I should've called the Politician. I could've gone waterskiing.
Instead, I went to Appleton, figuring that my roommate and his girlfriend would want some time alone in the northwoods, before everyone showed up exactly at 7.
I walked in our room (Humongous! Magnificent!), talked to Jubb and special guests Frisbee Matt and Alex for fifteen minutes, searched for Rock Show Girl (who'd mentioned some sort of carpool) and then turned on my heel (see me pivot from the left, my arms in a dramatic pose) and left the building again. I drove north alone.
The Politician's cabin, or "cottage" if you're from Wisconsin or medieval Europe, is conveniently located just south of the Canadian border, north of a town (spelled Shawano) that I've given up trying to pronounce. It's a nice place.
(Another clue that northern Wisconsin is trapped in time: one "village" had a sign informing "peddlers" that they weren't welcome.)
Rock Show Girl and I arrived at the same time. I suspect I was in a mass of tailgaters with her for most of the drive up, in fact. Our simultaneous arrival saved both of us from having to socialize with non-Lawrentians, though some of the Politician's extroverted friends tried to bridge the gap.
It was a pretty low-key affair. Good to see the happy couple, though. And drinking around the campfire was good. And watching the stars was good.
I liked that a kid who'd just returned from Deutschland readily agreed that the Southeast was the "bad" part of Germany. (In retrospect, I should have noted that however bad Bavaria is — and it's the German equivalent of the American South — the Northeast, with its unemployment and neo-Nazis, is the worst quadrant.)
But the quote of the night goes to the Politician's fiancee, mainly because she voiced a frustration I'd been having all night. After a regrettably-mainstream pseudo-hipster — the kind of guy a real hipster might dismiss as a "popular, not critical, success" — used some bookish word, she said:
The Politican's fiancee (aside): You really have to choose when to use your vocabulary.
Or something like that. I'd had like six beers, so I suppose my memory is suspect. But it spoke to me, because the aforementioned pseudo-hipster and some other young'ns had been using the word "yonder" to mean "here" all night. As in:
Some Freshman: Hey, pass that popcorn over yonder.
Our Bold Hero (to audience): No! No! No!
There was other drama, the rare kind that annoys others and entertains me, and that was fun. The Politician's little brother passed out at some point, which I thought was funny until the next morning when he couldn't find his car keys and The Deathtrap was boxed in.
I still made it back to Appleton on time for my Sunday afternoon engagement, which means that I can justifiably cross off one of my seven lofty goals for this summer:
For Brainerdites who've read this far, the answer to the question you didn't care to ask is "Beth" — I met up with my old best friend after spending several years nearly incommunicado. Since some out of context quotes blogburned me last time I mentioned her, I'll just say that we ate at a Mexican restaurant and caught up on current events.
Rock Show Girl and Jubb's special guests left shortly after I got back to the room, leaving Jubb and I alone and unentertained. We played a round of F-golf at Telulah and I was happy to get 20 over tournament. Then, afraid we'd run out of stuff to talk about, we rented and watched two movies in the lounge.
The first, Spartan, was a popcorn thriller that didn't know it was supposed to be a popcorn thriller. The middle third was good, but the rest of the film sucked. Val Kilmer's soldier character randomly spouted the kind of religious claptrap you'd expect in an overreaching play, and I can only assume that David Mamet wrote/directed the implausible ending to win a bet.
We also watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which I insisted we see instead of Cliffhanger. That was fun.
Jonas and Mi� Sarah surprised us back in the room; I considered the event worthy of a pratfall. It was good to see them, naturally. I'd forgotten how infectious Jonas' enthusiasm can be: he's made me all excited to be playing old games on his MAME cabinet this year.
And he finished Lucky Wander Boy, a book I praised somewhat too soon. All the wonderful modernist stuff at the beginning is undermined by some annoying postmodernist (or "post-postmodernist", if you'll accept that Trojan horse) quirks at the end.
As much as I love ambiguity in storytelling, I've always been frustrated by the inability of postmodernists to make tough decisions and cut stuff out. I'm glad to hear that Jonas found Lucky Wander Boy's multiple endings equally frustrating.
Soon enough, it was Jubb's bedtime, and the three of us left to get a quick midnight snack before parting ways for the night. The Politician surprised everyone by calling and arranging to meet us at Perkins with his girl, so we had another roommate reunion there. Also, I had some pancakes.
And that — finally — brings me to today. Jubb and I met during his lunchbreak and ate some Mexican food before I left. I attribute the teeth-gnashing pain I experienced earlier tonight, as I was driving through the Cities, to some secret and malicious ingredient in my giant burrito.
I cut short a visit to Dylan because of some unexpected rain and my affliction.
I felt like I'd been punched in the crotch. I had to get an ice pack.
And that's the last time I'll go to Appleton before school starts, he finished lamely.
It's a good time, especially compared to my one-man mission in Brainerd — but it's quite a trek and the Deathtrap is at 207,000 already. As long as it holds together long enough to get me to school, I'm happy.
