Madison New Year's Eve 2009: Time zone by time zone across the city

What did you do on New Year's Eve? As a Madisonian that enjoys so much of what this city's various music venues, bars, and restaurants have to offer it was a difficult decision to figure out where to be as the New Year crept across the Atlantic to our landlocked state. Should I go to one of the rock shows at the Frequency or the High Noon? Do I head over to the Majestic and ring in the New Year as I did last year with the always festive Mama Diggdown's Brass Band? Disco funk with V05 at Montmartre? Would I hit the Old Fashioned and try to convince them I was worthy enough to be in the "Big Shot" club and get locked in at 9:30 p.m.? Or do I end up at Mickey's where most of the dane101 contributors were planning on ending up to see the Shabelles provide their pop soundtrack as we welcomed 2009?

I ended up doing what any self-respecting and indecisive Madisonian would do...as much of the above as humanly possible.

The format for the night fell into place fairly easily. I had to be at Brasserie V at 5 p.m. for a date with the ringing in of the Paris New Year, so it made sense for it all to start there. Unfortunately, the general concept of how to ring in the New Year Eve didn't really click until after toasting to my lady who was celebrating midnight on the Champs-Elysées.

The spontaneous plan: We would go on to toast the new year every hour on the hour.

If I were to do it differently next year I would plan out a route that had my companions and me ending up at a bar, restaurant, or venue that corresponded in some way to the time zone celebrating the New Year in that hour. This poor planning led us to celebrating London's New Year's Eve at Pizza Brutta while drinking Capital Winter Skål. It was plenty enjoyable, but under more well thought-out conditions we would have been at Brocach toasting with Guinness.

Below is where we went, what we saw, what I drank, and what we celebrated hour by hour.

5:00 p.m. - Brasserie V to celebrate New Year's Eve in Paris under the glow of the restaurant's Eiffel Tower. We ate fritas and I toasted with Jenlain Noel. They were closed until 5 p.m., but were kind enough to open 10 minutes early so we could have drinks in hand as the clock hit midnight CET. At 5:45 p.m. we turned up our collars to the chilly evening air and walked down the slippery Monroe Street sidewalk to dinner at Pizza Brutta. Alternate NYE 2010 Location: None. This was perfect.

6:00 p.m. - Pizza Brutta to celebrate New Year's Eve in London and Greenwich Mean Time. We ordered Prosciutto Arugula and Oregano pizzas. This was my first meal at Pizza Brutta and I must say I was very pleased. The consistency of the prosciutto was perfect. I look forward to returning on a less rushed night. I toasted with Capital Winter Skål. Alternate NYE 2010 Location: Brocach. Guinness.

7:00/8:00 p.m. - The Old Fashioned to celebrate New Year's Eve in Cape Verde and in the Mid-Atlantic. Yep, the African island nation of Cape Verde gets a time zone all to their lonesome and conveniently helps us bridge the gap before we make the jump across the ocean. My drinks were a Schlitz and a Brandy Cherry Bounce. Two drinks because of two time zones. Alternate NYE 2010 Location: Takara. Sushi. I was a little flummoxed on how exactly one celebrates NYE in Cape Verde or the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Then I realized it would take a little bit of improv. I love sushi and sushi comes from the ocean, so next year this would be a good opportunity to slip in some Japanese cuisine (Japan is 15 hours ahead of us and I can't very well drink a drink every hour on the hour for 15 hours). Alternately, Cape Verde is heavily influenced by Portuguese culture, but I can't think of any Portuguese restaurants downtown.

9:00 p.m. - We tried to go to Genna's, but they were closed. Instead, we found ourselves at the Frequency too early for music but just in time to ring in Brasília's New Year (Brazil has three time zones and until 2008 actually had four). This is where I began miscalculating alcoholic intake and all of my pacing went out the window. I started with an Ale Asylum Ambergeddon and somehow thought it would also be a good idea to throw a PBR on top of it. We caught the first few songs by Cribshitter (video one), but had to leave shortly after they started so we could actually be in the Majestic for the next time zone. The room was starting to fill up as we headed out the door. Alternate NYE 2010 Location: Cabana Room at Samba Brazilian Grill.

10:00 p.m. - We celebrated the Caracas New Year at the Majestic. Caracas obviously is on Venezuelan Time and at the time my cell phone told me that 10 p.m. was midnight in VET. I now think my cell phone was lying to me because Google is telling me that Caracas is actually an hour-and-a-half ahead of us. The Majestic was a lifesaver, though, as they had a nice Mexican food spread the included tamales. Unfortunately, we didn't have a ton of time because we still had to hit the High Noon and then get to Mickey's by midnight because my accomplice on this journey had a midnight kiss waiting there. We skipped drinks, ate, and caught the first song by Baghdad Scuba Review (video two). There was a lengthy line as we headed out into the night and I would find out later that the Majestic nearly hit capacity for the evening. Alternate NYE 2010 Location: I don't know.

11:00 p.m. - Happy New Year to all of my peeps in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. from the High Noon Saloon in Madison. I'm a coastie by birth so skipping the ball drop is always odd for me. When I went to my first Wisconsin NYE house party and realized that there wasn't a Midwestern ball drop equivalent and the drop was simply rerun on TV, I vowed to never go to a NYE house party in the Central Time Zone again. All of my New Years will always be at a venue, because the symbol of the ball has lost all meaning. The nice part about being here and not there is I can spend the top of the EST New Year hour personally text messaging all of my East Coast damage.

We caught Screamin' Cyn Cyn (video three), my partner in crime made a balloon animal for High Noon owner Cathy Dethmers, she called me "a geek" for texting, and we toasted with more Ambergeddon (note: no repeats on NYE!). Shortly after 11 p.m. we hit the bike trail to catch the CST New Year at Mickey's. Alternate 2010 NYE Location: High Noon worked just fine.

Midnight - Mickey's Liquor Bar. For some reason I ended up drinking multiple Huber Bocks to end the night. Someone told me it was beer made by prisoners and I have no idea if that is a true story or not. I also don't remember who told me. I lost my companion at this point as he headed off to a back room to snog. I ended the night dancing to the Shabelles (video four) and the Takebacks. And there was much rejoicing.Alternate 2010 NYE Location: None.