Ask and ye shall receive

That's my friend Kate (and me, of course). Kate and I have been neighbors for a year, but only recently have we begun to forge a friendship. Sure we'd say hello outside or check on each other when the power went out, but that was about it. We started playing squash together, and watching movies, and going to parties, and this friendship came just a few weeks after The Huz and I had been complaining about how hard it is to make really solid friends after you move to a new place (especially in a transient place like a college town).

Kate had a little barbeque for the 4th of July, and we got a chance to be around a bunch of her friends. The people were so nice and fun and intellectual (Kate's a Ph.D. student in art history, and so many of her friends are artists and grad students), and spending time with them was effortless. Then a couple of weeks later they threw a birthday party for Kate, and we had even more fun than we did at the barbeque. Soon after that was when Kate and I started playing together more, and our comfort level with each other increased exponentially every day.

A couple that attended the barbeque, Lauren and Jordan, hosted Kate's birthday party, and they reminded me of how much I love having couple friends. It's so hard to find 4 people that all like each other and have fun together, but when it happens, well there are few things that beat it. Unfortunately, Kate's birthday party was also a going away party for Lauren and Jordan since they were moving about an hour away that same week. But yesterday was Lauren's 30th birthday, so a group of us drove up to their new place for a fun dinner and then dancing at a club.

Up on the stage there was some game going on where you'd throw a ping pong ball into a bucket, and several in our group got in line to play. I bet 10 people tried to do it but then Lauren was up, and the game had been dragging on and occupying the stage, so the guy running the game pretended like Lauren made the bucket, and oh the celebration. She got a bottle of champagne and a feather boa and a little attention from a male dancer that clearly had no problems in the self esteem department. Want to see?