Fleet Week

Back in 1996, I was in New York this very week. We didn't actually plan to be there for Fleet Week, specfically. Or, at least, I didn't. I don't think I'd ever heard of Fleet Week before. This, of course, was in the dark days before Sex & The City and other New York centered shows were on in force. Other than Law & Order. That's been on forever. Have they had a Fleet Week episode? They have to have. You can only find so many bodies in Central Park.

Anyway, we were living way up in the middle of nowhere in New England at the time and had been there for about two years. This was in the years of grunge and we looked it: lots of flannel, lots of jeans, hiking boots, thick wooly socks. If we were trying to look really cute, we might order something from J. Crew. But that would be for a really special occasion.

So we go to the city and get ready to go out. My friend, Vicky, lived on Long Island and we stayed with her, her mother and her pet rabbit. Don't ask. Her friends were back from the West Coast for the summer, having spent the last year or so working as extras on Baywatch and 90210. I specifically remember them in the scene when Donna was in the running for Rose Queen and they met at some house for interviews. That's when she saw her mother's picture on the Rose Court from back when she was in college. Donna's mom was always a bitch.

Anyway, so these girls show up in little bare midriff shirts with maribou on the neckline, miniskirts, high heels. We're in our boots and flannel. It wasn't pretty. We were, quite literally, the country mice.

Luckily, they drew in all the sailors, who were then stuck with buying drinks for us, too, if they wanted our company. I don't know that we spent a dime all weekend, other than for our cab ride, where Vicky sat in the front seat and proceeded to ask the cabbie who the wierdest fare was that he'd ever driven around.

How we didn't qualify, I'll never know...