The Slick Adventures of Downtown Girl

Luck of the Irish

Monday, March 19, 2007 | posted by Kate | permalink | |

St. Patrick's Day Weekend Adventures*

Friday: Met a good girlfriend (and sorority sister) of mine for burritos (what can I say, I am a Chipotle whore) and then hit a few downtown bars. It was fun to hang out with her, but lets just say that the day before St. Patty's day in downtown Chicago is total amateur night. (I have been out of waitressing for so long that I had forgotten that little fact...) What Chicago gets is those guys from Michigan who are like, "Hey-We're-From-Lansing-and-want-to-drink-Guinness-in-Chicago! And wear leprechaun hats! And pretend we are Irish! Woooooooo!!" You know, the standard total and complete morons. Seriously--after twenty minutes of being in a bar with these out-of-town douche bags, my friend and I were ready to hide in my little downtown loft for good.

Saturday: Met up with R--We hung out with Steve (R's best buddy), Amy and a few other girls at a real south-side Irish bar. After managing to fight my way out of downtown Chicago traffic (and away from the Lansing guys in the green felt hats and Purdue sweaters), I was relieved to be out of the city for once. The DJ at the bar must of thought he was at an Irish wedding--he kept playing all of the songs from the 80's and the 90's that you always hear at a reception. Nothing like a little "Like a prayer" to really make you think of St. Patty's day, right?

I'm glad we met up with R's friends--it was cool to see Steve, he always has such nice things to say to me (like that he's glad that I make R happy) and apparently even said some sweet things about me to R. I'm glad that R's friends like me (especially the guys)...because I know that for a guy, the approval of friends, while not required, is a big plus if it happens. And...so far I think I've been doing pretty well with his friends.

An Aside About Being Accepted By A Boyfriend's Friends...
I know it is a crap-shoot because guys either like a girl for their buddy or they don't. So I know it has to do with a combination of how good looking and cool the girl is, and how happy their friend seems. I bet it has a lot to do as well with what R is saying to them about me when I'm not around, too. If they didn't like me, I wouldn't cry in my beer or anything, but I will admit it feels good to be liked by them, to have them buy me beers (to potentially cry in, haha) and throw their arms around me when we're all singing a song, to have them talk to me and share about their jobs and their lives.

What definitely helps is that I genuinely like his friends as people. It is hard to actively dislike someone who honestly likes you or takes an interest in you, I think.

And back to the weekend timeline of drunken debauchery...
We had a great time drinking, singing and just hanging out. After the bar we went back to Amy's house for awhile and chilled out. I was so exhausted by 2 am--I am starting to feel so old. I have no good party skills anymore!

Sunday AM: Woke up at R's place (surprisingly, not that hungover...), had coffee with him, went about my day, prepped my lesson to teach on Monday night. I walked through one of my favorite florist shops and loved seeing the pretty peonies and daffodils which are starting to come in bloom. When rhubarb is in season (April? May?) I'm going to bake him a strawberry rhubarb pie. I can't really cook, dear readers, but I can bake the hell out of things--cakes, cookies, pies, you name it, I can bake it. I did make some pretty kick-ass oatmeal raisin cookies though.

Sunday PM: Watched the new James Bond movie with R (he rented a bunch of movies--he is really good at renting movies...me--not so much....) and then fell asleep with him at his place.

Monday morning, I woke up feeling like something was wrong and over Monday afternoon I developed a bit of a runny nose, fever and sore throat. (Snot-Yuck. Coughing-Double yuck.) I'm still pushing through my workdays and my evenings, though...I am feeling like this week, between work and teaching is going to be a really long one. The weekend hopefully will bring some much-needed rest...and this week puts me one week closer to medical school (yikes!) and one week closer to warmer weather here in Chicago (hurray!). I do like that in the evenings we are getting more sun and the air is starting to feel a lot more like spring.

Love until later,
K
xoxo