An Award-Winning Friday in Charlotte

Award For Best New Uptown Timewaster: Occupy Amelie's

There's a game I like to play at Amelie's Uptown on Fridays. I wait for a guy to walk by in a polo shirt. If the next guy walks by in a polo shirt, I win. I win a lot. It makes me feel good about myself.

I was there for about an hour this morning and just kept winning over and over again. Let's say a polo shirt is six points, like a touchdown. Extra point: hanging corporate ID badge. Field goal: coffee cup with cardboard sleeve. Safety: guy smoking and the smoke goes the other way.

I hit for the cycle out in front of Amelie's today. Mixing metaphors is fun.

Award For Best Traffic Maneuvering By The Nature Boy: The Nature Boy

Woodlawn Road at Park is one of those roads with a tiny little left turning lane. While I admire the economy of space, I'm not so happy about the parade of cars that stack up behind it when one guy want to turn left but just can't quite get up to the lane.

Today, traffic is a mess because some guys in hardhats were out standing around, looking at something at the intersection. I needed to get into the left lane. So did Ric Flair, because he's next to me in his customized white Camaro with red racing stripes, just revving his engine. And then he just puts his hand out and cuts in front of me. And my reaction was something like "Ohmigawd Ric Flair just cut in front of me squeeeeeee!" Because I'm not about to say wooooooo when Ric Flair is in the car next to me with the windows down.

My whole head would normally just pop right off at a Flair sighting, but this is the third time I've seen him now. I poured a cup of coffee when he was at the TV station Thursday. He's everywhere. I swear he'll be waiting for me in the bushes when I get home.


Award For Best Non-Vomiting Performance In a Vomit-Likely Role: Me.


I go to a CrossFit gym a couple of times a week and I'm not at the point where I need to remove my shirt. Other people, very seriously, do, because they are excreting a torrent of sweat as they lift 200 pounds above their heads. Or they are making it rain while trying to throw a 20 pound medicine ball into the ceiling.

Today, somebody wrote on a dry-erase board that we should all do push ups with stacks of weights on our backs, and so we did, without question. Then we partnered up and did a bunch of squats and running with 45 pound sacks on our backs. Then we swung 24 kg kettlebells between our legs and then carried them for 200 meters. I did not vomit.

But the whole time I'm thinking to myself: Should I vomit? If I was going to vomit, would that make me look weak? Is this workout vomit-worthy, or should I save my vomiting some other workout where, say, I am ordered to wrestle a bear?

Best Use Of A David Lynch Movie In A Story About Buying Beer: Blue Velvet

Remember in Blue Velvet where Kyle McLachlan goes up to Dennis Hopper and says he likes Heineken, and Hopper just explodes and goes "Heineken? F--k that shit! PABST BLUE RIBBON!" Yeah, I'm Kyle McLachlan now.

We're going camping and I'm completely Craft Beer Guy and I need some beer that comes in a can that doesn't taste like carbonated urine. So I pop into Brawley's Beverage and Mr. Brawley is in there, and he knows exactly what's up, and takes me back into a cooler, and I snag three six packs of beer that would make Augustus Busch himself weep like a little girl.

It's been a good day. And now I'm totally prepared to wrestle a bear after drinking my sissy beer in the woods. If Ric Flair wants to cut in, he's more than welcome.