Paris: Lesbian Lessons and the Sleep of the Just

My first full day in Paris, I woke up to someone pounding on my door and as I crawled out of bed with one eye open, managed to croak out a raspy, "who is it?" A familiar voice replied, "the girl you were supposed to meet for lunch two hours ago." It was my friend H, who had just arrived that morning. I quickly grabbed a towel to cover myself and flung the door open apologizing profusely and after asking what time it was, explained that I had asked for a wake up call two and a half hours before. "I know," she replied, "the two women at the front desk and I have been taking turns calling you and pounding on your door for the last two and a half hours. You, my friend, clearly sleep the sleep of the just." "I'm so sorry," I explained, "I was giving lesbian lessons until like six o'clock this morning" (when my star pupil had to run to catch her flight). "Of course you were," replied H, who affectionately (I think?) refers to me as "the gateway drug" because of the sheer number of women I have converted in my life. 

As I showered and got dressed, I gave H the quick rundown about how I had gone to the girl bar to find the stunning bartender only to find that she was on vacation and how after sitting at the bar lamenting my bad timing for hours with a fellow by the name of Jean Claude, this beautiful woman (whom JC had been obsessing over all night because he thought she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen) came over and started chatting with us. At first I sort of didn't notice how good looking she was or that she was flirting with me because I was still lamenting my bad timing, but thankfully at some point shortly before 1am, I snapped out of it, bought her a drink, gave her my full attention for ten minutes and then asked her if she wanted to have a drink with me at my hotel.

This invitation prompted her to launch into a flustered explanation (she spoke almost perfect english) about how much she wanted to come home with me, but that even though she was pretty sure she was a lesbian, she hadn't been with a woman before and so she would need me to teach her "everything," concluding, "it's too much, I could not possibly ask this of you." It took me a minute to process this beautiful woman with a flawless body (model thin, but incredibly and naturally well-endowed--so rare) acting like I would be doing her a huge and selfless favor by hooking up with her. "um," I responded a little dumbfounded by the conversation, "it's really no trouble (thinking: we are talking about hooking up right?). I'm happy to teach you whatever you need to be taught. Seriously." "Really?" she asked sheepishly. Cracking a big smile at the sheer ridiculousness of the conversation, I assured her that, "it would be an honor and a privilege." She laughed and said, "okay then" as she slid her hand in mine while we used our free hands to chug the last of our drinks before we trotted off, hand-in-hand, to lesbian school.

An hour later, when I finished up the blow-by-blow of the lessons that had been taught at lesbian school, over lunch at a cafe on the Seine, H started giving me the blow-by-blow on the three person, two and half hour struggle to rouse me from the sleep of the just, which I always seem to sleep in Paris. Immediately the conversation turned to my visit to Paris the summer before (my first in over a decade), when somehow I was so exhausted (I had closed two hugely stressful deals, back-to-back in the two days before I got on the plane and had been sleeping maybe 2-3 hours a night for the two weeks preceding my trip), that I managed to sleep 19 hours straight my first night in the city. This was after I had slept the entire flight and my whole first day in paris, only waking up to meet my friends for dinner for a couple hours then returning to my hotel where I slept for the additional 19 hour stretch. When I finally woke up and looked at my watch to find that it was 5 o'clock, I just assumed it was 5am because it was inconceivable to me that I had slept 19 hours straight and about 37 of the last 41 hours of my life. It didn't help that the sky was so thick with ominous black clouds and rain that it was impossible to tell whether the moon or the sun was hiding up there.

While I had told my friends (who lived in Paris and who had given me one of their cell phones which didn't have a time display because I had forgotten the adaptor I needed to charge my blackberry) that I would call them when I woke up, I thought I should wait until at least 9:30am and so I spent the next 4 and a half hours wandering all over Paris, rationalizing every single thing I saw because it was easier than wrapping my mind around how long I had just slept. When I walked past the gay boys having beers and smoking outside a gay bar, I just assumed they were coming down off their club drugs. While I was a little surprised that the starbucks was open at what I thought was 5:30am, I thought, well, why not? Look at the business they do at 5:30 am (the place was packed). As I made my way toward the Louvre through the throngs of pushy american tourists, I marveled at these gunners who had gotten up at dawn to beat the line. When a french guy approached me and tried to pick me up as I sat on the edge of the fountain outside the Louvre reading my guidebook, I was in awe of his confidence (I don't know anyone who has more luck with the ladies than me and I have never in my life even attempted to pick up a cold-sober stranger on the street at 6am). The couples walking all wrapped around each other at what I thought was 7am didn't phase me either, this was Paris after all, the most romantic city in the world. When I finally wandered into a little bistro around 8:30 and my waiter greeted me with "bonsoir," I made a mental note that people keeping saying bonsoir right up until the next work day officially begins at 9am.

Finally around 9:30, I walked out of the bistro and called my friends (who had completely given up on me having been waiting for my call all day and all night and having called my room about 10 times over the course of the day, while I was sleeping, to no avail). I left them a voicemail and started walking back to my hotel. As I walked, I couldn't help but notice that the sky had somehow gotten even darker than it had been and while only some of the cars had their headlights on before I stopped at the bistro, now all of them did. As my foggy little brain started chugging up to speed, it finally occurred to me that it might be nighttime and that I might have actually slept through an entire day. Knowing it was about a three hour walk back to my hotel, I hailed a cab. We rolled along in the direction of my hotel for a few minutes before I finally asked in my broken french whether it was day or night. Of course, the cab driver thought he wasn't understanding the question because it was such an insane one, but after clarifying for the third time that I was really asking him whether it was day or night, he burst out laughing. "C'est la nuit!" he roared. I immediately dialed my friend's number again for the second time in 15 minutes.

"Hi, it's me again..." I started and proceeded to explain that when I had left the message 15 minutes ago I was under the impression that it was 9:30am and that it had since come to my attention that it was actually 9:30pm, yeah...As I left the message I hoped it would be audible over the roaring laughter of the cab driver who was now crying and slapping the steering wheel repeatedly. As I ended the call and settled back into my seat, with the cab driver's roaring laughter giving way to little fits of wheezing from laughing so hard, I couldn't help but think to myself, laugh all you want, froggie, I sleep the sleep of the just.

Alive and Kicking

No, Mr. Charleston did not bury me in my yard (and if certain unnamed concerned citizens followed me on twitter, they would know that). In fact, we had a lovely time very much like the lovely time I had with Mr. San Francisco, lots of good food and cocktail crawls that lasted several hours and covered multiple neighborhoods. The only noticeable difference through the cocktail haze was that there was a lot more talk of restaurants and food and a lot less talk of board dynamics and the perils of angel investing, and by the time Mr. Charleston left, I had discovered all these great places I never knew about because he's in "the biz."

Shortly after Mr. Charleston's departure, I headed for my friend's place in Ptown for another week because I thought it was such an artsy place that I would feel like a real, live author just being there and would actually make some headway on the book. I was a little distracted by the gorgeous lesbo beach calling my name every day and exhausted from fending off creepy "straight" couples looking for a third every night, but I did manage to make some progress and now have a grand total of 70 pages down.

I might fall off pace a little next week though because I'm headed to Paris with an old friend (making good on the promise I made in Napa), using some of those miles I racked up bleeding through my life savings. This trip came about when I met my friend for dinner a few weeks ago and somehow the conversation turned to an absolutely stunning lesbonic bartender at my favorite girl bar in Paris and how for all our eye contact and flirting (mind you this was languageless flirting, like winking, unnecessary touching and refusing to let me pay for my drinks) we never got together because the only words we both understood were "oui", "non" and "Jack Daniels." Pretty much everything else we tried to say to each other got lost in translation.

Now, I have been working my way through the rosetta stone program since I got home, but so far I don't have much french that will actually help me chat with this woman, unless of course, I have to excuse myself to go to a costume ball, because I now know how to say that in french. Also, if she drinks my fruit juice, I know how to accuse her of drinking my fruit juice and then when she fesses up, assure her that it's no big deal ("ce n'est pas grave") even though I just threw a fit about it. Finally, if she tries to sell me a geisha robe or a package of beef, I know how to ask how many yens it costs and on the off chance that she comes out from behind the bar and tries to walk straight forward, I know how to tell her that she is not allowed to go straight and that she must turn right or left.

When I told my friend about all the french I had mastered and asked her how far she thought it would get me, she diplomatically suggested that we go back to Paris to find this girl together and offered to act as my translating wingman. Perfect. And if we can't find my girl, I'm sure that having a translating wingman will still come in handy, particularly in helping me avoid a repeat performance of finding myself in bed at 5:30 in the morning with a girl who is telling me that her older sister is 22. yikes. Now in my defense, (a) I thought this girl was at least in her mid, if not late, twenties just based on how fashionable, sophisticated and wildly cynical she was, (b) she was absolutely beautiful (think Neve Campbell's face on a model's body) and everyone in the bar was vying for her affection and a good number of those people were my age or older, (c) whatever english words she used to describe what she was studying in school left me with the distinct impression that she was in the german equivalent of grad school (she was visiting from Berlin), though it would seem that she was really talking about the german equivalent of college. At any rate, when I found out her actual age, I was a little rattled and I'm looking forward to having a translating wingman to help keep me out of this sort of trouble on this trip. Also, just in case my translating wingman runs off with some woman and leaves me to fend for myself, I have recently added, "quel age as-tu?" to my conversational french arsenal, bringing the grand total of phrases in said arsenal to about six and a half.

Look out Paris, here I come...

Update from the Homefront

I've gotten enough emails asking what I'm up to that I'm thinking it's time for a little update, not that I have much to report. As I spend my days getting my life and apartment organized, networking with lawyer friends in the name of finding a good in-house gig that will allow me to maintain some sort of life outside of work, running, learning how to cook again, remembering how to play songs I wrote years ago, doing my rosetta stone to remember all the french I used to know and entertaining old friends and new, I'm getting somewhat concerned that I lack the discipline necessary to write a book. When I shared my concern about my lack of discipline with Jamaica (who has been working on her new book for years now) last week, she reassured me, "my darling, if you need more discipline, well then, the rest of the world is really and truly in trouble." It's true that I never stop moving and being productive until about 10 each night (I'm a creature of habit)...I just need to spend less time on other projects and more on my book.

I'm hoping my book writing discipline will kick in when my social schedule calms down. Last week I hosted a bridal shower out of town for my sister, hosted a friend I met on the road in San Francisco (who stayed with me for a couple nights) and I met Jamaica for the official kick-off of the Melissa Etheridge tour, which she had some hesitation about attending because she didn't know if we should support a "deadbeat mother." Now, she obviously doesn't actually know or care what Melissa is up to, but she does love to goad me into debate and she always stays abreast of the latest lesbonic headlines (no pun really intended, but now that I've noticed it, I'm too fond of it to delete it) just to let me know that she is down with my people and knows what they're up to.

So, after she recapped some blurb she saw about Melissa leaving her partner and mother of their children penniless, I assured her that I did not support deadbeat mothers either, but that there was technically no way Melissa could have left her partner penniless since the papers were just filed and it would take months for the assets to be divided, child support to be worked out, etc. To which she replied happily, "oh, okay then" and after quickly laying out her case for why lindsay's parents should be going to jail instead of that "poor girl who was thrown to the wolves as a child by those people," (I was totally with her on this one too) we were off to the show, which was excellent, as always. For all my years of concert going, including several years as a radio DJ when I had to be at shows about 4 times a week, I am hard-pressed to come up with three other musicians who are as amazing live as Melissa Etheridge--the combination of passion, spontaneity and raw talent, particularly on the rhythm guitar front, is hard to match.

As for Mr. San Francisco, we had a blast (think swanky dinners, seemingly endless cocktail crawls and, of course, some hot girls who liked us along the way, one of whom might have real potential) and now I am even more excited to host Mr. Charleston, who is coming to stay with me this week. I have had so little time for friends over the last several years (during the week I wouldn't even get out of work in time to call a friend) and the friends I had were almost all fellow workaholics from the firm since I never left work long enough to make friends on the outside. I am relishing my freedom, my lack of stress and most of all, the incredible new friends I made on my trip more than I can express in words. I forgot what life could be like. I know that when I go back to work, and for the rest of my life, I will cherish these months of pure freedom.

Okay, back to that non-existent book...

I'm starting to think maybe I should call Kristin Hersh and get the name of one of those ghost-writers she kicked to the curb. I know she didn't love having some random guy shadowing her all day asking her about her feelings, but after my time with Mr. San Francisco, I think I might really enjoy it, especially if this shadowing, accompanied by mental and emotional probing, involves plenty of cocktails.

Home Sweet Home

I'm finally back where I started my trip just under 3 months ago, sitting in the one air conditioned room in my sweltering apartment. The weeks of rain, fog, cold and snow across the North seem so nice thinking back on them now. I can't decide what I miss more, violently shivering in flip flops and a t-shirt while snapping a quick picture on some snowy pass or being soaked through to my underwear from cold, torrential rain. I'd take either right now.

I probably won't be sharing any big realizations from my trip until I've had some time to process, but I can share one little life lesson with you that I've learned in the couple days I've been home: the only thing in my life (and probably yours) that thrives on neglect is an orchid. My refrigerator and freezer have died, my other car was dead with flat tires (but I got it up and running again yesterday), my plants (other than my orchid which is more beautiful than it has ever been) are all more dead than alive (apparently having a friend swing by once in a while to water them wasn't enough), and finally, my local love life is non-existent (if it wasn't for all that love on the road, I'd be feeling pretty sorry for myself right about now). I think the take-away is that if you want to achieve a positive result by completely neglecting something, make sure you're dealing with an orchid and not a car, an appliance or a girl. What this lesson lacks in depth, it more than makes up for in opportunities for practical application.

My apartment did not fare well either (never seen so many dust bunnies in my life) and I have been cleaning, doing laundry and running errands for days trying to avoid dealing with my livingroom, which is filled with boxes I sent home along the way, each with a teetering pile of mail (mostly bills) on top. Every time I walk past my livingroom and see all those boxes it reminds me of the clerk at the motel I stayed at my first night on the road in Rehoboth Beach, DE. I told him about the trip I was setting off on and he started telling me about a similar trip he had done in college (about 35 years ago). He spent a solid half an hour telling me where I had to go and what roads I had to drive before he finally asked, "what are you drivin' on this trip? Ya got a good truck?"
Me: "um, no, I'm actually driving that little porsche out there" (pointing at my car through the window)
Him: (looking at my car for a minute then at the floor shaking his head) "no, young lady, you can't do it in that thing, no way."
Me: (laughing a little) "I know, I know, my trunk space is already completely full and I'm definitely a little nervous about blowing a tire at some point, but the whole point of the trip is to do it in this car because I just love it so much that I'm always happy when I'm in it."
Him: (deadly serious, still slowly shaking his head and staring at the ground while he thinks) "Yep, yer gonna have to sell that thing and get yerself a truck. You can't do the kinda trip yer talkin' about in that thing. Nope, gonna have to get a truck."
He then proceeded to outline the three main reasons I couldn't do the trip in my car and needed to sell it and buy a truck before I went any further: (a) storage for all the souvenirs I would pick up along the way, (b) unpaved roads all through the west and (c) the weather I would inevitably hit (from snow to hail storms).

Well, I have to hand it to Porsche, everything Mr. Buy a Truck warned me about happened, from getting stuck on treacherous dirt roads where I was constantly bottoming out because the ruts were so deep, to getting caught in torrential rain storms, snow storms and the wild storm (complete with hail and tornados) outside chicago, and my car never let me down once. As for the paces I put it through, from breaking 140 repeatedly in an afternoon, to swerving at 120 to avoid a lawnmower in the middle of the passing lane somewhere en route to Palo Alto, to bottoming out so violently in Marfa, I still never found the limits of my car, it took everything in stride. As for the storage factor, you really don't need much if you know how to mail things. All in all, I'm glad I didn't sell my car and buy a truck because the trip wouldn't have been half as much fun and the few nicks my car has from the trip (mostly from debris ricocheting off it during the storm outside Chicago) are a small price to pay for all the fun I had and the stories and memories I will have for the rest of my life.

I'm going to be focusing less on blogging and more on writing my book and finding a job over the next few months, but I'll keep you posted on my progress and any good stories that I remember as I write. I just have to say, to all the amazing people that I met on this trip and all the people who sent me such thoughtful emails along the way, thank you. Turns out, the best part of this journey wasn't the driving, the scenery, the music, the food or even all that love on the road...it was honestly just realizing how many incredibly nice, caring people are out there in every corner of this country. From the total strangers who offered to make me a home cooked meal or put me up for the night, to the ones that pulled over to make sure I was okay when I pulled off the side of the road to snap a picture, let alone the hundreds who bought me a drink or two along the way, the kindness and generosity of total strangers never ceased to amaze me over the course of my trip. Even more amazing to me, is that I have no doubt that a few of those once total strangers, will be friends for life...just an added bonus of driving with gusto.

Provincetown

So, I've been laying low here in Ptown for the last few days, catching up on sleep and sun, and have barely anything to report because Mr. Adam Levy and I embarked on a 48hr sobriety challenge on Tuesday and I was scared I would blow it if I went out. I know myself well enough to know that the odds of me refusing a "Sex in the Dunes" that some gay boy bought for me because he thinks I'm "outrageous" are slim to none. I did find a nice restaurant for dinner one night that had a whole list of "mocktails", but I'm here to tell you that a "Safe Sex on the Beach" does not measure up in any way, shape or form to a "Sex on the Beach" or a "Sex in the Dunes", let alone a nice small batch bourbon.

The sobriety challenge was definitely not fun, but it did come in handy when I bumped into a girl I wasn't that into (whom I met at the salon earlier that day) on Commercial St and after chatting me up for a bit, she asked if I wanted to continue our conversation over a drink. I could honestly say, after a little pang of panic because I didn't want to hurt her feelings, "oh, sorry, I can't. I'm right in the middle of a 48hr sobriety challenge, maybe some other time..." After taking a few seconds to process that response, she finally came back with, "oh, okay, well maybe when you're done with the, um, challenge..." and gave me her card. Pretty sure she's still wondering if I just made up the whole 48hr sobriety challenge thing to get out of having a drink with her.

I also met a very nice lesbian from Pittsburgh at the salon because when I heard her say she was from Pittsburgh, I couldn't resist telling her that I had just come from there myself (though I made the trip about 3hrs faster ;-)). She told me that it was her first time in Ptown and that she made the trip with her girlfriend and another lesbian couple, prompting me to ask if they had found the lesbian beach. She immediately clammed up, turned red and stared at the ground for a minute before taking a deep breath and letting it all out...

Apparently, she had gotten her gay beach info from a gay boy who had only been to Ptown once before and so sent her to the naked gay boy beach via the infamous dunes that all the boys hike through, stopping for a quick sexual encounter on the way to and from the beach. Suffice to say, they heard things they never wanted to hear and saw things they never wanted to see and were so completely traumatized when it was all over, that the next day they drove directly to the straight beach and never wanted to go to a gay beach again. "Didn't you think that there must be some other beach for lesbians?" I asked, pointing out that "three quarters of the 200+lb lesbians in this town would pass out from exertion before they ever got to that beach." After she granted me that point, I gave her the goods on how to get to the lesbian beach (not to be confused with the naked gay boy beach) and after clarifying that people wore bathing suits on the lesbian beach and nobody would be having sex within earshot, she thanked me profusely and vowed to check it out the next day.

I did finally venture out last night and ended up at a club with the classic Ptown raging queen bartender, who when I ordered a knob creek on the rocks (not one of my very favorites, but best they had), gave me a big wink and sashayed away to get the bottle. Then he sashayed back, poured me a single, then paused to give me another big wink before he kept on pouring until the glass was filled to the brim. When he set the drink down in front of me, with another big wink as he quickly slid his hand up my arm and squeezed my bicep, he assured me, "I love a girl who knows what she wants!" It took all my self-restraint not to respond, "Really? Do you? Really? Because I find that hard to believe...Mr. spaghetti strap tank top, I really do." Instead, I just gave him a big tip and a wink back...didn't want to alienate him before he poured my second drink.

Probably heading home in the near future. I'll let you know when I get there.

Long Point Lighthouse at the very tip of Cape Cod (had to hike across the lesbian beach, the clothed gay boy beach, the naked gay boy beach and stare down a couple lookouts for the boys in the dunes to get this picture--by the time I got here I was so tired and thirsty I had to turn around)

Ellie-"78 years young and living [his/her] dreams" belting out his/her best "New York, New York" on Commercial Street. Not half bad, drew quite the little crowd on the street.

Dina Martina, on Commercial St promoting his/her 9pm show. Funniest comedian I have ever seen and a Ptown institution (though he/she does gigs in NYC, LA & London and has all kinds of famous comedian fans, like whoopi goldberg). The first time I saw his/her show, I couldn't sit up in bed for a couple days after because my abdominal muscles were so tweaked out from laughing so hard for so long (literally had to roll over and do a push up and drag my knees under me so I was kneeling to get out of bed). There was also a fair amount of crying and maybe a little peeing in my pants involved...

Having a drink on the deck of my favorite restaurant while the moon rises over Provincetown Harbor (that white dot on the horizon is the Long Point Lighthouse)

Madison to Pittsburgh

Just quickly filling you in on the last couple days because I am trying to cover as much ground as I can today in the direction of Provincetown.

I made it to Chicago in one piece, but it was the wildest drive of my life--black sky in the early afternoon, torrential rain, sustained 45 mph winds blowing across the highway and gusting up to 75 (sending tractor trailers with light loads swinging into other lanes and off the road), steady stream of garbage (cans, bottles, tarps, flip-flops) flying through the air slamming into my windshield and ricocheting off my car, truckers screaming like hysterical girls on the CB about losing control of their rigs or hearing a tornado touched down...chaos. When my CB/weather scanner confirmed the tornado and hail warnings I had heard the truckers screaming about, I decided to get to a gas station and take cover and spent the next hour and a half there with some other stranded people while a steady stream of people filed through the door to be told that there were no services--no power, no gas, couldn't sell anything because the registers wouldn't open, etc. Good times. When the sky finally lightened up again and it looked pretty clear that the front had passed, I made my way to Chicago to find Adam.

I was sworn to secrecy about most of our weekend together and the stories Adam had to share about life on the road with the Eagles tour and his long stint (3 albums and 3 world tours) with Norah Jones as we caught up on ten years of each others lives. I will say that we had an amazing 48 hours, hitting the most famous steakhouses, strip bars and deep dish places in the city, catching Keith Urban and the Dixie Chicks (wouldn't have said I was a huge fan of either, but they both rocked live) before leaving the show Saturday night for dinner with the band, after which we ended up crashing a very elegant wedding at the Drake Hotel...really? nobody wants to know who invited the kids in the skinny jeans, black shirts and leather cuffs?

Dragged myself out of bed (in more than a little bit of pain) around noon on Sunday and after coffee with Adam, hit the road bound for Pittsburgh because this guy who follows my blog on Planet-9 offered to give me a little tour of the city. Made decent time from Chicago to Pittsburgh (about 6hrs and 45mins) mostly because there were no cops on the road. I didn't think much of it until I heard these two truckers chatting about the lack of cops on the CB and one explained to the other that it was because they were all home trying to get their annual Father's Day BJ...huh...here I was thinking they were all home spending quality time with their kids...so naive...

Headed for Provincetown and a few days of R&R in the sun, can't wait.

JD and the Straight Shot opening for the Eagles 2010 tour at Soldier Field...and a blow up of Mr. Adam Levy's guitar while he rocked his solo--some things never change.  

Rendezvous with Mr. Pittsburgh.

 

Dinner at Primanti Bros--a must hit (a) if you like fries, cold slaw and a heap of melted cheese in the middle of your sandwich and (b) even if you don't because it's just an institution in this town.

Downtown Pittsburgh from Mt. Washington--the tallest building you see is the US Steel Tower, the tallest building in downtown Pittsburgh and the 35th tallest in the US. 

Bound for Chicago

About to hit the road bound for Chicago because one of my favorite guys in the world (Adam Levy, the guitarist I mentioned when I was in New Orleans, played with Tracy Chapman, Norah Jones, etc.) is in a new band with Charley Drayton (the drummer I met in NOLA who played drums for Simon & Garfunkel at the Jazz Fest) and they are opening for the Dixie Chicks and the Eagles Saturday night in Chicago. Adam and I became pretty tight friends one summer way back before law school at the National Guitar Workshop and then we fell out of touch my first year of law school because it sort of became my entire life to the exclusion of all other things, including way too many friends. I got back in touch with him just about the time I hit the road and we promised to get together and catch up at some point this summer. Sure enough, I got a tweet from him a few days back saying he was going to be in Chicago, so that's where I'm headed.

Speaking of life and people coming full circle, I spent last night hanging out with a fellow lesbonic blogger (her blog is called the Gypsy Chronicles) who emailed me just after I left NOLA asking if I wanted to meet up for a drink in NOLA. Apparently, she came across my blog one day while she was procrastinating at work and had been following it ever since. She explained that she was taking off on her own roadtrip around the country in the opposite direction and we have kept in touch ever since, hoping to meet up somewhere along the way. So, when she emailed to say that she was headed toward Madison I decided to stay another night so we could rendezvous here. I'm very glad I did because not only is she an incredibly interesting person (and an emmy award-winning sound editor who has worked on an endless list of big hit movies and TV shows), she is also a whiskey drinker and a fabulous wingman--best random company I've had this whole trip. We checked out the "Queer Shorts" (an evening of back-to-back short plays that happens annually here in Madison) because some girls I met the night before said that was the thing to do and then did a whirlwind tour of pretty much every gay bar in Madison until I found the real life version of the leggy Wisconsin blond I was picturing in my head.

I have to say that I really outdid myself trying to "keep it real" in Wisconsin, from the beer and cheese soup to the deep fried cheese curds, brandy old fashioneds, brandy slushes and Yahara whiskey (smooooth...and by smooooth, I mean ROUGH). Getting a little nauseous just remembering it all...but the classic WI leggy blond from lastnight is the only stop on my little flavors of Wisconsin tour that I don't regret. All the hotness of the hottest east and west coast girls, but so much warmer and sweeter...perfect Wisconsin girl, perfect Wisconsin night.

Fromagination, the most famous cheese shop in Madison and the best cheese shop I've ever found outside of France, Italy and NYC. I wandered in here after downing a plate of deep fried cheese curds and couldn't help but think how much less nauseous I would be if I had just eaten a pound of cheese...lesson learned.

The Capital is absolutely stunning, particularly when it is all lit up at night (tweeted a pic of it at night because I didn't have my real camera on me). Factoids: biggest rotunda of any state capital in the US (all granite, making it the only granite dome in the US and the biggest granite dome in the world) and that woman on top is pointing toward DC (good to have that point of reference to orient you as you stumble from bar to bar, particularly if you are supposed to end up in DC)