magicbeans. nothing if not awkward.

bret drove down to visit this evening. i had had three beers by the time he arrived at burrito night. earlier, chris.k had said: "it doesn't really feel like burrito night anymore because we don't drink as much as we used to."

and me: "there's two six-packs in the fridge, and only the two of us here at the moment. we could finish those off before anyone else shows up and then make them buy more beer." and we didn't quite, but i guess it turned out more akin to the burrito nights of old.

five by the time dinner was over, and i wasn't feeling the sense of indignation that was supposed to lead me to read [ . . . see yesterday . . . ] to stef when people started filtering out for cigarettes. it's hard for me to be upset when buzzed. i'm not sure i'll ever understand how some people can be angry drunks. everything's just sort of okay, even if i know it isn't really.

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after dinner, bret suggested exploring the old railroad tunnel that runs under the east side. i've been in providence for over two years now and never have. of course we get to the entrance to find that they've put in a new, well-lit parking lot for the new buildings going up on the lot nearby, and that they've welded the door shut.

we climbed around said new, under-construction building, looking for something to use a a crowbar, but no luck.

and then down towards the river. and over to the mall to see if there were any late movies playing. at was after midnight by this point and there weren't, so we walked out behind the mall to look at sarah.p's house which is hanging beneath a bridge over the river.

bret noticed the lights on the silver-top diner, and said, "i'm thirsty, what's that over there?" and so we stopped in, and i took two bites of possibly the worst bagel i've ever eaten and had a glass of water, and bret had some lousy diner food. and then bret said, "do you think we could get into that abandoned building?" i know people who have, so we went looking for a way.

there were people out front by the diner, so we walked along the railroad tracks to the back. then over two fences, up on the roof of the loading dock, and in a window. it looked like people were squatting in the room we climbed into, so not wanting to be wandering around someone's house, we climbed back out and continued along the roof of the loading dock which was riddled with large holes and not terribly structurally sound.

a ways further down the building we found another window that we could climb into. the building used to be a fruit and vegetable warehouse. it's still filled with cardboard and produce packaging and boxes and boxes of paperwork and broken furniture and all sorts of junk. we wandered from room to room looking for anything exciting (bret still looking for something to use as a crowbar on the rail tunnel door). found some price stickers for limes and an eight inch floppy disk.

one room towards the middle of the building had been completely cleaned out and the graffiti on the walls was much more intricate than the rest of the building (the whole place is covered with graffiti though, fourteen years of non-occupancy will do that). this was obviously the graffiti kids' gallery. there was even a broom up against one wall so they could keep it in good shape.

eventually we ran out of rooms on the second floor. it looked like the building went further (it's big) but no one had knocked a hole in this wall yet. we had checked some of the stairwells on the way down, but they had been closed up, so we figured that we were going to have to walk all the way back to the window that we had climbed in through.

we did find an open stairwell about a quarter of the way back though, and headed downstairs. at this point i started getting a little claustrophobic because it seemed that all the doors downstairs have been covered with bars and welded shut. bret was still content to explore, check out the graffiti, look for crowbars. eventually we did find an operable door. and out, and freedom.

we wandered around a bit. found a piece of rebar with a slightly angled tip. walked across the railroad tracks. crossed the highway. through downtown. sat and talked about art. then back to the tunnel entrance, and still no luck, so home.