November 12, 2004 - 3:08 PM

Amherst Ain't All Bad

Last night after work, I blew off plans with Matt (don't worry, it was a mutual blowing-off...errr...that sounds wrong...we both opted out of a previously planned rendevous...no...umm...we decided not to go to Largo to see Jon Brion and Mitchell Froom perform [I've been doing that a lot the past few weeks, skipping concerts that I'd wanted to see because I was too pooped or no one wanted to go with me]), and went instead to a bar in Hollywood for a get-together with young alumni of Amherst. I had forgotten about the soiree until Flori called me up and asked if I was going. I hadn't spoken to him since the premiere party and was interested to see if he had been watching the show and enjoying it, so I said sure, why not, I'll come.

I really don't like meeting up in bars. I like the beer, I like the food, I like the company, I just don't like the needing to strain your vocal cords and your ears in order to have a decent conversation with the person next to you. Then, you miss important pieces of information like where the person is from, and where they work, and what their name is. Maybe it's just me being silly, but I like to, I don't know, be able to refer to someone in a more familiar way than just "hey you" when I'm chatting them up.

About a dozen of us showed up, ranging from the class of '97 to the class of '03. Other than Flori, no one that I recognized, but for the most part, everyone there was cool. I say "for the most part" because I didn't get a chance to say more than a few words to a couple of the people there. Half of them work in the entertainment industry, from what I gathered, several as producers; of the rest, two are teachers, one's studying massage therapy, and another is in systems engineering.

Flori and I talked about how Drawn Together has been doing, and everyone at the gathering had heard about it or seen parts of it, and they all seemed to find it funny. So I guess that's the market that we've been hitting- the liberal, educated elite with a twisted sense of humor. :)

I had so much fun and good (partially heard) conversation over the course of 2 and a half hours (including a discussion with a girl originally from New York as to why she's a Yankees fan, why I am a Yankees hater, and how we both respected each other's rooting for our hometeams) that I think I might meet up with these people (and more alumni) at a bar in Santa Monica Saturday morning to watch the Amherst/Williams football game on Satellite tv. I never had an interest in that particular grudge match between those intrastate collegiate rivals, what with Soph having gone to Williams and me not having any hatred for her school. But what the hey, I've never gone out and gotten drunk before noon, so there's a first time for everything, isn't there? The only hope is that I get enough wits gathered before evening falls so that I can make it to Nick's for Tamale Night.

********
On the way in to work, traffic was congested as usual on the 101. I was in the second lane from the left, poking along, when I heard a whimpy screeech followed by a plasticky crumpling. I looked over to the left, and there was a guy lying on the road, partially covered by his fallen motorcycle and a car stopped behind him. I'm not sure what happened, but I like to believe that the motorcyclist had been doing that fucking annoying and illegal thing that the bi-wheeling set like to do in traffic, which is to weave from lane to lane and drive on the lines in-betweeen the lanes to get ahead. That shit always freaks me out, when I'm doing 5 MPH in bumper-to-bumper, and some asshat vrooms by on his bike, 2 inches from my side mirror. That's NOT a LANE, fuckpants! Sometimes, I wish that I could see them coming up behind me, and nudge my car over to block them, or open my door and have them crash into it.

Anyways, I like to think that this guy was doing that, and that he lost control while trying to thread the traffic and fell off his bike. Serves him right. And, yes, he seemed ok...at least, the person in the car behind him got out to ask if he was, and after a muffled response, got back in the car.

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