weekend review: leis, chili, & ballllllston...

(or Jungle Bash, Part Deux...)

Got Chili?
My understanding is it began as their answer to the $35/$40 ticket prices attached to DC's Chili Cook-Off. While there was no line-up of live music, there was the favorite 80s/90s party rock on rotation, complete again with the dancing flower in front of the speakers. Last year's celebration took it to the parking lot, with the party going from the houses out fully into the parking lot. Apparently "the management" squelched that from this year's offering, although I don't know that it was altogether too different. Upon walking up, you knew where to go. Like Jungle Bash, I'd heard plenty about the Chiluau in advance and was looking forward to checking it out, The party was the whole cluster of the four townhouses that were clustered together, with people out in the back spanning the whole "party runway" in between (AKA the sidewalk running back out into the parking lot).

The prime line-up though was the crock-pot line-up. It was a virtual buffet o' chili. I was a little concerned coming in. I don't like beans. I like my chili sans-beans (and I'm part of a select few that roll that way). I thought it might be hopeless when I saw D's comment on the Evite, stating "Attention Hippies: There will be vegetarian chili available. Please take Beano before the party". However, I was pleasantly surprised upon arriving to see the spread in variety, even including chicken. Aweso,e.

Fire it up!
There was actual voting on different categories. Tastiest... spiciest... most creative... best presentation... even a write-in category (my selection was best naming convention). The names were hilarious, including Derrick's Frickin' Chicken Chili, Hotter than Your Mom, Traci's Trucker Chili, and Becky's Bustin' BBQ Chili. My favorite name though was Stinkin' Hippie. It wasn't just Stinkin' Hippie. It was Stinkin' Hippie v. 2.0, stating "No animals were injured during the creation of this chili. Chili does not stink." Good thing I wasn't up from Miami visiting, seeing as the ballot upfront disqualified Floridians from voting. Guess they were aiming to avoid any potential hanging chad fiascos. Best presentation for us was clearly the Velveeta-y masterpiece here at the left. It started off chunkily sliding from tier to tier, but was soon rolling off like buttah!

The host was manning the grill, which definitely got Sassy and I thinking of learning how to tackle our own grill. She's got plans to take it for a test drive before we commit to a formal cook-out at our place. Thank goodness warm weather is here at last. It looked for a long time like the afternoon showers were inevitable, but thankfully they held off for the bulk of the afternoon. It was the perfect day, even if we were in Ballston... (kidding).

"Look at you, you have a baby... in a bar..."
We had a good crew... Sassy, WT, MsH, Buckeye, among others. There was an ecclectic crowd at the event as well. It was hard to keep up with who knew whom from where and how... with people going in and out of four different townhouses, all of which had I believe some four tenants. You do the math! I was surprised though to see a 3 week old baby there, even though yes, it was a cook-out in the afternoon. Something I guess struck me as ironic about that, as I weaved my way in front of the keg (?). One of the partygoers managed to catch my initial flash of confusion on that and I'm guessing that's a Kodak moment that will shortly be surfacing. Of course, we started taking pics. D was wearing a straw hat with clip on flowers, similar to what I'd planned on making but ran out of time to complete. He was happy to contribute to the cause, so shortly thereafter we had flowers to complete our pics. Nice.

The event started at two though so around 5:30, we decided it was time for a change in venue. Sassy'd headed out with a couple of others to a party out in Rockville/Bethesda. I said um no to that hike, but WT and I decided we could handle hitting some spots on the Hill. MsH gave us a ride to the metro. En route to her car, WT decided to snag a photo of the pimped out Transmero we'd passed walking to the party. Of course, the guys working at the auto store decided to come out and talk to us (clearly, when you have loud floral print on, it's kind of hard to blend into ones surroundings). He told WT it was for sale, and she was trying to hold back laughter as she told him thanks, we'd keep that in mind. Guess you had to be there, but yeah, pretty funny. So funny MsH was tearing up!

Back on the Hill, WT and I ran into E2 en route back to my house. Why is it when you are dressed in random theme attire that you all of the sudden manage to see a whole slew of people? He was headed out with some friends and we made plans to meet up later. In between wading our way around through three different massive downpours (spread out just so we'd be drenched and dry out and then drenched again - nice), I managed to show WT quite a line-up of Hill faves... from Finn's to Banana Cafe to the Lounge. Might make her a Hill rat just yet!

balmy days... sweet sangria...

As has been the annual tradition for some time now, I received a small package from my mom the day before Valentine's Day. I love it. She's always sent my sister and I something small on Valentine's Day along with a card. Mothers are just great like that. Just on cue, I received the package mid-day on Tuesday, which included a great turquoise/brown patterned top from Ann Taylor, the card, and the new Norah Jones CD from my Gramma. Love it! This was rounded out yesterday by the lovely Hersheys chocolate bar (with the Valentine's design, of course) my co-worker gave me. He brought in a bar for each of us ladies in the department, saying that every female should get chocolate from a male on Valentine's Day. So sweet! So my Valentine's Day chocolate fix was solved before I even started reading the day's email. Perfect.

Well, yesterday panned out to be a completely different day than was originally intended. The plan had been that last night I was to have traveled up to Boston with my boss so we would be there for an early morning meeting today. We were to have enjoyed a wonderful meal (not at our expense, of course, which was an added plus), stayed at a really nice hotel, and pretty successfully avoided the traditional Valentine's Day ballyhoo. Her husband is pretty adamantly anti-Valentine's, so we both thought it was a pretty good plan.

Unfortunately, the weather had other plans. With the mix of three different cities needing to line up for this meeting to work out (us coming in from DC, consultants coming in from NYC...), it seemed to be doomed quicker than the VA public schools closing down. So it was time to come up with a plan B.

KM had suggested to Sassy that they, along with her friend Bea, head to Dr. Dremo's (the perfect spot to avoid the descent of the creepy single guys on the hunt) and hit somewhere for dinner beforehand. I quickly checked to see if I could join in, and soon our group had expanded to include in the Fashionista and the Pea. For dinner, we ended up heading to Guarapo. I'd never been before, but mention of tapas and sangria I was all about checking it out. We did have to joke about it being owned as the same folks as Gazuza. I've had no problems with Gazuza, but both Sassy and the DG have had a terrible track record with guys, dates, and Gazuza.

It was empty when we first arrived, but it didn't take long for it to become overrun with couples galore. They first brought us the Valentine's menu, which was $60 per couple. We just laughed and said um no. Where's the normal menu? Thanks. We stuck out a bit with our table for six, but we couldn't care less. It was a great spot though, and several tapas and some four carafes of sangria later, we were feeling a bit warmer. KM and I were discussing the health benefits of the sangria (since it did have at least enough OJ to give it a glowing yellowish orange tint). She mentioned she thought it had something in it that was good at warding off scurvy. Whew. We are all destined to be scurvy free then... they should so put that on the menu.

We decided to head on to Dr. Dremo's, where we met up with some more of KM and Bea's friends. I'd only ever walked by Dremo's during the summertime when the patio was hopping so I'd asked Sassy earlier if there was an indoors portion. Well, now I know. Being a taphouse, Dremo's "menu" obviously highlights all things beer. The Fashionista, the Pea, and I were all not feeling it, so it was fun as always to walk up to the bar and bluntly state "um, what do you have that's not beer?". The bartender was really nice though and proceeded to name off the wines they had, their cider offerings, and then went into this long explanation about some sort of carbonated Hi-Cish beverage they had (and she kept stating "but it has alcohol in it" over and over). After her long explanation, sorry. Wine it was.

Next was the juke box, which we promptly loaded up with some fun girlie tunes. The Fashionista and I then noticed the multitude of guys (ok, and maybe one girl max) wearing these black t-shirts. We decided that of course we needed this t-shirt. Must have this t-shirt. The back read "the BEER set me up", which we thought was really funny. It was only after we went over to one group of guys and tried to get one from them that we saw the best line which was on the front of the shirt -- "made with Oregon crackberries". Those guys would have none of it though.

The Fashionista then saw this other group of guys who were playing GoldenTee. I know I've seen this out at other bars before. I'm not a big bar video game player, so I had no clue how to play. Suddenly though, she and I were participating in GoldenTee101... the fine details of choosing one's putter, the importance of back-spin... gee. Who knew? She was "FUK" (?) and I was AAA (hey, what can you say - I'm dependable). I think my GoldenTee game might be a notch up from my put-put capabilities, but that's definitely not saying much.

Anyhow, at the end of the night, we were in possession of two mighty fine black t-shirts as we hopped in cabs to head back into the city. This morning I'm remembering why I love going out in DC (the absence of smokey bars... sorry Arlington... this non-smoker's gotta give that thumbs down) and also remembering the essential role Starbucks can play after a long mid-week night out. It's been a long morning, but after my latte and now my Diet Mountain Dew I think this sleepy-eyed senorita is coming around.

Speaking of which, anyone able to catch the song reference in the title of this blog? I'm doubting so, but hey, a girl can dream. Take a gander!

So yeah... between the package in the mail, chocolates from a co-worker, valentine's wishes via email/text messaging from friends of all sorts, and a great night out with the ladies, can't complain about V'Day '07. Can't complain.