First thing I heard on the radio this morning (er, afternoon) was that there were no arrests made in Times Square last night. I guess that's due to the systematic removal of any factor that may have led to arrestable offenses. Between the metal detectors, alcohol ban and plain old chilly weather, nobody who bothered to show up could have gotten rowdy if they wanted to.

But it's moot; I wouldn't go to Times Square unless Dick Clark himself asked me to attend. I was safely tucked away in Brooklyn, enjoying an Eastern-European New Year's. We dined at Café Steinhof, a place I've always meant to hit. The staff was a little on edge because our group had something like 12 people in it. We couldn't all be seated together and then were instructed not to stay longer than 2 hours. Hmm. I start to understand why some fancy restaurants have only one seating a night. Brusque attitude aside, the place is lovely. I had the orechiette (pasta shaped like ears!) and the increasingly-popular Schneider-Weisse (Brooklyn Brewery, the main distributors of imports in our area, must have recently made a deal, cuz SW is showing up all over the place). Paranoia set in when I realized I had forgotten to eat all day, and my recent hangover experience has made me especially sensitive to nausea-inducing situations. So I spent a lot of the evening bitching about all the things that set off hangovers in my body chemistry (sugar, mixing alcohol types, not eating enough). Of course, all the while I am drinking a bunch of different stuff, including an after-dinner espresso with a shot of Slivovitz (I still don't really know what it is, but I like it).

Before we left the restaurant I managed to snag my pantleg on the edge of the table, ripping a nice-sized hole in the knee. My new Century 21 pants! Grrr. We went to Barbès to see the Zagnuts Cirkus Orkesta (guess they're following that Squirrel Nut Zippers method of using candy bar names). They were a Balkan brass band, meaning they play Balkan music. The band members themselves all appeared to be young guys from New York. Also there was a distinct lack of brass, as only one guy played the trumpet. The other guys played sax and clarinet, which I think I prefer. Though I do like to see a true all-brass band, as they are very loud and rousing. There was such a band at that wedding I went to a few weeks ago. But the ZCO still rocked. With the woodwinds, there sound is distinctly klezmeresque, which I can never get enough of. Makes me want to rent Underground again to see the brass band play "Mesecina." That movie kicks ass.

While at the show, I saw a woman I keep seeing around at other shows. She is the spit and image of a woman I knew some 10 years ago in Athens, Ohio. So I finally went up and asked her name. Indeed, 'twas her. She moved here a little while ago and is living in East Williamsburg, making and selling some kind of art dolls. Dolls! And they're selling well, apparently. Who knew?

Just as I was really starting to get into the music (read: I was getting lit), the band took a break and our herd emptied the small back room of the bar to attend a party around the corner. It was a lovely brownstone space to ring in the new year, nice folks, lotsa food, free booze. But there was something terribly wrong. They were playing awful, awful music on the stereo. At first I thought it was kitschy, ironically-chosen music. But when "I Wanna Sex You Up" by Color Me Badd came on, there was no mistaking it. Some songs simply cannot be played for camp value; they are always atrocious. Even Rick Astley has some cachet; CMB does not. Never will.

Some hours later we departed. My escort and I wandered around, looking for a taxi. We tried to go to the car service at 9th & 5th Ave, but it was closed. We walked on, when A realized one of her earrings was missing. This resulted in a lot of backtracking, staring at the sidewalk trying to pick out a relatively small piece of metal. We were not to find it that night. Fate smiled and produced a cab to take us home at long last. All the walking had sobered me quite a bit, but while I was removing my contact lenses, a bottle on the shelf fell and landed in my sink. It cracked the porcelain and left a big hole in the basin. So the grand tally for the night was: one torn pantleg, one lost earring, one cracked sink. Are these harbingers of the new year?

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