Whimsy is such an underrated thing, darlings. It’s hard to create space for it in our daily lives, let alone the time. About two months ago I was notified of a flash sale on Alaska Airlines and it was just too good of a deal to pass up. So where did I go? Seattle! With no plan or agenda, no real reason to go, other than just why not. I was not even excited to go, to be frank. My very brief whirlwind of a relationship came to an abrupt end when the other person acted really dumb when they came over to my place last Saturday and then ghosted me. So, I ended it and flew to Seattle the next day.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I needed this trip! I needed the whimsy! I needed to be on my own and just do whatever the hell I wanted and take my sweet time doing it. I knew I wanted to visit the Museum of Pop Culture (formerly the Experience Music Project). And I knew I wanted to catch up with a friend who moved up there a few months ago, but that was it.

I hadn’t been to Seattle in ten or maybe fifteen years. Back in the late 90’s when my ex-husband and I were not yet engaged, we visited a few times to feel it out and seriously considered moving there. It didn’t work out, but Seattle will always have a special place in my heart. Going back was a serious head trip! On my own I got to take in those feels and sit with them, which I highly recommend. It gave me such peace to be amongst the wet and the green and even the cold up there.

I snapped a selfie when I got to my air bnb

The next day I found a great place for some espresso and a lil’ bite for breakfast called, Diva Espresso! Woo! It was tasty and I enjoyed sitting by the window and watching people and their dogs go by. Then I went to the Museum of Pop Culture which was fun, but one of my knees decided it was too cold and pitched a very painful fit for two days. I utilized every elevator in existence (there is a lot of up and down at MoPop to get to the exhibits), got compliments on my dress from the staff, and overwhelmed with emotions at a couple of meaningful spots for me. My faves were the Prince from Minneapolis exhibit, Nirvana: Bringing Punk to the Masses, and the “Scared to Death” horror film exhibit.

Diva Espresso? Yes, please!

Legendary Fashion!

From the exhibit: Nirvana – Bringing Punk to the Masses

Kirt was always a feminist and anti-nazi! <3

I wasn’t “Scared to Death” but thrilled for sure!

I did not expect to get as excited and stoked and happy about the horror exhibit but damn, I got hyped! Seeing props from The Walking Dead and Video Drone and so many other classics made me feel like a kid! There was a sci-fi room and a magic/fantasy room, too. When I walked in to the Sci Fi exhibit I was stunned in place! I was faced with Mork’s uniform! Such a big part of my early childhood right there in front of me! WOW! I choked up a bit! I couldn’t understand why no one else was stopping to look or read the little plaque.

Sexy red lighting!

The Walking Dead: The Governor’s aquarium

Bio Hazard! Or am I the bio hazard?!

I wasn’t too into much of the rest, though I did pause and take in see Spock’s shirt from the original series. I mean to see it up close, though it was faded and appeared more lavender than blue now, the gold stitching was still shiny and intact. While I’ve never been a big fan of Pearl Jam I did go hang out in their exhibit and watched a lengthy slide show of their career set to their catalog. It is an odd feeling to know that all of your musical heroes are dead and yet this one band from a very important and developmental time of my own life is still going strong. It was also strange to hear Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains announcing things over the loudspeaker at the SeaTac airport, but these are just wild times, friends.

Mork, from Ork, Uniform <3

Spock’s Shirt, so cool!

I went nuts over this chandelier at the pizza place!
It’s just a regular small brass one but they hung a bunch of rosaries all over and I LOVE IT!

I got to meet up and catch up with a good friend I’ve known for nearly twenty years. We used to work at a music store together and have stayed in touch. They live two hours north of Seattle so we hung out and caught up on our mutual life stuffs at my air bnb for awhile. Finally we decided we wanted Italian food and ended up in this kind of hipster pizza place nearby, Lo Bocca di Lupo. Their pizza was sublime, I had one with mortadella, fresh mozzarella and pistachios! I also got to introduce my friend to the magic of burrata! YUM!

Me being a mega dork

I had wanted to go out that night, I tried to go out that night, but in the end I decided that giving my knee a break would be best and so I stayed in and watched the Astronomy Club on Netflix (new sketch show). It was good! I had a couple of those apricot ciders, and went to sleep at a reasonable hour. I had felt bad at first about not going out, like, I’m in Seattle I should make the most of it, but that whole thing about doing whatever the hell you want? It’s addictive! Ha-ha!

View from the street of my air bnb on my last morning there

Waiting for my Lyft home at SJC

While I do enjoy my lil’ hermit life, so much, I also think it’s a good idea to get out and cut loose sometimes. I’m not a big partier in the usual sense, though I do enjoy a nice cocktail with friends, I just hadn’t been up to much in a good long while. Most often it’s more of a lack of good timing or planning on my part, but it seems Friday night is the more popular night to hit the town and do it up right. Unfortunately, I am so dead ass tired after work on Fridays that I even missed my favorite dance night of the year, “The Cure” Night at my local goth club. **LeSigh**

Last December I reunited with an old friend and we bonded over Netflix’s “Nailed It” hosted by Nicole Byer. That first season we were mad at her stylist, like some of the stuff they had her wear was just bad, but now we look forward to her new look in every episode! A few months back I received an email for a really great deal to see Nicole Byer at the San Jose Improv and I reached out to my friend to see if they’d wanna make a whole night of it since they live a couple of hours away. They were down and so I got the tickets and kind of forgot about it. Ha-ha! Then the new season of “Nailed It” hit Netflix and we agreed to save it to watch together. Yay!

They arrived and I was a bit of a mess, as usual, but we quickly fell into a nice afternoon of laughs and “Nailed It” episodes. When we finished the new season it was just about time to get some food and start getting ready for the show. I didn’t know WTF to wear, I rarely do, but went with what felt best. I wanted to look and feel sexy, and maybe what I chose wasn’t overtly sexy to some, but I felt fabulous so who cares?! My old Torrid stretch velvet pencil skirt is my absolute favorite item of clothing, I even bought a backup! Ha-ha! My top & blazer are also Torrid, though from early spring ’19. My shoes are one of my fave bargain finds, platform suede mauve sandals from Vionic, yep orthopedic shoes with style! My right foot had been hurting me for about two weeks, I am certain I bruised the tendon, but I digress. I just wanted to look cute but not be miserable all night and those sandals did the trick! I didn’t do anything fancy with my hair or makeup but still felt fresh to death.

We had a couple of my fantastic and refreshing cocktails (don’t have a name for it): 2 shots vodka (I prefer Ketel One’s Botanical Peach and Orange Blossom), 6-8 oz. black cherry White Claw (hard seltzer), and a healthy splash of lemonade, stir to mix. It is delightful, I assure you. Once ready I ordered our Lyft and we were on our way in 3 minutes! I don’t live far from downtown so it only took us about ten minutes to get there. Our driver dropped us off right out front of the Improv and we already felt like celebs! Ha-ha! When they told us that we’d have to sit upstairs we were both concerned. So I pulled one of the ushers aside, he was an older black gentleman who was very sweet to us when we entered, and I incredulously said, “Now are the seats up there going to fit all of this ass we have going on here (gestures very broadly to the bodacious bounty that was our asses)? It looks like theater seats and those don’t usually work for us.” He smiled and nodded and assured us that we would be fine and if not to come get him specifically. I cannot speak for my friend, but I barely fit so I am certain that they were mildly, if not more so,  uncomfortable throughout the entire show.

If you’ve never been to a comedy show you may not know that there is almost always a 2 drink/item minimum. We were not even worried about that as this was all part of our plan, but if you’re trying to keep to a budget this is not something you want to find out about too late. We ordered some vodka cocktails called “Darker the Berry” that had blackberries. They had an option of a souvenir glass if you ordered two so we both got one and these cute mason jar brownies with caramel and whipped cream. Delightful through and through, though I could have had two more of those brownies on my own! Ha-ha! The drinks were great and the show began right after we got them. The host was a young blond guy who was kind of funny but not very relatable and not really connecting with the audience, truth be told. The opener was this gorgeous Russian Jewish woman who was fucking hilarious! I’m sorry I don’t recall their names, but it isn’t on the ticket and searching online has been unfruitful.

I snapped a couple of quick-silly selfies in the theater before the show started.

When Nicole Byer came out the crowd lost their minds. It was loud! Ha-ha! But we were cheering too! After all, we’d spent the whole day watching her on Netflix. She was wearing some cute tennis shoes and leopard print leggings, but for some reason also a light colored striped t-shirt that confused the hell out of both myself and my friend. Nicole Byer looked great, though, don’t get me wrong. I am only now wondering if in that first season of “Nailed It” she was styling herself and I do feel bad about that. Ha-ha! She started off her set with having everyone shout “Nailed It!” so it was out of their systems. She says she hates it when folks just run up and yell that at her, though it’s her favorite job ever to be on the show.

A lot of her jokes were about not having a man and being a black woman comic in America. She even took the basics of Harry Potter and aligned them with some interestingly coincidental facts about the KKK. Correlation is not causation, but then she also went all in on the Disney Princess films and gave her own commentary on consent and how a lot of those movies were super creepy if they weren’t animated. She’s not wrong but what she said about Cinderella made me mad…she said she cat-fished prince charming and I do not agree. She wanted a nice night off work, out in a fancy dress and who the heck doesn’t want a day off to kick up their heels?! Ha-ha! Her set was great and we walked out still giggling.

We had no other specific plan but we were definitely not ready to call it a night, it wasn’t even 10 pm yet! I knew of a great bar not far but then we walked a block in the wrong direction. I have no internal sense of direction, y’all! And when GPS shows directions on foot it doesn’t always show you which way is which, or at least I always get confused. Anyway, it was serendipitous because we found all these great murals and decided it was time to take some fab pics since we were having a blast and looking fine as hell.

I thought it was so hilarious that I was trying to showcase my ass in front of this “Gold hearted” mural, but hashtag alcohol 😛

We finally made it to the bar I had wanted to hit up, but not without incident. Just a few yards from the entrance a guy who looked wasted out of his mind tried to grab my friend and a guy selling roses on the street tried to put his arm around me when I told him I didn’t need a boyfriend. We were not there for dudes, we were there for us! Once inside we were good, found a great spot by the dance floor and just enjoyed ourselves and some Tito’s and Crans (vodka & cranberry juice). The guy who tried to grab my friend walked in as I was at the bar ordering. He stood in front of them for like a minute just staring and then walked to the back. Security clocked him immediately and escorted him out. That is just one of the reasons I like that bar (notice I won’t give the name Ha!), security was on it and were super chill, too.

Then the DJ started to play some early 2000’s jams and I couldn’t help it, I had to dance. Soon others joined in! It was silly and fun! As long as the music was good, we just kept drinking and dancing. When it took a sudden turn for the worst and didn’t let up, we knew it was time to move on. That is when I discovered this gorgeously lit alleyway while we searched for our next spot to live it up. I have a Pixel 3 phone and it has the absolute best phone camera I’ve ever experienced first hand. I was never that big on selfies before this phone, like I took them but wasn’t into  it, ya know? But now?! Whew! Lemme at ’em! I mean…LOOK:

This is probably my favorite pic from this past year!

We found another couple of bars around the way but then ended up hanging out at this one for the rest of the night, I don’t know the name but I do know it was right by a sign that said, “Social Ladies Club” so in my drunken state that is where we were because we were being social. Ha-ha! Really we were about to just walk by when I heard the “Humpty Dance” playing loudly out of this one place and I yelled to no one at all, “Well they might as well just announce my name over the loud speaker, damn!” and walked in dancing. I’m a bay area gal for sure! The hits kept coming, too! I danced in one basic spot at the front of the bar by the entrance for a solid two hours! I knew we were the oldest and fattest there, but we were also having the best time and could see looks of envy on some other patrons faces. The bartender was good and friendly and even security was trying to dance by us!

I was really into this ha-ha!

Finally though, my dogs were barking, my hips started aching and I just knew if I had any more drinks I would be in serious trouble. So we walked back to the Improv and ordered a Lyft back home. By this point (2 am) there was already a long line of police cars in the street, no actual cops mind you. I was telling my friend how when the clubs let out the party just fills the streets and people dance and fight and the cops just watch. It’s true! I love it. I mean, not people fighting or cops, but just the downtown party vibe, it’s the best. There’s food carts and just good times! Downtown San Jose is so underrated! Part of me is glad though because I don’t want it to get worn out. It’s definitely changed a lot over the years, but I still enjoy it. When the Lyft arrived the driver had an 80’s station on and soon all three of us were singing along!

When we got back to my place we put on one last “Nailed It”, as it was a holiday edition, had some snacks and went to bed. A few hours later, when my doggo woke me up, I realized just how much fun I had when every joint, bone, and muscle in my body was screaming in pain. It was rough, y’all! I drank some water and tried to go back to sleep but that was harder than it sounds. Finally I took something for the pain and got some more sleep. When we woke up we both needed coffee. I made my friend what I have every morning: 4 shots of fresh espresso with milk! Ah! I could barely move the rest of the day. I was glad to not feel like garbage waking up for work the following day. In fact, I felt great! Who knew?!

San Jose knows how to party!

In the end I guess I just needed to cut loose and kick up my heels, literally! I’m usually quite introverted and prefer to just dance at home and save money. Ha-ha! This night was special and I am so glad I forced myself to do that, it seems I truly needed it. It wasn’t about meeting anyone or attracting attention, it was pure pleasure! I think that was the key.