First Friday

It would be embarrassing to say that I'm buzzed from four tablespoon-sized cups of wine, so I'll say it's the excitement of having something to do with a new friend tonight.

My new work friend Fran and I went to the art museum for their First Friday activities. Wine tasting, snacks, cash bar, a jazzy country band, and art. I invited her to go because we had recently talked about the special photography exhibits that were about to close at the museum: Ansel Adams and William Wegman. We wandered the halls (the building and grounds are extraordinarily beautiful; the regular art collection merely so-so) and tried to carry on a conversation as the band's danceable music and loud voices of other people bounced off the tile floors. Terrible acoustics, there.

It was a neat event. I might have appreciated it in and of itself had my mind not currently been filled with Chicago again, so I compared it to the First Friday art openings I had been to there, and it was, well, very different. In Chicago, I could have indulged in more wine, because I wouldn't have to worry about driving home. And after the galleries closed, my friends and I would have spent many minutes narrowing down the choices of what to do next.

There are too many obstacles here: I considered inviting Fran to come over because we both enjoyed one of the proseccos at the tasting, and we could have gotten a bottle at Fresh Market, but then how would she have gotten herself home after we polished off a bottle together? And also, I need to clean the apartment because the MIL is arriving any minute.

But, I am making a new friend, and that's the most important part.