thursday...9 march...2000


The Philadelphia Story, Part 2

Before we begin, Corina has her entry up, and she was able to write much more eloquently about the way this weekend affected her than I will ever be able to.

Right back to you, girl.

So, all stuffed full of crepey (that's crepe-y, not creepy) goodness, we headed out the door to the infamous South Street. Just around the corner from the restaurant, however, we ran into a place called the Martini Bar. Melissa and I peered at the menu, which listed about 85 different kinds of martinis, from fruity to chocolatey and everything in between. However, there were only about three people in the bar, and we all wanted to walk off dinner, so we decided to try it again at the end of the evening.

South Street, it was. It reminded me a lot of Melrose Avenue, only much less pretentious. There were certainly plenty of freaks, but they were nice freaks, not scary ones. A freak girl bummed a light off Holden, then took off without saying thank you. ("You know, I wasn't really expecting it," he admitted.) The order of the stores we stopped in is a little fuzzy, but they are certainly etched in my memory.

I think it was the candles that drew us into the store called The Mood, and it wasn't until we were all in there that it sort of dawned on us (well, on me, anyway) exactly what it was.

A sex shop. A sophisticated sex shop, but a sex shop nonetheless. All the stuff in the front was very tasteful, sheets and pillows and glow-in-the-dark erotic dice. You had to make your way to the back of the store to find the "other" stuff. I think Corina stumbled upon the funniest thing back there -- the Bondage Starter Kit.

Sadly, no one anyone actually made any purchases in The Mood.

The next store we fell into was a used bookstore, which of course made all of us happy. I found a copy of Anne Lamott's "Traveling Mercies", which I had wanted to get but didn't know it was out in paperback. I bought another book, based solely on the fact that the only thing on its spine is "Elizabeth R". I ran around the store with it, showing everyone: "Look! A book about me!"

Okay, it's actually about Queen Elizabeth I. But still. I can pretend.

At some point I dragged a few people into a tattoo parlor with me. I'm still seriously considering getting one, and they actually had the exact design I want, for $100. The crazy thing about this particular tattoo parlor was that there were three or four stations out in the open. Some girl was getting her wrist tattooed, and we all marveled at the fact that she was sitting there calm as could be, like she was getting a manicure instead of a tattoo.

The girls mentioned this when they were talking about New York, but I was amazed at how the time flew. Before I knew it, it was 11:00, and we were all ready to cop a squat somewhere. I had heard about Xando's from one of my trial teammates, and I am so glad that it's where we ended up, because it was SOOO COOL. I wanted to order one of everything on the menu, all the frou-frou "funny" coffee drinks sounded so good. I ended up with a White Chocolate Amaretto Caramel something or other, and it was very tasty.

But not NEARLY as tasty as the S'mores! They bring you a tray with marshmallows, graham crackers, and Hershey bars, then light this lovely pot of Sterno in the middle, throw some skewers at you, and you're on your way to S'morey goodness, right there at the table!

If there were a Xando's near me, I wouldn't be at all pissed off that there's no Starbucks near me. Xando's rocks way more than dull, overpriced Starbucks.

As hard as it was for us to call it a night, we had to. Corina and the girls drove me back to the hotel via the major sights of downtown Philly, which looked beautiful all light up at 1:00 in the morning.

I've realized that I'm never sad about saying goodbye to people as long as I know exactly when I'll be seeing them again. And in this case, it was in just over twelve hours. So I made my way up to my room, tired, content, and not at all sad.

To be continued...