Things that might be decidedly odd…

NC Update

My trip so far in North Carolina has been fun. I went out to Patio Loco with many of my friends for a birthday dinner which was followed by some excellent pie at Sarah and Jason’s. Afterwards, a few of us went over to the Speakeasy in downtown Carrboro for a couple more beers to finish off the night. I spent most of Friday shopping. The Ross stores in the Triangle are so much better than in Seattle or California! I got a pair of shoes there for $30 that would normally be $60. I also did some shopping at the Briar Creek Target (one of the best Targets around) and over at Southpoint Mall in Durham. Friday night I had some takeout for dinner with Brad and Aaron at their place in Durham. After that, I went back to Jason and Sarah’s to watch some TV with Jeff T, Paul and Russ too.

This morning, I went over to Durham to have dim sum with Steve and Steve. We went to a place called ChinaOne (I think) over off NC55. I’d never had dim sum before and definitely enjoyed myself. After returning from lunch with the Steves, Jason and Sarah left to go to the outer banks. On a whim, I decided I still had enough time to drive to the beach today. Hence, I left around 2pm and was on the beach (North Topsail) by about 5pm. Travel time included a stop at one of those heinous beach stores to buy a beach towel and pair of boardshorts since I hadn’t brought either with me. It was actually a pretty nice time to go–not too hot or too much direct sunlight but the air was still warm. The water was probably in the high 70s which was also very comfortable. After about an hour and a half of being there, I decided it was time to go and drove into Wilmington.

Originally, I’d intended to return to the Triangle tonight after the beach, but I figured I’d just stay in Wilmington and check the place out. There’s a gay dance club called Ibiza in the historic downtown that I’m going to check out tonight. Hopefully, it’ll be fun…

Friday Night, Saturday Morning

Last night I went to see Quinceañera at the Egyptian with some people from work. The movie was cute, although not exactly groundbreaking. Still, I liked it, especially the concept of finding acceptance in a family within a family. Plus, Jesse Garcia’s character was pretty hot. Anyhow, afterwards nobody really wanted to go to the clubs or bars, so we all went our separate ways home. I called up Robert and ended up meeting him and his friend Cliff out at Purr some time just past midnight. After spending some time there, we went over R Place right as it was closing. We must have bought our drinks right at last call because as soon as we’d bought them, the staff starting pushing people out the door. Oh well, at least my drink there was cheaper than at Purr. From there, we went to the Cuff where we ran into some other folks. By the time we left, it was pretty late. The music had stopped and the lights came on, which happens comparatively late at the Cuff.

This morning I dragged myself out of bed to go to Frontrunners. Despite not having new shoes, I managed with the old ones for yet another run (sigh). I ran with Brent, who tends to go at a slightly faster pace than I’m used to. It was a good workout though. After that I went home, got cleaned up, did some laundry and then headed out to Madison Park Beach to meet up with Shepherd and Keenan. It was a beautiful day at the beach to say the least! Sunny, warm, perfect basically. The water was still cool and refreshing too. Eventually, a bunch of Keenan’s friends showed up and we all talked for a while. I also ran into Jeff, Steven and their gang and chatted with them a couple of times too.

All in all a lovely Saturday afternoon!

Sunny Saturday

Amazingly, I got up at 8:20am in order to make Frontrunners this morning. I’d been up until around 4am fiddling with my computer. I got all the software installed to RAS (remote access) into work, although the connection manager refused to recognize the smart card reader. I’ll need to look into it further at some point. Still, I was a bit sleepy for running this morning, but I still completed the three miles around the lake and had a nice time socializing afterwards.

I then went home to regroup and take a nap before meeting up wiht Jeff at Madison Park Beach. It was a beautiful day there–sunny, warm and again full of gay eye candy. I went for a dip briefly right before we left to grab dinner back up on the hill. Jeff and I got to talk a lot, which was really enjoyable. Hopefully, I’ll be able to hang out with him tomorrow after th OV hike to Lake Dorothy in the morning.

At this point, I’m pretty worn out and it’s only about 7pm on Saturday! Maybe I’ll rest up and see if anybody’s up to anything tonight.

Sunday at the Beach

I met up with Larry, Terry, Billy and Issac for brunch on Sunday morning at Martin’s. As usual, the food was good but the service was very slow. After eating, several of us decided it would be a good day for the beach. I went home to change and pick up beach necessities like sunblock before meeting up with the guys at Madison Park Beach on Lake Washington. It was a beautiful day to be out in the sun and splashing in the water.

The beach isn’t terribly large–basically a strip of grass against the shore of the lake. The northern third or so was almost entirely filled with gay men (i.e., guys wearing speedos). Clearly, this was the place to be on a sunny Sunday afternoon. We stuck around for about 2 hours or so, swimming around in the water, watching the ducks and of course watching guys in skimpy swimsuits. All in all a very nice activity for a beautiful day.

I got a couple of pictures. The day was clear enough to see Rainier:

At some point, these ducks came by ostensibly looking for food:

There was also a floating dock out in the middle of the swimming area with some diving boards:

I went out there at one point and jumped off. There were a number of people swimming laps towards the back end of the swimming area. I might try that out some time in the future. Apparently, it’s about 120 yards long and of course open water with small waves from passing boats.