Day 59: Late-night live-band

Many weeknights in Cambridge involve karaoke. However, very few weeknights in Cambridge involve karaoke until 2 in the morning. Typically it's because the joint isn't even open at all for karaoke on a weeknight (e.g. Charles Playhouse), the joint itself closes before then (e.g. Courtside), it's a flippin' Wednesday and people are exhausted well before 2 a.m. and the joint is located miles away (e.g. Costello's in JP), or in some cases, the band is done before then (e.g. Asgard; photo above c/o a the lovely Erica). In actuality, the only karaoke place my friends and I typically attempt to patronize on a weeknight is the Asgard on Thursdays, when they have their epic live-band-karaoke nights. It has come to pass only once before that they managed to play past 12:30am, apparently due to a late start.

Well, tonight was another one of those instances, because apparently no one told the band that they would be unable to start at 9 due to game 6 of some almost-final series of basketball between the Heat and the Celtics.  I have never seen the place so packed.  The upshot was threefold: first, it meant that E. and I could hang out with the lead singer for a bit while he scarfed a couple of burgers out of boredom. Second, it meant that Sarah B., D., and others who were at yet another Boston ball game (the Red Sox) had some extra time to get back in to Cambridge. And third, it meant that the band played until about 2 a.m.  Cheers to bars staying open till 2 on Thursdays, cheers to musicians who are rad enough to stick it out, and cheers to good friends who stay up past their bedtimes.

Day 30: Mariposa is a cozy coffee shop

Rarely do I go to Mariposa, one of the three coffee shops/cafes within a 20 foot (or so) radius of my house, but boy was I glad I did today.  I never thought of myself as very granola-loving, but I think I've just eaten too many greasy breakfast sandwiches recently because boy, was I craving fruit and health this morning.  Pricey though it may be, the granola and yogurt and fruit (with a whole banana!) concoction with a coffee while I studied for my final before work today really hit the spot.. and inspired me a bit.  Maybe I can go to granola-loving California and be happy after all.

The day sort of flew by, probably because I was just tired, but I was just so, so happy the moment I had finished the final that I brushed the tiredness off.  The evening was going to be a treat, I knew -- a *new* karaoke experience, and a new Jamaica Plain experience, all in one go!  E. and I went with mostly new friends to a place near our friend's house in JP, and it was quite the unique experience.  It was really one of those bars where it feels like everyone is hanging out together -- something I had only experienced via watching Cheers re-runs as a kid.  Costello's live-band karaoke on Wednesdays was way louder, rowdier, and sloppier than anything I have seen in Cambridge.  Thinking back to the previous post, I think this might be due in part to the fact that the "academics" of the area were mostly weeded out, the collar-poppers of Boston don't typically venture that far south, and the result was some awesome menagerie including a dude who brought his own fedora, fireman hat, and stuffed animals which he placed in inappropriate configurations that varied throughout the night.

Glory be to this weird, wonderful world we find ourselves in.  Another highlight of the evening was introducing E. to my favorite e.e. cummings poem:

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)