My weekend was pretty much perfect. On Friday after work, I decided to meet up with my friends at the Arena Bar & Grill. I missed the happy hour specials but I didn't miss the food that the Arena Staff brought out for us (FREE!) in anticipation of their grand opening of METRO Bar & Grill in Shavertown, PA on August 6th. Donna blogged about it on the SC blog.
After a few of us moved the gathering from the patio to the inside bar, I ran into an old friend, Iggy, from when I worked at Entercom. He brought his friend with him and he was also hanging with two marines- in full dress. I'm a sucker for a man in uniform, and struck up a conversation with one of them.
He was really sweet and when it was time for me to head to my next location- my friend Crazy Chris' 35th Birthday party at Spurs, I mentioned he should try and head up that way and we could continue our conversation. He guaranteed me that he would show up.
On my way out the door, I also met someone from Nashville! Go figure! As I was walking out, this guy in a big southern drawl said, “What, you're leaving us already without saying hello first?”
That had me laughing, so I stopped to chat with him and his friends. As it turns out, they were part of Kyle Busch's pit crew team. I had forgotten that it was a POCONO NASCAR race weekend. Even cooler still, this guy used to manage Silverados, in Nashville... and used to come up to Demonbreun when I was managing LongShot.. plus he was a regular at Tin Roof!
In fifteen minutes, we ended up discussing Nashville like long lost friends. The guys were staying at a hotel on the way to Spurs, and were waiting on a cab. I told them that there was no way I was going to make them take a cab, I would just drop them off at the hotel as it was five minutes down the road and on my way to my birthday party anyway. They were so excited to have found Southern hospitality in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
We joked around for a little as we sat on the patio by their room and I got to see their jumpsuits for work the next morning. I asked if anyone wanted to come to the party at Spurs with me, but they said they had an early morning. So instead, they told me I should do a burnout on my way out of the parking lot. I laughed and said I wouldn't even know how to do one because I had never done one before. They laughed at me and told me exactly how.
Now, I should explain that in an attempt to save money on gas, I didn't take my newer Honda Pilot that night, I was driving my old TN car- my 1991 Honda Civic Hatchback. They joked about my car and I told them they could fix it for me if they ever wanted to tinker with it! They could “Pimp My Car”. I said my good-byes, they said thank you again and again, I got phone numbers to stay in touch and got into my car, rolled down my window, and did a burn out on the way out of the parking lot. Just a little one.
So I puttered along on my way to Spurs, chuckling to myself about my crazy luck and silly adventures. I always meet some of the most interesting people when I go out! As I pulled into the parking lot of Spurs, my friend Jenn was waiting for me to go inside.
At Spurs, I saw all my friends and wished Crazy Chris a very happy birthday. I wasn't there long enough to take more than one sip on my Coors Light, when I got a tap on the shoulder. Guess who showed up??? The Marine!
I was really surprised, and I think it showed. We posed for a picture.
I introduced him to just about everyone I knew, and we continued our conversation that we had started earlier. We danced, and hung out and just had a great time together. When the bar started emptying out and it was past "last call", has asked me if I would like to have breakfast at the diner down the street.
I agreed, and told him I would have to make it kind of quick because I had to drive to Philadelphia in the morning, but that I would love to. So we went to Eddie's in Wilkes Barre. Over eggs, toast and bacon, we talked about lots of things, including parenting and standing your own ground when it came to parenting after divorce. I told him I was going to have to implement some of his ideas.
I went home, crashed, and then woke up in time to finish getting everyone's stuff in the car and the kids in the car and then we all drove down to Philadelphia so they could meet up with their dad.
The drive down was relatively uneventful. Lots of rain, not much traffic. I dropped off the kids, got a gift from F of Philly pretzels from the airport (which I gave most to the kids) and turned around and headed back north.
On the way back, I saw not one, but TWO really bad accidents. The first, there was a car that flipped over. The second, the car hit the side of the mountain. Yeah, both were not great accidents, although the second looked a lot better than the first- the people in the car weren't hurt in the second one (at least they didn't appear to be anything more than rattled).
I spent most of the ride home listening to music and trying to find out what I was going to do for Saturday night.
I called my friend Sam, to see what his plans were. He was lost too. I told him to come on in, we'd figure something out and then he could stay and play Paintball on Sunday. He was jazzed about Paintball, as he'd never played before, so he said he would head in that afternoon.
When I got home from my ride from Philly, I straightened up my room, cleaned up the house a little, then I took a nap. I knew Sam was on his way, so I jumped in the shower to get ready for a night out.
He got in really early. His car was outside on my street as I was just getting out of the shower. I yelled down to tell him I would be out in a second, and that he could sit on the couch if he wanted, but he was just going to wait in the car... then he called me on my cell and told me I didn't have to yell... and made fun of me for doing it the redneck way.
He was hungry, so we went to River Grille for some grub. It was early, only like 4:30pm. There were only a few people in the bar, so we sat down, shared an appetizer and started pondering what to do with the night. The specials sounded really good, but the side dish of horseradish mashed potatoes really sounded amazing. We decided to see a movie, as I wanted to see Dark Knight, so we ordered a side dish of the horseradish mashed potatoes to go... and drove to the movie theater with about 10 minutes to spare.
We ate it on the way. It was amazing.
I know if you have read my blog that you have read about my infatuation with Heath Ledger. He was simply amazing in this movie. I really forgot for a while that he was Heath Ledger. That is pretty amazing acting too. The movie was freaking awesome! It had everything... a great plot, twists, turns, characters played by actors who literally did a mind meld... action, adventure... awesome.
Sam likes to gamble. Hell, I met the guy in Atlantic City at a craps table. So, I figured I would take him to see the new Mohegan Sun in town. I hadn't yet been to the new building, so I wanted to check it out too. We signed up for players club cards, got $10 to play with free, so we played. I left with $7, Sam left with $37. Of course, part of what he left with was what I won... yeah, I picked the machine, I pulled the lever... and eh... we split some of it since he was buying the drinks.
So, then... we went to Olive Garden for our dinner. I had a $25 gift card, he picked up the tip. I got to take home a bunch of leftovers.
I fell asleep almost immediately upon getting home, even though we were back at the house by 11. I was exhausted from my night before, and then just being busy all day. My alarm went off at 7:30am, because it was time for paintball. I pulled on my overalls and woke Sam up. We loaded up and met up with the Cacti Crew.
We jumped in Clay's SUV and followed Kevin, Keith and Ben up to Skirmish. Donna was waiting for us. Our fun day ended up with lots of paint being splattered on all sorts of trees, people and buildings at Skirmish. Our team (GO TAN team!) won EVERY round. It was fantastic.
Here we are at the end of our day:
This is me and Donna before everything!
When we were finished, all of us were sore, but we went to Whiskey Business for two beers and cheap dinner. It was delicious bar food.
I got home around 9pm, jumped into the shower and right into bed (after inspecting for paintball bruises)... It was a wonderful, long, eventful weekend, filled with parenting, partying, pleasure (hey, I had fun!) and pain (ow, paintball!).
I wish more weekends could be so fun and fancy free!
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