where I'm calling from

Last night, Jim, Jarvis, Jenny B, Rei, Scott and I all got together in Fremont for a wine tasting event at the Fremont Studios called 20Something - The New Vintage. For $45 it's an all-you-can-taste sampling of 75 Washington winemakers. Pair that with gourmet nibbles from the region's finest restaurants and add a kick-ass DJ from KEXP and you have an awesome night, right?

Indeed. But as the wine kept flowing, our ability to process common sense and act with prudence ebbed. And the resulting actions were hilarious. Here are 10 winners from last night.

10. Having not properly eaten that day (smart to start, I'd say), I showed up with an empty belly. But my wine glass kept miraculously refilling itself and it was very difficult to eat while holding said full glass and pushing forward through the food lines. I'd get a prawn here, a nibble of tartare there, but altogether, a meal was not had.

9. No matter what was proffered, Jarvis's standard answer was, "Sure!" I think he mixed viognier with rose with cab-franc with reisling. There was no rinsing of glasses here.

8. Jim did Jarvis one better by throwing a PIke Place Stout in with his stomach mix.

7. At some point during the night, dancing to Sir Mix-a-Lot's song "Baby Got Back" seemed like a very reasonable activity. Also, MJ's "Thriller" and that classic '80s tune, "It Takes 2 to Make a Thing Go Right." I hoped no one was taping this.

6. We shut it down. And on the way out the door, Jim tried to confiscate a 1.5L magnum wine bottle, that was promptly taken away from him by security. Jarvis said he should have hid it in his back pocket, but I am still not sure the geometry of that solution.

5. The after-party stumbled across the street to Brouwer's. Jarvis and Jim went to drop off our souvenir wine glasses in the car. Six blocks away and in the pouring rain. Upon reaching the car, they also decided to buy and slam a 22oz winter beer, alcohol content 7%. By the time they reached us at Brouwer's, they were soaking wet and trashed.

4. Jarvis, realizing the end was nigh, decided to go outside for air. Repeatedly. His fiance Jenny B thought it would be a good idea to stick by him, so they went and stood in the rain together. At which point the bouncer told me he thought it might be time to call it a night for all of us.

3. We caught a cab (wise, I assure you), ditching Jim's car in Fremont overnight at the mercy of the Leninists, hippies and wolves. Jarvis stuck his head out the back window as the cabbie took the most circuitous, back neighborhood roads. One more round-a-bout and I think Jarvis would have parted ways with his dinner.

2. Once back to my house, Jim decided clothing was optional, so as Jenny B and I tried to set up the air mattress, Jim cat-walked around topless, distracting Jenny with his chest hair. Then Jim decided my clothes were optional, and that became a fun wrestling match in front of our drunken guests.

1. Finally upstairs and down to his underwear, Jim admitted he was dizzy. What better way to cure the spins then to walk into my bathroom, stand in front of the counter, and then lean over and place his forehead on the cool tiles? I laughed when I saw this, tucked him into bed with a cool washcloth on his forehead and kissed him goodnight. At 3 am he woke to ask me why his pillow was all cold and wet.

In the morning, I'd learned that Jarvis did indeed part ways with his dinner, and perhaps the best quote of the morning was when Jim came downstairs and walked over to the kitchen island: "Is this MY belt?" he asked, picking it up. I had put it there after I'd found it on the stairs the night before, a casualty of his striptease.

Bottles of wine consumed at event: About 10.
Bottles of wine purchased: Zero.
Number of times Jim drunkenly told me he loved me: Countless.
Fun had by all: Immeasurable.

Checking in with the Police Blotter back home. God, these reports NEVER get old.

2:21 a.m., Sonora — Woman told officers in the jail lobby that she was going to hurt herself in order to get their attention so they would give her a ride home. Police had towed her car earlier.

9:04 a.m., argument — Police responded to a public disturbance on Orchard Avenue. Two sisters were arguing loudly over the last cigarette in a pack.

10:46 a.m., Jamestown — A woman on the 10500 block of Suzanne Court reported a person coming into her yard to get cigarettes from another resident of her home despite repeated warnings not to enter the property. This time, the woman’s dog bit the person.

11:02 a.m., public displays of affection — A man slapped another man’s back side on the 600 block of South Washington Street. A caller thought the police should know.

12:31 p.m., Sonora area — A man on the 12800 block of Mono Way said a woman took his nephew’s cats, was holding them in her vehicle, flipping him off and would not let the cats out.

3:51 p.m., Phoenix Lake area — A man said he was driving down Fortuna Mine Road and an unknown man on a quad came down the road, blocked him in, started “cussing him out,” and then hit him through the open window.

4:03 p.m., Sonora area — An officer responded to a home on the 12800 block of Chukar Circle, only to find that the screaming that had been reported was a child with a bead in its nose. The bead had been successfully removed at the time of the officer’s arrival.

4:39 p.m., Jamestown — A woman receiving treatment at the hospital on Greenley Road in Sonora said she was at a grocery store on the 18100 block of Main Street, standing in the checkout line when three other people, unknown to her, began arguing. One of the people threw a sack of sugar at the other person but it struck her instead.

5:18 p.m., Phoenix Lake area — A woman reported a ball of fire in the western sky as she drove toward Sonora on Phoenix Lake Road.

8:35 p.m., disturbance — A woman in a verbal argument with an employee over a food order on the 1000 block of Mono Way complained that he smacked the back of her hand with a pencil while handing it to her.

Over the years I've made some pretty amazing friends. I tend to gravitate towards successful people, people with goals, a plan and a bucketload of panache. Some of my friends have gone on to be Ph.D. marine scientists, movie makers, world-class tango dancers, and damn fine writers.

While working my way through my Masters degree  in Santa Cruz in 1998, answering phones for a bio-technology company, I met The Blonde Russian. She was a supervisor there, fresh from college. Pretty, motivated, athletic and super-charged, she raced around the office in her high-heeled boots, arranging weekly sushi outings and sipping coffee. I took a while to get to know her, thinking she was "too LA," but was pleasantly surprised to find we had a lot in common: music, shoes, style, music, food and music. And more music. Cocteau Twins, anyone?

We became great friends, but like all 20-somethings, our life paths were not set. She left to be a dancer in Vegas, then worked her way into the TV production world. I received occasional reports of her work for a travel show on The World's Best Hidden Beaches. Then she was working on Punk'd. Then The Nick Lachey Show.

We kept in and out of touch, but hadn't seen one another since 2002. I remember that night well: drunken sushi blowout in Santa Cruz. One last hurrah.

That is, until The Blonde Russian hopped a Virgin America flight up to Seattle last Friday. And the fun began.

We sipped cooler martinis on the chilly porch of Chapel, then dined on scrumptious pasta dishes at Machiavelli's on Capitol Hill. The place was so crowded it was all elbows and wine bottles and freshly grated Parmesan. I got caught up on the past few years, learning what a line producer does, more about her new husband and the lovely wedding, what Vancouver is really like, and why I must must MUST come to visit her in LA.

We stepped next door to the Baltic Room, a joint usually known for its electronica, but Friday was bad hip hop/R&B night. Even Jim could not take the Color Me Badd-esque jams, so we drunkenly skipped out to the Noc Noc downtown. Mostly a goth bar/club, they were spinning everything from dark '80s to goth classics to good old fashioned Chemical Brothers. We'd never changed from our jeans, sweaters and boots, so we were a little overdressed.  Jim set up camp in the back in his UW basketball t-shirt while The BR and I spun in drunken, sweaty goth circles.

We slept in Saturday, then wandered around downtown trying on gloves, dresses and jewelry. She helped me to buy two necklaces that I can wear atop my slasher scar. At one point, tired and having walked up and down the city, we stopped at Zeitgeist Coffee. She had a soy latte, I had the Campbell's Cup-o-ccino, and we watched the never-ending drizzle and hipsters.

Umi Sake House has a stellar happy hour, so we sipped hot sake, ate raw things and stuffed ourselves. Later that night we went to a lovely engagement party for some friends of Jim's, then home again where The Blonde Russian downloaded two episodes of "Sex and The City." I now know why I need to own a pair of Manolo Blahnik shoes. I like the empowered characters of the show and the saucy attitudes. I have always loved strong female leads.

Sunday, after breakfast with Miss Haws, we met up with Jim and went to the Bodies exhibit. And while I did go a few years ago, Jim and The BR had never been. I was slightly disappointed. The whole exhibit had been scrubbed of the abnormalities that made it so interesting a few years ago. None of the malformed fetuses were on display. There were fewer vertically partitioned specimens. Very few cancerous organs. And way too many people. We all still had our appetites after the brief tour so we went to Dragonfish for more pan-Asian nibbles and lots of delicious sake.

With a slight buzz, I have to admit, I was a better dancer in my West Coast Swing class that night.

Sunday night was the big planned night. The Noc Noc hosts their "true" goth night, so we got dressed up in our finest. Truthfuly I felt a little too old to be caking on the make-up and donning the heels, but as soon as we got there, I relaxed into a very strong vodka soda as The BR started laughing at the people dressed with Skeletor Faces behind us. We did our best with the music, but it was too growly goth for our taste. After a few failed DJ requests, we left and went home to dance to The Chameleon's "Swamp Thing" and the Editors' "Papillon" on my kitchen's hardwood floor.

On Monday, I had to work while The Blonde Russian tromped all over the city in constant rain. She soaked her boots right through. We met up for drinks and an enormous Indian feast at Roti. She is a bit of a connoisseur of the cuisine so we ordered big and plenty, then gorged ourselves. Back at my house we admitted Fatigue Defeat, so Jim, The BR and I watched South Park on my computer and split a bottle of red wine. Or two.

At 5.30 am on Tuesday, I found myself driving my friend to Sea-Tac to drop her off for her flight home. When I got back home, a groggy Jim asked me if I would be sad now that she's gone. And while the answer is yes, I am so glad we made the visit happen. We did it and just as I thought, it was awesome. I've already started pricing out flights to LA.

PS: I could sure take some "How to Be Photogenic" lessons from The BR. Never a bad picture, yet I always look somewhat befuddled or frightened. Gah!

I love my teeth. I take very good care of them. Up until my early 20s, I'd never had a cavity and even when I did get two, they were tiny, baby ones. At my first real job out of college with health benefits, I signed up for oral surgery and braces. Sure, I looked like a weirdo with a mouth full of wires at 24, but I wanted pretty teeth. I was very tired of what my father used to say about my overbite: "Girl, you could eat corn on a cob through a picket fence." No, thank you!

I have a great dentist near here in Bellevue who takes good care of me. Over the years I have had some minor repair work, but nothing major. Just pits in my teeth or fixing sensitive areas. The  folks in the office always comment on how lovely my teeth are and how I have great oral hygiene. I go every six months, partly because I have to, and partly for the ego boost.

This last visit was not so good.

Despite having stellar hygiene, using ACT fluoride wash religiously, and flossing nearly every day, I have the beginnings of three baby cavities. My dentist could see the visible dismay on my face when he showed me the intra-oral images confirming the three spots. They are so small I won't even require numbing, but they should be sealed before they get worse.

Dr. Im scratched his head and said, "This is not your fault. You don't eat sweets, you have great dental habits, and you never skip a visit. This is because of your cancer treatments. You have dry mouth, don't you?"

Funny thing is, I do. And most of the time that dry mouth happens while I am sleeping, because my trap door jaw will flip open, and I sleep with my mouth ajar.

This is a recent problem and Jim teases me mercilessly. I get him right back with his deviated-septum Snorlax action, but still. So after I humbugged around my house that evening, I did something dangerous. I got on the InterWebs and looked for "home remedies."

What I SHOULD have done was ... nothing.

Instead, I saw all these fancy snore guards, chin straps and nose strips for sale. But being at home and prepping for bed, those were not readily available. That's when I saw the InterWeb Forums. Doubly dangerous because that's where I read about the simple home remedy of placing some tape over my mouth to keep it shut as I slept. At 11 pm, this suddenly seemed like a really good idea. So I did it.

I grabbed some left-over surgical-grade tape and taped my mouth shut.

I know there's danger involved by purposefully obscuring an airway. I also know the body is not going to let me die if my nose plugged up during the night. I crawled into bed and went to sleep, mouth tightly closed. I woke fine and my mouth stayed nice and moist all night.

In the morning, I wanted a drink of water so I pulled the tape off quickly. And that's when I remembered that my skin does not respond well to tape.

So yes, folks, I walked around all day at work with an angry red tape mark across my lips and face. When explaining the situation to my co-workers, I could not stop laughing. Hard. I even used this classic State sketch to exemplify why putting tape all over my face is not cool. Not  cool at all.

I am now on the market for a snore guard. Or a chin strap. Or some other horrific device that will absolutely destroy my sex life through its visual absurdity. But no more tape.

I promised I wouldn't regale my blog audience with the tale of my weekend, and I will keep that promise. But I do want to talk a little bit about Emotional Hangovers. Because I've been nursing one since the early hours of Sunday morning.

How did I manage to get myself into an Emotional Hangover situation? Well, as a wise friend told me, the liver can't possibly process emotions so these things are going to happen. Basically, I let myself get worked up over something to the point where I wasn't able to keep a lid on it anymore. Then I drank up all the sorrow and misery. And when my stomach started to hurt the most, I went home and cried on my kitchen loveseat until my sides ached, my head throbbed and my red velveteen seat was spotted with snotty tears. Then I went to bed.

I slept the sleep of a four-year-old who has exhausted herself in a tantrum when her father tells her she's too old for the nightlight.

No, that's not exactly right. It was more like being seven and being the only girl in class NOT invited to the weekend slumber party by the girl you thought was your friend. I cried that kind of cry.

Sunday morning I woke with an Emotional Hangover. I didn't want to be touched. I didn't want to be social or nice to anyone. I certainly didn't want to get up early and help paint Jim's house. I threw on a headband, some old sweats and my best game face and powered through.

I nursed my hangover with repetitive brush strokes, yakisoba noodles, swing class with Shaney, and a hot bath. Slowly, the hangover began to ebb.

And even though the issue's been talked about, acknowledged and apologized for, it's Monday and I still didn't get to go to that sleepover everyone was so excited about. Maybe the next one.

I've also come to learn that thinking someone you love might not be proud of you, might even be embarrassed by you, is a singularly devastating feeling. Thank goodness it isn't true, but those moments when I thought that might be true, they cut me pretty harshly.

All I'd wanted to do was go to the party, too.