Awesomeness Cubed

I am in the middle of a brief run of awesomeness that is so awesome it deserves public acknowledgement. Hence this post. I'm just gonna break things down numerically, because that's how I thought of them this morning while I was munching on the aforementioned (aforeblogged?) donut.

1) Awesome Yesterday:

Yesterday was one of those days that ruled. I woke up, felt pretty good about things, even with the snowfall, went to work, handled my business, then drove to Lakewood for an appointment, after which I treated myself to a late lunch at Melt, where I tried the new tuna sandwich. It was good, though I'm not terribly partial to the sweet glaze you find on Asian tuna dishes. If you are, however, definitely dig it next time you are out there. After Melt, I visited my friend the baker, where I scored some brownies with cute little Valentine's sprinklies going on. Next I hit up Tremont, while I was killing time for the big moment of the day. While I was there I took advantage of their crazy hardcover sale and purchased a couple books that won't be on my "to read" list long: Paul Hollander's The End of Commitment and Tim Tzouliadis's The Forsaken. Both books deal with interesting cultural developments during the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union; the former with respect to the rise and fall of intellectual affinity for Soviet-style communism and the latter about a team of American baseball players that defected to the USSR and the trials, tribulations, and horrors they suffered during the years of the Terror. Interesting, if harrowing stuff.

Finally, it was off to the Velvet Tango Room, where I had a total blast with a group that is quickly becoming my favorite folks to see in town. I love me a fine cocktail, and you can't help but have a fine one there. We had the good fortune of meeting there on a night when Carol was behind the bar and Paulius was in the joint, too. There was a newcomer to our group that also came, and made the night particularly awesome. Only one photograph exists of this evening, and oddly it features Tony Blair, so I guess you readers will just have to take my word for it when I tell you it was a great time.

2) Awesome Tomorrow:

The awesomeness doesn't stop there, though. Tomorrow is also destined to be awesome because it will be the first time in about a month that I will see my beloved Smelly Ellie. She's been chilling with my folks for the last month, since I've been on the road so much lately. But tomorrow I'm heading over there to pick her up. I cannot wait - I've missed her terribly, especially in the morning when I wake up or, even more, at night when I go to bed and I remember I don't need to tell her to jump up. Anyway, no use in dwelling on the sad stuff, as tonight is the last night I have to wait before picking her back up. Monday night (I think), we'll be back representing in Clevo. And not a moment too soon, as Smelly Ellie was the recipient of her first "who's dog is more awesome" duel invitation last night. I tried to explain that this is a totally unfair challenge, that the challenger is destined to come in second place, but such a defeat wouldn't necessarily reflect poorly on the dog. Still, this pet owner I'm talking about seemed unimpressed, so my only choice is to say: prepare your hound. It is on!

3) Awesome Next Week:

Not only is picking up and bringing home Smells awesome, but next week stands to feature significant awesomeness, as well. My old college roommate (and still one of my very closest pals) is coming to town to visit for a couple weeks or so. He's an artist who supports himself doing landscaping stuff, which, as you can imagine, dries up in the winter. So he's going to install himself in my attic and do some work in Cleveland, sorta like when Degas went to visit New Orleans or Matisse went to Tahiti ... Something like that. Anyway, he'll be the first person to visit in any meaningful way since I moved up here, and I'm looking to showing off all my favorite spots in the city. This, of course, means awesome things like Asterisk on Friday, the Beachland Brunch and maybe the CMA on Sunday, random French films at the Cinematheque followed by cheap Labatts at the Barking Spider during the week, another lunch at Melt, a trip to Akron to hit the museum, Square Records, and Swensen's some time during the week, and much much more. I can't wait.