it's a mustache new year

this year marked the second attempt at a mustache new year's party. this time we got near full participation, as you can see. some of us were man enough to grow there own, for the rest of us we had bandits, smartys and scoundrels. not only did they mustaches add a distinguished air to our personas, they also made the festivities that much more festive.

guess who's mustache.

christmas eve 2006

every year on christmas eve the knott family joins the hughes and skaggs family for dinner. this is one of my favorite traditions and we always have a great time. i've uploaded the individual family photos for the enjoyment of the growing number of people participating in this event.

the hughes family
the knott family
the skaggs family

Update: the bigger pics are up on the links.

holiday bon soiree

look at us! we are adorable when we get all cleaned up and ready to attend the holiday bash of the season. then, of course, we get our grubby little hands on the gingerbread men/stars of david and chocolate chip cookies and things get a little silly.

then we get our hands on the eggnog, manhattans, and coors king cans...and things get a little messy.

wow. what a party. thanks go to adrianne for the delicious gingerbread men, and a big thanks go to mark and sara for hosting.

party crash!

adrianne scored two tickets to cablevision's "holiday rock & roll bash 6" last night. this was the cablevision company holiday party and they go all out for their party. and adrianne and i were glad to take advantage of james dolan's largesse.

upon entering the b.b. king blues club in times square we checked our coats and immediately hit the open bar for beers and glenlivet. hell yeah free glenlivet! we then walked over to get our picture taken with a couple of rockettes (above), awesome. we got in line for the dinner buffet and piled our plates with mac and cheese, salmon, and fillet. after finishing dinner a group of 14 rockettes walked out and performed a short routine with high kicks and all. rad!

we then started through the crowd in front of the stage when i saw isiah thomas! i got a picture of him and me that will be uploaded later. we continued through the party, hit the bar again, got a second picture with the rockettes, ran into james dolan and got a picture with him and his wife. then it was off to the dessert buffet where we helped ourselves to a variety of treats.

after deciding it was time to go we headed off to the coat check where we were given gift bags that included a shoulder bag and insulated coffee cup. hell yeah swag! what a great night. thanks, adri.

Update: here's that photo of me and isiah.

this is halloween, this is halloween...

another year has gone by and halloween is here again. i love halloween. besides being a great excuse to eat a bunch of candy, i like the whole process of putting together a costume. adrianne and i came up with the idea for our costume back in may when we took a peter pan bus home from maryland. after scouring the city for cheap costume parts over the past few weeks, we put everything together on thursday night. then last night the day finally came to show off our costumes. as you can see, harrison is a businessman, adrianne is tinkerbell and i'm peter pan. i think we did a pretty good job. we all went down to mark and sara*'s to watch a hell of a zombie movie. after that we all headed to the levee where we saw the channel 4 news team, american gladiators, and a set of dominoes all hanging out, drinking beers like it ain't no thing. like i said, i love halloween.

Saturday: I have short shorts!

this marks the first anniversary of my blog. hooray! this time last year i was writing a post about preparing for mark's (s. gary's) birthday celebration. well another year has passed and it is time for another birthday bash in his honor. this year's party started at the water taxi beach in long island city which is basically a ton of imported sand spread out on the banks of the east river. the beach features a $2 shaefer special which everyone at the party was taking advantage of, including the out-of-town guests of honor, mr. and mrs. big mark.

after suffering through the 90 degree heat long enough i returned home to meet adrianne. we went out to dinner then met everyone at east river bar for act two of the nights festivities. as usual there were drinks downed, pictures taken and fights avoided. luckily i was able to miss act three at the levee where i hear everyone finally dropped off the ledge of reasonable drunk behavior.

bon anniversaire!

dice and ice

memorial day weekend just finished up and just between you and me, it was fuckin' awesome. adrianne and i continued our burger tour at burger joint. for those of you who don't know this place is in the corner of the lobby at the le parker meridian hotel. yes, the same hotel where guests of "live! with regis and kelly" stay. as you can see the burgers look like they were made on the side of the road, but they taste like the burgers you make in your dreams. the right amount of grease, right amount of cheese, right amount of everything else, and that's it. absolutely no filler. these guys don't mess around. delicious.

on sunday adrianne and i went to the park for a little picnic. we had a beautiful day laying out in the sun, drinking lemonade, playing kissy-face. later, everyone joined us for more sun and to throw a frisbee. hey, it's the sheep meadow. they all but hand you a frisbee on the way in.

finally on monday, to honor the troops, andy held a barbecue in his back yard. in this case a back yard consists of a patio, some picnic tables, and a fake cactus. ed brought a grab-bag of meet. everyone else filled in the gaps. by gaps i mean vegetables and beer. man can't live on beef alone, otherwise this happens. beside causing ourselves gastrointestinal stress, there was also some entertainment. for those of us with any money left in our pockets by that point in the weekend, there was some dice to be thrown. along with it came some delightful frozen treats. perfect to enjoy in the first evening shower of the summer. it was a fantastic way to finish off the weekend.

cheers to everyone on a well executed weekend. and apologies to mark and sara for giving deuce all that people food. i'm sure he lived up to his name that night...sorry.

ill-adelphia

i went to philly last weekend...this happened. that's about all i can piece together.

super pork

superbowl sunday has come to mean one thing for me the last couple years...pork. oh there's still nachos and beer and, oh yeah, football but really, thanks to jon and harrison, it's about pork. this year they outdid themselves. i think they put in 10 to 12 hours in preparing their lovely cuts of pig. however long they spent it was worth it. those sandwiches were freakin' delicious. if it wasn't for all the other food there i would have eaten three or four of them.

the party itself was just as great a success. there were crazy girls, dudes being dudes, gambling, and, of course, the party dude. special thanks go to andy for hosting, ed and sara for the big board, europe for "final countdown", sex, and of course jon and harrison for delicious ass pulled-pork sandwiches. bravo, gang.

thank you for leaving town

i stayed in the borough for thanksgiving. that was rad. i avoided the anxiety of travel, didn't miss work, and still got to see my family and friends. my sister hosted a small but delicious dinner after my family and i went to the parade. then we all headed to s.gary and sara*'s apartment for mad dog and turkey carcass tossing. everyone was full of cheer. although i noticed something peculiar walking down bedford the night before thanksgiving: the neighborhood was empty. i saw maybe 10 people where i would usually be sidestepping jerks the whole 12 blocks down to grand. not only was no one around but bars and restaurants closed too, for the whole four day weekend. i was embarrassed to live here. as s.gary said, "proof again that williamsburg is a college town." regardless of the desolate population, everyone that stayed here had a great time in BK, without all those clowns. hope yours was equally enjoyable, wherever you were. cheers.

philadelphia story

partydude took his show on the road this past weekend with his travel to philadelphia. while i was no c.k. dexter haven, i performed in a manner that would make mr. grant proud. i defended two ladies' honor by confronting a bum who was harassing them. i dipped and twirled women on the dance floor. and all of this was conducted with a drink in my hand. while that may be more characteristic of william powell, i think of cary grant as a man who never saw a cocktail he didn't like.
unlike cary grant, however, i didn't get the lady at the end of the night.

i had the pleasure of partying with the cutest girl in the room. we talked about movies, danced on ottomans and watched a fight break out. and the best part was she lives in manhattan. i might have a chance of seeing her again, which, as my readers know, is in contrast to my recent romantic escapades. all of this began to feel a little suspect. and i was right. she has a "boyfriend." what a disappointment.

there have been other grant impersonators in the past and they too got the girl before the lights came up. so maybe this isn't the end of the film, but simply the intermission.

magnum party

there is a party saturday night that may turn out to be one of the greatest. originally it was entitled "Night of 1000 Magnums." for whatever reason the planners scaled back on that goal. i'm not sure what the theme is now but it involves magnum characters, cartoons, and hipsters. it's kind of broad. regardless i will attend as if the original theme were still in place. i'm going as one thomas magnum, private investigator. i've got the hawaiian shirt, the topsiders, the sunglasses, the short shorts and the piece de resistance, the mustache.

i picked that up today, which is the impetus for this story. as i was browsing the costume shop a comely shopgirl asked if i needed assistance. i responded, asking if the store had any "magnum mustaches." she gave me a look like i was crazy. now there are maybe four styles of mustaches: the handlebar, the "clark gable", the "hitler", and the "magnum". that's it. this girl had never heard of magnum, p.i. not magnum. not higgins. not rick. not t.c. not ferrari drivin' private investigator. nothin'. maybe she was too young. (which blows 'cause it means i'm too old.) maybe her mother didn't have a thing for mustachioed men like my mother did. maybe her dad is tom selleck and she's blocked out the character from embarrassment. whatever the reason i left the store feeling as if the world was slightly off balance. there are people in this city who don't know about magnum. hopefully i inspired her to go home and search "magnum" in wikipedia and after reading the entry feel compelled to buy the dvds and after watching she'll throw her own magnum party. or maybe i'm a nerd who'll be dressed ridiculously for a killer party.