Remember when Matt and I took our first trip up to Virginia for his interview? It was still technically summertime for the university, and Matt and I noticed a very weird phenomenon: basically everything in this city closes down before 10 p.m. in the summer time.
On that trip, we had gotten back to our hotel room at perhaps 9 or 9:30 p.m., still wired and ready to go do something, and so we decided we should find someplace fun to hang out. Because we are not lame people! We are fun people! (Ha.) So we drove around. For a good half hour or so. And not a single place was still open, except for this burger-hot-dogs-milkshakes-coffee-pastries (??) restaurant called Cookout (which we did not stop at, but Matt is still curious, so I imagine we will go at some point). We were like, how is this town so dead on a weekend night?
And then, because we weren't living here yet, we didn't think about it again.
Admittedly, over the past few months, I haven't been quite so into getting out and seeing new things of my own volition. I'm not entirely sure why. A minor funk, if you will? I've been so bored, and so tired, so I haven't wanted to do much. I didn't feel that "sparkle" that makes me want to do crazy things and tell awesome stories. But I'm getting restless again, and I hope that means the sparkle is on its way back.
So on Friday night, I told Matt we should go do something, and it should not involve eating or staring at screens, because I had done an awful lot of both of those things earlier in the day. And it took us a good half hour to figure out what was even open. It was pouring rain and I wanted to go walking or something, and Matt suggested we go for a walk at the mall, but it turns out the mall was already closed at 9 p.m. He suggested we go get drinks at this Mexican restaurant, but by the time we got there, they were sweeping the floors and the last patrons were leaving.
We did end up going and playing a round of laser tag at the bowling alley. That was still open (and good thing Matt thought of it too, because I didn't know this place existed). And then when we left, there were two cop cars in the parking lot and it looked like they might have been about to arrest someone for drunk driving.
Exciting times in Virginia.
I'm going to have to take some time to think of new things to do, so we don't wind up not having any ideas like this again next time.
What do you like to do for fun on weekend nights? What have you been up to lately?
