Working Backwards: Cast Party Fun Times

I keep trying to marshall some time and mind to get the details of Bristol's closing weekend down, but I get distracted easily. So I'm going to remember the most recent things first, and I'll work my way backward.

Tom DJ'd the cast party, and he was a Super Genius Mastermind. Admittedly, we arranged a lot of the tracks ahead of time, at least into vague groups of times-of-night, because we've done enough parties to know what the Bristol crowd wants at certain party phases. We don't play country, and we don't condone any line-dancing sort of behavior, probably because it reminds me too much of large battallions of marching Nazi soldiers. That must be it. Anyhow, this was really Tom's first DJing venture where he was running the show mostly on his own, and as soon as the big crowds arrived, he packed the floor and kept it hopping all night.

He also achieved something as a DJ that I've never accomplished: he got Rush Pearson (Billy Billy Von Billy of the Sturdy Mud Beggars) AND Phil Johnson (MoOnIe the Magnificent) on the floor -- and they stayed, for song after song after song! I've never played to a room that had them dancing in it. Tom surpassed my amazing DJ prowess and left it in the dust.

I will take credit for the floor-packins resulting from my insistence that Daft Punk's "Harder Faster Better" be heard. But the rest is all down to Tom. He bolstered his amazing throw-down with a spankly new CD duo-deck from NuMark, with a nifty feature that automatically cues the other deck as soon as you start your cross-fade. So good!

The hotel booted the music at midnight -- Extremely Lame -- and closed the pool, so there were not the usual legendary 4am hi-jinks, at least not for my coterie. But a handful of the best people -- JulieBeth, Frank, Kiffen and the fierce Ms Teri -- and Tom and I adjourned to Marina Gardens for 2am waffles-n-bacon, and while we waited, we received heaping helpings of entertainment from none other than His Most Royal Majesty King Xavier and Crow from the Nation of Dark Cloud! They're hilarious, dangerous and crazy, and that's what we like in our barbarian hordes.

It was much less exhausting an evening than I'd anticipated it being -- which is fine, considering the dusty weekend ground us all down to weak mole-baby-eyed sniffling wheezing raw li'l nubs.

I'll try to push my memory back to the part of the weekend with patrons in it. Briefly, I do remember the audience being completely delightful, and I know I had brilliantly fun times goofing with the best characters, including My Lord Earl of Bath. Something happened involving a very, very tiny hat up on top of Bath's head, and he's exceedingly tall, and I know I laughed until I almost fainted. I know I saw faces from long ago and far away, and I know I made new friends too. And I vaguely recall receiving excessively-kind praise and learning "bad monkey" in up to 31 languages total. For the details, I shall have to restore myself further.