Belly Dancing Birthday Party

 

This morning Travalon and I met Tiffy and Jilly Moose for coffee, then we walked to the Union but it's closed until Monday, so we walked up Langdon Street. Travalon left to go to a Badger Basketball game, while we ladies continued on to the Edgewater. We were watching little kids ice skate (it was a 9th birthday party) when an employee joked that he could hit a kid with a snowball, which one did we want? We talked to him a bit, then suddenly he pointed at Jilly Moose and said, "Are you a Moose?" We were all caught off-guard, since her last name is not a common one, but it turned out he went to school with her brother, and he thought she looked just like her brother. I hadn't noticed that, but I do know she looks a lot like her mother. Then we walked back to State Street and had lunch at the Globe. They gave me a free dessert for my birthday!

Jilly Moose had to leave for work, so Tiffy and I hung out at her sister's apartment and then got bubble tea just as Travalon came back from the game, so he got some too. Then we went to Leopold's, and the same bartender was there, so we discussed with her what would be a good pandan ice cream drink. We decided on one with vanilla ice cream and vanilla liqueur, so she made a sample one in case it wasn't that good, but it was so delicious that we all decided to have one. We were coming up with names for it, and two of the bartenders liked my idea "Pandanic at the Disco" (there's a band called Panic at the Disco) and one liked my idea "Mr. Pandman, Bring Me a Dream." Tiffy suggested Pandantastic, and we had some other ideas that I can't remember right now. The drinks were a beautiful green.

Then we went over to Rich's house to help him prepare for my birthday party. Mamastep, R Van the Terrible, the Dairyman's Daughter, Kathbert, Cecil Markovitch, and the guy who makes wonderful desserts and his son all came too. Rich made chicken parmesan, and R Van brought broccoli and cauliflower that Cecil cooked in some way that they tasted AMAZING (I guess a ton of butter and garlic, and he charred them), and Mamastep made a salad. Rich made black magic cake, and the dessert guy made a tres leches cake. Somehow the topic of coffee that goes through civets came up, and Kathbert said it was "Number Two Brew" or something like that, but the best part was that it took Rich a minute to get it. I personally have never had coffee pooped out by a weasel, but Cecil claims he has tried it and that it's not that great. He gave Travalon and me matching Croatian hats, and then he whipped out his own.

It's some kind of Croatian sausages. I guess I'm an honorary Croatian now! 

There were so many blog post titles I thought of today, but now I can't think of any of them except Number Two Brew, and something Tiffy and I were talking about at coffee this morning: on the record Chicago XVII, some songs were by James Pankow and published by Make Me Smile Music, and I liked them. The bigger hits were by Peter Cetera and published by Double Virgo Music, and I didn't like them. I said they were both stupid names for music publishing companies, but what would we call ours? Travalon said something about washed-up wrestlers, so then I thought of Washed-Up Laundress Music. Oh yeah, that's right! Mamastep gave Kathbert, Tiffy, and me a belly dancing lesson before dinner, and one move was "snake arms," which she said really helps with the "chicken arms." So I said, "Snake arms kill chicken arms! That would be a good blog post title!" I will note that Travalon and Cecil seemed to really enjoy watching this lesson, and Travalon helpfully found some Moroccan music for us to dance to. 

I just ran the potential blog post titles by my focus group (Travalon), and we're going with "Belly Dancing Birthday Party." Maybe I should actually take some lessons. It's so good for your core muscles!

Famous Hat