Friday, July 25, 2014

johnny's in the basement mixing up the medicine

Today was a success wrapped in a mistake and topped with gin.

I should really leave it at that and let you guess what happened, but I shall recount the tale for my own benefit later when I inevitably come back to remember what I got up to. I woke up relatively early and met my friend Barbara for breakfast - she's my new friend Barbara, one of the two Barbaras who was on the Montauk retreat, and I'm v. happy and honored that she was able to make time to have breakfast since a) I really like her and feel a strong connection to her, and b) she's actually kind of a big deal and was the keynote speaker at one of the luncheons, so she has better things to do than have breakfast with me. Although not really, because I can be charming when I put my mind to it (I know, none of you have ever seen it).

So we had a great time catching up. Then I went to a workshop with Maya, and we skipped out a bit early so we could beat the rush and grab lunch at the Mexican restaurant downstairs with her other friend, who is also conveniently named Sara. Then I wandered around, did a bit of work, went to a workshop on intermediate-to-advanced self publishing given by Bella and my other friend named Barbara, and made a gigantic list of stuff that I need to do as soon as I get home. I was then able to spend a quiet hour recuperating in my room with my laptop, which may have been the only thing that prepared me for...

...dinner and (many) drinks with Laura and Dave. Laura is my former coworker from way back in 2007-2008, and she and her husband moved to San Antonio a year or so ago, so I got in touch with her to see if we could get together. It turns out that they're far more equipped to go out late than I am; for one, they're 'broken hipsters' (apparently this is a new phrase for people in their 50s/60s who have moved into posh urban areas and are driving up real estate prices/drinking fancy cocktails), and for another, I can't handle the heat of San Antonio like they can.

But I think I held my own for at least awhile. We started at Cured, which is a restaurant/bar, where we had some oysters, some steak tartare, and some poutine (fries with pulled pork and cheese), and I had the Cured cocktail, which was some amalgamation of moonshine and cava that attempted to ensure that I would never see the light of day. Then they showed me their temporary rental and the floorplans for their gorgeous permanent townhouse down the street, and then we went to Nao, where we split three desserts and I had two more drinks (the 'To Have and Have Not', which was rum, egg white, allspice, etc., and tasted like cold eggnog).

After that, we came back toward the area where my hotel is and met up with Kathia (who is currently Kate) at Esquire. This was a quiet gathering for approximately ninety seconds, until a bunch of people from a certain book retailer showed up, as well as a couple of other authors. So Laura, Dave and I alternated between talking to each other and talking to the other people, while I had two more cocktails (a shrub collins with gin) and eventually split a cheeseburger with Laura to soak up some of the disaster looming in my stomach.

But now, I'm desperate for sleep, and I predict the morning will not be pretty. I shall persevere, however, as I always do, and hopefully I'll wake up in time to have some v. restorative breakfast before my last full day of events. Goodnight!

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