Minnesota Adventure: Dontcha Know!

A couple weekends ago I went to MN to see a couple groups of friends. One was my old coworker, Harriet, and the other were my friends Peter and Georgia. A couple funny things happened along the way:

Disappointed?

Harriet and I went to a gay bar in the middle of downtown. We were by ourselves, awkwardly dancing together, when these two gay guys came up to us.

“Hey! It’s so refreshing to run into some straight people,” one of them said. “We want to talk to some straight people.”

I felt like we were at the zoo and they just got the chance to pet the goats.

Suddenly, a look of horror crept over one of the gay men’s faces after we didn’t immediately respond to him.

“Wait…,” he said glaring at us, “You mean… You aren’t straight?”

You would have thought we murdered his entire family and then just made him eat a stew that we made from their body parts. He was furious.

Harriet looked between me and the guy and was like, “No… ,” she pointed at me, “he’s gay.”

“C’mon!” The angry gay said to his friend. “We’re getting out of here!”

Harriet and I looked at each other and tried to comprehend what had just happened.  He was mad? Because we weren’t straight? At a gay bar?

B’ohkay, MN.

All the Lonely People

Georgia and Peter had a party for Peter’s bday. A whole bunch of people were there – roughly 11 or 12. We had been drinking and playing games all night, when my friend’s fiancé jumped up.

“Guys! We gotta go out if we’re going to go to Gay 90’s before it closes!”

She immediately sprinted upstairs.

It had been Peter’s idea that if we made it out, we would go to this big, gay dance club called Gay 90’s to party on.

I thought it was really nice of everyone, but I spoke up:

“Guys, we can go to any bar. Don’t feel like just because you have a gay guy here you have to go to the gay bar.”

My friend Sam turned to me and put his hand on my shoulder. “Tedd, you realize that you’re the only one at this whole party that isn’t married or going to be married in the next few months. You’re the only one who can get action.”

I kind of jumped back because I hadn’t even realized it until that moment. Everyone was really friendly and awesome and I had never thought about who was single/married/vegan what have you.

For some reason (most likely the 10 drinks in my system) it hit me weird and I got kind of sad.

“Thanks, Sam. Thanks for pointing that out. I’m going to go upstairs and put a gun in my mouth.”

That’s when one of the guys from the party jumped up.

“Tedd! Don’t worry! We got you!” (Remember I said they were super awesome?) He then proceeds to play “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” on the Apple TV, causing everyone at the party to get in a circle and sway. The lights were even turned off and people held up their cell phones like lighters.

Single or no, I felt a lot of love in that room.

Catching Fire

Sam and his fiancé, Jenny, were also from out of town and just visiting for Peter’s bday.

The next day, after the party, we all went out and got breakfast. It was at this place that had a bakery and sandwich shop in it. I saw Jenny sneak over and buy this flower thing from a bakery and stuff it in her purse.

I kind of forgot about it until later that afternoon when she pulled it out and brought it into the living room. We had all been watching TV and were pretty mellow.

“Peter! This is for your bday!”

She proceeds to take the flower out of the box and put it on the coffee table in the living room.

“Do you have a lighter?” Sam asked.

At this point I looked over and Georgia’s eyebrows were raised. She didn’t say anything, but I could tell she was wondering what was about to happen.

Peter and Jenny walked over to the flower and got out a match to light it.

Peter, as if hosting a bad 60’s game show, says, “I hope this table’s not flammable!”

He then proceeds to light the flower. Perhaps light is too gentle a word, he ignited the flower blaze.

A shot of sparks and flame about three feet high shot out of the flower. Both Sam and Jenny leapt back and fell on the floor.

I was laughing so hard I was crying. This wasn’t helped by looking over at Georgia, who had this complete look of, “Dear God, if anything is ruined because of this I’ll murder you” mixed with, “It’s Sam doing this, of course he almost burned the house down.”

In the end the thing was pretty awesome. After the sparkler flame went out, the flower burst open into like 10 tiny flames. It was supposed to play “Happy Birthday”, but it hadn’t been lit properly.

Jenny grabbed Sam’s arm. “Light the wire! It will play “Happy Birthday!” she said.

“NO!” Peter and Georgia wanted nothing more to do with that thing.

Of course, there’s a video of this thing on YouTube for reference: