First and foremost my thanks to Aaron (aka 601am), Rob, MAK, a lot of other people for their fond birthday wishes yesterday.

So now onto the fun of the San Gennaro festival! I met up with some of the rugby guys (who promptly bought me a large pina colada) and proceeded to cruise and carouse. We found plenty of young cute guys for Crash to ogle. I pointed out one that had to be about three and claimed that was the perfect guy for him. At least he smiled when I said it. However, for me, it was all about the hot Guidos in their wife beaters selling their wares. Oddly enough (well maybe not so odd) Crash and I have wildly divergent tastes in men but we did agree on two guys that we would have immediately done.

About midway down the long end of the street (we entered at Spring and Mulberry) I needed food and proceeded to buy a sausage and peppers sandwich on the stalest of bread. I ultimately gave up on the bread and just ate the sausage and peppers and opted to go get some zeppoles for my friends to share. For the record, zeppoles are like beignets -- sweet dough deep fried and covered in powdered sugar. But the best part of all was the conversation I had with the drunk woman behind the counter who sounded like she had smoked three packs a day for the last thirty years, had a thick Brooklyn Italian accent, had so much of her roots showing she could have been a skunk, should have been wearing a bra, and had the gap tooth thing going to....

Zeppole Woman: Are you a corrections officer? (Mind you, I'm 6'0, 225, and have a shaved head.)

646Guy: Um no.

ZW: Are you one of those Nassau County police officers?

646Guy: Um no.

ZW: Well what the hell are you?

646Guy: A rugby player?

ZW: Bah! Rugby player. (starts shoving zeppoles in the bag) Are you Irish?

646Guy: Well, Irish, German, Dutch, and...

ZW: I'm Irish, too. (starts shaking the bag after she put in the powdered sugar which sends a cloud of sugar into the air and on me) Oh, I'm sorry honey. Here let me get that (starts rubbing my head). I"m a little drunk.

646Guy: Oh, that's okay.

ZW: And I put three extra in there because you're so cute.

646Guy: Um...okay. Thanks. Have a nice evening.

We then plunged back into the fray and struggled though some of the more crowded areas (of which some people just decided to stop in front of us quite often) but then I saw him and I melted. It was this cop that I likened to porn star (if he can qualify for "star" status) Hank Hightower. You can tell he had the buzzed hair, he definitely had the goatee, the furry chest, and he was sucking on a stogie and I melted. If I could have gone over and propositioned him (maybe I should have been really drunk for that) and gotten away with it (or gotten something out of it) I would have but passing him at least three times (he was working one of those intersections where the festival extended onto a side street) he got hotter and hotter each time.

As we neared the end of the street, Crash commented that for all that festival entailed it was just a simple street fair since nothing really said San Gennaro about it. Of course, at this point, we happened upon the church that houses the shrine to San Gennaro where we bought rosaries (see, Crash, the Hail Mary is on the rosary) and toured through the church. We ultimately made our way back up the street and to the other end of the street fair where we both agreed on one Guido in his wife beater as being totally hot and that I would have to knee cap Crash in order to have him to myself.

I did get my annual henna tattoo at the street fair, this time a dragon instead of a spiral and it looked great when he did it but I didn't let it sit long enough so it's not as dark as last year's creation but it is symbolic of my rugby team so that makes me happy.

So that was my birthday....the countdown to the 30th birthday bash (and it will be a bash -- bring a friend) is on! Start saving for a really nice gift....