So, back at the beginning of the month (before the world fell apart, RIP March 2020), my friend Molly and I went adventuring up to Cleveland!
The plan was simple.
Work from 10-3, drive up to Cleveland, go to the art museum, hit a few of the cooler spots, then go down to the Cedar Lee theater to see a fun showing of Amélie, a french film.
It… didn’t work out that way.
Instead of an hour and a half, it took us three hours to get up to Cleveland. Didn’t feel like three hours, but the clock didn’t lie.
About halfway up to said Cleveland, I realized something horrifying.
Everything closed at 5.
Absolutely everything.
Now, we had looked at the times, but we had looked at them for Friday. Why everything in Cleveland closes at five on Saturday, I have no freakin’ idea! But they do.
So, drive up to Cleveland. Okay, we can go to AffoGATO for lunch (it will be open, right?), hope over to the Goodwill (it ought to have some super awesome stuff), and then we skip-dee-do-dad down over to Cedar Lee Theater.
So… uh… yeah.
We got lost in the worst part of Cleveland. Like, there was more trash than there was family help centers and salons and Rally’s. And there were, like, five or six salons on every street. I’m not even exaggerating.
We kept passing these ‘corner shops’. Like, okay. I’m from the country(ish). Our corner shops are dirty little things, full of food with the little stickers on them, but are generally quaint, and a good back-up in case of a zombie apocalypse. However, this corner shops were small, dirty had barred windows, and you couldn’t see inside.
They made me extremely uncomfy.
And just as I went to say that, like halfway through my sentence, we saw a massive billboard that said, “if you’ve been raped, there is help.”
Un
Comf
Y
So, we get out of that part of the world, and end up in a super industrial part of Cleveland. All pot holes and dirty water (there was a huge boat??) and just kinda honestly thought we were going to turn into lizard people from toxic waste.
So, we escape that. It’s 7 o’clock. It’s 30 degrees. Molly and I haven’t eaten since probably eleven or so. We are so ready for AffoGATO. Cute cats (I’ve always wanted to go to a cat cafe) and coffee and food? Yes. Freakin’. Please.
Yes, that’s a little flower *distant sobbing*
So, we climb out of her car after three hours of driving only to find…
They were booked for the day. We couldn’t go in.
So, we lovingly took a picture of darling Sir here.
Okay, now what? Everything’s freaking closed. We’re on the outskirts of a city we’ve never been in before.
Lucky’s Cafe is right down the road? Let’s go get a burger.
We walk in the completely wrong direction and instead run into…
Tandul.
Tandul is the cutest, smallest little fancy Indian place I’ve ever seen. I’ve never had Indian food before!
So, we went in, and had the best time. Tandul was small, but clean. It had lots of Indian decoration and Bollywood playing on the TVs. The entire menu was Indian food. There were no kids meals, no Pepsi or Coke products, no American beer.
It was 100% Indian.
It was the best food I’ve ever had. Butter chicken and cheese naan. AND OMG THE COCONUT ICE CREAM. We had super awesome (and super weird) lentil chips with an apple-butter tasting sauce.
*dreamy sigh*
I talked about it for days.
The people in there were super duper nice and eager to please too. They were so cute, and I was so happy. It was wonderful.
So, we still have an hour or so before the movie. Let’s go… bowling! The bowling alley is open! And five minutes away!
We start driving.
We encountered
Three cop cars
Two people parked in the middle of the road
So many drunk people
Four sketchy buildings (like, the school was in a wild condition)
A construction car
Thirty minutes of trying to find a parking space
A five minute walk through streets super dark in 25 degree weather
Now, I feel the need to rant.
If… if your bar is called HI AND DRY BOWLING AND BEER. And on Google maps you have pictures of bowling. And your website shows bowling.
This is their website!
DON’T YOU THINK YOU WOULD BE ABLE TO BOWL?
Alas, you would be wrong!!!!
We walked in to the most crowded bar I’ve ever seen, without a single part of bowling in sight. I thought it was going to be a bowling alley. It was a bar.
So, we struck out.
We cross the street and look at this super cute clothing store, Banyan Tree. The lady’s super nice, the clothes are soft and cute, the building is warm. I buy a cute shawl.
During this time, two idiots outside of the shop are screaming at two police officers who have their lights on and are yelling back with megaphones.
Ah, yes. Comfort and class, amiright?
Back to the car, as the shop is about to close and we are going to go see the movie now.
On the way back to the car we got called ‘sk*nks’. That was a lovely new experience.
We get to the theater scot-free. There’s minimal confusion about parking. We get into the Cedar Lee theater, get our tickets.
Me: Where do we say ‘bonjour’ for popcorn?
Snack Dude: Here.
Me: *asks for popcorn in French*
Snack Dude: (in the most deadpan, condescending voice) you just had to say bonjour.
There was a French man there who was a little tipsy, so he was being super nice to everyone and talking in both French and English and it was super cute and sweet.
We watch Amélie, which is a top notch film. It’s super cute and lovely. It’s fully in French with English subtitles, which was so cool. There’s a lot of nudity, but it’s always… non-offensive.
Watching it was an amazing lesson in culture and story building.
Also, I’ve been listening to the soundtrack since I was, like, thirteen or something because it helped me sleep, so when the piano part played in the movie I about cried.
It was amazing.
Then we walked out, and I was worried that, for a whole minute, we had been transported to the wrong dimension.
I hadn’t realized that the Rocky Horror Picture Show extravaganza was happening when our movie was done, so walking out into a whole theater of people dressed in corsets and fishnet leggings with tattoos and millions of piercings and black eyeshadow was very interesting.
Like there was a dude absolutely covered in tattoos, with fishnet leggings, a tiny black maid’s dress, and giant black heeled boots.
Wild time.
Then we went home and I slept.
We also almost died, like, four times because of dogs. Yes, we hit a curb looking at a pupper in a car.
We are very bad at adventuring. And, um… that’s all there is to it.
And we think we’re going to Tennessee at some point.
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