Hors d'oeuvres gone wild

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I’ve been taking Argentine tango classes for the last two months or so, but due to my schedule (and general cowardice towards dancing badly in public), I haven’t made it out dancing yet. But last night that changed.

I went to the Cafe Buenos Aires last night for tango dancing. They have a live band playing Argentine tango music every Wednesday night from 7ish until 10, and there’s recorded music after that.

When I got there, around 9:30, the restaurant was nearly full, with three couples dancing in front of the band. I wandered around to the back room, where I found a long table with several people I knew from the classes I’ve been taking, and sat down at the end. On my left was a woman in her thirties who I had danced with in the beginning class earlier and who had urged me to come. On my right was a younger woman who I didn’t know.

Further to my right, an olive skinned man with close cropped hair who I recognized as one of the higher-level dancers who occasionally helps in the beginning classes was being familiarly teased about the women soon to be throwing themselves at him, now that he’s a bartender. The woman on my left (unfortunately, I don’t remember her name) explained that Al, the guy to her left, owned a topless bar up on the Mesa.

I looked over at Al. He’s quite clean-cut, about my size, and wears large black Buddy Holly-style glasses. A few tatoos and a greedy glint short of my mental image of a strip club owner, but I suppose it takes all sorts.

“A few times,” the woman continued, “he’s done a tango night there. We called it ‘Topless Tango’”

“Neat,” I said. When at a loss for words, I revert to unthreatening retro slang.

I tried to imagine how that would work. Did the strippers know how to tango dance, or did the dancers let it all hang out? Or maybe the club was closed, and the space was just used.

“Topless.” She clarified.

Yep, I thought, I got it. Topless. As in without tops, titbare, light heart and funbag free.

“Tapas.” She enunciated. “A tapas bar. Tapas Tango. Sometimes it’s mistaken for ‘topless.’”

“Ah, yes,” I chuckled as we both pondered the humor of such a hypothetical situation.

Any humorous misunderstandings you’d like to share?

2

Toppless tango, thats a mindbogling thing to imagine! It so happens that one of the girls here where I live do dance tango twice a week, but I do not see the possibility to suggest the topic without a slap in the face. Hm, what to do, what to do.

But, heres my share of, well not exatly a misunderstanding, but more a flip of the speach central in the brain. A while there were some scientists from Ireland over here working on population genetics on some fish, and we happened to be standing on the pier waiting for the research vessel to come in and get us for a trip on the fjord, getting some of these fish. As we stood there a lot jellyfish were floating by, and they were of this big kind known for punching a good sting if you touch them. We call them “brennmanet” (or Cyanea capillata for those of you who want to look it up), which means something like “burning jellyfish”. But standing there talking about this I could not in my mind remember what this was called in english, so I blurted out “that we have a lot burning manatees this time of year”, only two seconds later realising what I actually said. The Irish folk just looked at me strangely, and I just kept pointing at the jellyfish.

3

My supervisor, tho having lived on Long Island for the last 20 plus years, still has a strong Bostonian accent. One day, when I told her I would be by the beach for a mini vaca, she asked me to bring her any hot stones I might find, as she collects them. “But won’t they have cooled down by the time I bring them to you?” “No, hot! hot shaped! like the boxes of chocolate on Valentine’s Day”…

4

I’ll just ad that I have met Al and been to Alcazar, that tapas place on the Mesa. He’s an aquaintence of my ex-wife and a damn nice guy. I’ve also been to Cafe Buenos Aires for dinner and have seen the tango night a couple of times. Maybe I’ve even watched you.

5

Unless you were there last night, you haven’t seen me. It was my first time there. But I intend to make a regular showing of it from now on, so maybe we’ll run into each other some other time.

6

When I first moved to Ireland, a girl at work was asking me whether I’d watched “Eeyore” last night. I presumed it was a Winnie-the-Pooh spin-off. Only after she mentioned George Clooney did I realise she was talking about ER.

7

When I was in college, a friend of mine had a roommate who was from Israel. One day, the roommate asked me if I knew how to get to the Singing Bitch.

Huh. No.

“Singing Bitch! Singing Bitch! I want to go to ocean.”

Took me a few minutes, but I did eventually realize that she meant Singing Beach.

8

“Dude. My cousin, you know… the hot one?”
“Sure.”
“She just quit her job in HRT and move dover to KFC.”
“Err… what?”
“What?”
“She quit a job in HRT to join Kentucky Fried Chicken?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“What the fuck does KFC need HRT for?”
“Why wouldn’t they?”
“Dude are you stoned? Why would KFC need someone who specializes in Hormone Replacement Theapy?”
“Not HRT you moron, HRD! Human resource development!”
“Oh. Well, duh.”

9

Heh. Up here in NH/VT I sometimes get confused when people mention a “birthday potty”. :eek: Also, I was at my quilt guild once and someone mentioned “ot” lights. I wasn’t clear for a little while whether they meant art lights or the brand Ott lights.