Saturday in Queen Anne at the wine bar

Whenever I walk by the wine bar and look in I think how elegant everyone seems inside, drinking wine perched at the counter, happily chatting in the glow of the tea lights. And I wish I was sitting in the wine bar and not running off to some errand in the wind and rain.
When I do happen to be sitting by the window in the wine bar I mainly feel cold because of the draft from the window. The view from inside is less than elegant - but the people watching is great. If you look in I am probably the one clutching on to the minimal warmth of the tea lamp rather than the stem of my wine glass.

Last night some of my friends and I went to Bricco in Queen Anne. It was a girls night, mainly because most of our guy friends were doing something incredibly stereotypically male and boring.

The best people watching sometimes begins with your friends. The night began like this: Three of us arrive together and park on a side street. Sonja announces that she has to change out of the clothing she is wearing because she has just come from a sporting event. She says she is going to change "right here on the street". I think she is going to change in the back of the car, but when I turn around she is standing in the road taking her shirt off. Did I mention that it is cold, windy, and the rest of us are in winter jackets? Just in time to avoid indecent exposure and exposure to the elements, she has pulled a sweater over her head. Two cars drive past and a couple of pedestrians cross at the cross walk. She slides on some flats and we walk around the corner into the bar.

When we get inside the only seats left are in the front window. Not ideal because we are still expecting Fiona and Will. Did I say it was a girl's night? We also invited our friend, Will, who is definitely a guy but ....not boring? I begin to wish I had changed into a sweater too.

Fiona shows up next. She is my roommate, and even though you would never guess it from her name, she moved here from Spain a couple of years ago. I guess her mother studied in Ireland for a year and became obsessed with everything Irish. Behind us at the bar the drunk man behind me starts stroking the rings on the hand of his equally drunk companion. She eventually leaves to step outside. Sonja also steps outside to call her husband who is probably playing video games, and, by the way, not invited to girls night.

Through the window I can see Sonja on the phone and further down the block drunk woman is also on her phone and I wonder why she is squatting down next to the cars to talk. Apparently, however, drunk woman is actually puking her insides out onto the curb, and Sonja tells us all about it when she comes back.
This is all a bit peculiar. I mean, we are in Queen Anne,....at a wine bar. Everyone else is politely sipping Pinot and Syrah, quietly eating overpriced appetizers....really good appetizers with goat cheese mind you, and this woman is vomiting her wine and goat cheese on to the nearest car tire. Whatever happened to elegant?
We are shocked and horrified, well at least horrified enough to steal her chair when Will shows up.
When she and her companion finally do leave, we quickly commandeer their vacated spot at the main bar and cross our fingers that our better seats are not compromised with the residue of vomit.

The bartender winks.