Pride Weekend!

This weekend Jess and I made the trek up the I35 corridor to show our PRIDE!
Fantastic weekend, full of dancing, drink and merriment!
Friday night we made it to the Brinkmann's new loft after a loooong day of work for the both of us. It was good to get out and take somewhat of a vacation for awhile. Colleen and Barney had dinner ready for us and gave us the grand tour of their new pad, which has an amazing view of downtown dallas.


The next morning we woke up and went to breakfast with Leah, a friend of Jess' that she went to highschool with, and a new friend of mine. It's really neat that she has such great friends who are supportive and have known her for so long. We went to breakfast and caught up on life, the election and what the future holds. Then I met my lovely youngest sister Maisey at Ziziki's in Dallas for lunch. We caught up and ate a really wonderful Meditteranean lunch. It was really good to see her even though I will be going to visit her in two weeks. I sometimes feel like I missed out on getting to know her because I was concentrating too hard on being her overbearing older sister, so its nice to have opportunities to get to know who she is now.
Then Saturday night Jessica and I met our friend Angie and we went to The Rose Room for a drag show. I had no idea how much I would love this! The gals weren't necessarily that great of performers, but there's something about cheesy music, lip synching and shiny costumes that makes me go crazy! I was dancing right along with them on the front row and when there was one that really wow'd me I'd whip out my dolla bills and wave it around in adoring glee! I don't think Angie and Jess had as good of a time as I did at the Rose Room.


Cool Tangent: When we arrived there were these women on the front row who just amazed me. They were about 60-65 and were having a bigger ball than any of us! They were all glammed up and ready to party with the youngins. I just sat there in amazement, wondering what life had been like, what it is like for them. I wanted to know them. I want to be them. Being happy, going out and being themselves and not caring what other people think about their age, their sexuality, or their interests. It was wonderful!
After the show was over we went downstairs to the S4 club which was packed! I've never danced in such tight quarters. We tried to find our own space in the middle but the Latina who started a butt bumping war with me clearly won. So we just sucked up the tight space and danced the night away. I'm known as kind of a rigid dancer with no rhythm and no skill. But Saturday night, I was a different girl, or at least so I hear. I was breakin out the moves and feelin the music and just having a ball, I didn't want to leave. This guy was trying to pass thru the crowd and said to me, "You are too cute! Wow, you are just the cutest! I'm not ever attracted to women, but wow!" HAHA! I got a kick out of that and it boosted my dancing confidence a little more. It was nice to be able to keep up with my girlfriend who is an amazing dancer!
We left the club and crashed at home for a couple of hours before waking up and making the Brinkmann rentals a nice PRIDE breakfast. On the menu: Asparagus and Turkey Bacon Frittata, Tri-colored heirloom tomatoes, Fruit salad, Cranberry Walnut toast and Fresh squeezed orange juice. YUMMY!
Then we hit the road to stake out our spot for the parade! It was a ridiculously hot day! But we braved it. We found our spot and set up camp, waited for 2 hours in the hot sun for it to start and then watched the parade for another 2 hours. There was really just so much to see that its going to be hard to describe to you. So just look at my pics (http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2020238&l=9a810&id=38600567). I would post them up here, but at work I get on here sometimes and I don't want pictures of drag queens to pop up on my computer screen for all to see.

After roasting, we made our way to the festival full of booths, food, music and fun! We got a hot dog to fill our grumbling tummies and then walked around to the different vendors to see what we could see. We came across the Orbitz booth and saw one of those money booths set up. You know where you are blind folded and all the money flies up and you have to catch it all!

There was no line so Jess and I decided to give it a shot. We both had to get in and be blindfolded, the guy manning it told us that we had to gather up all the money/paper money we could and then stuff it into the other person's shirt. Jessica was amazing, I sucked. I came out of the booth with my whole shirt full of money and paper money, she had about 4 pieces in hers. I looked like I had just gained about 15 pounds. So we unloaded our winnings at the table and the people there told us we could either keep the 9 dollars of real money or we could take our winnings of the paper money which meant 700 dollars in plane ticket vouchers. "Plane ticket!" we exclaimed. So I guess this means we'll be going on vacation soon! YAY!
We then made the drive back to Georgetown, tired and happy.