His & Her DINKs

HER knows theater a bit. HIS, not so much. But a favorite band of HIS, Type O Negative, once covered ‘Angry Inch’ from Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Soon after that, HIS spent a quiet, drunken evening at home watching the movie version of the musical on IFC. Fast forward a number of years and the Boxcar Theater in San Francisco was putting on their version of the musical about a German that cuts off his cock for his GI boyfriend, only to have it go horribly wrong, resulting in Hedwig being cast aside, only to find love again in the form of a young musician. That is the short version. It is actually pretty good.

The Boxcar Theater’s version has several people, men and women, taking on the role of Hedwig, each representing a different part of the entertainer’s personality. The theater is a little bigger than black box, holding ~100 people, including a mezzanine, but not so big that you can see the show unless you are in the fancy seats. The show was interactive, from a ‘hype-man’ encouraging audience members to promote the show via social media in exchange for shots of Evan Williams (side note: said man would essentially lap dance you while pouring the shot down your gullet; I always imagined my first lap dance would be from a gay dude wearing makeup and a ripped Doors t-shirt), to various actors climbing on tables and engaging the audience members, to handing out Sugar Daddys during a part of the show when they reference, well, Sugar Daddys.

One of the things that turn me off to musicals is the cheesy songs and the price. Hedwig has none of that (ok, maybe a touch). As much as I was disappointed by Rent (spoiler alert: it sucks), my expectations were met with Hedwig music-wise. Goldstar has half-off tickets and we sat in the front row (of two rows) in the Mezzanine for $20 per ticket. That is a fair price. Some tickets are well over $50. That seems silly. Theater is way overpriced. The Goldstar-ing (or Groupon-ing) may be a good thing because couples like us are more willing to drop $20-40 per ticket than we are $75-150. 

At the end of the show, some of the actors were in the lobby collecting donations to help pay the actors. I am sure it is a struggle so giving a few bucks at that time is good because it goes (I assume) directly to the people working their ass for very-little-to-no money. If I had a dollar for every stand-up show I did for no money, I may have quit my day job. Another nice touch is the location just off Sixth St. in SOMA. I had never known the level of fear someone goes through when a lethal injection pumps through their veins when they are sitting on death row in San Quentin. Luckily a ‘sober, illegal camper’ on ‘neighborhood watch’ filled me in on his ‘personal experience’ as we headed back to MUNI. 

You can buy tickets here.

While my music tastes tend to lean towards hard rock and heavy metal, one of my favorite bands is Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, particularly their eponymous debut album, ‘Take Them On, On Your Own’ and ‘The Howl Sessions.’ Moving to SF from Boston, I was a little excited I was going to be in B.R.M.C.’s hometown and hoped they would do cool SF-only shows. Turns out they now live in Los Angeles. Still, they have not forgot about their hometown. 

In April, Robert Levon Been, the band’s bassist/singer, will be playing Slim’s with his father’s band, The Call. I had never heard of The Call nor did I know Been’s old man was a musician. Turns out he was quite the musician. In fact the band’s ‘Let the Day Begin’ was a bit of a hit and was Al Gore’s 2000 campaign them song. B.R.M.C. has now covered the song and it is the lead single from their new album, ‘Specter at the Feast.’

Pretty good, eh? Like any red-blooded American I immediately headed over to Spotify and added The Call’s discography to my library. It was a helluva decision because I am now obsessed with their song, ‘I Don’t Wanna.’ It is powerful. It aches. It is so good. I feel bad that I never heard of The Call before. Seeing Been play with his late father’s band is neat in itself but that said band, namely Michael Been, is so very good makes it a must attend. I know I hope to get there. In fact I may be looking forward to this show more than B.R.M.C.’s show that takes place at The Fillmore the week after The Call at Slims. Now click below and enjoy your new musical obsession.

Taken from our Yelp review of Rogue Moving and Storage:

Friday, 8:45 a.m.
You have an appointment with Rogue Moving for this time. Do you know where they are at? If you guessed loading up the truck because they arrived 20 minutes early ready to work their tail off then you guessed correct.
Three hours later we were moved into our new SF apartment in the Excelsior area. Granted we got lucky with a parking spot directly in front of our apartment and we are the ground floor, but three hours was very impressive. Great guys too.

It has been a while since a post was made here in DINK land and we have a very good excuse. We moved. HIS took a new job in Santa Clara and HER still has her job in San Francisco so we made a dick move and brought our DINK asses to San Bruno thinking it would be a nice mid-point for a respective commutes. One year later, after realizing it did not save HIS a whole lot of time while adding significantly to HER commute, we are now back in San Francisco, this time we now live in the Excelsior neighborhood.

Never heard of Excelsior? Neither did we until we started apartment hunting. It is just outside the Mission and Glen Park neighborhoods. You know all those SIlicon Valley people that live in the city and take buses to work? It is like that, but affordable. A lot more affordable. HER can walk to BART, HIS can drive to work. It is very do-able, though HIS gets up at 6:00 a.m. to get ahead of the peninsula traffic.

Now we could have maintained our online DINK presence but we simply were not that inspired nor did we think a suburban couple with no kids was particularly interesting to the Tumblr community. But San Bruno was not all that bad. Here are some things we rather enjoyed:

• BJ’s Brewhouse Restaurant
• West Coast Cafe
• 8:00 p.m. Friday Happy Hour at Round Robin 
• Amami Sushi
• Fort McKinley
• Celia’s (Beer and a shot for $6)
• BevMo
• Being able to drive to the grocery store
• Having a parking spot
• Lots of bike trails
• Costco
• Our apartment had a little deck

So long San Bruno. We will always have the taco truck around the corner from our apartment and the lines spilling out the door at Chili’s.

Hello Excelsior. We look forward to exploring you, Glen Park, and the Mission. We have already enjoyed John McLaren Park, Glen Park Station, Chenery Park Restaurant, cheap (for SF) rent, and our little outdoor area. Parking has not been bad yet so let’s keep it that way. We are not digging the hills but more hills does mean less homeless people (especially compared to our old Civic Center apartment).

HIS and HER are both sports fans, in particular the Boston Bruins, Boston Red Sox and the New England Patriots, because we are from New England and it is required. And when I say HIS and HER and fans, I mean HIS watches and HER puts up with it, in particular the Bruins. But we both agree that the Bruins have great web videos, in particular those that feature the Bear. The newest video is below and is quite funny, in particular those clips featuring Zdeno Chara (HIS’ favorite) and coach Claude Julien. How many times can I one write ‘in particular’? Does five work for you?

One of the good things about being a DINK rather than a hipster is that you do not need to be pigeon-holed into liking indie music or whatever is trendy; you can listen to whatever you want. And for me, one of those bands is Meshuggah. And they have a new song you can download for free. Click on the image below:

And while you are here, Meshuggah is touring with Baroness who are pretty awesome in their own right. Check them out below:

“Blah blah blah ‘Hunger Games’ blah blah blah.” That sums up many of the conversations in the HIS and HER household as of late. HER was an early reader of the trilogy and encouraged me to read the first book by giving it to me as a Christmas gift. My review in four words “Better than ‘The Passage,’” which was the last book that HER bought for me to read.

This weekend the movie hits the theaters and we plan on checking it out, just not opening weekend because that is for people with energy and us crotchety mid-30’s DINKs do not like a carnival with our movie-watching. If you are a fan of ‘The Running Man’ or ‘The Long Walk’ by Stephen King then I would imagine you would dig ‘Hunger Games.’ Plus Jennifer Lawrence is rather easy on the eyes.

\does quick Google search to make sure Jennifer Lawrence is of age

\she’s 21, we’re cool (if just a tad pervy)

There has been a bit of a lull here in DINK-land and there is a very good reason. For a bit, us DINKs were SINKSs as one half of the couple was out of work. But fear not, the SINKs have once again been upgraded to DINKs and it was time to celebrate. And for that HIS and HER went to Opaque, a restaurant in the Hayes Valley area of San Francisco in which you eat in complete darkness. Really. When you see a report on ‘60 Minutes’ about dining in complete darkness and said restaurant is restaurant is walking distance from your apartment, you go to said restaurant. That is the law.

Upon arrival we are met by a hostess that provides us with a menu and a comfortable seat. Five minutes later we have our meals picked out (it is a three-course price fixe menu) and are being led to our seats by our blind waiter. Really. I can not stress this enough, it is complete darkness. If our waiter turned around and punched me in the face I would never see it coming. (Side note: If I was a blind waiter, I would absolutely punch somebody in the face). 

NOTE: Not our waiter

We literally feel our way to our seats and sit in for an evening of listening in on other people’s conversations, and you better believe my elbows were on the tables. And I can not confirm nor deny that I blew my nose on the cloth napkin. Nobody saw nothing except for the crazy busboy that was probably walking around naked wearing infra-red goggles. That dude is weird. But the conversations were lacking, so no good stories to share other than the two women next to us that bitched about the menu because one was vegan and the other does not eat fish in stereotypical San Francisco entitlement pitch.

The food was solid though you end up eating a bit with your hands. I had salmon with potatoes and carrots and I would end up scooping with my fork and then use my hands to hold the food on the fork as I shoveled it into my gullet. And you bet your ass the ice cream that came with my chocolate cake ended up on my hands. 

A nice surprise was that we got some extra food with our meal; before the meal we had one of those one-bite appetizers that has a fancy name (it was a cucumber with some sort of fish on it) and they also served veggies and dip that you could get all over your fingers.

Overall, it was a fine and unique experience if it a bit on the pricey side. And by bit I mean ‘Holy shit I would never pay these prices unless it was a special occasion and we had a gift certificate from Restaurant.com and a Visa gift card.’ But can you put a price on something so different? Yes, probably. We most likely would not do it again, but we would never discourage anybody from trying it. Enjoy. 

On the walking/biking trail at Land’s End near Ocean Beach in San Francisco:

HIM: “I still have to say the best hike I ever did was the Grand Canyon.”

HER: “Well, yeah.”