Ow. Or, why I am only a social drinker.

Still in NYC with thesister and having a wonderful time. I just can't hang, and while I'd like to qualify that by saying that I can't hang like I used to, I never could.

We started last night by heading to an Indian food restaurant in Little India, and YIPEE for yummy curries. Thesister and her roomie shared a bottle of wine with dinner, but I stuck to water, knowing it was going to be a long night and not wanting to give in to the embarrassing tendency to just passing out when I've had too much to drink...I will just fall asleep on you.

We left the Indian food place to head to a poetry reading at KGB, which was awesome. The author/poet we went to see has written a book called "The Amputee's Guide to Sex". Awesome, no? It rocked. One rum and coke for Lucy there.

Moving on, we went to another place called Piano or Pianos, I'm not sure which. Another rum & coke there, but that place sucked. Too crowded, too many hipsters. I'm just not that cool, y'all. No place to sit down, but on the upside, I love the fact that you can't smoke ANYWHERE inside in New York. We left when a DJ began setting up his two turntables and microphone right where we were standing and he bitched at the roomie and I to not touch 'his equipment' which made us giggle for about a half hour afterwards.

We went next to a place called Boss Tweed. We were, I think, on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I mean, I know we were in Manhattan, but my sense of direction is terrible and I just follow thesiter around when I'm here because she has a fantastic sense of direction. Anyway, Boss Tweed was much calmer, quieter, there was someplace to sit and a back patio that we could sit on, and thesister and the roomie could smoke out there. I had two (at least) drinks there. I'm pretty sure it was only two.

We took a car back over the bridge into Brooklyn, and headed to thesister's local, a place called the Duck. At The Duck, that's where things get much more hazy, confused, and not tipsy, but drunk. I have no idea how many drinks I had at The Duck. Three? Four? So for those keeping track, that would be somewhere between six and eight rum and cokes.

A trick that I learned a long time ago is to have a glass of water after every alcoholic drink, which helps keep you hydrated, and hangovers are partially (IMO) due to dehydration, so since I did that, I am not hungover today, but I am hurtin'. Thesister and I talked after coming home from the bar until almost 4am, and then I was done sleeping at 10.40 this morning. So, yes, OW.


Before all of this insanity last night, yesterday we tramped all over parts of the city, visiting a branch of The Strand, a fantastic bookstore, and a toy/comic book/sci-fi geek store next door, called Forbidden Planet. Thanks to some friends on the fan forums, I had some suggestions for new books to look for, and I picked up a bunch of great new books. Which I now have to cart back to Ohio, silly me. They're heavy. But fantastic, I feel like I'm standing on the threshold of new worlds about to be opened to me when I have new novels to read.