Went to First Friday.

It so would've been better if I didn't have to drag the family with me.

Pros:

- got to see Mike attempting a faux mohawk for the first time (dear, use pomade, not plastic-inducing gel)

- hung out briefly with cool people again (instead of the usual family fair)

- Red Bull tastes like pissant, but it keeps me wide awake

- Willy Wonka the juggler... disturbing streat performer

- really nice artwork (more so from the non-cluttered Arts Factory) and people whose eyes don't automatically search for genitalia (like my dad... and it was an effing gay Italian movie too)

- lots of charming boys

- amazing antiques from the Funk House

- that one girl singing in the gallery with the Tiki Show (the one with my vectored thingy in it)

- Michaels' friend Chuck, the sexiness in the olive green shirt and his floppy chestnut locks

Cons:

- dad taking away my lighter while I was repeatedly turning it on and off when we got lost

- dad displaying his Marc Polo navigation skills, leading us for a block in the opposite direction on foot

- mom's furrowed eyebrows

- sis' general incompetence... but mainly the fact that she felt so ackward around 20-somethings that drink (and she's suppose to be the older one?) (plus, that's a dead give-a-way that she's still the meek highschooler type)

- HAN's parents hassling me to help them find her

- not being able to hang out with HAN and friends

- missing out on an hour of First Friday when I had to go "eat" (translation: sit at the table and ignore) with the family at Pinoy Pinay

- ethnic music

- lots of charming boys... with their dates (male and female)

- lots of charming boys... but when one asked me if I had a light, I didn't (thank you, oh seminal source of my conception (dad))

- amazing antiques from the Funk House... that are usually over-priced

- Michaels' friend Chuck... who's old enough to be cute yet still get slammed by jailbait (and he seems as shy as Catherine... wouldn't know if I have the patience to be with someone like that)

Overall... It was a depressingly disappointing experience. I hate having people and obligations limit my actions.

I've resolved to get my license by next month's First Friday. Then I'd be able to drive 'round with friends before and after the events of the night.

And when another charming lad asks me for a light, I'll be able to share mine.

. . .

With the piece that I'm working on (not the watercolor/gouache one, this one's new), I know that I'm going to upset a lot of people in my family.

Now I have to wonder if I should unfurl it before Thanksgiving or do the houseguests a courtesy and wait until they've left to explain it's meaning.

Cheers.