Happy Valentine's Day, Fools.

         I wish I could say I have never been in one of these... but that would be a lie.  Did I ride around like a fool in  a stretch Hummer last Saturday night?  Absolutely, I did.  To my credit, it was not my idea.  We were in Portland for one of Eric's friend's 40th birthday party.   Good news: the night started out at a Lebanese restaurant called Al-Amir.  Ever had a Lebanese margarita?  I never even knew they existed until Saturday night, and now I have had 2.5 in my life time.  (Why so few, right?  I had a bit of an incident on Thursday night with Sangria sneaking up and biting me in the ass on Friday morning...)

        The other good - nay, excellent- piece of news about this whole gathering was the restaurant had a BELLY DANCER, which I know about.

Don't be confused by our similar body types- I'm the one on the right

        After dinner it was back to the Hummer, with our driver, Wayde.  I wasn't nearly drunk enough to ignore the nagging thought, "I bet there are a lot of dried liquids of unknown origin crusted on to these pleather seats."  And I didn't bring any Purell (rookie mistake.)  Ratsicles.

        The final destination (for most of the group) was a horrible place called Dixie's.  It wasn't so much the $10 cover that I hated.  It wasn't even the electric blue glowing bar ware the drinks were served in that made it suck.  It was more along the lines of the average age of the crowd being 23 years old that made me wish I was never born.  Well, that, combined with the fact that those kids looked about 17 years old, only confirmed the recurring greatest "going out" fear I have.  Last time I went to the Red Door here in Seattle, my friend Carly looked at our group, and then scanned the rest of the room.  "We're like the frickin' Golden Girls in here, Nik." 

       

Would the Golden Girls do this?

      There, I said it.  I'm afraid of being perceived as Betty White when I go to the bar.

This is what the kids at Dixie's saw when we stepped out of the limo

        Now, I like watching girls with daddy issues dance on the bar as much as the next guy, but when it started sounding like something I should try, I knew I had to get out of there.

        As many of you probably already guessed, I made Eric take me to get food.  And siiiiince we were hanging with old people who haven't been out in Portland at 1 am for approximately fifteen years, no one had any idea where to get food at that hour.  This was perfect because I already knew what I wanted.  Spicy mac and cheese from my favorite- Le Bistro Montage - obvi.

         If there is one thing to be learned from a birthday night on the town which included, but was not limited to being carted around in a stretch Hummer with a bunch of old frat guys to bars in which the clientele looked suspiciously like the cast of Jersey Shore, it is this:

        I win.*

Suck it, Jersey Shore.

        *I win for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is avoiding going out to bars for "fun" to try and meet a man- that would be way too exhausting.  Smarter not harder, people.