Whew. What a weekend. Spirits may have been a bit dampened not only by the ever-present rain and cold but by the recent spate of deaths in the Civil War community. I had a fine old time though.
Friday night I headed out to see an old friend and commune with Mr. Kinney who, for whatever reason, showed up to an all Civil War weekend in full Irish Guards kit complete with an inappropriate Black Watch kilt. Wanker. Drank some, then headed downtown to visit with the rest of the Reserves at Uncle Larry’s house and drank some more. Got a phone call that the rest of the “family” had arrived at my place so I headed there and drank even more and at some point fell asleep.
Woke up Saturday fully clothed and proceeded to be regaled with tales of my behavior in the latter part of Friday night before being put to bed. Fortunately I was home so nobody was permanently damaged…physically or mentally. I always worry…the last time I can’t remember what I did I apparently verbally assaulted two ladies while wielding a M-65 entrenching tool like a lightsaber. Typical. Headed out to the parade and wandered a bit around the formation area saying hello to everyone then up the street to a lovely spot on the wall outside O’Rorkes with an excellent view of the entire parade. I swear the bloody thing went on forever but it was wonderful to watch for a change rather than participating and getting more and more annoyed as the idiots in charge ruin the entire experience.
Once the parade was over spent a fine time relaxing outside with an ever-changing array of folks. Tried unsucessfully to catch a nap around 4, finally gave up and went back uptown. Another old friend rolled in around 630 so we had a couple and then headed up to the NR dinner to catch the awards ceremonies and visit with the other folks there. Bailed from the Dobbin House and bee-lined to the G Bar for a last couple of pints before day’s end. Caught up with Mr. Kinney finally although the other kilty boy (Mr. Rall) was still MIA. The Bar was packed like it hadn’t been in years and at one point all the Confederately inclined folks left and we had a bar filled solely with the glorious blue of loyal Union men. Saw some more folks come out of the woodwork for the first time in years and finally retired around 2. Nifty.
Sunday was spent wandering around, visiting some more folks on the way out of town and generally coming down from the weekend high.
All in all a most excellent weekend. It didn’t quite go as “imagined” but I did get to see everyone I could think of even if I didn’t get to spend a lot of time with any one group of people. Now I can roll happily into the holiday season and then cruise on into the long white season before spring dawns and the whole insane carnival starts again.