Tenth Musee

The song “I Love Paris” has been forever ruined for me by the Meg Ryan film, “French Kiss“. I cannot sing that song without compulsively adding “… because my love is theeeeere… with this slut girlfriend.”  Thank you, Hollywood, for ruining that for me.

I may have mentioned this before, but I get the total heavies when I use a public restroom and the seat is still warm from the person before.  How long was that person sitting there that it they warmed up the seat? Were they writing a book?  Save it for home, sister.  No crapping in Target. Unacceptable. Next stall.

Those ‘wacky, wailing, inflatable, arm-flailing tube men’ used by car washes and Radio Shacks to get people’s attention? Yeah, I hate those. Like hate those. I can’t look at them for too long; I must avert my eyes. Some people are afraid of clowns, though I think that’s pretty cliche now.  I don’t know one person who says, “Oh, yeah, man! I love me some CLOWN!”  Unless, they’re like Juggalos or something.  I can legitimately say these things unnerve me. I won’t pee my pants or run down the block or anything, but I definitely would prefer they not exist.

I have 32 cookbooks, including mixology books (for cocktails).  I don’t know that I’ve ever cooked one thing out of them. Maybe some cookies… but I always have these great plans to cook my way through various cookbooks, but really, I’d rather read the recipes than actually cook them.  Cookbooks without pictures are lame. This one is my favorite.

And finally, I don’t like warm carrots or fresh green beans, in general.  Spicy carrots, sure. But not hot, or warm. Or, at least, I’ve never had a warm carrot I was particularly fond of. I can eat raw carrots all day, but warm it up and I’m out. Green beans are hit and miss for me. If they’re fried and served with wasabi ranch like at Mo’s? Hell yes. But that kind of negates the purpose of a vegetable.  I do like them canned, which I realize these days is a big no-no what with all the creepies in canned foods and sodium out the wazoo, but I just prefer the canned ones. Fresh ones are like eating pipe cleaners. Furry veg fail.

Welcome to my neuroses.

Last night, I met up with danielphillip and richardallen for our standing Monday night happy hour at Mo’s.  (I’ll have to do another whole post on what happened last night.) We usually roll in around 6:30 and we always sit in a center, tall table in the middle of the patio, closest to the bar.  We like to be in the middle of things, to meet new people, to mingle — because we’re fabulous like that — but still be able to sit down and get table service from Marisol, the best server on planet Earth.

Anyway, last week someone was at our table. We don’t officially reserve it, it’s just kinda of understood that’s “our” table. You can’t sit there unless you’re ordering food, so the usual happy hour crowd usually mills around it. And Marisol and the host always kind of keep an eye out, knowing we would be in.  But there was a new hostess and Marisol was busy, so someone was seated there.  Whatever. It was a bummer, but we rolled with it and sat in another area, where we could observe the patio action, if not actually in it.

There were three women at “our” table, all dressed in that special way that says, “This is my first time in the States.”  One, who I’ll call Helga, was wearing a Body Glove wetsuit-style t-shirt circa 1990 with a mini skirt and Teva sandals. The other, who I’ll call Gunda, wore a black hoodie covered in hot pink metallic lip prints. (The third I couldn’t see because she was in my usual seat, behind a pillar/bush.)

This was amusing in itself, but then it got more interesting. A fourth woman joined them, this one wearing a neck to floor prairie-style dress (in 80 degree weather) with a frumpy shawl. It didn’t look like religious wear, it just looked… frau-ish. They were drinking big pitchers of Stella Artois (as told to me by Marisol) and complained about the price — saying they’re only 3 euros in Germany and why are they so expensive here?  Ladies, 3 euros in American dollars is like $4.  That’s just not happening here — not for steins the size of your thigh — come on!

Then they pulled out a few paperbacks and proceeded to have a book club meeting — in the middle of a loud, hoppin’, gay patio happy hour.  That’s fine, I guess — unorthodox, but then so is that hoodie.

I’m not sure why the next thing happened and I don’t entirely understand HOW I missed the opportunity to take a photo of it, but Gunda reached into her bag and pulled out a huge 32 oz tub of yogurt and set it on the table.  Then she rummaged around again and brought out a mammoth, chef-style, Julia Child, no-fucking-around block of butter. Big. Huge. Enormous butter.  She set it on top of her yogurt and they continued talking.

What book were these women reading?  Who brings their own dairy to a bar? Vegans, maybe, but this wasn’t even vegan dairy. This was dairy dairy. Lactose dairy. Full-fat dairy. This dairy was probably milked by Helga in her Tevas. How did I not get a picture of the B.Y.O. Yogurt?!

But I did get a picture of this guy, who the week prior chased me down in the adjacent alley asking me for mints (I tossed some Tic Tacs at him and clutched my purse like an old lady).  This time he spotted me in the open door of Mo’s and proceeded to do a little dance for me to the super diva house music that’s always coming from there.  I was blessed with not only the Cabbage Patch and the Running Man, but his own “humpty dance” rendition, some air smooches and a little tongue wagging.  My heart be still.

This is what a night out with me is like, people. Any takers?

(Please forgive my crappy German. You can thank Babelfish for that.)

My funny friend, Allison, asked her friend, who actually speaks German, and this is what he said:

ihren eigenen?! thats grammatically incorrect
If you said ” Bring deinen eigenen Jogurt mit” that would mean you’re asking people to bring yogurt that they’ve physically made themselves.
It doesnt make sense. It also sounds weird and rude. The people would be like “what?!? I have to make my own yogurt??!?”
“Bring Jogurt mit” works the best in this context.

And now, kind readers, you know how to rudely and non-rudely tell people to B.Y.O.Y.