Saturday Day

Okay, so concert-ward. Better late than never, right? Damn, I'm slow, though.

I’ve been looking forward to Guster playing at the Murat for weeks, and Saturday was finally the day. But before that I had made plans to head down to Bloomington with my friend Suzy to this Catholic retreat place for Mass and food. No problem, we were supposed to be back by 3, and then I was going to meet up with my friends around 5:30 for food and concert fun. In theory, of course. In practice, this is what went down:

Suzy fixed us this delicious breakfast. There was a loud rap on my apartment door around 8:45. I’m thinking, “Barry, your mom can walk to the damn hospital.” But no! It was a dozen red roses and a card! So I’m all “I got flow—that’s not my name.” Kara had gotten flowers, from our friend and co-worker Sami, who had suddenly decided he was entirely smitten with her. Well first, we were all plotzing for Kara, because really, how cute is that? But second, because I am a shallow and small person, I said, “Wait, did a woman who is not me just get flowers at my apartment?” Fortunately, my friends all laughed at me and pointed out that they did give me lovely dishes and stuff the night before, so I tried to reel in my smallness. I still contend that it was slightly bullshit.

So I decided to take Shadow over to my parent’s house for the day since I was going to be out most of it. Of course, while I was over there, my father mentioned something ass-y my mother had said, and I ranted about that and got myself worked up into a royal snit. Post-snit, I saw the girls off besides Suzy, and we headed B-town-ward and talked theology and whatnot. It was really nice. So was the Mass. It was more old-school than anything I was used to, but still really cool. I don’t know. There are aspects of Catholicism that rock, and others that do not. We’ll see.

On the way back, we stopped at a diner called Lennie’s, and I had a sandwich that had to have been inspired by God Himself. (Catherine, if you read this, please try to visualize, as I do not yet have a digital camera!) Picture a pile of roast beef, mixed with bits of crumbled bacon, slices of tomatoes, sweet marinated red onions and melted mozzarella cheese on store-made, fresh baked bread. Also, picture it being the size of your face, because it is. It’s a marvel and a joy and oh, so delicious. Also delicious was the cucumber slaw, very tart and refreshing. SO GOOD. After that, Suzy stopped at this Thai place to get some to-go for her dinner. She just couldn’t make the trip and skip it.

Well, we didn’t get back by 3. It was more like, oh, 4:30, and I had forgotten my cell phone at home. I had four messages and seven missed calls. Did you ever notice that on the days you forget your cell phone you become popular? This is what seems to happen to me.

Coming up in adventures of weekend-dom: A great concert! Crappy weather! And the afore-mentioned rotten parents! Stay tuned!