...and we're back!
It's been a little over a week since my little romp in Atlanta and I still haven't really remastered the flow of living in Los Angeles, the pacing here is so different. Not necessarily different in a bad sense, just different.
My original travel plans involved some sort of multi-city trip around the South, but my schedule, the schedule of the unemployed and unhindered, really didn't coincide with anyone else's, so for the time being I had to settle with just a short little trip to Atlanta, with some open plans to revisit the South sometime in the near future (If anyone wants to brave the red states for a little jaunt, let me know!).
I probably would have never visited Atlanta if it wasn't my best friend, Professor J, who's finishing up her PHD in Philosophy at Emory College. This trip was a two part mission, the first was to just hang out with her while she was on Spring break, you know, playing catch up, drinking, just making our limited time together worth it. The second part of the mission involved a little scrutiny on my part. It turns out that while Prof J. was away, she done and got herself a good ole southern boyfriend.
Now a good friend would just trust that Prof. J made the right choice, and a good friend would unconditionally accept the new guy without question. I'm not a good friend, I'm THE best friend, so it's part of the job to shoot first, and ask questions later. Even if the guy is the greatest guy in the world, or if he found the miracle cure to AIDS, or even if you had a 12 inch flaccid dong, I'm still going to scope you and your intentions out, it's just this instinctive thing I have to do with all my friends.
I arrived at the airport early Thursday evening. Apparently I had just missed President Bush's arrival at the airport, thus immediately reinforcing any sort of Republican-loving stereotypes I had already formed in my head about the people of Georgia. I look around and spot Prof. J, but she isn't by herself, the new guy is there with her. She looked different, or rather there was something different about her, and I could tell she was smitten (that or she's just been having a lot of sex). I gave her a hug, and then introduced myself to new guy and say hi. He shakes my hand, says "hi" back, and I am immediately disappointed that he doesn't have a Southern accent. At least with her ex, the French guy, I was immediately charmed by his accent.
A younger and more immature Gary, would have been furious that she brought him to the airport before we could spend some quality one on one time with each other. A younger Gary would have pulled her aside and said, "How dare you spring him on me right away. How dare you ambush me." The older Gary was actually glad he was there. Let's get this introduction crap out of the way and have some drinks. Plus he had a car.
I was also relieved that New Guy wasn't hideous, actually to my relief he was quite good looking, handsome, very man-ish if you will. I'd say he's a cross between Keifer Sutherland and Peter Sarsgaard. Not that I'm surprised, all of Prof. J's past conquests have been good looking gentlemen, this guy could hold his own. It would have sucked if he was ugly, and I would have to put up this facade of approval. She'd ask, "Well what do you think?" and I would reply, "Weeeell, he's nice and he has a car!"
Straight from the airport we went to a bar, and this pretty much would set up a precedent for how I would spend the rest of my evenings in the South. We drank and drank and drank. This was like the Olympics of drinking, and my poor liver played torch bearer. I love bad analogies. I drank more on this trip than I had in a long time. I had not drank this much since my early 20's. I think on average I was paying anywhere between $60 to $100 a night on drinking alone. Jager, you are no longer my friend. I couldn't help it though, Atlanta is such a bar culture kinda town. You couldn't throw a rock in that town without hitting a bar.
Not that I'm complaining, I do whole-heartedly believe in the mystical nature of alcohol. It loosens the tongue, lowers inhibition, it's as Margaret Cho would say, the equivalent of Wonder Woman's lasso. Sure, belligerence is an easy option, but moderation was key here. Drinking at a steady pace, the truth comes out, drinking in excess, the puke comes out. As long as I could straddle the thin line between truth and puke, it was all good. It was in these drunken conversations that I learned he was an a-OK guy. He gets the stamp of approval. I really like this guy, and hopefully my words don't come back and bite me in the ass in the future. (Though what really sold me on him was his collection of still-in-the-box Transformer toys at his house, and he also let me touch his Voltron (wink)).
One night we met up with a girl who was the friend of a friend here in Los Angeles. We drank, we danced, we talked. I asked her why is it that people in South seem so nice. Here in LA, people seemed obsessed with what you do for a living, and if always feels like you're trying to prove your worth to someone. If you randomly say "hello" to someone in LA, people get all freaked out, like you want something from them. Or they give you a look, sometimes they might go out of there way to ask, "Do I know you?" The people I met in Atlanta were all really nice, not as nice as the New Orleans folk, but nice nonetheless. How can the South, with it's seemingly stereotypical reputation, maintain it's manner and charm?
"Well we're just raised that way," she said.
I bit my tongue. Sure what she's saying might be true, but I don't want to hear it. Basically you're nicer because you were raised that way, unlike myself, who was raised by wolves, in this survival of the fittest Mad Max wasteland future world, otherwise known as Los Angeles. I was too drunk to argue so I let her have it, even though I disagree 100%. Besides something even worse would happen, that would pretty much scar my memory for life.
I excused myself to go to the bathroom and relieve my bladder of the 4 beers I accidentally drank at break neck speed. I get to the back, and of course I don't see the line of men waiting for the toilet, and I fling the door to the bathroom wide open, and of course the toilet is occupied, but it's not just occupied by just anyone. There at her most vulnerable was Prof. J, like a yoga master in mid-hover, pants lowered down to her thighs, toilet paper in hand, just about at pre-wipe. She looks up and our eyes connect, and then she lets out a scream, I let out a yelp and quickly shut the door. The guy next in line to the toilet says, "Way to go, man." To which I reply, "I wasn't supposed to see that, I wasn't supposed to see that, I wasn't supposed to see that." What I actually did see was nothing, no piece of poo in mid plunge, no privates, nothing I couldn't share with the rest of world. She'll probably kill me for sharing this, but really it's nothing. If she wants to witness me in mid-stream, 10 feet away from a urinal, she's more than welcome to.
All in all, it was a great trip. I got to hang out with Prof. J, I made a new friend, I drank, I danced, I ate some really good food, I got to see Prof. J in a three dollar donkey show...wait, that was a totally different trip, but still, I had a lot of fun in Atlanta. Now that I'm back in Los Angeles, and I've finally settled back down to the hum drum way of life I lead, I actually kind of miss Atlanta.. I miss being an arm's reach away from my best friend, I miss the Southern hospitality, I miss the cheap drinks, and I miss the good food, but this is home. I talk so much shit about LA, but the truth is I love it here more than anywhere in the world.