Indie mermaid cartoons?

A Mario is always welcome?

A close friend of mine had her birthday on August 30th, and to celebrate she had her birthday at the bar Howl at The Moon in Houston, Tx. Due to that day being International Cosplay Day, it was a costumed birthday party for her. At a bar. The double whammy of Birthday + International Cosplay Day made me dress up as Mario, as seen from a friend’s photo to the left. I chose this, because I still owned most of the costume from a previous time, needing just the hat and gloves that I ended up buying at Party City and 99 cents only store. Turns out a dude there saw me at Howl at The Moon! What a small and drunken world!

When we all arrived, The Birthday Girl™ and her female friends dressed up as the following: Sherlock, another in Kigurumi, one as Daken(Wolverine’s son), and one was dressed from Doctor Who, while the male veteran cosplayers abstained.

Fun was had, and after we found a menu for local pizzeria, Gotham Pizza,  we ended up gathering $6 for them to put the phrase “I’m Batman” on the mirror behind the band, making that my first ever successful crowd funding attempt.

When it came time to turn in the info and money to the band, which was my idea, we ended up getting The Birthday Girl™ to do it, as I knew that if I got close to the stage, my loud(est) costume would garner attention. Cosplay is fun, but I thought the costumes were going to be sillier.

I forgot about the “I’m Batman” idea, and enjoyed the music and conversations until a band member said the following on the mic:

‘There is someone tonight that I’ve noticed in the audience the entire night, and as soon as I play the next couple of notes…”

Awe crap. I knew where this was going.

“… he’s going to immediately know…”

I knew the moment the sentence started!

“Who he is.”

The first three or five seconds from Super Mario Bros. world 1-1 started playing, and I was basically forced into the spotlight in front of the stage. I of course, being a good sport, ran up there to do some Mario poses, such as running and jumping with my fist in the air! Yay, right?

but… I’m Batman!

They then also put on the mirror right after words “I’m Batman” the word I was too chicken to go up there and pay to have up there moments ago. Awesome.

Most of the evening was then dancing with my friends, and being torn away for photos with women who were getting much drunker as the evening went by. Every so often, we would go out to the dance floor, dance to an awesome song or three, and then go back. Then, after a drunk Hispanic gentleman got me to pose with his wife, who he later pretty much kept explaining how beautiful she was, and possibly offering to me(?), I noticed that my friends were all back at the table. I was out there in the wild.

I was dancing with other women who happened to have their birthday that night, and it was a ton of fun. What wasn’t fun was the creepy frat-like dude that kept hanging around and later wanted to wear my hat to have a picture with it on. Apparently there was a dare or a bet or something. It took him forever to realize that I wasn’t cool with him wearing my new hat. kind of a pet peeve of mine, considering what has happened with a Poison Mushroom cosplay years ago.

BTW: It turns out that I can’t dance to latin music. Even ‘The Macarena’ required a refresher course.

Drunk dude’s girl, who it might have been her birthday, came over to us saying how awesome are costumes were, and then she wanted to take a picture with my hat on. Cause she’s got boobs I guess?

Things were over all okay, except for the drunk woman who bought one of The Birthday Girl™‘s 3 reserved tables off of us. She was older, drunker, and falling down. I think it was a younger friends bachelorette party, as there was a woman in raver gear and a light up… penis pacifier necklace… thing? Very mature.

She eventually felt me up, once by accident, a second time on purpose, and almost pulled Sherlock’s Birthday Girl™ wig off, as she discovered that she was, in fact, a girl.

Despite old, drunk, and falling, I had a ton of fun at Birthday Girl™’s party. It’s unfortunate that I can’t find any pictures of us yet, as we were literally dragged half way across the bar to take some photos with us.

Perhaps I should make my Mario costume more elaborate and wear it to a convention? Maybe I should go to Howl at The Moon for my birthday in February, and let Ojy former Birthday Girl™ be Mario instead? I dunno if I’d be okay with someone else being the bell of the ball though….

Oh well, we will see what happens, when it happens.