5 July
So yesterday Nik and I went out to Staten Island to Luis and Wendy's party and had a swell time.
I brought my bread pudding, which was not the easiest bread pudding I have ever made. On Friday, before I went to rehearsal, I put the seven slices of bread out to stale, then came home and sat Molly to help out upstairs (stories to come on that one), so I didn't get a chance to even begin the pudding until midnight, whilst I was on the phone with my Mom.
The first thing that needs doing, when one makes a bread pudding, is the stale bread needs toasting, so I put two slices of bread in the toaster, and only when the clouds of smoke started pouring out the top did I realize that perhaps there was something wrong with the toaster! No flies on me!
So I started toasting the rest of the bread, vowing to pay attention and not let any more bread burn, but I did manage to burn two more slices anyway, so I had to put out four more pieces of bread to stale and leave making it till the morning.
I had to get up an hour early in order to make it, and you'd better believe that not a slice was burned that time! It turned out really well, too, and I was glad because Nik had never had it before.
When I was talking to Mom, she asked how I would get to Staten Island, and I told her "the van to the subway to the ferry to the bus" and realized that this excursion necessitated the use of every single mode of public transportation, but for taxis.
I left the house about a quarter after twelve, got to the ferry at 1p exactly, which was just when Nikky and I had agreed to meet, so I was pretty impressed with myself. He wasn't there, though, which surprised me, 'cause he's always early everywhere, but I just settled down to wait.
After about ten minutes, though, I decided to go inside and see if he was there, even though we had agreed to meet outside, and of course he was there, but he was right by the upstairs entrance that I had forgotten existed. He had gotten there an hour early to get away from the firecrackers in his neighbourhood.
So we ferried across, got to the other side, and started looking for the S59 bus, the bus Luis had told us was the bus to take (foreshadowing). We saw the S61 bus, which said "Travis" on the front, which was where we needed to go, so Nik suggested grabbing that bus, but I said no, let's not improvise.
Of course, we then found out that the S59 bus does not go to the ferry, and that the S61 was the one that we wanted, and that was when I remembered that Luis has done the exact same thing to me the first time I had come out to his party, in 1995!
I had completely forgotten.
So we had to wait for an hour for the next bus, 'cause they only come for the ferries. And I was starving because I hadn't eaten, and I desperately needed to take an Aleve because of a headache due to not getting enough sleep.
We finally got to Luis' at 3.30p.
The party was really nice. Three people whom I did not remember from previous parties remembered me and said "Hooray! Kymm's here with her bread pudding!"
We hung out and talked in the sun, music playing, and ate hot dogs and shish kebabs and hamburgers and Kalhua chicken and steak (Nik had one of each, I just had...um...one of each except for the hot dog! And only a tiny piece of chicken!) and watched the kids swim and talked about work (a little too much for Nik's taste) until it started to rain a few hours later, and we hustled the food inside.
Now, Nik was completely thrilled at going inside, because that meant that he would get to visit The Shrine.
What's The Shrine?
It's Luis' basement hidey-hole, with a bar and a big screen TV and floor to ceiling sports memorabilia. We were going down there, Nik walking slowly and looking at all of the stuff in the stairwell, and I was behind him saying "Honey, try not to cum on the stairs". We got down there, Nik sat down on the sofa, and the waves of contentment radiating out of him were almost visible.
It was Boyland.
Nik was so deliriously happy that when it stopped raining and people went outside again, he was extremely reluctant to move, only doing so when Luis promised he could come back later to watch the game.
So we went outside and sat by the pool and Nik made himself useful by filling Matthew, The Biggest Two Year Old In All the Land's water pistol and telling him to go shoot me!
Later, after going back inside and sitting down to watch the game on the living room TV, Nik started fidgeting, actually getting up and stepping away from the TV for a bit, surprising the hell out of me, until he said "But it's not the same--it's not The Shrine!"
So Luis and Nik and I and a couple others went down to the inner sanctum, and I've never seen Nik so happy than that moment, surrounded by sports stuff, watching the Mets lose to the Braves, a beer nestled in his crotch.
At 10p, Luis said that he was driving a couple of other people to the bus, did we want a lift to the ferry, and even though that was earlier than we had discussed going (and the fact that Nik had to be pried out of The Shrine like a walnut) we decided to go along.
We left at 10.15p, getting to the ferry at 10.40p. The sign said "Next boat 44 minutes" so we rolled our eyes and got some donuts and went outside and sat on a bench and talked about our childhood pets, coming back inside in half an hour.
The sign still said "Next boat 44 minutes".
It was then that we realized that the sign was perhaps somewhat less than accurate.
So we sat down resignedly on the floor and decided to go to Philadelphia for a day trip in two weeks. Well, wouldn't you do the same when forced to wait for a ferry that has become stuck in time? It made sense to us at the moment at any rate.
The ferry finally arrived and subsequently left at 12.15a, two hours after leaving Luis', then we had to wait for half an hour for the subway, then I had to wait for the van to fill up, and the whole trip home took (get this) four hours!
Worth it, though. It was a really great day.
Got a heads-up yesterday that #20,000 was coming (I hadn't noticed) by Jilanna Eagles, who was #19958 and then, in another impressive try for the gold, #19,999. However, since the actual #20,000 has decided to forego this great honour, the first runner up will be crowned #20,000 in his/her stead.
Congratulations Jilanna, and remember, always use your powers for good rather than evil!
One year ago today:
Please. Talk about clunky.
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Last Updated Sun 5 July 11:19:09 1998