Last Saturday, I went to Patriot Harley Davidson in Fairfax to see how the DC Rollergirls were doing with their motorcycle wash “fundraiser.” I was expecting it to be similar to the carwash they did at Hooters in Woodbridge a couple months ago. Instead, Patriot HD was holding its annual open house, and it was a big huge deal. There were tons and tons of Harleys in the parking lot, as well as tons of bikers, booths, and roller babes. There was also a stage with live music from some random band. The DC Rollergirls had a merch booth on one end of the parking lot. On the other, a few of them were washing bikes for free (yes, free). I wasn’t really sure what the goal was for their appearance, since they weren’t making any money from the bike washing. …Unless it was simply to generate interest and awareness in the league from a bunch of bikers. Ben (a Sprint graphic designer and fellow photographer) showed up with a friend on his crotch rocket speed bike. Talk about out of place… Not only did he show up on a non-Harley motorcycle, but he was probably the only full-blooded Asian there. I thought there was going to be a lynching. Ha, ha. Anyway, I snapped a few photos. Ben donated five bucks to the league and arm wrestled a rollergirl. We both left shortly after.

Click here for some pics.

There were a couple of interesting events this week involving my company (Sprint) and my co-workers.

On Tuesday, Sprint had some sort of charity fundraising event out in the parking lot. The event was co-sponsored by the Washington Redskins. There was a big stage, which featured several speakers including reserve quarterback Jason Campbell and veteran Super Bowl champion Charles Mann. I arrived with Bridget just as Charles Mann was being introduced. His speech was thought-provoking and well-delivered. Bridget and I ran into more of our teammates. I took a few pictures (including one of me and a couple Redskins cheerleaders). Since I didn’t have any sort of “real” camera with me, I was forced to use my Treo 700wx. It ended up being a decent backup. A bunch of us checked the food out and decided to go back to the indoor cafeteria for lunch instead. We returned after lunch to make use of our free ice cream coupons. By that time, the lines for autographs were cut off. I had hoped to meet Charles Mann, who I respect very much, but was unable. It’s just as well. I would have just put his autographed picture in my file cabinet with all my other stagnant autographs.

On Friday night, Raphael (a content editor on the Hispanic web team) was DJ’ing at a new bar in Adams Morgan called Baci (downstairs from Azul). He invited a bunch of us to come and said he’d put us on the guest list. I showed up around 10 PM. There was a seriously low-showing of Sprint folks (only Chris, Becca and Norma showed up in addition to me and Rafa), but we made the best of it. It was slow-going at first, but I got in good with the bartender and started getting free drinks, which were quickly consumed. Rafa was also getting free drinks for us, including wine for Chris (who is only 20). Becca brought some friends, who I talked to briefly. The three of them left for some dancing at Tom Tom. I stuck around in hopes that the rest of the Hispanic team would show up (they’re the wild ones of the group). Norma did show up with her husband, but by that time, I was pretty tanked. We all soon parted ways. Norma went upstairs to Azul. Chris went home. And I went to Tom Tom in search of the other girls. When I got inside, it felt really cramped, and I didn’t want to stick around, so after I got my bearings, I said goodbye to the girls and headed home.

Before I let too much time pass, I guess I should write a few words on my trip to Austin last weekend. I flew in on Sunday and flew out on Monday. Somewhere in between was my Austin experience.

The only thing noteworthy about my flight to Austin is that the security at Dulles Airport confiscated half my toiletries (hair gel, toothpaste, cologne, etc.). Most of those items were practically new, so it was a total loss.

Three hours later, I touched down in Austin. I hopped into a cab and headed downtown to my hotel. The area between the airport and downtown looked very rural and less developed than I had expected. The downtown area reminded me more of Baltimore than any other big city I’ve been to. There were many vacant retail storefronts and buildings. I was honestly expecting an active economy with tons of coffee shops, bars and clubs filled with eclectic live music. Instead, I saw few people walking the streets (nearly outnumbered by the homeless community) and a lot of unoccupied bars and restaurants.

After dropping off my luggage at the hotel, I went straight to Vertigo Hats on 6th St. I figured this would be the biggest purchase of my visit, so I’d better get it out of the way as soon as possible. Inside, I was greeted by Lauri, the very friendly owner. I found a cool, dirty tan canvas cowboy hat right away. It was the first hat I picked up, and it fit perfectly. I then looked for a black one. There weren’t many black-painted canvas hats. Definitely no plain ones with no decoration (which is what I wanted). I did find one with a small skull & crossbones mounted on the front. I figured I could always remove the ornament, if I ever wanted to, so I went ahead and bought it. Lauri asked to take my picture with the black hat on, so she could put it on her website.

I continued on 6th St. to see what other goodies I could find. I got a fairly tolerable black Austin shirt (meaning it wasn’t an obnoxious “touristy” shirt). I also found some grooming supplies at a small convenience store. I dropped all of these things back off at the hotel, then went in search of some food.

I headed towards the Alamo Downtown theater, hoping to find some good Texas eats at a restaurant nearby. I didn’t see any sort of indigenous eatery. I saw a spaghetti shop, a seafood restaurant, an Irish pub, and some other random, non-Texas-like places to eat. I gave up my search and almost went to a sports bar, but thought the spaghetti shop had a better atmosphere. As it turned out, the atmosphere was very relaxing and the meat ravioli was delicious.

After my meal, I went to the theater. I was in line behind a rollergirl I believe was Lotta (from the Putas del Fuego). Because she was there with a fella, I didn’t engage her in conversation. When I got into the theater, I wasn’t really sure where to sit. There weren’t many people in there at the time. I did notice a couple rows of reserved seating, which I figured were for Quentin Tarantino, his guests, and some TXRD rollergirls. I just didn’t know if it’d be better to sit behind or in front of them. It’d be more entertaining to hear their comments during the movie than to see them, I surmised, so I sat in the next row up. This turned out to be perfect.

The place got packed right at show time, and the first film was introduced by Quentin after a short opening from one of the TXRD rollergirls. After QT’s intro, he left the stage, walked down the aisle and sat in the seat directly behind me. It was great. For the duration of the first & second movies, I was able to listen to a live audio commentary from this great director. Not that he was talking much during the movie. But hearing his reactions & verbal responses to the events and dialog of the movies made the viewing experience much more enjoyable.

I only recognized a few TXRD girls in the audience. I saw Venis Envy, Miss Conduct, and Cadillac. I recognized other girls from the TV show, but couldn’t put any names to the faces. Unfortunately, I was unable to talk to any of them or get any pictures. During the intermission between movies, I did turn around to shake Quentin’s hand and ask him if it’d be alright if I got a picture with him. He very kindly declined and explained that he wanted this to be “a hang out thing.” That was totally understandable, and I didn’t want to be the one to start a barrage of fans coming up to him for pictures and autographs.

Following the two movies (which, by the way, were Kansas City Bomber and Unholy Rollers), most folks quickly left the building. I followed them, hoping to talk to some of them outside. Unfortunately, it was raining fairly hard, and most people ran directly to their cars. I waited a short while under a small overhang, listening to where people were heading. Since it was already after midnight and the weather was terrible, it seemed like nobody wanted to go out afterwards. Once the crowd thinned to a minimal size, I myself lost the desire to go out. Instead, I walked back to my hotel in the rain. For some reason, I lost my sense of direction and walked the wrong way on a couple streets, which made the normally 10-minute walk twice as long.

I had four Texas beers during the movies at the Alamo and by the time I went to bed at the hotel, I was already nursing a slight headache. I also turned on the TV just long enough to find out the Redskins lost to the Cowboys earlier that evening. Two Tylenols and eight hours of sleep killed my hangover right quick.

My phone alarm went off at 8:30 AM (which was 9:30 AM EST). I called in to one of my morning meetings at Sprint, since we had a big website launch over the weekend, and there was a bit of trouble with it. I didn’t mind clocking in an extra hour of work. It’s become a standard occurrence on all of my vacations for me to call into at least one work meeting. It happened in Orlando, Seattle, New York, and now Austin. Phone-in meetings are easy ways to make up for the lost time of vacations.

After getting all my crap together, I checked out of the hotel and walked the streets of downtown to kill a few hours. I ate lunch at The Jackalope. It was practically empty, and the food wasn’t very good. I wish I had gone there the previous night, when it was surely livelier.

I quickly got tired of walking around and decided to go wait at the hotel until it was time for me to go to the airport. On the way back, I stopped in a small gift shop to see if I could find a small, stuffed jackalope. No such luck. But I did notice a Halloween card featuring a picture of a model, who looked very familiar. It was Oksana (a D.C. model I photographed this past spring). I could only imagine these cheapo cards were using her picture illegally, so I bought the four they had in stock to bring back to Oksana. Should be interesting to hear what she has to say about them.

I waited for an hour at a table on the hotel balcony. The weather was perfect in the shade. The air was warm, but the breeze was cool. I couldn’t help but fall asleep for a short while.

When it was time to go to the airport, I couldn’t find a cab. I walked blocks and blocks down major streets, but there were no cabs in site. I knew there were big events happening in Austin that weekend (namely the funeral of Ann Richards), but it was ridiculous to not see any cabs. Eventually, I walked back towards my hotel. Before I made it all the way back, I came to the Omni hotel, which had cabs parked outside. Finally.

I though I was going to be late for my flight, but unlike Dulles, the Austin airport wasn’t nearly as busy, nor did they have a lengthy security check. I ended up having to wait over an hour at the gate.

The flight home was uneventful. On my way home, I realized most of my trip was uneventful. I didn’t get any decent pictures. I didn’t meet and hang out with any rollergirls. I didn’t experience anything that was uniquely Texan. After all was said and done, I didn’t really have anything to write about. Maybe I’ve just been spoiled by my past few out-of-state trips, which had several good stories to accompany them.

I’m hoping there’ll be more to talk about next June, when I go back for the TXRD Calvello Cup championship bout.

I’m ready for my trip to Austin, Texas this Sunday. Again, I will only be there for about 24 hours, so I won’t have a lot of time to do a great deal. But thanks to some helpful tips from the TXRD rollergirls, my agenda is now set.

My flight arrives in Austin at 2:30 PM. I’ll need to take the shuttle to my hotel in downtown Austin. My hotel is right by the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, which is the location of the day’s main event. I’ll dump my stuff at the hotel, then walk down to 6th & Congress to a cool hat store called Vertigo Hats to pick up a “rockin’ black straw cowboy hat” [thanks, Lux]. I’ll try to do the rest of my shopping then, as well. I’ll drop my booty off at the hotel, then head to the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema for the roller derby movie marathon.

The first movie, Kansas City Bomber, starts at 7 PM. The second, Unholy Rollers, is at 9:45 PM. Since I already own these movies (or bootlegs thereof), I’m not particularly interested in actually watching either. My main objectives are to 1) get a picture of me and host Quentin Tarantino, and 2) network with and meet several TXRD rollergirls, so I’ll have folks to hang out with afterwards.

As for the post-evening entertainment, I’m not really too concerned with where we go—just as long as I have people to go there with. There are probably tons of cool bars in the downtown area. A dance club named Elysium was recommended [thanks, Venis Envy]. I simply want to go drinking with some crazy Texas rollergirls.

Check-out from my hotel is at noon on Monday. I’ll have a few hours to kill in downtown before hopping on the shuttle back to the airport. I just hope I’m able to limit myself to only two carry-on items. Cowboy hats are pretty big, so I’ll probably have to wear it on the plane. Ha.

I can’t wait to get to Austin. The best thing about this trip is that I won’t be putting a dime on a credit card. (This is huge for me.) Everything will be paid for in full, including the goodies I’ve budgeted to purchase.

The only disappointments so far are 1) I’ve been unanimously informed that there are no mechanical rodeo bulls in Austin, and 2) most of the TXRD rollergirls I specifically wanted to meet will not be at the movie screenings. They did, however, provide great suggestions and well-wishes for my first visit to Austin. [Many thanks to Lux, Venis Envy, Chola, and Punky Bruiser. You girls rock!]

Friday night was my roller date with Fili*Bust*Her. I won the date at the DC Rollergirls fundraiser at Dr. Dremo’s a couple weeks ago. Initially, I was going to suggest we go to 80’s Dance Party in Adam’s Morgan, but Thursday nights are tough, so I suggested going to an improv show at the Washington Improv Theater in D.C. instead.

WIT was debuting two shows (The Shower, Best Friends) on Friday, and one of my pals (Jaime) was performing in The Shower.

I met Allyson (aka Fili*Bust*Her) around 8 PM at the Chinatown metro stop. From there, we walked over to La Tasca, which was just across the street from the Verizon Center. We had two small meals, a few drinks and lots of conversation. We then quickly headed over to Flashpoint (the venue where WIT performances are held), because we weren’t sure how packed it was going to be. There was no set price of admission, but a donation was requested. It turns out it wasn’t as packed as we feared, so we leisurely waited in the lobby until show time.

The Shower was a show composed of all females. The initial setting was a baby shower, but the show quickly dissolved into a myriad of improvised skits ranging widely in subject matter and setting. The cast members varied noticeably in experience, but they supported each other well. Overall, I thought the show was very funny.

Best Friends was a show composed of three males. They asked the audience for an activity idea (which ended up being “canoeing”), then established their story around this activity. Unlike The Shower, these guys stuck with the same story throughout their performance. While this was certainly impressive, I grew tired of the premise and wished they had added the variety of different settings and different personas.

After the show, we said hello to Jaime, then went in search of drinks.

Surprisingly enough, we couldn’t find a decent place to have drinks in all of Chinatown. Everything near the Verizon Center was trendy and upscale. Even the bowling alley (yeah, I didn’t know there was a bowling alley either). Eventually, we gave up and called it an evening. Allyson took the metro home, and I made my long drive back to South Riding.

The end.