The Weekend Edition

Ahhhh...back to normal. My first weekend edition in a while, but boy, it was a good weekend and one that I'll enjoy writing about. Here's a breakdown of what happened:

• The Crew and I hitting up Tommy's Burger Stop (delicious!)
• Elton John!
• Foosball at the Avenue
• Vegan supply shopping
• BBQ at Jason's
• The Homie with the Crewnit
• Snow City for Amy's birthday
• Ballin' at the AK Club
• Day 1 of vegan David (Tofu Pad Thai ftw)

As per usual, I've chosen a couple subjects in specific which per particularly spectacular to elaborate upon, and you'll see those bad mamma jamma's below.

Elton John being spectacular at the Sullivan Arena

As I've mentioned a time or two, Elton John visited Alaska recently to much fanfare. Myself and the Crew went to the show Friday night at the Sullivan Arena along with a LOT of other people. Both shows were sold out (even exceeding capacity on both nights) and the town was abuzz with Elton fever. After seeing him myself, I really understand why they were.

The man is the consummate performer, putting on an incredible show, sounding fantastic, and seemingly genuinely appreciating Alaska's love for him. To be honest, I can see why in terms of the latter subject, as I've never seen an Alaskan audience go so nuts for a performer before. Truth be told, I don't think I've ever seen a show with such an appreciative audience. I was really amazed at everything that happened though.

After hearing his performance, I realized two things: I know very few Elton John songs and the man is an incredibly talented musician/songwriter. Almost every song was stellar, and his piano work sounded alternately beautiful and genius (he would "jam" for minutes at a time, and he was clearly having fun with it). With that said, his most powerful instrument was his voice - this man can really belt songs out. Loved the performance and I am very thankful I had the opportunity to attend it.

The Crewnit

Saturday night, Jason had a BBQ at his place and the entirety of the Crewnit was invited. Well, us and a ton of people I had never met before but who also ended up being awesome. This was a very fitting event though, as it was Amy and I's last night as meat eaters for a while and I really went overboard in consuming. Example? My second "burger" consisted of these layers: bun, salami, burger, cheese, shrimp, beef kabob, chicken, hot dog (one whole), bbq sauce, bun. About half way through I really felt like a nap and upon completion I felt like dying.

But god, was it worth it! I sure went out with a bang.

Colver, Kim, me, and Hannah - Serious faces only, please

After the actual BBQ section of the evening, the Crewnit segregated ourselves from the rest of the group by going out to Jason's deck/porch business. We had ten people or more out there quite often, and it was an absolute blasty blast, to quote Hannah. Sheer ridiculousness flowed from our mouths all evening, especially after more and more beer was consumed. The table team (my special nickname for the inside people) seemingly thought we were insane. Which, you know, we may have been.

Jason's "badass" face and Amy...being Amy

So what happened out there that made us seem so crazy? Hmmm...

• Jason rolling a pack of cigarettes in his sleeve as if he was a street tough from the 50's
• Lorna repeatedly getting her heels stuck in the deck and becoming frantic immediately afterwards
• Hannah and I wrapping ourselves in a blanket and taking pictures with nearly everyone
• Roughly 100 pictures being taken of us in various crazy poses outside on the porch
• Playing football from the porch to the grass
• Ridiculous amounts of yelling

Hannah and I in the blanket - I have my best Batman face on

Of course there is the distinct possibility that it was not animosity coming from the table team, but sheer envy of our awesomeness. That's a possibility, for sure.

Amy, Hannah, Nate, and I on the deck - I look crazy as per usual

No less, after a few hours of hijinks at Jason's, the entirety of the Crewnit rolled out to the Homie for sheer ridiculousness in a public setting. This was probably the most fun I've ever had at the Homie, and it was great that Colver and Lorna came out for the first time to it. The night featured a lot of awesome foosball playing, myself nearly getting into fisticuffs with a girl (but in a playful way), lots of shot taking, dance party plus on the dance floor (I was told I could get lower than anyone else on the dance floor...I got skills!), and of course feeding beer to each other with pitchers.

Because that's normal, right?

All in all, it was a great night. Insane, for sure. To be honest, it didn't cost that much, I had an absolute blast, and I wasn't hungover at all today. I feel great to be honest, especially as I look through pictures recounting our night. Very good times indeed. To quote Amy via Barney Stinson, this summer is going to be legendary. No diggity. No doubt.

What's going on back in AK?

Once again, before I get cracking on my Sasquatch related posts, I wanted to get into details about my thoughts about a few things and then a couple current happenings in my life. This post is about current happenings in the good ol' AK, now that I'm back from vacation and getting integrated back into the ebbs and flows of that crazy place.



Before I left, Amy became really interested in the vegan lifestyle, or at least sampling what it had to offer her for a month. This extremely random scenario came to fruition because her good friend Blake decided he was going to do the same thing (as you can see here) and was going to blog about the whole experience no less. She set herself upon the idea, but before I left we had a discussion as to how long I would last as a vegan.

Amy: 45 minutes?
Me: Come on...way longer right? I'd be ok so long as I had milk.
Amy: You can't drink milk - cows remember?
Me: ...
Me: ...
Me: Dammit.

Ok, that isn't exactly how it went, but there was not a lot of confidence in her. While in Portland I quizzed friends and the general consensus was somewhere between one (AMANDA!) and three days (Erik and Sheri I believe). Upon my return, I asked Colver, and he suggested I'd last a week, but to quote him it'd be "because everyone said you couldn't, and knowing you, you'd do it just long enough to prove everyone wrong."

Colver apparently gets me very well. So I'm going to try it, just to see how long I'll last. I'm shooting for a week, but who knows! Maybe I'll last even longer. Maybe I'll love it and develop taste for soy milk and tofu.

Nah. No way. But it's a worthy experiment - but for those concerned, don't worry - I am not getting involved with issues. This is just a study in self control, or better yet, my extreme lack of it. Starting June 1st, it is on.



My Alaskan posse and I (also known while in separate factions as the Crew and the Unit, or the Crewnit when combined) are embarking on a legendary journey this summer taking us from sketchy bar to sketchy bar across the Alaskan wild. This summer is going to be the inaugural Crewnit Alaska Dive Bar Tour, taking us all the way from the Buckaroo Club in Anchorage to Tips in Eagle River, from the Salty Dawg Saloon in Homer to the Comet Club in Fairbanks - we are going to turn this state upside down - Crewnit style.

Should be delicious and ridiculously fun, but special thanks to my good friend Raechelle who designed our shirt logo above. She did a great job and dealt with my needy nature when it came to the shirt design, and I love the finished product. Now we just have to make the shirts and distribute them, and then drink in sketchy places of course. We're good at that last part at least.

As you can see in my post here, Elton John is coming to Alaska for a few performances. After the first show sold out incredibly fast with no tickets coming my way (myself and the Crew all struct out), I managed to secure six tickets for the show this Friday. Tomorrow night after three straight days of wall-to-wall performances, I'm getting myself back in the thick of things for a performance by the Rocket Man himself.

I'm very excited though, as my parents told me it was a good performance on Wednesday, so now I am even more excited for the experience. I'm hoping it will be akin to Neil Diamond's performance, which was incredibly fantastic facing lowered expectations. Just can't let those get too high, but it's really hard not to fall victim to Hannah's limitless enthusiasm for the show. I just hope it's good so she isn't disappointed, but I have faith the man will bring it like only he can.

The Weekend Edition

Hooray! A weekend down without any ridiculousness like last one! That's what I'm talking about!

What it did feature was wall to wall beautiful weather, very little sleep, and tons of fun. What'd I enjoy this weekend and what did I partake in? Here goes!

• Cooking dinner for the Unit+1 at Kim's
• Pool at Anchorage Billiards Palace
• Baby Mama
• The Homieeeeeeee!
• Driving drunk people home (extremely memorable)
• Finished two books
• Frisbee golf (once with Amy, two rounds with Colver)
• Dami with Amy and Hannah
• Rocking it out with Puma Town
• Downtown with the Crewnit (more on this later)
• Mother's Day breakfast
• Clothes shopping with Colver (this was in no way gay)
• Plotting the new alignment of my apartment with Kim

To stick to some semblance of chronological order, I'll delve into the explanation of the Crewnit now. Amy and her friends (my friends, our friends...whatever) are referred to always as the Crew, however me and my friends (their friends, our friends...whatever) did not have a name. Taking it upon ourselves, we were subsequently named the Unit, after a word frequently used by Colver and occasionally dropped by Kim.

Hence "the Crewnit."

No less, instead of going into super boring details about what happened with the Crewnit, the long story short is that we went downtown to Bernie's and the Shed, danced like idiots, chilled and had a bunch of fun, and bonded in the way only two former rival gangs can: through the consumption of alcohol and hijinks. Photographic evidence below!

Nate, Amy, Lorna, Jon, and Julie - one fifth unit, four fifths crew

Jason, me, Hannah, and Kim - half and half!

I'm totally shocked, because Hannah is trying to eat my face!

Jason, Amy, and I

Jason's face is classic - Nate, Colver, and Jason at the Shed

So that was all in good fun, and I managed to still be able to get up at 7:30 the next morning without wanting to shoot myself because of a lack of sleep or because of hangover. Nice!

I had to get up that early of course because it was Mother's Day, and my dad and I were preparing dinner for both my mom and my two sisters, plus their kids. It was a hellacious feast, featuring a cornucopia of breakfast selections including: scrambled eggs, poached eggs, bacon, maple sausage, biscuits and gravy, a horrifically futile attempt at waffles, toast, and mimosas. Pretty ridiculously delicious, and it was a great time making it, although I did eat far too much.

The three honored ones (mom and sisters) seemed to love it, and it was a great time spending some quality time with family. Plus, anyone knows that if an event involves food, odds are I'm going to love it. Unless that food is liver, and in that case you have found my kryptonite. See photographic evidence of the event below.

Myself and my dad working in the kitchen

Towering over my dad in the midst of cooking

All in all, it was a great and super varied weekend. Can't complain about that! One more weekend to go, and then my big trip to the Pacific Northwest is here. Can't wait, although I have to admit - I'm going to miss Alaska for the week I'm gone because of good times like this.