So much for staying in ...

Last night 'Mr. and Mrs. Bassclown' invited me to join them for dinner at a Tapas joint called La Casa here in the Eastside. They had a $50 gift certificate that they needed to use for the place ... cool with me ... I'm down for some free food and drinks.

We got there around 7pm and ordered a round of drinks and 4 tapas that we all could share. 'Mr. and Mrs. B' had a pitcher of Sangria while I had a Martini. Two of the tapas came out pretty fast, within a 1/2 hour ... some chicken spring rolls and Beef tenderloin brochette wrapped in ham ... pretty tasty but very small portions. Then nothing happened for about a full hour. Our waiter seemed to disappear. We didn't really notice at first since we were having fun yapping and telling stories, catching up, etc. Finally, it was 9pm, 2 hours since we got there. I flagged down our waiter and asked him what was the hold up ... he said he was going to check with the kitchen but we all got the feeling that he didn't even know what tapas we still hadn't received. Oh well, I ordered another Martini since we were going to have to wait.

20 minutes later the waiter finally came back (sans Martini) and said that they were having problems in the kitchen and that all orders were backed up. Well, it had been close to two hours since we ordered so we said that we would just like our check (plus he failed to bring me my second martini in his 20 minute absence ... not cool.)

He left and the manager came out with our check. He apologized and said that they took the tapas and martini off of our bill and all we had to pay for was the pitcher of Sangria. Alright ... that's cool ... except it was now 9:30pm and we still really hadn't eaten. We slapped down the $50 gift certificate and left.

We then walked up the street looking for a restaurant that had outdoor seating (since it was nice out) so we could finish our dinner. We settled on Bites and Brews so we could grab a slice of pizza and a beer. We each ordered a pint of Franzeskaner and before I could even take my first sip of beer 'Mrs. Bassclown' knocked into our table tipping over her and my full pints of beer into my lap. All I could think to myself was 'Did that just really happen?'. I was soaked ... shirt, pants, shoes ... but there was nothing I could really do ... I went to the bathroom and dried off as well I could using paper towels since the place didn't have a warm air hand dryer.

We got more beer, ate pizza and made fun of each other the rest of the night ... 'Mrs. B' for being a klutz and me for having to sit there in wet clothes reeking of good Bavarian hops.

Eventually I dried up ... but the smell of beer lingered. I just hoped I wouldn't get pulled over on my way home later.

We ended the night on a good note ... we stopped into one of my favorite restaurants, Soba, for some more drinks. We had two rounds but the bartender on staff knew me and she bought us our first round. Very nice since we were drinking $9 martinis.

So anyway ... the moral of this long winded story is ... I've learned that when you are invited to go out to dinner with 'Mr. and Mrs. Bassclown' you should definitely eat ahead of time and be prepared by bringing an extra change of clothes.