Post-Haste

After doing some Myspace and Facebook related Patch work, I biked down to Solera, in somewhat of a funk due to the fact that I had missed a block party over at nearby Memory Lanes in Cedar/Riverside. May 24th is symbolic for Patch, being that it was going to be the day that Schuyler was to be finished with mixing/mastering. Today I would have had the finished product in my hands, ready for the masses. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Now Christmas will be the "release date".

Solera, in downtown Minneapolis, was holding an event called "Carnival", based off of the Brazillian traditional festival (I'm talking out of my ass here, I was just rollin' with it, I have no clue where "Carnival" came from) originating in the Fuechenga Tribe and their celebration of La Chupacabra y el Perro con Tres Cabezas. Upon arrival, there was no place to park my bike. I looked a fool trying to find a damn sign post to chain it up to, a garbage can, a bench. After a little finangling (with a garbage can across the street), I met the gang outside on the street sharing Sangrias. Apparently, the event was free before 9:00pm, so Adri, Laura, and I high tailed it into the restaurant.

We walked up to the hostess in the front. We all just stood there looking at each other. Adri started doing the swinging arms back and forth with mouth puffed up routine, slightly nodding. No one said a thing. The hostess finally broke "What . . . do you guys want?" I said "Where do we get hand stamped?" The hostess pointed through a door "That way."

We traveled "that way", stopping at someone who had a stamping pad and a cash box outside of a stairwell. I asked "Is this where we get stamped?"

"No, you want to go straight up."

So, we traversed the stairwell. At this point it became abundantly clear that I was slightly underdressed. I was in blue jeans and long sleeve shirt, my Friday "working with children" clothes. I was also toting my tote bag. Not stylish. The bouncers were in high class suits, the women all around were in expensive dresses and ensembles, most of the civilian men were in either suits or looked to be playing the part of a Spring Break on San Pedro Island college spring breaker -- still dressier than me, for this particular event.

After climbing five floors, we made it to the roof. Music bumping, wall to wall people. I was in the world I rarely ever traverse into anymore -- not rockers, not indie heads, but the world of the corporate clubster. These aren't hipsters. These are the rich snobs of my peer group. These are clubsters. Spiked hair, striped button up shirts, women all cloned from the same assembly line in Area (Studio) 54, slightly older women who will hump your leg because you are either A. Small and adorable and non-threatening, and B. They're bored. Most likely it's a combination of the two. Actually, that's pretty much it exactly.

We couldn't move, the people were giving us strange looks, I didn't feel up to snuff for the occasion. We traversed back down with drinks in hand to meet the gang outside sitting in the comfort of their own space. I commented that if there was ever a place, this would be the place to get "roofied". Mild smiles from all. I wasn't on my A-Game apparently.

The post-strange world encounter conversation dealt with the plethora of sites on the internets dealing with Fuck my Life, Post-Secret, Twitter, Text from Last Night, all the blog sites that make it seem that your life isn't as bad as you might make it out to be day in day out.

I started drifting in my head whilst sipping on my Mojito (seemed to be the drink of the weekend). Adri had mentioned how Bukowski had said that "normal" people were dangerous. I feel that Solera was the "Normal People Convention" for that particular evening. These people scare me. Well, I guess most people scare me, to some degree, but there's something off about "normal" people. Their strict code of conduct produces anger toward anybody or anything. They are the most in tune with their basal instincts. They are the people who cyber bully peeps on every single forum known to man (show me one comment area in YouTube that has more than ten comments where the comments haven't resorted to personal bashing, either against the subject in the video or against another commenter). They are the people who hate the outsiders because they want to be one too. They want pussy, they want cars, they want tans . . .

I'm generalizing. But these cliches haven't gone away. Not really. Maybe I'm the normal one trying to break into an outsider convention. Maybe there are more of me than the people I eye suspiciously when traversing these clubster meccas. I eye people at First Avenue, too, the Hipster Mecca. Maybe I give the eye to everybody, just like they eyeball me.

We're not different, in the end. That's why I found myself at Solera today. And that's why I should have thought more on how I was going to dress and blamed myself for the insecurity rather than eyeballing everyone else's great clothing choices.

Here's my "Post-Secret" post: I hate every person's outfit and style because I can't afford to spruce up my own.

Beck -- "Tropicalia"