I’m around, you know I make your world a better place.