So Saturday night I was out at Bootie with G and a gaggle of straight girls (one of whom works at Apple and demoed the iPhone for me... it's sweet, folks). Bootie is an all-mashup dance club, and it's pretty sweet, but the venue is really the attraction.

DNA lounge is owned and run by Jamie Zawinkski, one of the original programmers of Netscape Navigator (and several notable open-source projects). Jamie made so much money off of Netscape stock options back in the day that he retired and just runs the nightclub for fun -- and I figure that's key, because my favourite club in the world, Popstarz, is also in the same odd situation of being run for the love of the club rather than the money.

So there's a big dance floor, the all-important stage and podiums, a nice balcony, some quiet rooms off to the side... all the right ingredients, and a world away from all the frankly rubbish clubs I've been to in SF so far. And wonder of wonders, it turns out DNA lounge is also the host of Pop Roxx, the NYC version of which I have already been to and enjoyed as a perfectly adequate Popstarz substitute. The clientele at DNA Lounge are also entertaining: despite going to tiny little clubs, everybody is dressed up like they're an extra out of Hackers. This is sort of ridiculous, of course, but it's also one of all-time favourite films, to find myself in the middle of it made me giggle in a happy way.

Around 1am we decided to switch venues and headed over to the Cat Club, which was having a New Order tribute night (allegedly... it seemed to mean 80s indie). It was at this point I realized that my house keys had gone missing from my jacket -- and I say missing, rather than fallen out, since they managed to disappear from a small pocket that was buttoned closed, when nothing else in any of the other pockets did. A panicked dash back to Bootie and the girl who runs the cloak room said they'd been found on the floor of the club -- except they were clean, and the tiny flashlight which was such a pain to get onto the keyring in the first place had been carefully removed. Why would you steal a tiny flashlight? Especially when there was an iPod in the other pocket? Whatever, it was a small price to pay for an excellent night out.

So finally: venue sorted. Yay! Two hours of continuous dancing as usual left my body a happy exhausted wreck the next day, but I can already feel my energy levels returning. Just need to keep up the pop-fueled aerobic exercise, and all will be well.

Now, to re-watch Hackers...