+ As we prepared to eat the mushrooms in the car,
anjeelou asked if they were going to taste nasty. One immediately after another, _ikeware and lurpy said "yes," which was instantly followed by H.W.S.R.N. and I each saying "no." _ikeware declared that anjeelou would have to be the tie-breaker.+ When I overheard
lurpy ask H.W.S.R.N. if the beer at the party was "free range." At first I thought I had misheard, and then I thought lurpy was making some weird sort of joke because I'm a big old hippie. H.W.S.R.N. knew exactly what lurpy meant -- he was asking whether the beer was up for grabs. I, however, had no clue, and responded with a snarky "No, it was raised on a factory farm in inhumane cages," or something like that. The image of what a free range beer farm would look like stayed with me for a long time -- beers frolicking freely in the fields ...+ Hipster and I at the party, dancing like Rainman (he had to show me how, but I quickly caught on).
+ At one point at the party, the music kept cutting out.
lurpy and I, confused, or perhaps trying to be funny (or maybe both) kept counting down to New Years every time the music would stop. "Ten, nine, eight, seven ..."+ The visuals ... like the faces in the walls, the dreidels on
_ikeware's face, and the vibrating beaded curtains in the doorways+ Trying to plug in the Christmas lights and accidentally turning off all of the other lights in the room (no clue how I did that - I swear I didn't actually unplug anything)
+ The amazingly sweet thing that Hipster did early Saturday morning while I was passed out on his living room floor: I woke up and saw that he was getting his shoes and coat on. He asked me where my car was and, half asleep, I told him. I asked why. He told me that his street was a parking permit area, and he took my keys and went out and put a permit sticker on one of my windows. Didn't tell me I had to get up and do it -- just did it for me. I thought that was incredibly sweet.
Now here's the sad little epilogue:
H.W.S.R.N. has been looking to go away for the winter, to work on a resort. Last night he told me he'd gotten an offer from one, and was waiting til today to find out if they could offer him housing. If they can, he could leave as early as next week, and would be gone until May. It made the whole weekend seem so bittersweet ... was it going to be one of those times where I would realize in hindsight that it was the last time that all of my friends were together in one place?
