It's All the Rage in

It's All the Rage in Shanghai

Season has begun. Season (for those of you not from a town dependent on tourist trade) is when all the pretty people come back to our oasis once the heat has broken. Those of us who choose to live here in the Devils Anteroom year round are always a bit taken aback when we crawl out from under our rocks and are inundated with the snowbirds and weekenders. Suddenly, parking is more difficult. Restaurants are more crowded and god forbid, you have to wait in line to get into a bar. Well, folks, Season has begun and that means the social scene is back too.. Here then, is the first weekend report.

Friday Night Report:
Sunset Mojitas at my cousins and then we were off to Toucans to do some "research" for the upcoming Tiki Weekend presented by the Preservation Foundation (this would be the big project I am in the middle of) and of course we had to have the mixologist try out our Zombie and Mai Tai recipes before I publish them. Toucans is tiki for the new millenium. Half Trader Vics and Half Hawaii Five-O on acid, it's always a fun time. It was packed, but being full-timers we always get good service. I think the drinks were good, which means that they were and I will publish them.

Saturday Night Report:
Double booking social conflict - I hate that. We accepted an invitation to go to the recently re-opened Racquet Club Bamboo Lounge (yes, more tiki research) without thinking that we had already accepted an invitation to R&M's birthday bash. Oops. Fear not, we were able to combine the two (actually it got late at the warm-up cocktail hour so the entire group never made it to the Racquet Club and instead just went straight to the party.

I was instantly greeted at the door by an interesting creature who identified herself as Lila (later to learn that her name is something completely different and she was just trying out this one - whatever). Lila is a Belly Dancer by trade. Even though she was off duty, she choose to wear all black with silver jingle jangle belt with many charms attached. She also had an assortment of other shiny silvery sparkly things attached to various parts of her body.

While I found her attire amusing, she unfortunately had a classic straight girl hot for butch dyke syndrome. How do I explain... you know those dogs who follow you around and like to stick their nose in your crotch? Yeah, kinda like that.

As I was hiding from the crotch sniffer on the patio, I dropped in on a conversation between the missus and my cousin. Something about pajamas...

Me: "It's all the rage in Shanghai you know..."
The Missus: "What?"
Me: "You know, Pajamas... PJs. They're very popular in Shanghai right now. People wear them everywhere..."
The Missus (laughing): "That's the last thing I ever expected to hear you say"
My cousin (also laughing): "Where the hell did that come from?"
Me: "I don't know, read it online somewhere... Anyway, people in China love them."

Enter Lila (damn it - she found me): "MJ, you simply have to come with me to see the lesbian go-go dancers. (intense stare) I promise you a night you'll never forget "

For some reason, I just started humming Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves.

And for those of you who doubt my info about PJs in Shanghai, here's the AP story: New Shanghai fashion: Jammies during the daytime