Unexpected Joy

Just got in from a lovely evening out with Ken Bolden and Topher.  And it was one of those strange, serendipitous evenings that can only happen in the presence of friends who're a pain in the ass.

We spent the whole afternoon haggling over what we were gonna do this evening.  Kenny had a host of movies he wanted to see, and Toph was just being (his words, not mine) a big pain in the ass about the fact that he didn't want to do the same old thing.  I -- the typical passive aggressive devil that I am -- just wanted the whole thing settled and didn't frankly give a damn what we did, as long as I didn't have to serve as the intermediary between the two of them.  Truth be told, I've been down lately, and would have been just as happy to spend the evening curled up in bed under my covers.

Well, as it often will, The Universe stepped and kicked all our asses.  Not a minute after Toph mentioned to me that he'd like to see Matthew Bourne's Play Without Words at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (and I nixed it, claiming poverty), a friend of his called up and offered him two free tickets to see the show.  I'd resolved in my heart of hearts to insist that Ken and Toph go together (Kenny had missed his opportunity to see it a few weeks earlier when he had to waste the ticket he had after being struck down by the flu on the day he was supposed to see it), when Kenny decided that he was gonna go to the box office and see if he could get a returned ticket for tonight's sold-out performance.

As you may have guessed, he got it, the three of us saw the show together.

The show itself is amazing.  I'm not entirely sure I like it as much as I liked Bourne's famous Swan Lake, but it was thoroughly engaging, and smart, and sexy, and just visually spectacular.  This is high praise from a guy who doesn't love Dance (with an uppercase "D") in general, and Dance As Theater in particular.  Just a great evening.

But it didn't stop there, dear friends.  Oh, no.

 After the show, I exposed the boys to the joys of Total Wine Bar!  It turned out to be the perfect night for it, too, since the driving monsoon that New York's been suffering through for the past two days made for a fairly empty bar when we arrived.  It gave Ken and Toph the chance to meet Adam, Greg, and a new bartender I'd not even met yet, Ryan.  Oh, and they also got to meet -- briefly -- Celestine Heard, yet another fixture at the bar.

And speaking of my beloved wine bar-ians, I finally got a chance to snap some pictures of the folks I love.  Check 'em out:

The delightful Adam Robertson - proprietor extraordinaire, and all-around hottie.

Celestine Heard.  She's the Total Wine Bar's other first regular.

Greg Ed Lalo Moribito - upon whom I rather ungenerously used the camera's flash without warning.