I was quite excited when the Davis Life Magazine publisher suggested I do a story about the bar scene in downtown Davis because contrary to popular belief about foodies/winos, I turn into a pumpkin (yes, a food reference) around 9:30 p.m. I am 32 and quite past the college party scene. I thought it would be a great opportunity to stay up late and see a different side of Davis than I had seen in my 13 months of living in California. I researched and found that there were seven bars in Davis that stayed open after midnight - the definition we arrived at for "after dark." Since there were probably more than seven bars on my block on the Lower East Side, I deemed checking out each of the Davis seven an easy task to accomplish in two evenings.

We (my beau, Michael Sachs, and I) were schooled enough in hitting the bar/club scene from our Manhattan days. I think maybe once or twice in the five years we lived in NYC, we went to see one of our friends DJ at a club at about midnight. But when we did, and here again for this mission, we knew to take a "club nap." Yes, a nap taken from about 4 to 5 p.m. until 9 or 10 p.m., so as to be able to stay out until daylight. We weren't going to go to those extremes, but we wanted to be prepared. It was hard getting up, but we struggled along and, once out on the town, had a grand time exploring Davis after dark.