Que cinematic goosebumps

Regrettably, my willpower was weak, and I peeked at the "Watchmen" trailer online yesterday (many, many times), vs. waiting to see it as it should properly be seen: in the theater before "The Dark Knight" this weekend. However, that won't spoil the icing in my Batman cake - catching Christopher Nolan's opus at the new shrine-to-cinemagoing that opens in my 'hood today: The new AMC all-digital cinemaplex in Southcenter. Putting aside the irony of such a lavish movie cathedral being built in the heart of such a classless and even dangerous shopping mall (at least 2 shootings have occured in Southcenter's parking lot in the past year), I can't wait. If both the movie and the new theater are half as good as I've heard, I'll feel even better about refinancing my home 2 days ago and committing to sticking around this neck of the woods.

So this is 40

Ad and I shared back-to-back 40th birthdays this past month. Dad told me I could expect to lose my hyperdrive metabolism that allows me to snarf Top Pot donuts and snack on Kraft Mac & Cheese just before bedtime. We'll see about that - but I'm not giving up video games and superhero movies just yet. I don't yet feel that old.

Also not lost to old age (or is it, the new age?) is a taste for cocktails, live music, and an otherwise raucous good time. We caught The Red Elvises at Ballard's Tractor tavern Saturday, which was as good a commemmoration of turning the page on our 30s as I could think of. Sadly, I forgot the camera to capture the ex-Soviet surf rockers leading the Yankee capitalist dogs in song and dance.

Jack Tripper to the rescue!

I joined Adrienne and her siblings in treating their father to a 70th birthday/father's day celebratory weekend at the Quinault Casino/Resort at Ocean Shores. Beachcombing and sunsets were the highlights, as one might expect. Drinking and gambling, on the other hand, proved to be a predictable debacle, albeit with comical highlights.

Saturday evening, a scrumptious-but-heavy seafood dinner at Alec's By The Sea was followed by watching the sunset with Ad and cocktails in our room. I drank much more than usual, since the food baby in my belly acted as a firewall to the alcohol - at least in the short term. By the time we adjorned to the casino floor for some late night gaming, the booze hit me like a collapsing ice shelf. One of my only recollections was throwing the dice off the craps table not once, but twice, I think. Surprisingly, I wasn't tossed from the casino, but not so surprisingly, I got murdered at the table games and slots. To my amazement, upon opening my wallet the next morning and expecting moths to fly out, I would find several dead presidents staring back at me.

The rest of the evening would be detailed to me by Ad and her sister Wendy the next morning, since I have no memory of it: After stumbling back to our room around midnight, I was so hammered that after sloppily brushing my teeth on autopilot, I returned to the sleeping quarters (now pitch dark). Ad and I were sharing a room with 2 beds with her sister, with a door to the adjoining suite where her parents stayed. Apparently, I proceeded to climb into bed with Wendy, until she barked "Wrong Bed!", startling a blind, disoriented, drunken Dane, who then scampered over to the correct bed, whereupon instead of walking around to my side, I crawled right over the top of Adrienne. A few hours later, I would rise, somnambulist-like, and crash about, unconsciously searching for asprin and the bathroom. After entering the closet and rattling the door to Ad's parent's room (thankfully locked), I achieved some measure of success and returned to bed til dawn.

Kids In The Hall and Fun with Crackheads!

We saw Kids in the Hall last night, which was funny and all that (though I felt a little jipped that they used some video bits in concert that are available on YouTube - lazy fuckers). I had parked in Chinatown, and heading back to the car afterwards, I make the ill-advised decision to detour and use one of Seattle's notorious public self-cleaning toilets in Hing Hay Park. As we reach the park, we walk right past a crowd of druggies huddling around a crack pipe, right out in the open. Just ahead is the toilet, but I can see there is a red light on the toilet's door, meaning it's occupied. A scraggly woman is walking circles around the toilet, casting the stinkeye our way as we wait.

Suddenly, a fracas erupts amongst the druggies. "Hey man, that shit wasn't real!" "Oh yeah? You want some of this? C'mon muthafucka!" Three of them are circling around the other, fists raised in the "put up your dukes/kung fu fighting" pose, throwing wild punches and yelling. Morbidly fascinated, I watch as it spills into the street. I say to Ad, "Hrm, maybe I can just hold it til we get home. We should probably get out of here" Ad: "Can we... Please!?"

Dessert Daddy

Thanks to some lucky traffic-dodging and killer robot speedwalking, Ad and I crammed more into a Friday date night in Seattle's arts district than one would have thought possible. For starters, we pondered our place in world history, gazing at time-ravaged marble genetalia at SAM's roman art exhibit. Food-gasming at Troiani followed soon after - I caved in to my carb-craving id and ordered Lobstah Mac & Cheese, determined to will myself into beating the inevitable food coma that would follow.

Chocolate dessert and a double-shot latte at the Triple Door staved off said coma and provided rocket fuel for the Cherry Poppin Daddies show. The Eugene swingers haven't missed a step, and it was nice to see them strut and toot in a swanky venue befitting their talent and style. I hadn't seen them in over 10 years, though I don't think they'll ever top a show at the now-gone OK Hotel, circa 1993 (maybe) from which I snatched a set-list written on the back of a classic Daddies showbill with Evil Clown illustrations.

I captured a great video of their encore rendition of "Cherry Poppin Daddies Strut", though my retarded video skilz haven't figured out how to compress it to an acceptable YouTube bite-size just yet. Stay tuned!

Teppanyaki A Go Go

April was a brutally stressful month for this traveller. May is shaping up much better, thank Zod. In the midst of much fretting and teeth-grinding, last week I got to enjoy a relaxing night of good food and even better company at Seattle's Mikado restaurant. We did the teppanyaki grill dinner-show thang, but the Mikado also has those cool, intimate tatami style rooms, where you take off your shoes and they cook for you at your table. Some 30-odd years ago, I went with the family to Bush Gardens for that dinner treatment, and it was an experience I never forgot.

Tomorrow is hot date night, with dinner at Troiani, followed by The Cherry Poppin' Daddies at the Triple Door. When I first set foot in the Triple Door last December, I told Ad that it was the perfect venue for a Daddies show. Their ears must have been burning from their Seattle fans' collective yearning, cause they booked a gig only a few months later. I'm looking forward to snapping some choice pictures and getting my swing on!

Tulips + Shriners = End of Days (not really)

Being as the weatherman predicted a Seattle April heat wave of 80 degrees on Saturday, we decided to be "outsidesy" and head out to LaConner to take in the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. I'd seen postcard pictures of the tulip fields for years, and as a native Washingtonian it one of those nagging items on my "bucket list" to check off.

We spent the morning literally tiptoeing through the tulips, as well as the mud - Tiny Tim left that part out of the song. I was a little underwhelmed - I'd expected seas of tulips as far as the eye could see, but it was more like the occasional big field and a lot of smaller, but very gorgeous patches.

We stopped in downtown LaConner for an afternoon of antiquing, art-walking, and gnoshing. My heart lept when we saw a food vendor selling my latest food addiction, indian flatbread. Their flatbread tacos, stuffed with salmon (Adrienne had beef), cream cheese, and salsa was right in my junkfood palate's wheelhouse!

As we were readying to leave, our exit was postponed by a town parade - though we couldn't have refused the chance to see Shriners driving those tiny cars anyways. When we got home, Adrienne gasped at the supernova sunburn on my pasty-white neck. Thankfully, I'd been wearing a baseball hat to protect my delicate noggin.

"See Washington's Tulip Fields" - check