exciting tales from the city

Friday was '90s night at Town and I could not pass up an offer to go. The music did not disappoint, but why don't DC drag queens ever know the words to any song they try to lip synch to? My suggestion to the DC drag queen community is this: don't pick a song to perform if it's not your favorite. Or if you don't have the time to practice, do interpretive dance instead. However, I must note that DC drag queens are the tallest drag queens I've ever seen anywhere.

Fridays are 12 and under night there, which usually isn't my thing. I'm told people closer to my age go on Saturday night, but I've either been tuckered out from rugby earlier that day or have something else going on. People who haven't been to Town yet are asking me about it, and despite only having gone on rugrat night, I think it's a great nightclub and a mature evolution from Tracks to Nation to Town. You don't get the impression that the place is a converted warehouse - it has several spaces for different kinds of socializing, from dancing to reclining, and is a good experience in DC nightlife in my opinion.

The next day we had our last local match of the season down at the Quantico Marine Base. Both A and B sides lost to The Hooligans, and the heat and humidity made for a trying match, but at least we finished before the Saturday afternoon storms rolled in. As the match progressed we watched huge cargo planes land on the airstrip near the pitch, including a pair of V-22 Osprey aircraft, which was pretty cool.

This evening during our D&D session, Skwurl replayed an attempted mugging against he and a friend that happened a mere block away using Homies™ figurines that he collects. The assailants were not local - they apparently stole a taxi van in Virginia and drove it into DC to conduct drive-by muggings. A few of the assailants came out of the van while the vehicle idled nearby. The assailants asked for the time, then said a magic word and jumped the pair. Both of the victims reacted well, considering the circumstances. One yelled "fire!" and "help!" while the other got a few punches in. The assailants didn't shake anything off either of them and the bad guys got away in the stolen taxi van. Meanwhile, the group of darlings that is always hanging around outside down the block just stared from across the street - they contribute absolutely nothing to society or to a fellow man as far as I'm concerned, but I don't expect much except 24-7 loitering from them anyway.

That attack and the rise in general mayhem here in the 'hood has me fairly down on DC "living". The cops and even the local press is aware of what is going on, but in the year I've lived at this address it's only gotten worse. And after ten years of living in marginal neighborhoods, I'm tired of it, even though I've witnessed former neighborhoods changing for the better. I simply don't want to live in a "transitional" neighborhood anymore, or whatever you like to call it. The neighbors who lived in other half of this duplex moved to Takoma Park for the same reasons. While I expect my salary to go up with the next job, it still always seems to be behind the curve when rent goes up at the same rate. And it seems stupid to piss away half my salary to live in "marginal" neighborhoods for so long. Yeah, I've bitched a lot about it over the years. Job transitions are often an opportunity for life transitions too, and perhaps it's time for a bigger move. I no longer see any romance in city living at this point.

In other news, I have a job interview on Tuesday. I won't disclose the details of the position, but it's an interesting one, so we'll see what develops.