We clean, then Anna, Nikki, Tolu, Kelly, Chrissy, and Nathan arrive to celebrate Nikki's and Tolu's birthdays. We go downtown to the Blues club Kingston Mines. While a band plays on our side, we sit near the back and order some food and drinks, which are $2.75 each, including water! Anna is not so happy about this, as she "only" ordered a water. We watch the other stage's band on the TV a little, then move up to the front in anticipation of the next band on our side. We have fun conversation, and then Kid Dynamite plays right in front of us. He has a fun swagger and can really dance. During one of his songs, somebody starts break dancing awesome in front of the stage, on the concrete! My favorite song was "Sue," where Kid Dynamite-who really drags these narratives out like a great club singer-set the audience up:
"When I was sixteen I had a girl named Sue. My Mama asked me, 'What is it that Sue does to you that makes you so crazy about her?' I didn't want to tell my Mama what it was that Sue did to me. One day, Sue sat me down and had me close my eyes. Then she said, 'Put your right hand on my left shoulder. Now put your left hand on my right shoulder.' Then you know what she did to me? Wait! Is everyone hear grown? Is everyone in here grown? OK. You know what Sue did to me? You wanna know what it was that Sue did to me? … Can't tell ya, ya don't need to know, can't tell ya, ya don't need to know."
After Kid Dynamite was done, Chrissy, Nathan, and Kelly took off to head back to our place, pick up their car, then drive downstate. The remaining four of us stuck around for a little when, then left about 3am. I picked up an Onion as we left and read it on the train. We had to take the blue line because the green line was no longer running. As we neared OP, I thought about how far of a walk it was going to be for girls in high heels, so I offered to run back to get our car and pick everyone up on Harlem. I gave Christine my wallet and everything else I was carrying except the keys to the apartment, which I would need to go in and get the keys to the car.
We get to our stop and I trot up the ramp and out to Harlem. It's about 4am now, and it's a chilly night, I have my black jacket and jeans on. As I get onto Harlem, I see three cops at different places along Harlem having already pulled people over. So I jog comfortably in order not to appear as if I were darting or sprinting. I take my usual route, get to the apartment, grab the car keys as fast as I can, get in the car and pull out of our little lot. Immediately, lights flash behind me and it's a cop. I thought that maybe he was just trying to get through the alley, so I pulled over to the left to let him get past. He pulls next to me and flashes a light in the passenger window. I roll down the window, and he asks if it was me who had been running earlier. I said yes. He asked if it was my car and I said yes. He asked if I lived here and I said yes. He asked for ID. I had to smile to myself inside, because of course I left my ID with Christine. I told him I was meeting people and they had my ID. He said, "just a minute," and went to talk on the radio.
He came back and asked if it was my car. I said yes, and I got the papers out of the glove compartment. He again asked if I lived here and I said yes. I also gave him my name and tried to explain that the car was in "my wife's grandfather's name." Then he said "just a minute" to go talk on the radio. He came back and said, "Is this you, Gordon Thomas?" I said no, that he was my wife's grandfather who bought the car for us. He asked again about my ID, and again I tried to explain that the party I was meeting had my ID, and I started to sort of indicate that "they might be here by now." He had a pad of paper and got my info and wrote it down. Again he said "just a minute" to go talk on the radio. He came back and said, "there have been a lot of thefts around here, so we're just checking this out." He had a suspicious look that said "So you were running in street clothes at 4 am and you immediately jump into this car that is not in your name and hurriedly start to drive off…" I smiled and realized how bad this looks, so I just spilled the story: "OK, some friends of mine and I went to the Blues club and it's a little bit of a walk, and I'm in pretty good shape, so I just thought I'd be nice and drive to pick them up so they didn't have to walk as far."
He looked somewhat enlightened and asked about who these friends were. "Four females, walking up Harlem." He said "just a minute." He came back and asked, "Have you been drinking tonight?" I said, "No, I don't drink at all." He asked if I had the keys to the vehicle and I showed them to him, showed that they actually started the car. I thought it was nice that the pocketknife on my keychain has my name on it to further strengthen my credibility. Then he again asked, "Do you live here?" and again I said yes. He said, "Is there a buzzer with your name on it?" I said yes and he said, "OK, that'll be good enough for me." I get out of the car and there are like 3 or 4 other cops around with their cars all over and lights on. The others are talking and looking at me and I can't help but in my head mock the fact that all these cops are here for me. [Note: Meanwhile, the four girls are getting hassled by a guy on Harlem asking them to come to his car. But there are no cops around for them!]
I take the original cop to the main door and show him my name and he has me show the key that opens the door. As we walk back, he says, "Now it's makin' a lot more sense, I'd been wonderin'." I walk back to the car and all the cops are looking at me and I ask the original cop if I can go and he says, "You're free to go." But it's been about 20 minutes by now, plenty of time to walk all the way back from the blue line. So I drive down Harlem and don't see them at all, then drive back and they are waiting in the back lot, grumpy and quite chilly. I explain the story and it's a pretty good laugh. Then Nikki and I go grab some snacks at White Hen. Christine keeps Anna up so we can have more late-night fun. We goof around until 6am.
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