Sipping ourselves into pixelated nostalgia

Jacinta and I checked out Barcade last night.

We heard the rumor from the local eccentrics that it opened with quite a storm.  Allegedly, people could not get in, they were lining up in the street, it was crowded and uncomfortable, and there was plenty of immaturity in the crowd.  Allegedly.

So we had decided to let it go through its beta phase.  We had tons of fun last night.

Namely, the Barcade concept started in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY.  The place was opened to cater to the hipster, W-burg scene (craft beer, nostalgia arcade, come on!)

The place is very spacious and open.  Chairs and tables are spread out in a beergarden-like, "community" fashion - large tables where groups are to share space and interact.  The walls are lined with vintage arcade machines.  The bar has 20-30 craft beers on tap, mostly american beers.  I did not take photos, but here are some of their own:

We arrived around 7:30.  We sat down and we were quite cozy.  The crowd around us was comfy, unobtrusive.  The music was a bit too loud, and it got louder as the night went on.  I tried the Avery Reverend, which is a Belgian, Quadrupel-Ale style beer, from Colorado.  It is a formidable Quad.  I tried a few more, such as the Slyfox Royal Weisse, before I ventured into the Weyerbacher Hops Infusion in a Cask.

I had been skeptical about cask ale for some time, especially because most American cask brewers tend to do hop-heavy beers in cask, and I am not a hop fan.  However, much to my surprise the Hops Infusion (which I've had in a bottle and regular keg, before) was quite balanced with the hoppinness.  Served warm, the flowery aroma of the hops dissipates softly up the palate and through the nose.

J, not being a beer person, stuck to vodka-seltzers.  Being objective, I'd have to admit that I wish the place would cater more for non-beer clientele, perhaps with a more diverse wine selection.  I wouldn't request anything great, but all we saw were three wine bottles at the butt end of the bar, standing there open for who-knows-how-long.

We tried playing some Galaga, but neither of us was a Galaga person.  We opted for some games that we could play 2-Player.  Two that hold special places in my heart were Golden Axe and Contra.

Golden Axe quarter intake was broken so we spent most of our quarters on Contra.

All in all, a good spot - the likes of which Jersey City needs more, especially on Newark Avenue.

Ghosts of towns past

This past weekend we were invited to spend it with our colleague Srdjan, and his family, in Asbury Park, NJ.

The entire weekend I felt completely out of place due to my lack of lore about this town.  It is an abashing finding to realize that we have lived in New Jersey for so many years and have no real knowledge of what Asbury Park hath been, in different stages of its turbulent life.

Luckily, both our hosts as well as my good friend Paul knew quite a bit of the history of this town.  Namely, both Paul and his wife, Marcia, had grown up a good part of their respective childhoods not far from the town. They have seen its decrepit state first-hand, and then learned of years past from tales of older generations.

I will begin this by stating the most important of thoughts, before I lose it.  Whatever Asbury Park may have been at any other, given, era, it is certainly not it now.  This came as an exponential amplification to my amazement with this town.  As a first encounter with it, I was in deep disbelief that we could find such a gem at only an hour's drive from our house.  Then, learning the baffling past, and the tales that these old streets might tell, it intensified my liking for it to a level that is hard to describe here.


Back to what we found there...

Firstly, Srdjan welcomed us to his magnificent duplex where his brother and a friend (Bojan, and Zoran) were preparing some pljeskavice.  His condo is truly marvelous. 
We spent a wonderful afternoon on his balcony, sharing beer lavishly with our new friends, and exchanging stories of each one's lives as the sunset bathed us with crimsons and chimney reds.  When Bojan finished his meat masterpiece, we all recharged.  He even dared to bring somun.  Oh, cursed nostalgia!  How heavy your blade!   
As the dark veil came over the ocean, we were depleting our deposits of effervescent conversation-lubricant.  Just in time, some fireworks lit up the sky from a handful of miles away.  Paul guessed that it might have been Belmawr.  They lasted for over a half an hour.  The night was brewing an early potential of being magical.

With meat and carbs still in our esophagi, and out of beer, our clock rang the time called "time to hit the town".
We hit the streets.

The charm or downtown Asbury Park, at night, came to shine.  We visited several places that served good beer and good food.  Srdjan, being a foodie (besides his wife, Annette, being a 5-star restaurant chef) knows the who is who of the local gastronomy scene. At the first place we went, the owner was still in the midst of opening the establishment.  The official outside banner had not, yet, been propped.  In its stead, a plastic tarp hung with the logo of the place.  The owner came out to shake hands with Srdjan.  Then he tucked himself behind the swinging door of the kitchen, just to come out 5 minutes later with a large oval plate with a heaping pile of smoked meat.  He dropped the plate on the bar in the middle of our seven-member party and welcomed us to a treat on the house.  The hospitality!  The meat turned out to be short-rib meat smoked for sixteen hours straight.  Succulent is an adjective that falls short of how delicious this meat just was.

We kept hopping door-to-door in a whirlwind of beer, meat, conversations, faces, laughs.  Whenever our pint glasses were reaching bottoms, Srdjan would raise his both arms and point his fingers towards the door.  It all became a blur.  In my inebriated state it became very difficult to process this quantity of information.  I cannot recall names of establishments, but perhaps one or two.  It all became some euphoric nirvana.  I just remember that the overall feeling was very cozy, with hipster characters surrounding us.  I did not feel threatened at any point in time, something that is an easy pitfall of any town's night scene.   Instead, we painted the night with craft, draught beer like Chimay and Stone IPA.  Asbury Park has all the makings of awesome.


We closed the party at Bond Street Bar.  I should have mentioned that Srdjan had bragged about the burger at this place, earlier.  He called it the best burger in the World.  He also stated that Annette, with all her culinary knowledge and prowess, loves this burger more than many.  I thought he built it up too much.  The truth is: he couldn't build it up enough.  When Srdjan mentioned to the bartender that we were looking for some burgers, the bartender said the kitchen is closed.  Almost contiguously, the chef came out of the kitchen, recognized Srdjan and came to shake hands with him.  He did not want to hear it, he quickly went back and cooked us the best burgers that I had in a long time.  Sincerely, very few burgers compare to what this guy cooks. A patty of quality beef and perfect seasoning is smothered in cheese and mushrooms.  I just made my mouth water typing this paragraph.
Jacinta and I kept our own conversation by the bar as the rest of the group played some shuffleboard.  What a perfect way to wrap up our party.

Back at Srdjan's place, Paul and I picked up the guitars.  Srdjan took the tambourine.  We strummed some classic tunes for a bit.  I was too drunk to carry on, so Paul had the torch.  Good times.

I wanted to see the sunrise.  Srdjan said he will walk Moby, before 9AM because no dogs are allowed at that time, onward.  I made a promise that I would join him.

------


In the morning, I failed the keep my promise.  Surprise, surprise!  The beds were very comfortable and we slept in.  I went downstairs and drank 5 glasses of water trying to get back to my senses.  The house was quiet.  Little did I know that the Serbian contingent had already left for coffee.

That day we were joined by Annette and the lovely Mia, their daughter.  We hit the beach right away.  Much to my (and apparently, everyone else's) surprise, this beach is splendid! 

Our biggest regret of the weekend was to not bring the camera or to walk around with our iPhones, to be able to take photos.

At the beach, Paul began telling us the tales of this town.  It seems that, chronologically, Asbury Park went from being a ritzy weekend destination, pumped with attractions, to being an abandoned lot that opportunistic rock-and-rollers sought to raise noise, to just being an abandoned plot, then to (again) being a wonderful weekend spot.  This chronology, evidently, spans multiple decades.

Walking around the boardwalk in daylight, it is still evident that this town has seen some low times.  Most of the places on the boardwalk are sporting their fresh coats of paint, but there are still some flagships in town that paint a different picture.  The outer shell of the casino is still so horridly dilapidated that the Casino itself looks like it's feeling out of place and wants to just pick up and walk away from it all.  The Convention Center is halfway renovated, but its walls still tell tales of sumptuousness, decadence, atrophy, then putrescence. 

Srdjan explained some of the struggles that the new developers have with the town and its government.  Local corruption is only a speculation on my part, but one that Jersey is quite comfortable with. 

Paul later showed us pictures of Asbury Park from seven years ago.  I asked him for copies.  It is not recognizable.  The decrepit buildings offer a post-apocalyptic impression, to the extent that it's laughable.  It just didn't belong on a U.S. coast.  The lonesome boardwalk longed for the merry shuffle of some flip-flops.  It was a Sunday and Paul and Marcia were the only people there.

Coming back to our Sunday, we turned ourselves into kids in some tall waves, then caught a bite and a PBR with Srdjan at a bar that opened inside of the Convention Center.  We tried to get into the Watermark, the Wonder Bar, and they both had private parties.  Later, Srdjan found out that the Boss had played an impromptu 45-minute set at the Wonder Bar that night.  Wretched fate!

We ended up at an opening of a beer hall, right behind Stone Pony.  It is called Porta National Park.  Annette and Mia also re-joined us there after Mia's nap, and we met some more of their local friends.  The place has bocce ball and they just installed two brick ovens so they were serving free pizza to all the tables.  We washed it down with some Sam Adams Summer Ale and the girls played bocce.  We welcomed the evening there, by listening to a blues jam band bust out some of Jimi's finest tunes, and drinking and conversing with all the friends, new and old.

We closed our weekend by going for another BSB burger, and then some gelato. 

I think Jacinta summed it up the best, while we were at the beach, when she said: "I feel like we went away somewhere, for a weekend vacation!"  It is true.  At just an hour away, Asbury Park takes you many, many miles further, and you let loose.

We can't wait to go back.

I also wish I brought G here instead of Coney Island.  Oh well, we know for next time someone is visiting.

It's about plankin' time!

I broke down and got meself a blog.

After many discussions with other interesting bloggers, such as my friend Raam, my interest kept growing.  Perhaps more for the reasons of solidifying my life's and thoughts' posterity than a mere thought that someone out there in The Cloud could potentially find my blabber remotely interesting.  Intently self-induced flashbacks can be more appealing than those incidental ones.

After all that, the fun events of this past weekend pushed me to document a few wedges of this pie of events.

Let me tell you a bit about all that...

It all started with my cousin Dragan coming to visit me from Louisville, KY.  He flew into LGA about 6 hours delayed (courtesy of American Airlines, but that's another story of itself).  As soon as we picked him up, we dropped J off at home and the two of us hit the town.  It started off by drinking at Fat Cat.  It ended by drinking at Fat Cat.  We drowned our airline anguish in some Allagash Tripel.  Listened to two jazz quartets, and some randoms.  Played a bit of ping-pong, drank some more Tripel.  Got wasted quickly.  On our way to get some falafel, we couldn't help but notice this mannequin in a store window, that displayed disturbingly disproportionate nipples, so a picture was in order. 

We closed the night by relaxing at Fat Cat until the buzz wore off, then finally made it back to Jersey City around 4AM.



The next day it took us a while to get up, but we started off with a long walk into Liberty State Park.  Jacinta was at work and we walked to sweat out the hangover.  G posed for some digital memories.

It's amazing what an iPhone camera can do.  So we drank a few beers and ate lunch in JC, then headed off to Williamsburg.  We were to hang out until Jacinta came out of work, and then we were all to go to some music venues.  We passed the Brooklyn Brewery.

G said I resembled a "retarded squirrel".  I told him that it's by design.  Traces of alcohol effects are notable on both of our faces, of course.
We pounded a few brews around W-burg before J came to meet us.  Then we all ate, did a shot, and headed to watch some bands in a quasi-underground venue, curated for all of us by Todd P (if you've never been to one of his parties, you are missing out).  The abandoned warehouse did not breathe well, so after a half an hour, the place smelled like humanity.  The bands rocked it, I believe Beach House was one of them.  I also believe it was the lead singer of Beach House that said "It is like performing a gig in a sauna!"
The abundance of sweat, whether from your own body or someone else's, as well as the fact that it felt like the average age was half of ours, we left the Burg and headed back into the Village.  Caught some blues acts, got more falafel and headed home to devour it.

This is where all the true trouble of this weekend begins.
Namely, on our way home, in the cab... the screen in the cab showed a bit from Jimmy Kimmel Live, where Rosario Dawson did an impromptu plank on Kimmel's desk.  My cohorts, not knowing what it was all about, required my Meme expertise to do a thorough explanation of it (*brush shoulder*).  We all started falling asleep in the cab.

After we got home and refueled with the marvels of the garbanzo bean, all of us got a good boost of energy.  Jacinta got it in her head that she wanted to plank (don't forget she just learned the term all of 20 minutes ago, that is how awesome the mindfuck effect of the cognizance of the plank is).

Instantly, without much hesitation all three of us got into our own separate mind trips of where, in the house, the best plank would be.  I thought the loveseat was a formidable opponent, J thought the combination of the two sofas gave for a more interesting spot, and G... well... G... hhhmmmm.
Now, I don't know how exactly to explain this, but G got it in his head that the perfect plank involved the actor to make effective use of their face, for the said plank, instead of another more convenient part of the upper body.  The result caused much amusement, as one may expect.  See for yourself...

 WTF?

That cannot be comfortable!

This is my attempt:

 And J's:

  

G, then, observing the potential comfort of the sofa, agreed that he should make an attempt there as well.

 

WTF WITH THE FACE AGAIN, FFS???  You look like an angry gopher, trying to dig into the couch.

 

 Epic fail.

That might just be the complete opposite of a plank.


Here is J on the bar stool:

That concluded Saturday night, actually at 6AM Sunday morning.  We woke up really late Sunday and Jacinta did not have to go to work.  We were up for more live music.  However, it was sunset before we even got ready to go.  Here is a pic (iPhone again... amazing!)

Our favorite Italian restaurant in the Village, Malatesta, had just opened a second, "sister" joint called Malaparte.  We ordered pizza and seafood pasta there.  The overall feel of the restaurant, including the food, fell just short of its big brother.  Oh well...  We headed into the Bitter End to watch some acts.  I never thought I would say this, but I saw the best ever keytar player that night: Mr. Delmar Brown.  This cat was an entertainer in his blood.  If George Clinton, Jimi Hendrix, and James Brown had a kid, it still wouldn't have been as cool as Delmar Brown.  

Bitter End then opened the night to an open jam.  If you've never seen that open jam, it is lead by Mark Greenberg, and I highly recommend it.  Some real talent shows up there.  If there were only a way they could keep the enthusiasts (who want to use the jam band as their own backyard karaoke) off the stage, it would be even more enjoyable.  But that's just some of my own rant there. 

Back to the good stuff... after Bitter End, the planking bug bites again.  It's like an instant euphoria that engulfs you and reverts you back to an infant stage.  This time it hits us right on Bleecker Street.  Here are some captures.

I think G completely redeemed himself with this photo above.  It's just epic.  He's perfectly parallel to the stairs and the colors just came out beautifully.  Also sporting the cool new kickers acquired earlier.  I think the planking Gods wanted to give him his chance of redemption, for last night.

Another night that ends after 5AM.

Besides my cousin visiting for the weekend, it was also the last weekend our buddy Choo was in town.  He's leaving us for greener pastures (literally, bumfuck Wyoming), and we were all a little down about it.  We spent the day in Coney Island (bad choice - hotdog eating contest on 4th July).  

At night, we made another run for the city.  This time we were to conquer LES.  It became quickly evident that live gigs were not so popular on the same eve that the largest Fireworks Show is.  Struggling to find live acts, we strutted our way down to Arlene's Grocery.  It is one of my favorite places around.  Always good music, always good beer and bourbon, and never a dull moment.  We caught the butt end of some band from down south's gig.  They rocked it.  Then, much to my surprise, we got to see the Arlene's Famous Rock and Roll Karaoke.  Some of us contemplated signing up, and I am glad we didn't.  Incredible singers lined themselves up on stage one after another, singing R'n'R classics that we could all sing along.  I was appalled at the amount of talent around.  

However, towards the end of the show, that itching got my legs twitching again, and quicker than I could believe myself, I found my body propped up on top of the back rests of two bar stools.

My co-conspirators saw immediately what time it was and wasted no time in pulling their snappy phones and cameras:

Dragan agreed that it was a really good spot, and he got a better shot - immortalizing Arlene's Grocery in our memories:

The funny part was that I don't think anyone in the joint even noticed us planking in the middle of it.  

Now the interesting part begins.  We have a new recruit!  Choo is joining us in our infantile endeavors and he must be broken in.  He begins by rejecting the idea at Arlene's, but curiosity was oozing out of his eyes.  We could smell the blood.  However, a celebration of the planks was in order, so here is a nice mugshot.  Jacinta snapped it so she is not in the pic.

It almost looks like a random girl in a bikini is hanging out with us.

It didn't take anything for Choo to fall prey to the magic of the plank.  As soon as we exited the joint, we started talking him into planking a newspaper box.  Choo replies "No, I wanna plank the chair", pointing somewhere across the street.  Surely enough, there is a random office chair in the middle of Ludlow Street.  So there he went...

From that point on, our planking onslaught took charge through LES, East Village and who knows where else.  We loaded ourselves with enough bourbon, beer, and vodka-seltzer that it all became one, big, suspended blur.

Here is some of what all we could capture.

Choo?   On a TV set in the garbage?  Epic, IMHO.

 Well at least he's not using his forehead.


Double- and triple-planks! 

 An assisted plank is still a plank!  If you notice, that's pretty high for her, it is above the height of my head!

  

After this admirable feat of Dragan's to climb up to the traffic signs, two guys noticed us and one of them queries: "Are you guys planking???"  Nothing like meeting strangers over some common ground, at 2AM, while completely wasted. We talked our new friend into joining us for a good plank like that.  Here is his attempt. 

  

 

 Good job, brother.

Finally, after all this nonsense, we could not end the weekend without attempting the plank of Choo on top of my and G's heads.  That didn't work out quite well, but here is a capture of the attempt.

 

Well there it is.  It's hard to recover from all the liquor and all the bruises from planking (I am seriously too old for this shit).  

Now you know how to plank around NYC.  Let me see your planks!