Holding Steady in Birmingham, AL

So, I’m sitting on a couch that’s covered in pillows and blankets that were used this morning during the few hours of sleep I managed after 5am.  I think the weekend messed up my ability to sleep like a normal human being or maybe it just messed me up.

Either way, it’s over.  I’m now in Columbus, Ohio.  There’s an upcoming wedding.  I have little to say about it or Columbus or about anything in general, but there was the weekend, the weekend where Hector and I flew from Denver, CO to Birmingham, AL to see The Hold Steady.  Like we’re a couple of college kids. Like we don’t even remotely know how to act like adults.

Did anything amazing or life-altering happen?  Nope.  We pretty much just drank too much, saw a sweet show, and met some new friends.  So what’s the point?  I don’t know.  I’m really really tired and thought maybe I’d do a public service announcement kind of deal about Birmingham.  The announcement is real simple:  Birmingham is actually pretty cool.

The trip started Friday afternoon.  We arrived in the afternoon, took a cab to a hotel on the south side of town.  Our cab driver mumbled to the point of complete incoherence, but got us there.  We then ate our Doubletree chocolate chip cookies, washed down with Knob Creek and Diet Coke.  After that, it went like this…

We walked up a giant hill to Dave’s Pub, met Kim, our bartender.  She said, “Ya’ll are from Colorado.  You must like good beer.”  She was right.   She recommended some Rye IPA thingamajig from Georgia.  It was splendid.  I followed with a Pecan Nut Brown Ale, another southern treat.  We had a couple more, till maybe 6pm (if we were lucky).

The rest of the night… J. Clyde (wonderful beer selection, decent food, a nice gent named Jerry), back to Dave’s pub, and then ??? followed by ??? followed by some Greek food followed by Captain Lou sending some wildly inappropriate, homo-erotic text message followed by sleep.

The next morning started around noon at the Original Pancake House.  We went on a trek to find Vulcan, god of steel and fire.  The trek was up an even larger hill.  I was wearing jeans and it was stupid hot.  We made two wrong turns, one up a private drive, the other down a forested, country lane.  We eventually got to the statue, up it, down it; is it just me, or are southerners all afraid of heights?

After that, we bought kazoos.  Hector’s was yellow.  Mine was green.

We napped and half watched the Alabama vs. Arkansas game.  Then it was time for dinner.  We headed to a BBQ place that was closed.  Fortunately for us, a young, stout man named Forrest was able to recommend another BBQ place and ultimately pointed us towards this highly enjoyable Fish Market where I had tasty fried okra, Cajun treats, and Greek beer.

The show followed at the WorkPlay Soundstage, a small, intimate venue that seems newly updated, modern, and trendy (another place where the bartenders were super cool).

I’ll just say a certain, retarded number of Vodka Sodas were consumed and then I’ll skip to dumbest thing I did all weekend.

It was about halfway through The Hold Steady’s performance.  My dream of getting on stage and playing my kazoo was waning; we were too far back (though not that far at all).  I got a brilliant idea:  I’ll throw my kazoo on the stage.  I looked for security (actually, this is a lie; that thought never once crossed my mind), then waited until there was enough room on the stage to avoid any harmful incident.  I chucked it.  It landed between Craig and Tad, bounced into an amp, and rolled in front of the drums.  A roadie spotted it immediately, threw it away.  I was sad and embarrassed.  My kazoo was gone.  End of story.

The next day, as Hector gave me his (because he can’t play it, ha ha), he asked why I did it.  I said, “Because I thought they might want to play it.”  You can’t imagine the laughs this response produced.

Anyway, the rest of the concert night was more of the same–stumbling up and down hills, some drinks, much more food.  (If you want to read how the concert went, there’s a more lucid account here.)  We went to sleep at some point.  Then, as we were about to head to the airport the next morning, we had our final weirdass run in with a Mr. Loury (misspelled slightly to protect).  He wore gray suit pants, a black, NFL t-shirt that draped over a 75″ gut (I presume).  He snarled and cussed but in a friendly, jovial sort of manner.  He said something about the rain, his convertible in the rain (later he had no car?), and then he offered us a catfish.

Let’s let that one sink in… Literally, after one, 10-second elevator ride and a nonsense comment about his car, he offered us what?  A catfish.  I just can’t imagine what would’ve happened had we taken him up on this offer.

Anyway, he then went on to bad-mouth Springsteen, hip-hop, Bush, a ton of other things.  We had 15 conversations in the span of 5 minutes whereby Hector and I said little to nothing.   He gave us business cards and then our little shuttle took as away.  And that was about it for the trip, unless you want to hear about the airport… I’m pretty sure you don’t.

Again, the point of all this:  Birmingham is pretty cool.  And yes, I realize if I ended there I’d be making a statement more likely made by some childish college kid, so I should step it up a notch…  But who am I kidding?  That’s good enough.

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