The one thing I’ve mentioned over and over again that I truly miss about Hoboken is the ability to just walk out the door, walk into a bar, and have people I know to hang out with. Growing up in the ‘burbs, I actually got accustomed to biking (and later driving) over to friends’ houses just to say hi and see if they were up for doing something. But, then again, we were all living in neighboring… neighborhoods. No big deal. And there’s also parking in Pennsylvania – something they haven’t discovered over here in New Jersey, yet.
So Friday was a fun little throwback, as I drove into Hoboken to drop Lisa off for a visit into The City. It turned out to be a rather wet and miserable day outside, so I seriously debated just heading home until she called as I had limited photo ops available. But on my way to Tunes before leaving town, I poked my head into good ol’ L&J’s to see if anyone was around. Turns out a couple members the OpenMic crowd were there (Yvonne and John Beret), and we proceeded to imbibe, talk, and just generally laugh it up. What started as just a random hello ended with me two sheets to the wind and ready to unfurl the third. In fact, Lisa had to drive me home at the end of the night (after I insisted that we stop for fries at Mickey D’s).
I doubt I could ever go back to my nightly barhopping days, but I sure do miss the times when nights out weren’t exactly a scarce occurance. To be fair, I’ve actually had a decent share lately – the previous week I got to hang with co-workers at the local Irish Pub to say goodbye (or goodnight, I forget which is the good one) to a (now former) co-worker, who decided to abandom us for life up north with her boyfriend. On top of that, the festivities continued on Saturday when we headed over her friend’s house for yet another stop on the farewell tour. Somewhat ironically, on that first night of the NJ smoking ban (yeehaw! more on that later), I ended up with burning eyes and smokey hair thanks to the fire they had outside.
The party was a blast – I mean, it had everything. . There was a no-so-blazing fire, awesome food (the hostess was one of those amazing cooking types that think nothing of whipping together cocktail weenies from scratch for a get together), just enough alcohol to listen lips, derogatory stories about the South, bizarre photos, a spanking, and someone saying “Boobie was totally an asshole.” And no, I’m not going to explain any of that.
Now I just need to get back to working on re-hydrating my body, as nights like these certainly don’t help