So, um, this website really isn't a blog, right? But sometimes you just have one of those days where you need to tell people about what went down. My day yesterday was one of those days. This one's going to need pictures.

ken duda, mr. genius

So I had a pretty good start to the day, on five hours of sleep, to go meet up with Ken Duda, who is a friend, former boss, and the CTO of There.com, in order to figure out how to keep my new company from smashing itself into smithereens from a technical perspective. Ken is a really hilariously smart guy. I mean, he's the kind of guy to go write programs to test theories about operating systems with the kind of ease and regularity with which most people sneeze. So it was a good start to the day. Ken, if you're reading this, I want to hire you!

Then I headed back home with the idea of maybe taking a nap, which turned, as it usually does, into a little programming and a little innocent gaming, with the help of a few dark chocolate-covered espresso beans.

So I went up to the city and had a rather nice and laid back dinner at an Italian restaurant with Susan. As we were finishing up, we realized that we were not going to be up for our existing plan of going to a huge party at Snodrift (a birthday party for DJ Dimitris Mykonos, who is a totally rocking house DJ - in a fit of small-world syndrome, it was my friend Alf Marcussen throwing the party, of whose company I am a board member -- and Snodrift is where Georgy threw her gubernatorial party! )

It was around 9:45pm and seemed like it was going to have been a Very Reasonable Saturday, which is fine in-and-of itself, but I think I have this mild terror that as one gets older all a guy really looks for in life is Very Reasonable Saturdays, and I think I'd like to hope for more than that. Especially given that I'm 25 and expected to live for several more decades, if not possibly a century.

WHEN SUDDENLY...

On the right hand side of the street, there were several dozen clowns, apparently cheering. Some of them were on cell phones. I was busy, well, driving, so I only saw this in my peripheral vision and could have passed it all off as some sort of baked-rigatoni-enhanced hallucination, but Susan was like "There are clowns back there!" So I immediately did the only thing a reasonable citizen could do; I took a U-Turn right away to find out what those clowns were up to. Clowns are never up to any good, which is to say they can be counted on to be having all of the fun.

So, we pull up next to this one clown who looks like he's on hold on his cell phone (modern clowns, sheesh), and Susan yells out "What's going on?" The clown says "Oh, hold on mom!" into his phone and asks us "You guys going to the Marina?" "No," Susan answers honestly. "Oh," says the clown, "cuz we need a ride to the Marina."

A couple thoughts go through my head at this moment, but within a few seconds, one thought in particular takes hold over the others. Could I possibly regret giving these clowns a ride? No. "Oh, hey!" his clown-fianceé chips in as she walks over, trying to see what's going on. I look over at the bunch with a smile. "Hop in."

An instant later, I answer that burning question every small-car owner has to ask themselves at some point: How many clowns can fit in my car? Well, in the case of 1996 VW Cabrio, the answer is three, in back. They promised us comedic quantities of liquor.

So we head off to Bar None in the Marina, which is interminably filled with yuppie scum that all look and feel and smell and act exactly the same; as Nathan likes to put it "all of the people we loved to hate in college, in one place!" So the trend in that froo-froo district is to wear whites, blacks, and very muted tones. Into this poshly pretentious gathering bursts no fewer than 45 clowns, including our three, all of whom had been celebrating their friend's birthday until they had been booted off of a trolley by seven cop cars. (One of the 45 had thought it a Particularly Good Idea to throw eggs off of the trolley, but the policemen begged to differ.) Seeing the bemused reactions on people's faces was great - random guys and girls came up to engage the clowns and passerbys alternately cheered and cowered.

me, clown #1, susan

I called Nathan. "You have to come down here, now. Bring your camera." He did.

nathan with cool glasses

By the time we put a Belvedere and Red Bull in him, Nathan was having a good time with the clowns, too.

clown-fiancée, me, susan

Yessir, we had a jolly old time at Bar None, bouncing around to the music and giggling and whatnot.

clown #4, susan

There seemed to be no shortage of clowns who wanted to hang out with us. They were a very drunk and very happy crew. Even getting thrown off of a trolley by a dozen policemen didn't faze these guys. Some had flown up from USD just for the party. :)

clown #1, susan

Susan was a big hit with the clowns. Probably because she's a bit of a clown herself. :) (Is this site starting to feel like Black People Love Us, only "Clown People Love Us"?)

nathan tossing darts

We watched on as Nathan and a bar girl dba Rachel hit it off tossing darts.

rachel tossing darts

I hate to say it, but Rachel kicked Nathan's ass at darts. I mean, look at that concentration and technique!

susan

Susan was relegated to wearing my hat and making funny faces.

helpless yuppie girl, clown #42

One of the best parts of the evening was watching the clown-guys mingle around the bar and shamelessly hit on the yuppie girls with varying degrees of success. In this picture, you don't see where Clown #42's left hand is. Some of the girls walked right up to the clown guys, though, so I can't naysay clowing as a macking technique just yet. :)

#21, girl, girl, #1, DJ, #15

Indeed, looking at this shot, it seemed a pretty successful night for some young clowns. The clown with the huge glasses is a house DJ and gave me his mix CD as a thank-you for picking up his friends.

nathan, susan

At this point, Nathan and Susan started fighting in Italian and we decided we ought to call it a night.

THE END...?

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

We decided that the night wasn't just over yet, influenced in no small part by the copious Red Bull, so we decided to go hit the beach. It seemed like a calm and sensible end to a crazy evening.

Down on the beach, however, we noticed a bunch of bonfires. We found a pile of wood and a half-dozen still-warm embers and decided to try and make a go of it with no matches and no ready kindling except for damp cardboard.

me, fire

After some careful tending, we managed to stoke the fire up. Then people materialized out of thin air to provide all sorts of nicely flammable stuff. We built it up and before long, we had one of the nicer (and hotter) bonfires on the beach.

me, girlx2, naked-man, susan

Hot enough that one of our "guests" deemed it sufficient to justify him removing all of his clothes and throwing himself into the ocean. Then he came back and dried himself off au naturel.

me, fire

We weren't really sure what our guests were on, but they were all really mellow, quiet, and happy. All of us sat around the fire each with our own thoughts but united in the cool night by the ocean in the solidarity of the simple task of fire-building.

me, susan

I have a saying (first told my dearest Sarah) that if life doesn't feel surreal, you're doing something wrong. Saturday felt very right.