Cincinnati, Best Nati

So we went to Cincinnati for the long weekend because...well...where else are you gonna go? Usually I expect things in the Worst State Ever to be awful, but we actually had a great time!

We flew out from the airport that is super close to our house, which is really the only way to travel--who wants to take a subway to a train to a bus and THEN fly? The flight to Cincinnati is crazy short so we left at 6:00 and landed by 7:15!

One thing that was kind of weird was that when we were walking toward baggage claim to meet our friend and driver both of the down escalators were out of order. So, it was annoying and everyone had to walk down carrying their bags. Zack and I joked that it was like using the DC metro, but as soon as someone heard us, they jumped in with "It's probably Michelle Obama's way of making us all lose weight!"--a comment that both isn't funny and doesn't make much sense. But, that was a quick reminder that we were currently in Kentucky, and not in the liberal wonderland that is NOVA.

She's probably yelling about how we all should eat vegetables. What nerve.

Once we made it outside, our friend Bobby picked us up and took us back to his new apartment. It was super nice! The good news is that even though he lives with an MSU grad, the decor is either neutral or Michigan themed. We'd like to commend Bobby on his constant vigilance for making sure the apartment never gets too Sparty-like.

The other good news is that his roomie was gone the whole weekend so Zack and I got to sleep in his bed instead of the couch! Also Bobby made us really good gumbo, which is a thing all of us weren't sure he knew how to make. 

Then we went to this crazy bar in the OTR part of Cincinnati. We took a Lyft there so that we could all drink and ended up riding with a guy names Jason who looked a lot like the lead singer from Coheed and Cambria.

Well known artist, or cab driver in Cincinnati? Hard to tell.

Bobby warned us that this bar wasn't in a good part of town and that it looked kinda weird at first. Good thing he warned us, because the first two floors of the bar are like gutted and definitely look like a good place for sexual predators to hang out and discuss tactics.  But when you get to the top, it's this huge warehouse with like 8 sets of corn hole, a foosball table, a bunch of tables and all the brewery equipment.  It's huge and the beer is really good (but definitely not cheap) and incredibly hot! It's also got this really cool graffiti/art on the walls and seemed to be filled with pretty cool people. I normally don't like games, but we did play one game of corn hole while we waited for Charlotte and Charlie to show up. Tim (a rando at the bar that agreed to play with us) and I lost to Zack and Bobby, but it was a very narrow victory and I think they'd be hard pressed to repeat.

Charlotte and Charlie are really cool people! Zack and Charlie had a lot of common ground between liking every sport ever and Frat Lyfe at their respective colleges. After a while we decided we'd go to the next bar and Charlie was nice enough to drive us there!

The next bar was like a hipster bar that had a live band, which is apparently not normally a thing. I think the band was being bad ironically, but even if they weren't they were not great to listen to--lots of screaming, and the guitar was way quieter than the screaming dude. So we got our rum and cokes and went to the patio so we could play giant Jenga, which is apparently this bar's schtick. You all probably received the snapchats, but apparently giant Jenga is a thing I could get pretty into. It also causes a medium to large size scene when the Jenga tumbles, which is probably a good way to start a conversation and hit on people. I didn't try it out because Zack was cramping my style, but I watched that happen a few times. The rum and cokes were super strong though so Jenga got progressively more challenging after a while.



We eventually decided to head out. I was trying to keep it together, but in retrospect, I was pretty drunk. The thing I had been most excited about for visiting Cincinnati was to eat real, authentic Skyline Chili. I've only ever eaten it out of the can, and still like it, so I figured it's gotta be better fresh! I wouldn't say it's significantly better out of the can, which is both comforting and disappointing. At least now I know I've been pretty much enjoying the real thing for many years. Zack found the noodles to be a little too whelming, but everyone knows my carb game is way stronger than his. Another thing I didn't realize though is that Skyline Chili places stay open super late and know their a good drunk food establishment. I wish we had one here.

Then we went back, slept real late and woke up for the Michigan game. I'm sure Ashley and Christine can give better details and stories about the game, so I'll just highlight something that I think probably got over looked. This is Bobo Beathard and he plays for App State. I was happier Friday when I could pretend his name is pronounced either Bobo or Bob-o Beat-hard and not Bobo Bethird. Either way, I'm glad he has the name he does.

After the game we went to visit the med school. We walked over and Bobby showed us all the stuff he does in the med school. That included a bucket of eyes, a brain, and head cut in half. I don't feel like it freaked me out, but I didn't really need to see any more of it than we did--I did not find it interesting and that is why I'm going to law school and NOT med school, or nurse school. Bobby mentioned he couldn't take us into the cadaver lab because the school cracked down on that and I was pretty much entirely okay with that.

Then we walked around the undergrad campus, saw the absurdly nice gym they have and looked at their pitiful stadiums. There was a high school game going on on the practice field and we were gonna watch it, but then it started to rain. So we did the only reasonable thing and went to a restaurant to eat macaroni and cheese and drink beer.

The only sad news was the had to walk back to Bobby's apartment in the rain. But then we just took showers and got ready to go out to Newport. That was a pretty cool area! The aquarium is out that way, which Reba told me she loves. They also have a place that sells donut grilled cheeses, a gameworks, and one of those restaurants where they say mean things to you and make you wear hats--I know they definitely have the same kind of deal in Boston. It was also apparently Bachelorette Weekend! We saw 5 bachelorette parties and one bride!


We went and ate pizza because Bobby and his friend Buckley were super hungry. Zack and I were not because of all the macaroni. Then we met up with a few more med school friends at a bar near by called Brothers. They all had fun med school stories to share. It's weird that they've all sawed up dead bodies before, but aren't psychos, you know? I mean I guess all doctors have, but for us lay people, it still seems like something crazy only crazy people do. Brothers was the bar where I got a rum and coke for only $3.75! If there were those kind of specials in DC, I think a good 75% of the area would be wasted about 75% of the time.

After that we went to another bar that was kind of like Heidelberg--all German and stuff. You can either order a half liter of beer or a whole liter of beer. No boots though. At first we were just waiting for Bobby's high school friends to show up, and we were looking for a table, which is like the worst part of every bar experience. But then all of a sudden, both things happened at once and we had friends AND a table!

We just sat there talking, listening to an accordion band and occasionally doing the chicken dance. We also had to listen to Hey Sloopy. But to make up for it they played Sweet Caroline and Wagon Wheel, so there was some amount of redemption. It was a great atmosphere and no one was "too cool" to do the chicken dance and this is where we saw the bride in her wedding gown and everything! It was really unpretentious, which I feel like is sometimes hard to find in DC. We went home around 1:30 and slept in late. My tummy was full of beer and that was kind of uncomfortable.

The next morning we got up and hard brunch and looked at all the other people who were struggling, which were numerous. I got something called a "Hot Mess" and Zack got chicken and waffles.

A hot mess. It seems like things that I would put together when I was drunk--potatoes, cheese, egg, gravy.

Chicken and waffles. Looks the same everywhere.

Then we walked around all the suburbs of Cinci. We went to Mariemont, Indian Hills, some bar that had a beach volleyball court, somewhere that had great ice cream with huge chunks of chocolate in it and Bobby's high school. There some nice stuff back there! It was fun to see where Bobby lived and grew up and everything. He was not able to show us the bank where he banks though, which makes the Almont tour much more satisfying.

Then we headed back to Bobby's apartment so he could do his fantasy draft. Mostly I just played my own fantasy game, which is called Kitchen Scramble and I'm addicted to. Both are equally productive.

Then we went to Bobby's parents house, at take out and saw their Michigan basement! I was really happy to see them! They'd only gotten back to Ohio like a half hour before we showed up, so they were a little frazzled, but always nice to see! It was funny because even though we were having take out, we were eating off a formal place setting with multiple knives, spoons and bowls. We were initially planning to go see fireworks, or maybe hit up the casinos, but we ended up just talking with Bobby's parents until midnight! There was a lot of sports talk, but we also talked about law school, where Mrs. Slater had travelled to, and history. It was the kind of super nice family dinner we don't get to have very often living hours away from our parents.

Then we just went home, packed and slept! We had to leave by like 9:30 in the morning on Monday, which was nice because we were back in our apartment by 1:00, but didn't have to wake up crazy early either. Then we did chores and went to the pool since it closed on Monday. The only sad thing is that I've diagnosed myself with a sinus infection. Lots of coughing that sounds gross and lots of nose blowing. Gotta get it together by this weekend so I can eat falafel and watch the Michigan Notre Dame game!

I wanna hear about several things: 1) the Michigan-App State Game 2) the new apartment 3) Teenie's first day as a grad student 4) Taylor's first day at her job 5) Ashely's prep for her new job 6) anything else I might have missed. Get to work!