How to Make New Friends...Feel Awkward

The Count and I had an amazing weekend in wine country.  His band was playing with the local symphony up there, and it was over a weekend, so I flew up there with him to watch the performance and do some wine tasting with him.  I also met the guys in his band for the first time.  It went swimmingly (ahem...see the title of the post).

Separating the grapes from the stems.

First, let me tell you about the wine tasting.  The Count is a total lightweight when it comes to drinking.  I'm not kidding: two glasses of wine and he's laughing, cracking jokes, whistling, and completely unable to whisper.  It's hilarious.

Our wine tasting tour bus had a total of twelve people.  Among the various characters were two ladies from Ohio, probably in their late twenties, and if they hadn't said they were from Ohio, I would have sworn they were from Jersey.  They each wore a couple of giant sparkly rings, which matched their sparkly diamond-encrusted earrings and designer sunglasses and handbags.  I know all of those characteristics could hint at Newport Beach just as well, but something about their mannerisms hinted at Tony Soprano rather than Kobe Bryant.  

In any event, the Count, within the first 30 seconds of the trip, had started referring to these women as the "Bling Bling Ladies."  I posted on Facebook: "Vince is already pretty tipsy, and he's dubbed two of these people the 'bling bling ladies.' I give it one more winery before he accidentally says it using his outdoor voice.  Hehe."  We didn't even make it to the next winery.  Within 10 minutes after posting it, tipsy Vince yell-whispered a joke about the Bling Bling Ladies.  Fortunately, they were talking with the Australian couple and didn't hear it.  

Winery #2...I think. 
Who can freaking remember after all that wine?

 

A number of stars have played at that
venue, including Raffi, aka the Justin Bieber
of my little brother's childhood (his words)

The day before that, the Count's band performed with the symphony.  It was a fabulous show.  The crowd primarily consisted of the symphony regulars, but by the end of the show, the crowd fell in love with the Count's group, too.  They sold over a hundred CDs at the concert, and people were lined up to talk to them after the concert and have their CDs signed.  Awesome.

Afterward, we went to dinner with the other guys in the group--for anonymity's sake, I'll refer to the guys by their vocal parts: 1, 2, and 4 (the Count sings the third part)--and 4's friend.  This was my first time meeting the guys.  Officially, at least.  I sat with 4's dad at the Las Vegas show two nights in a row, and he quickly became one of my favorite people.  He's an absolutely crackup, and completely unafraid to make himself the butt of a joke.  We had a great time.  I saw 4 and his dad talking after the Vegas show and waved to them, so I assume his dad told him who I was, because 4 recognized me at the wine country gig.

Anyway, so we're sitting down having dinner, and 4's friend--a young-ish, really talkative chick--had baked cookies for the guys.  She sandwiched them between two paper plates and wrapped it in a giant wad of plastic wrap.  While she was chattering on to 4 about her latest voice-over gigs, 1 was playing with the wad of plastic wrap while 2 watched.  

Me: Wow.  That's enough plastic wrap to suffocate a child.

1: Maybe even two.

Me (loud, saucy voice): "I know what *we're* doing later!

The four of us (2, 1, the Count, and me) laughed, and then 2 broke off abruptly.  "You know what would be weird?" he said.  "If you met someone and within the first few minutes they made a joke about suffocating children."  Hahaha.....ha....ha.....shit.

Original here: Hyperbole and a Half

2 is definitely the comedian of the group, both onstage and off, so I think he was just kidding.  We had been joking about killing spiders and various other topics before that, and he wasn't snarky to me at all, so I'm pretty sure he wasn't being an asshole.  Mostly sure.  But just in case, I'm glad no children turned up missing the next day.