Clareified

It wasn’t me.

Of the 10 cats and dogs whose deaths have been linked to pet food that was recalled over the weekend, seven died in a test that the manufacturer began administering last month, the Food and Drug Administration said Monday.

…ellipses indicates an opportunity for the non pokerphobes to read more on that other blog for which I write.

In keeping with her new obsession, when we got back to Brooklyn, Karol dragged rybka and I into a game of pool.
We played teams, with me and rybka on one team and Karol and her friend on the other.
Up until then, my pool skills involved being able to hit the cue ball off the table on every single turn, so rybka had to line up every shot for me and was often heard giving me choices like “Dawn, we could either win this game or you can try to hit that ball.”
We played for a couple of hours, otherwise known as just long enough for Dawn to get a ticket for parking on the street after midnight. Rybka gave me money for half the fine, but I was still on crazed person ticket tilt.
We ended up watching Saw at like 5 in the morning, which was just freaking creepy enough that I forgot all about the ticket and was just glad not to be chained to a pipe in a bathroom.Which, when you think about, is pretty much all we can hope for in a day.

Last year we found this out about D.C.…now THIS:

About one-third of the people living in the national’s capital are functionally illiterate, compared with about one-fifth nationally, according to a report on the District of Columbia.

Our nation’s capital is apparently in Africa.

To the people that I applauded and congratulated this weekend on their fine plays only to have them ask me why I am applauding them for what are, in reality, fairly easy plays only impressive to an amateur like me: Bite me.

Poddy died this afternoon at 4:12 p.m.

I cry.

He really was the best ipod anyone ever had.

Guy: How do you take your coffee?
Judith Light: With vodka and ice. Hold the Coffee

Karol: “I got in the cab and headed home.” As I read that I thought: ’she forgot her tab’…which, actually, is annoying, because if there’s one place I don’t want to be, it’s in your head.

“How’d you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day when you were a kid, Dawn,” Mary asked.
I laughed.
“St. Patrick’s day in the ghetto?”
“Hmm…I think you would run inside to avoid getting shot,” Ftrain answered.
“Yeah. And we just called it Wednesday.” I added.
So yes, this was my very first St. Patty’s day in a bar. And I was committed to doing it right.
I took a cab to the bar where Mary’s friends were djing, Ftrain met me at the door.
“Holy shit. Look who showed up!”
“Well, I knew you thought I wouldn’t, so…you know, suck it.”
“Ha! Well, whatever works.”
I ordered up a Pete’s Wicked Ale. They didn’t have any, so I gave the bartender my Amex, told him to open a tab and keep the amaretto sours coming.
Good thing alcohol doesn’t affect me in any way.
Ftrain and Mary were drinking Jameson’s whiskey and when Mary told me that whiskey was Irish for Vodka (which, incidentally, is Russian for water)…I switched it up and got me some sweet sweet Irish whiskey.
I took a tour of the bar and found a pool table at the back, I returned all excited to play!
“How do you like the whiskey,” they asked upon my return.
“Yeah, it’s not sweet, so it’s a longer drink,” Mary added.
Umm…really? Cause I finished it in two swallows on the walk back to the pool table…
They stared at me in disbelief.
“Well, you know, getting it on the rocks probably makes it an easier drink,” Mary chimed in before Ftrain signed me up for AA meetings.
I was eager to change the subject.
“F-train! They have a pool table! Come on, I’ll show you how to play.”
“Show me? I own my own pool cue, bitch. I can have ten Jameson’s and still kick your ass with one hand tied behind my back.”
Well, la di da.
But my mama didn’t raise no fool.
“Barkeep, get this man a whiskey on the rocks!”
“No! I drink them neat.”
Of course, you do.
Ftrain then told us that he prepared corned beef and cabbage for dinner on Friday night.
“It was quite delicious.”
Question? Answer.
“I’m not gay! I’m Irish!”
“HA! Irish? What kind of Irish name is Train…my last name’s more Irish than yours.”
Mary agreed. “There’s a county in Ireland named Summers.”
“See? So’s your face.”
And then Ftrain did that classic drunken leprechaun “cha cha cha” thing where he shuffles his feet and rotates his fists in circles in front of his chest.
“I’m going to punch you in the boob.”
No seriously. You put a green top hat on his head and a corn pipe in his mouth…well, you get the idea.
The bar was showing poker on TV and Mary started to lament that our weekly game was going on hiatus until Spring.
“Man…can we go to AC on Saturday?”
Ftrain and I simultaneously did the traditional tapping the arm in search of a vein motion, as is traditional when someone who just last weekend was in AC, asks to go to AC again.
And then Ftrain whipped out his cell phone and dialed 1800Gambler.
“GUY! You cannot drunken dial a gambling hotline from a bar…I think they automatically transfer you to 1800Alcoholic.”
He closed the phone.
“So I just got a text which says ‘I’m coming over, but I am covered from head to toe in glitter…you have been warned.’”
“Was it from Joe Speaker?”
“Dawn, Joe is in California. But aside from that…do you want that text to have come from Joe? Really? Cause while he would be on his way over here…he would be covered in glitter.”
Hmm.
The man has a point.
Turns out the text was from Ftrain’s latest…um…lady friend. His bald lady friend.
Bald.
You read me.
“Don’t blog the next twelve minutes, Dawn,” he said.
“Why are we in for a discussion on you doing a bald chick, cause…umm…color me not interested.”
“Ha! I was imming Fisch on Friday and he said he didn’t think he’d ever done a bald chick.”
Awesome.
And just when I thought all hope was lost and I was stuck in this conversation, the bartender changed the poker show we were watching and put on the clever, fast-paced, emotionally wrenching show “Dance your Pants off.”
Ah, yes, MTV2…what would America do without a show where contestants stand in front of a camera and…um…wait…let me see if I can remember the plot exactly…dance their pants off.
By the time the first chick was in thong, Ftrain had forgotten all about everything else.
I bought him and Mary another round and went to look at the pool table situation.
Having learned the protocol from Karol in recent weeks, I put my quarters up.
Ten minutes later, a guy tapped me on the arm and said we were up.
Crap…Ftrain is only on the fifth Jameson…ruh oh.
I put my quarters in, when a guy wearing a turtleneck and a ‘My Name is Earl’ mustache asked me who my partner was.
“Oh, we’re just going to play each other,” I responded.
“Nah. We own the table right now. You and a partner will be playing us.”
“Oh.”
“Ok…then I guess he’s my partner,” I said pointing to 130 pounds of fury with a glass in his hand.
“No. I don’t want to be on her team!”
“Shut it. You’re on my team and you’ll like it.”
The mustache guy stretched out his hand and said “Hi. Dan.”
I took his hand and said hi.
“Dawn…when a man introduces himself to you, you’re supposed to introduce yourself to him in return.”
“Huh?”
“Your naaameeee.” Ftrain slurred.
“Oh…um…Dawn.”
“Tanya?”
“Um…yeah…sure, why not. Tanya.”
I whispered to Ftrain that I will be Tanya for the rest of the night.
Dan broke and sunk a solid. He missed the next shot and then Ftrain was up.
I told him we were stripes.
“I KNOW GUY!”
He then rolled the cue around on the floor…something I saw Fisch do the first time I played with him.
Weirdos.
I don’t know what the rolling was supposed to accomplish, but Ftrain missed his shot.
Dan’s partner sank a ball, missed another and then I was up.
Under the tutelage of various men at Nitecaps, I have managed to improve beyond hitting the cue ball off the table during my turn. (In fact, Dan’s partner whacked the ball off the table and I laughed and said ‘I used to do that all the time! Some said it was my signature shot, in fact.’) However, I am usually more the…defensive player on the team. To wit: I leave the cue ball in places that help no one. But I not only managed to sink my first ball, but followed it up by leaving myself a shot on another ball AND hitting it in.
I told Ftrain that even though we were teammates and no one was keeping score, it was now Dawn: 2; Ftrain: 0.
Ftrain stepped up and we managed to clear all our balls but two after five turns…and then we melted down.
Ftrain tried some crazy behind his back shot and then slammed the cue stick to the floor and shouted expletives when he missed. Something I also saw Fisch do the first time I played with him.
Boys are retarded.
I sank our last ball and then not only completely whiffed on my eight ball shot, but also lined the cue ball up perfectly for the other team to hit it.
But, at the end of the game they said we were a good team and they thought we were going to beat them.
Well, back to drinking.
At some point by the night’s end, there was a beagle sitting on a barstool drinking a bottle of bud.
Now, just because it was too dark to take a picture with my camera phone, does not mean it wasn’t real.
There was a dog drinking beer at the bar.
F-train saw it too. And just because he was three sheets to the wind, does not make him an incredible eyewitness.
It just doesn’t.
It happened.
There was a dog there!
OK then.
The party started to break up, but Mary and I sat at the bar nursing our drinks, with our eyes glued to the door.
Finally, she said what I was thinking: “I’m waiting to see the bald girl.”
“HAHHAAHAHAH. MEEE TOOO!! I’m in full on carnival mode.”
(Now, this is where I should point out that Mary and I are horrible people. The reason this woman was bald is because she shaved off her head to donate the hair to cancer patients. That’s right. CANCER PATIENTS. Me + Mary = Bitches. And yet…)
Finally, a petite Asian woman pulled the bar door open.
“Aw man…she’s wearing a hat.” I said disappointed.
“Yeah dude, when you don’t have any hair…and it’s snowing outside, you wear a hat,” Ftrain said.
And just in case I didn’t hear him, he loudly repeated it to bald girl as she took her coat off.
“I was just telling Dawn that when you don’t have any hair…and it’s snowing outside, you wear a hat.”
He then turned to me and said “Rachel, this is Dawn.”
Oh.Good.God.Kill.Me.
Thankfully, she was a very cool and already knew what an assface Ftrain was from performing with him in improv comedy shows.
“I went to one of those where Ftrain played a woman…were you there?”
She sighed and said “who knows,” in a way that suggested that Ftrain played a woman many a time.
“How do you know Ftrain,” she asked “from poker?”
“Yes, I met him in a poker club in the Village where he was grifting,” I replied.
“Really?” she asked.
“No. It was in Midtown,” I replied.
“GUY. We went to law school together. Don’t believe anything she says. She’s a liar.”
“It’s true. I am.” I said deadpan.
“Now, I don’t know what to believe,” Bald girl said.
F-train then asked her what she was drinking and bought her a drink.
Mary and I were all “dude…he didn’t buy us drinks.”
WTF.
“AND WE HAVE HAIR!”
Bitches.
Bald girl then told us about funny things that have happened to her since she shaved her head…like getting hit on by lesbians in the gym locker room.
“Yeah, I never know what to do when I’m in the locker room and a known gay guy is there,” Ftrain empathized, “I’m like do I undress in front of him.”
I turned to Mary and asked if I had somehow hit my head and been transported back to 1967.
“What year is this…did he really just use the phrase “Known Gay Guy?”
Mary laughed…which just encourages me.
“Ftrain is afraid that he is so hot the known gay guy will be unable to control himself and take him right there on the locker-room floor.”
Mary laughed again and Ftrain told her that she was dead to him.
“This one has been dead to me for years, but you! You are dead to me now.” He then wrote our names on his “list” using his finger.
“Dude. You don’t have a list.”
Mary once again then added what I was thinking “You’re not man enough to have a list.”
HAHAHAHAHA…that Mary was quite the find.
And then F-train drunken texted Fisch and I figured it was a good time to leave.
I asked the bartender for a car service number and called a cab.
Mary waited with me in the snow for my cab to come. We wanted to play in a tournament at a new place in Brooklyn on Sunday, but our contact for the place ignored my phone call, so we couldn’t confirm our plans.
I got in the cab and headed home.
Now, for those of you with a keen attention to detail, at this point you’re saying to yourself “oh no…Dawn never closed her tab at the bar and got her Amex back.”
(No? None of you remembered the Amex? Or the tab? Good, cause neither did I. now, I don’t feel so badly.)
By the time I pulled up to my front door, I realized the card was missing and asked the cab driver how much he’d charged to take me there and back…when he reached forty dollars worth of calculations, I decided to just call Ftrain and hope he and Baldy were still there.
“Are you still at the bar…hooray! I left my card there…can you close out my tab and bring it for me?”
He told me to hold on while he talked to the bartender.
“Ok, she said she’ll let me close your tab for you…what…ok…Umm…Dawn, guess which bar doesn’t take American Express?”
“FECK!” (Although, dude…why would the bartender TAKE the Amex to open my tab if the BAR doesn’t take Amex…ugh…as a further aside, I recently told a friend who inexplicably has no credit cards, that he should get an Amex card because even if he’s tempted to use it, no one takes it, so there’s no chance of racking up huge bills.)
“So, guess who owes me $44 dollars?”
“Me?”
“That’s right.”
And Ftrain breaks thumbs.
I made it home by 3 and was asleep in short order.
Not too shabby for my first St. Patrick’s Day.

For a fair barometer of how selfish you are, add up the number of minutes people are generally waiting around for you.

DiFara’s has been closed by the board of health.

via Mary