Denvah in '07!

Oh.

My.

Gawd.

Did we have a good time. (click me)

We set forth on a chilly Thursday evening that was going to get way chillier. Like chilling out with the children of Chile while eating a chili-dog with green chili and a bev from the chiller while watching a chilly-willy cartoon, awaiting the start of The Big Chill. Cody and I did not care. We were on a mission. And we were in a heated, 4WD truck with some good music. Cody is good company. The road trip is a good test of friendship. If you don't want to jab an ice-pick into someone's eye after hours and hours trapped in a tin can with them, then you never will.*
We did well, with Arctic Monkeys and Eddie Izzard, and peeing on a gas station in the freezing cold keeping us awake. That is until about 4:00 am, when we both started to crash. But like that famous line from the Gambler, we were both too tired to sleep.
We made it to the Breakfast King and all was well. The King has changed a bit. The smoking ban has forced a bunch of dives and greasy-spoons to smarten up a bit in order to appeal to those who would otherwise not want to fight thick grey fog for a plate of biscuits covered in thick grey sauce. No yellow windows with my fluorescent yellow eggs, please. It also means that your clothes don't stink after a night at the bar.
A visit to Cain at the Pablo's to get some keys and we got settled into my mom's mostly empty condo, feeling a bit like squatters. At least I did. I was on a mat on the floor, whereas Cody had a King-sized bed. It may not have hit him as hard. Funny thing is that I got to sleep right away on my little mat, and Cody fussy-butted around in his king-sized pile of cousin's until he gave up and went to the mall.
I met up with him a bit later for sammies and coffee and shuffleboard and Newcastle. Then we tried to take naps, but I couldn't sleep this time. Cody had a craving for a Gabor's hamburger, so off we went. People slowly trickled in, and we chatted and drank and ate. I took off for a bit to visit with Amy, and while at The Thin Man, Eric the owner bought me a beer. This was a bit weird. I've seen him charge his own mother. Off to Sputnik, and a fantaboulous time. This was a great night. I met a lot of really cool people and had a lot of fun in the photo booth (see above). We closed the place down, and went home to sleep it off.
Saturday we slept in. After a kick ass if way too expensive breakfast buritto from watercourse, Cody went off to visit his sister, and I tooled around town with Aaron and Jeremy until it was time to hit LeCentral with my mom. I saw the new Tattered Cover, the new Twist and Shout, and some galleries and toy stores along Broadway. It was cold and icy. I bought a little toy from a very cute girl. LeCentral was delicious. I had beef tips on a bed of pasta and the French onion soup that has an inch of provalone on top. Yummy. We called the whole world and told them to meet us at the condo.
Then the real fun started. See, in the condo, you need a phone to buzz in somebody from the lobby. Being squatters, we had no phone. But I remembered that if you have a TV hooked into the antenna for the building, you get a channel that shows all of the security cameras. At first, we were just watching to see when someone showed up so we could go down and let them in. Each time somebody got there, we would make them do something goofy, not knowing that the rest of the group was upstairs watching. We speculated on what would be amusing to see on a camera pointed at a lobby, like putting Jeremy in there in a recliner with a reading lamp, or Cain spilling a box of baby chicks. Once everybody got there, we spent a while doing other weird things, like little plays, pretending to strip, or a hockey fight that spanned two floors. Then Cain put a dollar in the lobby to see if anybody would grab it. After a while we thought it would be fun to put a sign by the elevators, telling them to put it back. This we did to hilarious results. After two people came through the garage instead of the front door, and with a large group of malcontents getting steadily more drunk while staring at a bunch of security camera images with growing anticipation, we hit pay dirt. A young couple came into the lobby. The man noticed the dollar, picked it up, and did that thing where you hold it with two hands in front of someone and sort of snap it like "look what I got". She nodded in that unimpressed way every girl nods, as if to say "great," but not really mean it. As they round the corner, they see the sign. They look at each other and look back at the floor where the dollar used to be, and to our complete astonishment, the guy fishes the dollar out of his pocket and puts the fucker back! Then he peels the tapped up sign we put on the wall, and re-tapes it to the floor by the dollar. Then he and the girl, giggling, enter the elevator and go out of sight. Hoo Boy did we have a good laugh at that one. A while later, another guy, who's honesty really amazed us, picked up the dollar, and left it on the coffee table ling before he ever saw the sign. When he did see it, he went back and put the dollar back on the floor. By that point, it was late, and fewer people were coming in, so we decided to go to Streets of London Pub, where we spent the rest of the night throwing darts(not always at the dartboard), giving each other fake knuckle tattoos, drinking whiskey, and generally having a great time. We went our separate ways, Cody and I got some Taco Bell, and watched the last part of a weird as fuck animated movie about giant fish-faced people oppressing tiny humans, and the first part of a Hercules movie before crashing out.
Sunday I had lunch with my Dad, ironically just 45 minutes after I woke up. I spent the later part of the afternoon with my mom, having coffee at the shop, and then we all decided we wanted Indian food, so we went to Lisa's house. We drew on the wall, and listened to Cody play the guitar, and soon realized that not only was there no Indian food in her house, there was no Indian food in out bellies either, so we went to an Indian restaurant. Called India's. The mightiest vindaloo in the land, I tell you. I needed Lager**. I was informed that not only did Cody once piss off the lead singer of Live for no reason, but the movie we saw was called "Fantastic Planet" and was the product of a Czeck and French team-up intended to freak out really inebriated people in the future. We headed back to Sputnik, and met even more cool people, and had an awesome time. I had a few too many whiskeys, which was fun because I was a lot more mellow after having vodka redbulls the previous two nights. Cody and I had a wonderful conversation with Vanya and Katie, that I don't remember much of. After being forcibly defenestrated at about 2:30, we went home and slept the sleep of the dead.
Monday we packed up and headed home. All we did on the way back was text all the people we just saw, talk about how wonderful the weekend was, and how much I wanted to get home to see my wife and kid. We made it back despite a massive series of snow and ice storms that made the whole state look as though it had been covered in vanilla icing.
Today I went to work. Yes, the fuckers made me go to work.

I can't even begin to explain how much fun I had. Thank you to all who made it so. Despite all that, I was Jonesing to see my family. As much as I love you all, I love them more. I am happy to be home with them, though missing all of you. I feel so torn.



*maybe
**The only thing that will kill a vindaloo.