Madam's Organ, Banjo, and Synthesizer

As DC: A-to-Z celebrated its half-way point, it was only appropriate that we return to the neighborhood where it all started. Adam's Morgan. What a love-it-or-hate-it place. Probably the only area in town where, just like a Jumbo Slice pizza, you can get incredible bang for your buck all in one place. AdMo played a pretty big role in my mid 20s, but I had somehow failed to check out Madam's Organ. I wish I had sooner! It's a three-story bar with so much variety within it's walls and a great rooftop deck to boot. Downstairs has a stage and sizeable viewing area. Middle level has pool table, DJ, and dance floor, and upstairs has the nice rooftop deck. [Side note: Madam's Organ is the only bar in town where transposing the letters in the neighborhood where it's located makes sense. Think about it -- you wouldn't go to a bar called Poodley Wark or CuPont Dircle, would you?].

We started the evening downstairs, dining on fried chicken and okra and taking full advantage of the 2-for-1 happy hour specials that run till 8pm. I got a kick out of the wall decorations. The place was practically a taxidermy store. Half the animals on the wall had antlers or horns (we discussed the difference between the two at length...not sure we ever settled on the real answer), and the artwork appeared to have no thematic purpose. To wit: a painting of the Virgin Mary next to a painting of a nude woman who certainly wasn't a virgin. And a stuffed pheasant hanging above. Soon the entertainment began, as a live bluegrass band took the stage. The band was good and created a suitable background to our southern home cooking, but after we ate we needed something a little more lively for our happy hour purposes.

Luckily, "lively" was just a staircase away. Well, kind of. Unbeknown to us, Wednesday is not just bluegrass night at Madam's Organ, it's also 80s night upstairs. I say "kind of lively" because when we first went upstairs it was painfully obvious the "80" referred just as much to the age of the patrons as it did the era of the music. Yes, there were quite a number of older folks gettin' down upstairs. But that didn't deter us. We joined them for a good ole' fashioned dance party as "DJ London" dropped many an 80s classic. I also had the pleasure of witnessing an older group of bachelorettes grinding to the new Duran Duran hit, "Hungry Like the Cougar." The place filled up some more, and our happy hour crowd of 20 or so folks continued to enjoy the music. My proudest moment of this entire A-to-Z experiment occurred around midnight, as the night was winding down, when I successfully led about a dozen strangers in a conga line, "Safety Dance" style!

A few of us capped of the evening with a trip to, of course, Jumbo Slice -- or as I like to call it "Back Pizza" because the slices are the size of my back. We enjoyed the greasy foldable goodness while a group of youngsters had a pull-up competition on the doorframe. Not to be outdone, one of our A-to-Zers, Andrea G., hopped right up to join the competition. She didn't exactly win, but her attempt gets high marks for courage in the face of breaking a nail.

All in all good night, and I'll definitely be going back to Madam's Organ soon. In closing, I would be remiss without mentioning the tragic/ironic fact that when we first arrived, the bar played Michael Jackson's "Thriller" album, start to finish, before the bluegrass started. Less than 24 hours later, the King was gone. Say what you will about the drama surrounding his life, but you can't deny his prodigious musical talent and impact he had on our culture. My top 5: "The Way You Make Me Feel," "I Want You Back," "Black or White," "Beat It," and "Wanna Be Startin' Something."

All-star of the evening: Andrea G., not just for her feats of strength, but for getting the dance party started early and sustaining it throughout the night.