As promised, I hit Lucky Brand like a whirlwind yesterday, determined to buy many half price pairs of dreamy jeans. In the end, I only managed to get two, but for a ridiculous £20 each. Nice. What wasn't so nice is that I couldn't fit into my usual size. Fie on deliciously enormous American servings! (erm, and our pathological eating out.)
While I was in the shop, another motorcade sped by - the same size as the one we saw last week - and the shop assistant explained that it must be Cheney. Apparently when it's Bush, they shut the entire block off and he has way more vehicles with him, including a van which drives directly behind his car, filming the journey. Apparently this was introduced after JFK's assassination and is in case POTUS gets shot and they need to examine footage of how it happened. I think that's kind of bleak.
Last night, we went for dinner with Cindy and her actor husband Jim, at Jaleo - a tapas restaurant near Chinatown which had been recommended to me by loads of people. It was really nice to see Cindy again (she's the lady I had lunch with in Georgetown yonks ago) and funny to meet Jim, having seen him in that terrible play last week. He's really nice and we had a really good time with them. Cindy barely got a word in edgeways, as Jim did all the talking but, except for his earnest theatre chat, made for good conversation. Especially when he told us how he's the world record holder for the longest game of frisbee ever! He and some stoner friends of his at college just threw a frisbee between them constantly for something like two months.
Conversation obviously became somewhat awkward when it turned to Jim's play. I'd emailed Cindy shortly after seeing it to say that we'd thought Jim was great but hadn't really cared too much for the play, because we really did hate it that much, that I couldn't bear having to gush about it when we met again.
I think I just about got away with it - no thanks to Max, who suddenly lost his tongue - and was interested to hear Jim kind of agree with some of my garbled reservations, explaining that the writer was very involved and the cast only really knew what was going on because the writer explained the motivations and backstories of the characters. Jim reckons a company who doesn't work so closely with the playwright will have a real problem, which is a major weakness of the play.
This afternoon, I went up town to play tennis with criminal lawyer Sarah in what is becoming an almost weekly daytime arrangement, which is nice because I like playing tennis and Sarah is kind of fun, but would be nicer if our games were slightly more exciting.
Weirdly, there was a queue for the court, so I locked my bike up and Sarah drove us to a court in deepest darkest Bethesda, even further uptown, where the really really fancy suburban neighbourhoods are (she lives just round the corner). We played on a court surrounded by woodland and I kept expecting squirrels to scamper across the court. Unfortunately Sarah then had to drive me back to my bike, as we were miles away, and I sweated all over her car seat. Whoops. Hey, but she and her husband have three cars. It's so gross. Her husband has a car, she has the SUV she drove me around in then they have a third, bigger car that's like a big people carrier for when she does the school run. Eugh.
I was knackered by the time I got home, but had to almost turn straight round again to brave my second ever softball game. I figured that the disaster of my first attempt was inevitable of a beginner and that only if I continued to be rubbish on my second game would it be worth considering abandoning the whole endeavour.
I decided to cycle all the way to West Potomac Park, after mine and Max's odyssey last time that got us lost in the FDR memorial. But it was a long and treacherous ride at rush hour and I couldn't help notice, as I weaved in an out of static traffic, that there weren't any other cyclists at all on the road. This became less of a mystery to me as the number of times I nearly died reached double figures.
Fortunately I made it in one piece and it was really nice to see Patrick again. But you'll NEVER guess who else rocked up to play on his team? The guy from tennis and jazz!! I should disclose at this stage that said chap is really very hot, and I swear I detected a flicker of stalker-fear on his face as he saw me for the third time, but hey - he should be so lucky! It was such a freaky coincidence, though. He works for Patrick's firm (but they don't know each other) and I found out today that his name is Micah (last name, Brill!), which will help when we next bump into each other.
I had been a little nervous to go to softball without my cheerleader (Max had to work late), but there was a really friendly atmosphere tonight and I felt very welcomed (perhaps because only about two of the team were there last time I played, so everyone else was blissfully unaware of what mookery lay ahead...). I even managed to remember everyone's names, which was an achievement and helped me feel more team-y.
Great chortles went up when we discovered we were playing the AARP - America's equivalent of SAGA - and I felt that my chances of doing well against a team of over-50s were pretty good.
Oh how very wrong I was. It's not that they were really good - we totally dominated the game and eventually won. It's that I was just so BAD! Much, much worse than last time. Once again, I was put out in the right field, where no-one can hit. But as soon as it became obvious that I was the weakest link in the team, even the white haired old lady started targeting me and hitting balls in my direction! The one that actually came near me, I fumbled and threw wildly wide of the mark, while Patrick and Mika were managing to get the entire opposition out between them with their glue hands catches and deft throwing.
But it was the batting that was the real disaster. At least last time I made contact with the ball, even if I did get out through not knowing the rules. This time - every time - I swung wildly at the ball and never once managed to hit it. It was miserable. I was miserable. And matters were made worse by a really confusing ump, who didn't say 'out' - he just assumed I'd know if he said some numbers, that they added up to me being out. So I was regularly left stranded on the batting spot like a lemon, not knowing what was going on.
Once again, the team were very kind, but it felt worse for me this time, because last time there were a few token girls who never once made contact with the ball and were just a little lame. But this time I was those girls and everyone else on the team was better, so I felt like I was letting everyone down. I was wearing a McSweeney's t-shirt that says, 'It was awkward at first', which the captain quoted to make me feel better, until I pointed out that it is apparently also awkward at second.
I didn't stick around for post-game training. My softball career is over.
Patrick and I mooched back to the metro together on what became a humorously eventful journey. First of all, we came across a whole mini-field of fireflies zipping about. We stood there for ages, just watching masses and masses of little glowy flies and a bemused squirrel in the middle of them. Fireflies are so cool. When they're not glowing they just look like regular flies.
Then, as we walked by the tidal basin, there was the most lovely sunset just starting 
over the Jefferson monument. There was a black helicopter buzzing across the water and Patrick said it was probably some senator being whisked somewhere. But then when we got across into the city, there was a massive noisy motorcade that I noticed wasn't escorting anything - it was just lots of police and ambulances in a row, with the helicopter overhead. Patrick said that we'd only have to worry if there was a SWAT truck, because that either means a bomb or a hostage situation. I'll leave you to guess what drove by at that moment... Eeek!
We had great trouble finding the lift (for my bike) when we got to the metro, but Patrick eventually found a door opening onto a lift at the base of a building. This isn't what they usually look like - the metro lifts are usually in a big black column, but we went inside anyways and the lift started going up. Again, this was unusual, because the metro is underground. But somehow we just accepted it, until we got out of the lift and found ourselves in the Department of Agriculture. Whoops.
When we emerged back on the street, the big black metro lift column across the road loomed large and we couldn't believe we'd ever missed it, so hopped on the metro. When we had to change trains, we took a lift from the platform up to the concourse, to get to the next platform we needed to go from. This time the lift was a glass one and Patrick pretended to crush the heads of the teeny people below us. One lady looked up and saw him and he got embarrassed until I pointed out that he'll never see her again. Until we realised we'd come up on the wrong platform and had to get the same glass lift down to the place where the lady was, walk right past her and everyone else Patrick was crushing between his fingers and get another lift up onto the opposite platform. Awkwaaard.
I finally got to Dupont Circle, and picked up a message from Maxy (who'd been working late) that he was on his way to the El Salvadorian restaurant down the road from our flat, so I met him there for supper and consolation. I'm not going anywhere without my cheerleader again.
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