Well, this last weekend was actually pretty fun. Which is good since I had a disaster Saturday night out the weekend before last in NYC. I first met up with my university friend Scott from Calgary in a little divebar by Times Square, and that was fun. But then after that, I tried to hit two clubs and they were both horrible. I mean typical NYC !!horrible!! And it was even Halloween weekend too. Yeash. Both places were also quite dead, so maybe there was some big parties elsewhere that everyone was at. Oh well.

So after that night, I knew I didn't want to stay here in the city over another weekend. So, I decided to go down to Baltimore for basically a day and a night. At first I was thinking of going down on Friday, but then I decided to just catch an early train on Saturday morning and come back Sunday afternoon instead. In hind sight I'm quite glad that I did as well. Baltimore was nice, but one day and you've can see about all that is needed to be seen. Let's just say that it's not a very picturesque city. The harbour area is quite nice, but it only takes a few hours to explore it, and then there didn't seeem to be much else very interesting.

So not even a death-march in the afternoon! I think I was only out sightseeing for about 6 hours. Oh well, I'm getting to the point where it's not as important to see absolutely everything anymore. Now, it seems when I am out sightseeing, after ever increasingly short times, I'm just ready for a beer and a good meal and sit a watch life go by. So this is what I did while the sun set in the harbour. It was quite nice. Got to sit outside as it was an extreamly nice day, very hot for November! There was a busy boulevard of people right in front of the harbour. Of course people-watching in the US is not quite the same as in europe where I really love it. It's more like whale watching. And I'm not talking about only from my anorexic-obsessed viewpoint. I mean anyone would see a huge difference. It's hard to explain, unless you have spent a lot of time in both places, but sitting and watching people go by in NA vs. Europe, they are two completely different worlds. Of course I guess they are in a lot of ways. Take civilized vs. non-civilized for example :) Oh well, it was interesting at least.

Then I was home fairly early because the sun is setting now around 5pm, crazy. Took a nap and then out on the town around 11:30. The first place I went to called Grand Central ended up being a lounge, a bar, and a club. Well the lounge and bar seemed OK, good mix of people. But then I went into the club, and it ended up being Goth night there. I was the only one in there that was not wearing black. Yeash. Talk about out of place, and it was mostly (meaning 90%) straight too. Needless to say I didn't stay there very long.

Then it was over to the "Hippo" club. Yes that is actually the name of a gay club! Can you believe it is the longest gay club that has been in business under the same name on the east coast?? I think I read that somewhere. Crazy eh. But, hey, it was actually a real cool club. It was quite large, almost the size of Celebs I would say. It had a good mixed crowd of gay/straight, girls/boys, quite enjoyable. There was only a couple of problems though. The first was that it was only about 1/3 busy. There was a huge lack of people there. And, this was true of all the bars/clubs throughout the entire night as well. The second was that it was only open till 2am. I think I got there at about 1am, so that really sucked. It was also one of those places where they serve you a drink at 1:59am and then kick you out at 2am. So completely stupid in my opinion. Stupid law that only contributes to drunk driving.

Well, I think I had only had 4 drinks by the time the "Hippo" is closing at 2am. So, needless to say I am asking around for the after-hours. Low and behold there is one just up the street! Now the weird thing, it is only like 16 blocks away, but people are advising me to take a cab there or I will get mugged!! Nice. And this is kind of the area where my hotel is, well in the opposite direction, I guess. Didn't make me feel all that safe. So, since it was more than one person that informed me to do this I took a cab there, didn't seem all that bad an area, but you never know. Also later in the evening, when I needed more money for "stuff", I was informed by people at the after-hours to take a cab only 3 blocks to the bank machine and back!! Crazy! I would hate to live in a city like that where you have to be afraid to walk around in the gay neighboorhood. That's just crazy!

So, I got to the afterhours, and it was called 2722 or something like that. hmmm.... 816... 2722... hmmm... Any ways it was hit-miss. The "miss" was that again there was a serious lack of people there. The crowd that was there was pretty fun though. The "hit" was that they had specials!! But no, these were NOT that nasty special shit that they serve at 816. For these specials they had vodka disguised in a plain container which the bartender would pour for you and then you can select you mixer. OJ, pop, red bull, whatever. Very civilized! So that made the place much more enjoyable :) Met some very "colourful" people, as one always seems to do at after-hours. Including a female stripper, with little boobs ??, who seemed very intent on giving me her number and having me call her... Hmmm? Of course I lost memory capability about half way through the after-hours. Thank goodness I found a special someone and got some special stuff early in the evening. Now I will be able to stand the Roxy on Saturday during the twins visit, without going too crazy.

So after ?? amount of time, left the after-hours. Don't remember if it was closing or if the fun just fizzeled away since there was not all that many people there. Then when I got back to my hotel it was like 6 or 7 in the morning. So, I decided instead of trying to force myself to sleep for a few hours, and have to get up all hung-over, that I would rough it out and take an early train back to NYC, so I could sleep in my own (sort-of) bed. But no the night was not quite over. Because after a shower, packing and on the way to the train, I remembered that the people at the after-hours had all told me that the original club I went to (the Goth place) was the after-after-hours club!! :) Aparently they re-opened at 6am when they could legally start serving again, and the people from the after-hours club all went to the after-after-hours club :) Well, had to check that out! :) So when I got there, I asked how busy it was, and they said there was only like 50-60 people inside. So that probably meant there was only 30 people, because you know how they try to get you in. But then I got my train schedule out and they went every hour to NY, and I had just missed one, so it was either go in for a while or wait at the station. So I went in and had one drink. Sure enough there was only about 30 people. Not very interesting. Had one drink then off to my train. No people on the train, which was really nice. But only two seats accross, so kinda hard to sleep, but did get some rest.

Got back to the city about noon, just as the NYC Marathon was starting to make it's way into Manhattan. Sorry Jimmy, but I didn't take any pictures. But as you can imagine, I was in sore need of a bed by this point. So off to bed to basically sleep most of Sunday away. You know, just when I think I am getting too old for the partying, an all-nighter pops out of nowhere. Baltimore of all places? Who would have thought. Of course perhaps it's like my last contract in Belgium where all the little cities were a lot more fun than the big ones like Amsterdam and Paris. I think I am seeing a patterm, as Baltimore was ten times more fun than NYC. Who knew??