The night began innocently enough. Along with Jackie, Tessa, Gene and a slough of new UPChicago cohorts, we started off at Innjoy with $1 PBR's ($5 pitchers). We got all of the introductions and businessy stuff out of the way, finished our drinks and moved next door to Small Bar. There was apparently some sort of sporting match of the international football variety. Already failing in my pledge to pay more attention to the sport after the World Cup last year, the significance of this game was entirely lost on me. Alas, I had to leave before the first half even ended. In a hurry to other dinner reservations, I slammed my Lagunitas Pilsner, picked up a sixer of Leffe Blonde at a nearby liquor store, withdrew a lot (a lot) of cash and headed to Schwa.
Schwa. That tiny hole in the wall, infamously lower case 'f' fine dining gem hidden in plain sight on Ashland Avenue on the edge of Wicker Park. The meal: incredible, and the details will be revealed elsewhere soon enough. But a curious thing happened at the end. As they had Max's credit card in the back, and after we were greeted by Mr. Carlson himself (after devouring our Lou Malnati's gift), the server asked one final time what we thought of the meal. Now, some people aren't familiar with my brand of sarcasm. It's so...incessant, ubiquitous, sinister...it's very delinquency is so absurd that I should almost never be taken seriously in casual, social banter. And I get it: it's hard to for some people to grasp that such extreme abuse of this lingual form can exist and that they have to be confronted with it. So when I insinuated the meal (the nine course, $115 meal) was on par with a cheeseburger I ate earlier (which I never even did for the record), it's understandable that someone after a long night or serving and drinking, taking care of us for three hours, might misconstrue the comment.
Totally get it. That was my bad, dude. Our minds were each in states separate of objective reality, both having just consumed delicious food as well as for me enjoying particular libations and him whatever other chemical delights he may have imbibed that night. So when I was told to 'enjoy my cheeseburgers' and to 'get the fuck out,' I complied. No reason to make this a bigger deal than necessary. We had been a respectful and entirely appreciative crowd the entire evening and I wasn't going to let a misunderstanding change that. I dug the place. Das Rascist on the speakers? Deal. In another time, I can see going back when the menu changes. For now, I'mma lay low.
(Further, to keep in mind after what happened the previous night, also pretty funny. Looking forward to getting blacklisted from every restaurant in this city).
So after all that, I remeet up with the UPC kids at Bangers & Lace for a night cap. An Allagash White (because I didn't really want to read the full menu) and a shot of Malort was placed in front of me (thank you, Gene). Andy shows up post-Michigan, we head to the street corner and start making noise. A lot of it. This is hovering around 1am at this point. He's got his guitar, I have my cajon, xylophone and assorted other percussion for everyone else to play with. Fun fun fun time. Of course, Division Street doesn't last two long without some 5-0 patrolling, but we got about half an hour in before we were asked to stop playing. It's a good thing Chicago cops have other things to worry about than a bunch of drunks making some noise on a street corner late at night. We stashed our drinks and dispersed.
As most everyone else there was of the responsible type, I said goodbye to most of the fellow writers. Most. In what's becoming bar crawl tradition, Gene and I found ourselves the two remaining soldiers heading to Estelle's. We split a PBR walking up Milwaukee and a friendly stranger warned us of the dangers of drinking in public. We get to the bar and find a uncramped area in the back to stand. We drank who knows what, talked about someone else knows what, and a third person would have to tell us what music was blaring.
So ends another successful evening; this tweet says it all. I biked home the short distance, found the right keys for entrance and climbed into bed, tactful enough to take off my jeans, but compromised to leave my sweater on. The snooze button got a workout the next morning.
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