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January 13, 2001 |
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A night out with the guys… It was a bit strange; I suppose there was a
part of me that wondered how I would bring it up to Pam. She would be able to deal without me for one evening.
I've been neglecting my friends lately and really didn't plan to miss this
evening. However, there was also the part of me who didn't want to be
completely insensitive to her needs. My compromise was to just tell her
that I would be spending the evening with my friends and ask her if she had
any objections. She didn't.
It was going to be Tom, Scott, Kenny, and Dave. We were celebrating
Dave's birthday, but really we were just getting together to be together.
I suppose we are a bit of a mixed group… two of us are single (though I
have a girlfriend), two of us are divorced, and one of us is married.
Unfortunately, I have had the displeasure of seeing two of these friends
though their divorces. I suppose that I don't really know what to say but
to simply ask how they are doing. As for tonight's plans… we would
start by grabbing a quick dinner, going to the IMAX theater and seeing
Cyberworld, the Pink Floyd laser light show, and then perhaps a
gentleman's club. Unfortunately, Scott was missing in action; he won't be
joining us.
First was the quick dinner. There was a food court in the Pacific Science Center and that's where we went. I think most of us got Chinese food. This is when we started to catch up on what was going on in our lives. I told them about my entire predicament with being on probation. There was a part of me who was a little embarassed about it, but I figured that if I couldn't tell my friends who could I talk to about it? They were sympathetic and a bit quizzical about it. I answered questions and went into some explicit detail about how unpleasant my life had become.
Next was the movie Cyberworld. If you have never seen an IMAX film. It's something you should all try. Gimme some credit… I'm not talking illicit drugs here, just a movie. This particular theater, at the Pacific Science Center had a screen which was several stories high. The movie is about cartoons and all kinds of computer created animation. It was hosted by a female cartoon played by Jenna Elfman (from Dharma and Greg); she was cool.
This particular movie also used a 3D headset. The concept is simple really, the screen shows you what you should see on your right eye and the headset blocks vision on your left eye, and vice versa. It is done so quickly that the human eye cannot really detect it. The headsets have infrared receivers on each side and there are large infrared transmitters on each side of the theater.
It is always dangerous go on such an excursion with engineers. We are driven to understand the gadgets that surround us and had we had more tools with us we might've been tempted to take apart our headsets. Okay, truth be told we were temped already, but had we had the tools we might have actually done it. As it was, we were already talking about taking one of the headsets with us, though not very seriously.
As for the movie, it was exceptional. The 3D effects were good enough for me to get a little motion sick. Yes, it was a showcase of computer animation, but it didn't have that feel. It felt more like a movie composed of some skids. I would recommend seeing it. We had fun.
Having woken early today, Kenny decided to call it a night. So we would not be joining us for the remainder of the festivities.
The laser light show was also quite good. Being a child of the 80's, I'm familiar with Pink Floyd. Admittedly, I only have a couple of their albums (The Wall and Delicate Sound of Thunder). I had only gone to one previous laser show, but this one was comparatively better. They played tons of Floyd songs that I had heard over the years.
Admittedly, I wondered what kind of technology went into a laser show. How many contiguous beams are there? How tough is to put together one shape with a laser? What is involved in orchestrating the entire show? Those kinds of things. Once an engineer always an engineer.
As for the later entertainment, we wound up going to the Déjà Vu on Denny Way. In truth, Dave and I went to Déjà Vu, and Tom came along for emotional support… really. As Dave went to the restroom, we setup a birthday celebration at the club, though it would not take place for a couple of hours. So we had to remain until then… not that we were complaining, mind you.
Oh, the reason why I list Tom as being there for emotional support is because he didn't partake in the entertainment. Oh naturally, he couldn't avoid the visuals, but he didn't participate in anything else. I did and so did Dave. I don't think that I need to elaborate in the details… so I won't.
As with any strip club, the club was filled with predominantly male patrons. You may occasionally see women in the audience, but they're few and far between. The particular strip club wasn't quite as polished as some others you might see. The laws in Washington prohibit the serving of alcohol in these establishments. In fact, there are seemingly strict rules when it comes to the running of a strip club here in Washington. Sorry, but I'm not particularly fond of regulating anything on the basis of morality. It's a pet peeve of mine.
When it came time to Dave's birthday event, he was called up to the stage. The set up a chair in front of everyone and asked to sit down. One by one, each dancer came by and took their turns toying with him. They thrusted, bobbed, slithered, and gyrated. He looked like he was enjoying himself. The final dancer also handed him a G-string. He left the stage muttering, "You guys are my best friends!" Though upon closer inspection, the G-string was exceptionally large… so large in fact, that we were fairly certain that they were a little too large for any of the dancers. They would've fallen off her hips. It was still a nice souvenir.
We had called it a night shortly after that. I rode back with Tom.
January 13, 2001