Manlio Rules

Penn station around christmas time is a terrible way to arrive in New York City, especially when you’ve got lots of luggage, and i did.

on the plus side, there were plenty of cabs (are you listening San Francisco? cabs are useful! i hope you asked santa for some).

I arrived at Derek and Mary’s apt and met Scott. this is the place:

yeah i know. nice, right? thanks guys for letting me stay there, sorry i threw all those candy bars in your dryer. i’m a terrible person.

thursday night i met up with Alex Naro and crew, and went out to sammy’s noodles for a great dinner. then i dball stalked stephen and got to meet his new girlfriend in bburg, before staying up all night playing the Wii with scott. Wii = awesome. i will have one soon.

Friday i met neil and matt at 12:30 for a little lunch, which ended up being somewhere i don’t remember, but i think it was good. then we wandered around the city for an hour or so. one thing i’m not used to anymore? walking everywhere. my feet are killing me and my toe hurts (that’s probably more from the booze than the walking). we ended up down at Lotus Lounge, where we ran into Luke and Lyandra, not uncommon since Lyandra seems to pretty much live there.

So, then i went to brie’s house for a little dinner party. it was delicous, and super classy, as evidenced by the table setting:

from there i went to see Gabe’s show.

it was great, i’m not a huge folk country fan, but this stuff i like. then we went to Bouche bar, which i’d never been to before, but is a very underappreciated little spot on 5th between a and b, a little down from ace bar. we tried ace bar first, but it was douchetastically crowded by the doucheoise. terrible. we drank till i hit my wall at around 2:30, and had to get the hell home.

saturday morning i met nicole (ok, so it was 1PM, i guess that’s technically saturday afternoon), and we wandered around the city most of the day, meeting up with Katie for a bit before meeting Michael, Neil, and Matt for dinner. Scott caught us a little later and we headed over to hangar bar to see the penn girls club,

who were all a few sheets to the wind, especially lyandra, who was wearing fall down shoes yet somehow managed to not fall down, at least not that i could see. after they all went to Crif dogs, we headed to Bouche bar for one more drink. ran out of steam around 3.

Sunday i woke up and called Jody for a little UES breakfast. Jody’s new apartment is sensational, and i convinced him not to go clean his old one before moving out. i uh, hope that worked out. raced back home and put together my DJ set list for the gig that night. This is the original untouched setlist:

1. Hours – TV on the Radio
2. This Modern Love – Bloc party
3. Comfortably Numb – Scissor Sisters
4. Boy from School – Hot Chip
5. Let’s make Love – CSS
6. Close to Me – The Cure
7. Lazy Eye – Silversun Pickups
8. Title and Registration – Death Cab
9. The bleeding heart show – New Pornographers
10. Higher and Higher – Jackie Wilson
11. When you were Young – The Killers
12. Mr. November – The National
13. Monkey Gone to Heaven – Pixies
14. Pour some Sugar on Me – Def Leppard
15. Maps – Yeah Yeah Yeahs

I thought this was a great list. what i actually played left out 8, 9, and 15, moved 13 up to the top, and added a ton of other stuff like Blondie, more CSS, Billy Idol, the Arcade Fire, Gnarls Barkley and a bunch of other stuff i can’t remember.

so i burned me some CD’s got all dressed up like a rockstar, and headed down to Park Slope to meet Alex, Karen, Matt, Freya, and Kevin for Hibachi dinner.

Hibachi dinner? awesome. where else is there this much fire??

we went for 4-6 on catching food in our mouths.

So we hit union hall at about 8:30, and it takes us awhile to figure out how the system works, but we get it going and Karen gets on the tables around 9:30. She played a great set, but most people hadn’t shown up yet, which is their loss, losers. I got on at about 10:45, and immediately discovered 2 things about DJing

1. it seems to make you about 400% hotter to women.
2. Most of the people who come up to talk to you are annoying.
3. if you think your set will go the way you planned, you’re kidding yourself.

thats not to say that all of them are. 23 year-old Hofstra film school graduate working for MTV, your unconditional support and encouragement was the best part of the DJ process.

oh, and woman who wanted me to play “just like heaven”? i’m sorry, it turns out no one had it. apologies.

and just for fun, here are some random conversation quotes from the booth:

woman: what kind of stuff do you play?
me: umm… i dunno, indie electronic rock?
her: what about 80’s?
me: uh, maybe.
(she goes through my ipod)
her: do you have any New Order?
me: no
her: how can you say you spin 80’s and not have any new order?
me: I didn’t actually say that i spun 80’s
her: well, someone said it.
me: yeah, that was you.

——————–

brit woman: thank you so much, you’re saving my night
me: uh… thanks
her: i can’t find anyone who plays the pixies around here
…
(the hour goes by and she comes back about 5 times. we chat about shows, music etc… then, near the end of my set)
her: what are you playing next?
me: Def Leppard
her: seriously?
me: yeah, and i like Journey too

at which point she exited stage left and was never seen again.

————————-

woman: I want something to dance to. do you have any Jeff Buckley?

————————–

guy: do you have any CSS?
me: this is CSS.
guy: oh. well, can you play alala?

————————–

after I got off the tables Alex and Kevin put on great sets,

I got hit in the head with a coyote by a drunk dancing girl, Nikki apparently got punched in the face (and if anyone saw what the hell happened there, i’d love to know who did that, i have a bone to pick with them, as does Stephen),

Marisa and Karen made out with the coyotes,

Jocelyn almost got me to wear the lampshade on my head,

Briehan, Maureen, Megan and crew rolled in and hopefully had fun (sorry i didn’t see you guys much),

Theresa made a cameo with her friend who once saw my apt and thought i lived like a pig, which i immediately brought up (classy).

and then there was the general party craziness

and we finally closed the place down at 3:30 with a little geese of beverly rose.

if you’ll remember, back in May i put up a list ranking all my NYC New Years. Even though it’s recent, i think i can safely say that this one is the new reigning champion. soooo much fun!

and this morning i woke up, packed, and generally felt like a rockstar. i miss New York, and it was super great to see everyone. i can’t believe i have to work tomorrow.

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