Everyone Loves a Parade

Last night Joanna and I joined her former roommate Julie for New Year's Eve at her new digs in Long Beach. She lives right on Ocean Blvd, just a couple miles east of downtown where they were having a block party. After a threesome of drunk dudes ceded their cab to us (not without requesting to sit on our laps), we peeled down the street. ""Don't be afraid!" the cabbie urged as he weaved in and out of traffic. We made it unscathed just in time for our dinner reservations at King's Fish House, where we had a nice, leisurely meal of Parmesan-encrusted Alaskan sand dabs. I admit the name "sand dabs" doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in a dish, but they were fantastic. We slipped out into the block party crowd around 11:30pm, where people were dancing in the streets to a live band. We quickly realized it wasn't really our sort of crowd. If we were dressed in a tarty fashion and falling down drunk, we would have fit right in. Enter another cab to whisk us back to Julie's just in time to pop some champagne and watch the fireworks over the Queen Mary from just outside her place. Lovely. Even better, no drunkety drunk drunks got in my way on the drive home!

After very little sleep, I jumped out of bed and drove over to Joanna's in Pasadena to watch the Rose Parade. Right before the parade finished at Pasadena High School, it goes up a residential street a couple of blocks down from J's. Every year her neighbor stakes out primo spots practically on top of the parade route. We played some football on the street before the cops cleared us off. And then it began! It was breath-taking to see everything so close and to share in the goodwill that was in the air. The grand marshal this year was Captain Sully Sullenberger, the pilot who landed the plane in the Hudson River. We also saw some of the Tuskegee Airmen and a blind marching band. Joanna and I started crying when they strutted by. They were followed by a float of organ donors. We were no match for moving stuff like that. Luckily, they also had Jackie Chan and snowboarding bulldogs to balance things out, so we didn't snivel for long.

I have to tell you, this is the best way to watch the parade. Not the glossy tv version where they catch all of the action at the top of the parade. No. We got the tail end where the floats are breaking down (highly entertaining to see the giraffe with a broken neck), some are being towed, and the kids in the marching bands are flagging. A tuba player started to sway and was whisked away into a support vehicle. I loved it! The rain a couple of days ago cleared the skies and helped give birth to a beautiful day. A good start to a better year. Happy New Year! Or as my brother says,"Crappy Old Year, Everybody!"