walking through the park and reminiscing

One of my fondest memories due to a hangover happened last October, if I recall correctly. Anyway, Ashley and I reunited after many years of living separate lives and running with separate crowds (me by myself, and he with his fun partying friends). The previous week, Roomie and I hosted him and Stib at Eric's chinese restaurant and they returned the favor by hosting us at their favorite place, which for the life of me I can't remember the name. It's right across the street from Martuni's, but I think the restaurant no longer exists, or they changed the name.

We agreed to meet for dinner that Friday evening almost a year ago at the restaurant, but when I got there, the place only had a few diners, and even the bar area looked deserted. So I called Roomie, but he didn't answer his phone, and I left a message for Ashley. Apparently, by the time Ashley called me back, I mistook the meeting time by two hours earlier. Ugh, I thought, what the hell am I supposed to do, walk up the down the aisles of Rite-Aid? Luckily, Ashley came over to hang out with me and kept me company before the other two came down. It felt like the good old days, about seven or eight years ago, when we hung out often, and laughing laughing laughing. But while I waited for him, the sun just went down and the crisp autumn air comforted me. I crossed paths with a homeless woman who sang "Do You Know Where You're Going To (Theme from Mahogany)," and I followed her down the street just so I could hear her sing some more of the song.

At the restaurant, we drank cosmos, and since I drank on an empty stomach, I started to buzz halfway through my first cosmo. They ordered me another cosmo when dinner came, and by then I practically lived in another world. Luckily, the restaurant provided entertainment in the form of vocalists/lounge acts; they sang old standards accompanied by piano, one gal even sand "Maybe This Time," from Cabaret, and I enjoyed that thoroughly.

After dinner we headed to the Cafe, and geez, I think Stib bought us more drinks, I can't even remember what, but I got so wasted. Luckily no vomiting or any other nasty stuff happened.

The next day, my head felt so heavy, I lay horizontal the whole day. Ashley and Stib planned to come over, but at the last minute, they cancelled, which probably was a good thing because I couldn't host them, not in my condition. Roomie stayed upstairs seemingly fully functional and doing some file managing/home errands.

The only thing I could do: turn on the Magic Mic karaoke machine and belt out some tunes. There, laying on the sofa in front of the tv with mic in my hand, my head resting on a decorative pillow scoring 100's at least seven times in a row. I sang my old diva standards like Reflection, I Turn to You, Don't Cry Out Loud, etc. At some point, The Greatest Love of All finally made sense. In my hungover state, I finally listened to what the lyrics meant, after all these years of hearing that song, understood.

Ah, the fun you can have with autumn memories. And the title does reference the Little River Band's song "Reminiscing."