The Big Grey, a dash of Jobim, and a touch clueless

Happy New Year!

The Big Grey
I was talking to a colleague and he said we're heading into "the big grey" meaning constant winter rain that's not like the misting for which Seattle is famous. It's also dark in the winter because of the latitute of the Seattle and with the lack of snow, the city is just darker. He says it lasts until March. I said that's ok, sometimes it snows in Cleveland - in April.

Jobim
Friday night headed out to my new favorite neighborhood of Ballard and sat at a coffee shop Verite Coffee Shop and Royale Cupcake (yes, they have gourmet cupcakes!) and with an Americano and a mini-gourmet cupcake in hand, I spent nearly two hours working on a play.

Eventually found myself heading out to the Wonder Bar to hear the live Brazilian band they have on Friday nights. The crowd was light at first but the music was absolutely fantastic! The band was 5 members, two drummers, two guitars, and another percussionist (tambourine, etc). There was a beautiful Brazilian woman who was just a fantastic dancer who had most of the floor to herself at first. The place soon became crowded with the rainbow nation, both women and men packed in around the band. I found myself tossing my jacket on the floor and samba dancing to some Antonio Carlos Jobim, meeting some new people and learning about other great places to dance in the city. I left at 1 a.m. exhausted with a standing date at the Wonder Bar on Fridays.

A Touch Clueless
I couldn't decide what to do exactly for the New Year. There was a crazy artsy party I was considering attending with some of Pyg's friends in the city and there was also a house party just down the street a little way (also one of Pyg's friends). I decided at the very last minute to go to the house party thinking my chances of meeting new people/friends would be much better in a more intimate setting (even if there were 100 people). I arrived with my bottle of wine around 10:30 p.m., grabbed a beer myself and headed down into the basement. I was watching some people play dance revolution when this guy turned to me and said:

Guy: You look just like my friend Aubry's sister.
Me: Oh, well I'm not. My name is Michelle.
Guy: Hi. This is Inga and I'm Scotlin.
Me: Scotlin? I think I know you.
Guy (complete look of surprise)
Me: You're friends with Steve and the two of you came out to Cleveland four or five years ago to visit Kathy and we raged the city one night.
Guy (still looking shocked)
Me: Remember, we went to Mango's, the Fulton and danced at Twist.
Guy: Oh my gosh! I have pictures of you at my house! I completely remember you.

How absolutely fun and random! Now I have another friend here in Seattle.

I met a guy whose always wanted to be a writer and so we made plans to write in the new year, meeting up a my new favorite place in Ballard. I met quite a few people who worked for Microsoft (surprise), some engineers and foresty type people. I met a guy who delivers pizza to Dave Matthews (he lives two blocks from where the party was in a very modest house). We counted down the New Years with the ball in NYC (though clearly it had happened hours earlier) and danced to the tunes of a bunch of different DJs. At 3:30 I found myself teaching a new gay friend how to salsa, and decided that I had had a wonderful time, had stopped drinking hours ago and it was probably a good time to head home to bed. It was a great way to start 2006 in a great new city making new friends.

(Oh yeah, the clueless part, it turns out that the guy I was teaching to salsa actually wasn't gay and was just trying to get to know me... Wooops. Gotta pay better attention.)